HENRY FOX,

LORD HOLLAND,

[SON of Sir Step. Fox, paymaster under Cha. II. was

constituted one of the commissioners of the treasury in 1743, secretary at war 1746, one of the principal secretaries of state 1755, paymaster of the forces 1757, and raised in 1763 to a peerage, by the stile and title of lord Holland, baron of Foxley in the county of Wilts. He died in 17742. His lordship, who was considered as the political rival of the earl of Chatham, left a son who has shone with still greater celebrity, as the parliamentary opponent of the earl's famed descendant, William Pitt.

Some poetic scintillations from lord Holland's pen. have been gathered up by the collectors of fugitive pieces. The following little brilliant appeared in the Annual Register for 1779.

"VERSES BY HENRY FOX, ESQ. AFTERWARD LORD HOLLAND, TO A LADY WITH AN ARTIFICIAL ROSE.

"Fair copy of the fairest flower!

Thy colours equal Nature's power.

• Smollett says he fought surprising battles with the first demagogues of the age; and in shrewdness, policy, and perseverance yielded to none of his contemporaries. Lord Chesterfield adds, that he was a most disagreeable speaker, inelegant in his language, and ungraceful in his elocution; but skilful in discerning the temper of the house, and in knowing when and how to press or to yield. His ambition became subservient to his avarice: and rem, quocunque modo rem, became his maxim. Char. p. 54.

Thou hast the rose's blushing hue,
Art full as pleasing to the view:
Go, then, to Chloe's lovely breast,
Whose sweetness can give all the rest.
But if at first thy artful make
Her hasty judgment should mistake,
And she grow peevish at the cheat;
Urge, 't was an innocent deceit,
And safely too thou mayst aver,
The first I ever us'd to her:

Then bid her mark, that, as to view,

The rose has nothing more than you;
That so, if to the eye alone
Her wondrous beauty she made known:
That if she never will dispense
A trial to some sweeter sense;
Nature no longer we prefer,
Her very picture equals her:
Then whisper softly in her ear,
Say, softly, if the blushing fair
Should to such good advice incline,
How much I wish that trial mine!"]

Sir C. H. Williams says, in a poetical epistle addressed to lord Holland:

"Ambition had no beauty in my eyes,

Verses like mine would hardly make me rise:
'T was your desire, perhaps your flattery too:
My verse, my fame (if any) springs from you;
Your smiles were all my vanity requir'd,
Your nod was all the fame that I desir'd:
All my ambition was to gain your praise,
And all my pleasure you alone to please."

Poet. Register for 1802, p. 270.

ELIZABETH,

DUCHESS OF NORTHUMBERLAND,

[WAS the only daughter of Frances, duchess, and Algernon, duke of Somerset, at whose decease in 1750 her husband, sir Hugh Smithson, succeeded to the dignities of baron Warkworth and earl of Northumberland, and in 1766 was created earl Percy and duke of Northumberland 3. The extensive charities of this lady to the poor, her encouragement of literature and the polite arts, and her generous patronage of every kind of merit, rendered her death a public loss. This loss took place on the 5th of Dec. 17764.

Her grace does not appear to have inherited so rich a mental dowry from her mother as she did a personal property from her father: being only noticed here for the following bouts rimes which were contributed to the Bath Easton vase, and are printed in vol. i. of Poetical Amusements at a Villa near Bath.

• See article of, p. 217.

Debrett's Peerage, vol. i. p. 52.

• The following character of her was written in 1762:
"The crescent shines-NORTHUMBERLAND is near;
Taste, grandeur, order, in her form appear!

Still affable, though of a warrior's race;
Peace in her breast, and plenty in her face."

VOL. IV.

New Found. Hosp. for Wit, vol. i. p. 196.

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