A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith
Letters 1812
Sydney Smith to Francis Jeffrey, [17] June 1812
June, 1812.
My dear Jeffrey,
I feel that I owe you an apology for troubling you so often
about the Review; but I am really
desirous of doing something for it, and, in my search for new books, they turn
up at different times, and compel me to make these different appeals to you.
The subjects I have already mentioned are:—1st. Sir
F. Burdett on
the Law of Imprisonment for Libel; 2nd. The
Statement of the late Negotiations; 3rd. The Duke of Sussex’s speech; 4th (and
now for the first time), Halliday’s ‘Observations on the Present State of the
Portuguese Army;’ in which I propose to include some short
statement of, and observations upon, Lord
Wellington’s campaigns in Portugal. The last undertaking
is the only one to which a fresh answer is required from you.
Horner is, I think, getting better.
There never was a period when the hopes of good Whigs were so cruelly
94 | MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH. | |
disappointed. I dare say Lords Grey and Grenville meant
extremely well, but they have bungled the matter so, as to put themselves in
the wrong, both with the public and with their own troops. The bad faith of the
Court is nothing. If they had suspected that bad faith, they should have put it
to the proof, and made it clear to all the world that the Court did not mean
them well; at present they have made the Court the object of public love and
compassion, made Lord Yarmouth appear like
a virtuous man, given character to the Prince, and restored the dilapidation of kingly power.
I write from Cambridge, and shall be at York on Friday to
dinner. Adieu! and believe me ever your sincere friend,
Sir Francis Burdett, fifth baronet (1770-1844)
Whig MP for Westminster (1807-1837) who was imprisoned on political charges in 1810 and
again in 1820; in the 1830s he voted with the Conservatives.
William Wyndham Grenville, baron Grenville (1759-1834)
Educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, he was a moderate Whig MP, foreign secretary
(1791-1801), and leader and first lord of the treasury in the “All the Talents” ministry
(1806-1807). He was chancellor of Oxford University (1810).
Charles Grey, second earl Grey (1764-1845)
Whig statesman and lover of the Duchess of Devonshire; the second son of the first earl
(d. 1807), he was prime minister (1831-34).
Sir Andrew Halliday (1782-1839)
After studying medicine at Edinburgh he was an army surgeon and physician to the Duke of
Clarence; he published on lunatic asylums and contributed to the
Literary
Gazette and
Gentleman's Magazine.
Francis Horner (1778-1817)
Scottish barrister and frequent contributor to the
Edinburgh
Review; he was a Whig MP and member of the Holland House circle.