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Madrid, dated the 23d of August 1757, gave him instructions to open a negotiation with the Court of Spain, engaging it to join England, and to procure her the repossession of the island of Minorca ; in return for which he was to offer the restoration of Gibraltar. Mr. Pitt at the same time stated, that this measure had been submitted to the King and Cabinet, and approved of. The English Ambassador, in his answer, of the 26th of September 1757, says, he had found in General Wall, at that time Prime Minister of Spain, a great repugnance to make the proposition to the King his master, and that the General did not think it prudent to lay the matter before the Council, least he should be left alone in opinion, and therefore weaken his influence. Sir Benjamin Keene was, at that time, much indisposed, and died soon after, and the affair was never again brought on the carpet.

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125. DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND.

The late Duke of Northumberland told me, that when he took possession of the

property of the Duke of Somerset, his father-in-law, in the county of Northumberland, the annual revenue did not amount to five thousand pounds, because it had been the practice to grant long leases, and receive heavy fines on each renewal. But, in 1774, the Duke of Northumberland received from the same estates 50,000 7. annually, all expences and taxes paid; that is to say, 40,000l. rent of the lands, and the rest from the rental of coal mines. Beside which, his rental in Yorkshire was 5000 l. per ann. ; and his houses in the vicinity of Northumberland-House, and his lands in Middlesex, netted 5000 7. annually. The land he had in Northumberland formed in extent a third of that county; and adding to it the land he possessed in Yorkshire, Cornwall, Devonshire, and Middlesex, his landed property amounted to one hundredth part of England, which is larger than the whole of Rutlandshire.

The annual expenditure of the Duke of Northumberland, including what he allowed his two sons, amounted, in 1775, to 55,000l. including also 7,000l. for the election of

that year. During twenty years, he expended annually 7,000 7. in repairing Alnwick Castle. His table, which however was elegantly served, was his least expence; the butcher, baker, poulterer, and fishmonger, received no more than 1200l. per annum, while his bougies amounted to four hundred pounds, and his wine to more. His whole expence for his table, including that of his domestics, and wine, amounted to 5,000l. per annum; and his stables, domestics' wages, and liveries, to the same sum. His villa of Sion-House cost him 2,000l. per annum for taxes and keeping up; Northumberland-House, the same; Alnwick Castle, 3,000 l.;-and the support of his parliamentary interest, 5,000l. per annum. He had expended more than 200,000l. in buildings.

126.

COUNT DE LALLY-TOLENDAL. Count de Lally-Tolendal was the son of General Lally, who was beheaded in May 1766; his mother was the Countess de Molda, a Flemish lady. He was the fruit of a secret marriage, and the Countess, who continued to bear the name of her first husband, had

brought him up in ignorance of the name of his father. During the whole of the trial of General Lally, she, however, talked without ceasing to the child of the General's innocence, and touched upon every topic that could interest him in his favour. After all, seeing her husband condemned to death, she had recourse to a very singular expedient toexcite in the boy's mind a desire, hereafter, to revenge his death. She confided her secret to a gentleman, her friend, who was persuaded to take the child to see the execution, and to follow her further instructions. During all the preparations for the awful spectacle, he laboured to impress on the boy a sense of the General's innocence, and at the instant when the head was sepa rated from the body, he addressed young Lally thus:-" You have been eager to "know your father: you have, this mo"ment, seen him die by the hands of the "executioner, innocent! Remember, and. ❝ vindicate his memory."

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If it were even admitted that the events of our life were pre-ordained, it would not follow that our prayers are fruitless; for, before the creation of this world, when this system, with all its series of events, was preferred by God to every other which might have been brought into existence, it cannot be doubted, that all other systems were also foreseen by God through all their chain of consequences, and that their respective nature and effects, as well as those of the present system, have concurred to determine the Almighty in his preference thereof. Whence it results, that these very prayers, which now determine God to interfere with his Providence, determined him, at the time of the creation, to decree what his will should afterwards execute or permit.

128. PREMATure Births at seven and eiGHT MONTHS.

It has been deemed surprising, that a

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