arbitrary power, was banished by ostracism, which, rendered into modern English, would signify that they voted he should be removed from their presence and council for ever. But they had the wit to recall him, and to that action owed the preservation of their state by his future services."

The death of William occurred just in time to prevent the formation of a new whig ministry, principally under the direction of Somers and Sunderland. After the accession of Queen Anne, Lord Somers appears to have nearly altogether withdrawn himself from public life, and to have spent much of his time, at his seat near Cheshunt in Hertfordshire, in the study of history, antiquities, and polite literature. From 1698 to 1703, he sat as president of the Royal society; but he still continued his attendance in the house of peers, where he opposed the bill to prevent occasional nonconformity; and, in 1706, introduced the important statute, 4° Anne, c. 16, entitled, Act for the amendment of the law, and the better advancement of justice.' The project of the union with Scotland again awoke the energies of the ex-minister. In the debates which took place on this subject his lordship bore a conspicuous part, and Burnet declares that he had a chief hand in the arrangement of this important and delicate affair. In the year 1708, our veteran politician came again into place and power, with the whig party, in the character of president of the council; but another change of administration was effected in 1710, when Lord Somers finally bade farewell to public life. Towards the latter end of the queen's reign he had indeed grown very infirm, and his faculties had suffered considerably from a paralytic affection. With a few intervening gleams of recovery, he gradually sunk into a state of mental and bodily imbecility, from which, on the 26th of April, 1716, he was released by death.

Lord Somers was never married. A disappointment in a first attachment is said to have caused him to renounce ever after the idea of marriage; and, if his biographer, Cooksey, may be credited,-to have entertained very loose ideas on the subject of female society. We cannot help thinking, both from the evidence of the general tenor of his lordship's life, as well as from the negative testimony of his bitterest political opponents, that such a charge has been unduly advanced. Addison declares that "his life was in every part of it set off with that graceful modesty and reserve which made his virtues more beautiful, the more they were cast in such agreeable shades. His religion," he adds, "was sincere, not ostentatious; and such as inspired him with an universal benevolence towards all his fellow-subjects, not with bitterness against any part of them." Horace Walpole beautifully says of Lord Somers, "He was one of those divine men, who, like a chapel in a palace, remains unprofaned, while all the rest is tyranny, corruption, and folly. All the traditional accounts of him, the historians of the last age, and its best authors, represent him as the most incorrupt lawyer, and the honestest statesman, as a master orator, a genius of the finest taste, and a patriot of the noblest and most extensive views; as a man who dispensed blessings by his life, and planned them for his posterity." "He was," says Burnet, "very learned in his own profession,

⚫ Own Times, vol. ii. p. 468.
Freeholder of 4th May, 1716.

with a great deal more learning in other professions, in divinity, philosophy, and history. He had a great capacity for business, with an extraordinary temper; for he was fair and gentle, perhaps to a fault, considering his post. So that he had all the patience and softness, as well as the justice and equity, becoming a great magistrate."

Lord Somers was an industrious collector of tracts and manuscripts. Of the latter, his collection filled upwards of sixty volumes in folio, but was unfortunately destroyed by fire in Lincoln's-inn in 1752. Some remains which the fire had spared were published by the earl of Hardwicke in 1778, under the title of State Papers from 1501 to 1726.' 'The Somers' Tracts' are a number of scarce pieces which were published by Cogan, in four sets of four quarto volumes each, from the pamphlets collected by Lord Somers. They were republished a few years since under the superintendance of Sir Walter Scott.

Herbert, Earl of Torrington.

DIED A. D. 1716.

THIS brave officer was the son of Sir Edward Herbert, attorneygeneral to King Charles I. Having attached himself to the naval service, he was appointed lieutenant in the Defiance early in the year 1666, and experiencing a very rapid promotion, was advanced on the 8th of November following to the command of the Pembroke frigate of thirtytwo guns. After much highly honourable service, and a variety of encounters with the enemy, in which he constantly displayed the utmost gallantry, he was on the 5th of November, 1677, appointed captain of the Prince Rupert, and having been ordered to the Mediterranean, was, not long afterwards, honoured with a special commission, constituting him second in command of the force employed on that station under the orders of Sir John Narborough. In April, 1678, he had a desperate encounter with one of the largest corsairs belonging to the Algerines. Her commander was esteemed the ablest and bravest in their navy, and defended himself with the utmost obstinacy to the last extremity. On board the Rupert nearly thirty officers and seamen were killed, and forty wounded, among whom was Captain Herbert himself. On board the corsair two hundred men were killed or disabled ere the piratical colours were struck.

In the month of May, in the ensuing year, on the return of Sir John Narborough to England, the chief command was left with Mr Herbert, who on that occasion was officially called in the London Gazette, Viceadmiral Herbert. The command, however, might be rather said to have devolved, than to have been conferred upon him, and a period of fifteen months elapsed ere he received a special commission appointing him regularly to exercise the functions of naval commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean. During this interval he rendered very considerable service to the city of Tangier, then formidably pressed by the Moors. Admiral Herbert, arriving at a very critical period of the attack, landed a battalion of picked men from the fleet, of which he himself assumed the command as colonel, and obtained no small addition to his honour by his eminent services as a military officer. He afterwards very spiritedly

renewed hostilities against the Algerines-who appeared not to have been sufficiently chastized by the punishment they had already received -and compelled them to sue for peace. No farther necessity existing for the maintenance of so formidable a force in so distant a quarter, Admiral Herbert returned to England, and was not long afterwards created rear-admiral of England. The stream of honour still continued to flow towards him, on the accession of James II. He was appointed master of the robes; and additional honours might, not improbably, have been heaped on him, had not the steadiness of his principles, and the inflexibility of his political integrity, exposed him to the disapprobation of the court. Having firmly opposed the repeal of the testact, a measure which lay nearest the heart of James, that infatuated prince caused him to feel the whole weight of his indignation. Lord Thomas Howard, a strenuous supporter of the wishes of the court, was appointed to succeed him as master of the robes, and he was removed from the honorary station of rear-admiral of England, in order to make room for Sir Roger Strickland.

Herbert-among the first of those who considered the interference of a protestant power necessary, ere the restoration of those rights which James had so violently invaded could be obtained-now repaired to Holland. The States-general, sensible of his worth and value, hesitated not a moment in conferring on him the chief command of their fleet, with the title of lieutenant-general-admiral. Through his exertions and his advice it was that repeated difficulties were overcome, and absurd propositions rejected; and to him all persons attribute the southerly course which the fleet of the states, with William and his army on board, at last held, instead of steering to the northward, which, most probably, would have ended in their destruction.

William appeared ready to do all possible justice to the exertions and services of Mr Herbert. He continued him in the command of the fleet, and, on the 8th of March, 1688-9, nominated him first commissioner for executing the office of lord-high-admiral. In the ensuing month, he was sent admiral of a squadron, which, though it consisted of no more than twelve ships of the line, was ordered to Ireland to oppose that of France under Mons. Chateau Renaud, which amounted to fortyfour sail, no less than twenty-eight of which were of the line. Unappalled by this superiority of force, Mr Herbert shrunk not from the trust, and he fulfilled every object of it with the same intrepidity which induced him to accept it. On the king's arrival at Portsmouth, pecuniary rewards were bestowed on the seamen, and honours on the officers. Admiral Herbert, amidst this general display of royal munificence, was, on the 29th of May, 1689, created a peer of England, by the titles of Baron Herbert of Torbay and Earl of Torrington. An addition being made to the force which the noble admiral had before commanded, by the junction of a squadron under the orders of Admiral Russell, and several Dutch ships which had reached England in the interim, his lordship proceeded to sea early in the month of July, but the enemy, having no further enterprise in view of sufficient importance to render the hazard of a contest necessary, were content to confine themselves within their own ports, and the remainder of the year consequently passed on without encounter.

In the month of January of the ensuing year, the first dawnings of

that ill-fortune and bad treatment he was soon afterwards destined to experience, made their appearance. His past services, his integrity, his constant zeal in the support of every measure for the public good, were forgotten. Some very absurd and ill-founded clamours were raised in the house of commons relative to the quality of the provisions with which several of the ships had been supplied. These acquired in a short time such head, that the earl of Torrington, whose character certainly rendered him as little liable as any man in the kingdom to the suspicion of having connived at any imposition or impropriety practised by contractors or other persons connected with the navy, felt it an imperative duty indignantly to withdraw himself from the abuse of a faction whose contumely he despised. He accordingly resigned his office of first commissioner for executing the functions of lord-highadmiral, but retained that of commander-in-chief of the fleet.

The most indefatigable exertions had been constantly made by France, ever since the commencement of the war, and particularly during the preceding winter, for the augmentation of her marine; but the same degree of activity by no means appeared to prevail in the arsenals of England; so that when the French fleet made its appearance early in the month of June, augmented to the almost incredible extent of seventyfive sail of the line, attended by a proportionable number of frigates and smaller vessels, the combined fleet of England and Holland exceeded not fifty-six sail. Great as the disparity was, his lordship, considering that it would tend more to the advantage of his country for him to put to sea, and at least watch the motions of the enemy, in the hope that fortune might afford him some partial opportunity of attacking them to advantage, quitted his anchorage almost on the instant he heard of the arrival of the hostile fleet; but the magnitude of the trust confided to him caused him to act with extreme caution; and it is far from improbable, that, had he been permitted to follow the dictates of his own opinion, the fleet of Louis XIV., feeling itself incapable of effecting any advantageous service, would have retired, after having enjoyed the short and empty parade of momentarily alarming the English nation. The ill-fortune of Britain decreed it should be otherwise. Certain fallacious, though apparently plausible reasons for risking an action, even against such fearful odds, induced her majesty to send peremptory orders to engage the enemy without further delay. "The noble admiral instantly took every measure in his power to render the event of the expected contest, if not successful, at least as little disastrous as possible. He immediately convened all the flag and principal officers of the fleet, and communicated to them his orders. It was for them, as well as for himself, to obey, and not to remonstrate. On the 30th of June the signal for battle was displayed at the dawn of day, and, as soon as the line was formed, which was not till near eight o'clock, was followed by a second for close action. The line formed by the English fleet was nearly straight, the van and rear extending almost as far as that of their opponents; but there was some distance between the red, or centre squadron, commanded by the earl in person, and the Dutch, who being in the van, contrary to their usual caution, pressed forward rather too rashly to engage the van of the French fleet. There was also a second interval between the rear of the red squadron and the van of the blue, which cautiously and very prudently avoided closing in with the centre,

through the fear of having their own rear completely destroyed. In few words, the whole space between the rear of the Dutch division and the van of the blue squadron was filled up in the best manner circumstances would admit, by the earl of Torrington, and the red separated into three subdivisions, which, by necessarily narrowing the different openings in the line, rendered it less easy for the enemy to break through, or throw it into any material confusion. Opposed to the earl lay the French centre, and, owing to the very superior number of ships which it contained, crowded in the extreme; in so great a degree, indeed, were the ships of the enemy huddled together, that they were compelled, in order to avoid falling on board each other, to form themselves into a kind of semicircle, of such depth, as caused the centre of the French fleet to be considerably distant from that of Earl Torrington and the red squadron. To have approached the enemy under these circumstances, would have betrayed the most unpardonable rashness in the earl's conduct, and have exposed the whole of his fleet to the dreadful disaster of the most unqualified defeat; instead of which, by adopting the system of action which he displayed through the whole unequal encounter, he completely kept at bay, with eighteen or twenty ships, double that number, of which the French centre was composed. But the very measure which so deservedly entitled him to public gratitude and applause, became instantly the parent of invective, ingratitude, and persecution. It was urged by his enemies, and implicitly believed by the ignorant, that he had traitorously and ignominiously hung back from the contest, and had thereby sacrificed the first interests of his country. The trivial damage sustained by the red squadron, in consequence of its peculiar situation during the action, afforded to the clamorous a sufficient proof of the delinquency and cowardice of the earl. To have saved the greater part of his fleet, was madly considered inglorious; and the Dutch, who, so far it must in justice be allowed them, fought with consummate, though ill-timed gallantry, took every possible means to augment the outcry, as some species of palliative to their own loss."

The whole of the loss sustained by the combined fleet on this momentous occasion did not exceed seven ships of the line, six of which belonged to the Dutch, and the seventh, the Ann of seventy guns, to the English. It must be observed, at the same time, that none of these vessels actually fell into the hands of the enemy, but were destroyed in action, or afterwards, in consequence of their disabled state; and the greater part of their crews were happily preserved. When it is considered, in addition to the comparatively trivial loss, that the fleet of the enemy, in consequence of the damages it sustained in the action, was totally incapacitated from undertaking any further offensive operation, though their opponents had been compelled to retire, perhaps it is not unfair to say, that the encounter off Beachy-head, though unattended with the brilliant honours of victory, was productive of many of the most solid advantages which could be expected to have resulted from it. Such, however, was the virulence of his enemies, that the earl's services were from that time lost to his country. He lived ever afterwards retired from public life, and died in a very advanced age, on the 13th day of April, 1716.