sion for excitement, whatever
might be its price, made even the two years of peace so irksome to
him, that he actually adopted a gross and foolish insult to the
British ambassador as the means of compelling us to renew the
conflict. The first result was, the return of Pitt to power; the next,
the total ruin of the French navy at Trafalgar; the next, the bloody
and ruinous war with Russia, expressly for the ruin of England through
the ruin of her commerce; and finally the crash of Waterloo, which
extinguished his diadem and his dominion together--a series of events,
occurring within little more than ten years, of a more stupendous
order than had hitherto affected the fate of any individual, or
influenced the destinies of an European kingdom.

With the ministry of Mr Addington, Lord St Vincent retired from public
life. He was now old, and the hardships of long service had partially
exhausted his original vigour of frame. He retired to his seat,
Rochetts in Essex, and there led the delightful life of a man who had
gained opulence and distinction by pre-eminent services, and whose old
age was surrounded by love, honour, and troops of friends. He appeared
from time to time in the House of Lords, where, however, he spoke but
seldom, but where he always spoke with dignity and effect.

In the month of March 1823, Lord St Vincent was seized with a general
feeling of infirmity which portended his speedy dissolution. He had a
violent and convulsive cough; yet his intellects were strongly turned
upon public events, and he expressed an anxiety to know all that could
be known of events in France, which was then disturbed; of the Spanish
revolution, which then threatened to involve Europe; and even of the
affairs of Greece. In the course of the evening of the 13th, while his
physician and family were round him, his strength suddenly gave way,
and at half past eight he died, at the age of eighty-eight, and was
buried at Stone in Staffordshire. He was succeeded in the peerage by
his nephew, who, however, inherits only the viscounty.

In our general notice of Lord St Vincent's career, we have adverted as
little as possible to the opinions which his biographer had introduced
from his own view of public affairs. We have no wish to make a peevish
return to the writer of a work which has given us both information and
pleasure. But it is necessary to caution Mr Tucker against giving
trite and trifling opinions on subjects of which he eviden