WELLINGTONIANA.

New Zealander, Volume 9, Issue 766, 17 August 1853, Page 3

WELLINGTONIANA.

(From the Britannia, April 9.) The Quarterly Review will be read with avidity for the sake of its two admirable articles on the Duke of Wellington, so replete with anecdote, and so life-like in their portraiture of our hero.— In the one, “ Apsley House,” the writer, whilst acting as cicerone of the house and its contents, makes each room alive again with the personal habits of its departed owner, and shows him to us as he lived his daily busy life of unostentatious labour, frugality, and generosity. Each picture of note carries with it its story, and every statue can be made to testify to some trait in the character of its great possessor. For instance, Gurwood’s portrait introduces us to the real editor of the Wellington Despatches :—■ Gurwood wielded the sword better than the pen; but, if he did not succeed as an annotator, he is fully entitled to the credit of a zealous, trustworthy compiler. The thanks of the world for the Duke’s despatches, are mainly due to an elegant and accomplished lady, Mrs. Arbuthnot, the wife of his Grace’s faithful Achates. She first suggested the printing and publishing of these documents, to which the Duke objected for a little ; but he at last took up the idea, and pronounced Col. Gurwood, who happened to be present, as “good as any one else to superintend the operation,” The real editor, however, was the autlior himself ; be read all in proof, and corrected every page, text, and margont, with his own hand. The papers were originally set into type exactly as they had been written, but their illustrious editor, always considerate for others, struck out all the names and every sentence which might give pain, and to such an extent, that matter sufficient for six additional volumes was, it is said, cancelled. The typographical duty was so honourably conducted by Messrs. Clowes, that neither the bead of that vast establishment, nor Mr. Murray wh© published the book, ever posse.-sed, or even saw the proof sheets. One copy alone exists of the entire work, and it consists of the identical sheets marked by the Duke’s revising pen. This, indeed, is a typographical rarity, which future lloxburghes and Dibdins may sigh to possess, and Humes and Hallams to peruse; and when the present generation is passed, when personal considerations cease to operate, and history can fairly claim its rights, these now scaled volumes will raise their author to even a higher pinnacle, by a more complete display of his genius, arid a further revelation of the inadequacy of the means by which ends so great were accomplished. Then, as he remarked himself, “When my papers are read, many statues will have to be taken down.” Take again the dark passages and their contents :

On quitting the first floor, the visitor descends by a back staircase, which a Lord Apsley might compare to a tortuous suit in Chancery, and the Duke to tiie escalier derobo of a sallyport ; it leads to a rabbit warren of dark passages, in which regiments of chests are drawn up, and boxes piled like Pelion on Ossa. The long rows of oaken brass-bound cases of convenient size, and each placed on a moveable stand, are docketed with (he years of their contents. In these, the priva e papers of the Duke are so methodically arranged, that by an index any one can be instantly referred to. This multitudinous array conveys an idea of his vast ami incessant correspondence—the eagerness of aU the world to obtain his advice in difficulties—the boundless mass of sta e secrets confided to his faithful k teping. Here also are the private papers of Geo ’ge IV., to whom the Duke was surviving executor. It makes one shudder to think that the candle of a careless maid might reduce to ashes these precious materials for future historians. The Duke had prepared a fire-proof record room under his garden—but their removal into it was never effected ; and we may add, that no risk they ran was more serious than that occasioned by his Grace’s habit latterly of leading with a light between himself and book or document in his hand. In fact he thus, when dozing, had over and over again set fire to what he held—especially, of course, parliamentary papers. On emerging from this chaos of cases, several low apartments under the Waterloo gallery are found principally and not unaptly appropriated to his presents of China and table decorations.— Among the few pictures in one room, to which a fire would do no great harm, is a full-length fac simile of Charles X. This disagreeable article was dethroned from the dining room by the Duke, to make place for Francis I.; nor did Ins Grace deem it worthy even of a frame. The book cases here are filled with finely-bound copies of volumes printed at the Clarendon Press, Oxford, and sent to their Chancellor, who needed not such soporifics. The last work, which he did not live to read through, was the Blue-Book onslaught on poor Alma Mater perpetrated by unnatural Whiglings. The identical copy of their ponderous production, which might have sapped the health of a younger student, lias been presented to the Bodleian by his son, and w r e trust this farrago of new-fangled projects will long rest among the most undisturbed folios of that venerable receptacle. Of the Mule Box ;

On quitting these caves of Golconda, the scene changes at once into the Spartan simplicity ol the Ironljuke. We pass the threshhold of his privacy, and are admitted, as it were, to a personal interview, and realise his everyday life. The suite of rooms and the contents are left, by the present Duke’s especial direction, in their unchanged state—-a lew articles only having been removed to make a gangway for the'public. One glance at the Secretary’s den will satisfy the most skin-flint economist that his situation was no sinecure. Plain to plainness, the only decorations are some Prussian china, painted with incidents in the Duke’s life, from Dame Raguenean’s at Eton to the opening of Waterloo bridge. Every nook and corner is dedicated to work. Around are heaped oak cases and boxes, books of reference, and all the appliances of pen, ink, and paper. Near the fire are the chair in which the Duke sat when giving instructions, and the table at which, when alone” or much pressed by business, he ate a hurried but hearty dinner. On a smaller table stands an ordinary deal box, which never has had a coat of paint, and is fattened by tlio rudest iron lock and hasp ; yet henceforward this rough bit of carpentry will rank with the gem-studded casket of Darius, in which Alexander deposited his Bible Homer. This article followed the Duke’s fortunes

throughout the peninsula, and was generally called the “ Mule Box," as an especial animal was employed to carry this object of constant solicitude, and which was missing more than once. In this humble husk his most secret papers were kept; on its cover his plans were sketched, and his despatches written. Lastly; the Duke’s own room : . Everything in this workshop is calculated to insure quiet and exclude draughts; the Duke, however hardy out of doors, was chilly, and loved warmth when chained down to the daily desk.— Within easy reach we sea the books he most trequently consulted, chiefly historical; nor is t etc any lack of easy chairs for their student, iha i which a medal is inserted, was made of therein under which lie stood at Waterloo. It was given him by Mr., Children —that gentleman having m 1818 purchased the tree of the fanner rapilio e, who cut it down because plagued by V, . S ls°T S ’ as Shakespeare’s mulberry was dealt with Rev. Goth Gastrell. In another chair, made trom the oak of the Temeraire, Mr. Arhuthnot usua y sat; the Duke’s place was naturally in front oi the lire, where his own habitual chair, with red-tea-ther cushions and moveable desk, stul remains. In it be was wont, when bis work was done, to amuse himself with the paper, and lighterliterature of the day’, of which last, when out of omce, he was a diligent devourer and eviscerator of marrow and meaning—an occasional nap, and may-be a. a blaze, to the contrary notwithstanding. * -Vr •> *

The Duke wrote close to the fire, and formerly seated himself on a stool at the circular-headed old-fashioned mahogany bureau, still here; latterly he stood, and almost on the rug, at an upright desk, where papers and letters remain exactly as he left them. The rnantlepiece is no less characteristic of the man ; on it a chronometer and pendulum clock mark his appreciation of time and punctuality, the soul of business. In fondness for watches, be rivalled Charles V., who amused his “cloister life” bv trying horological experiments with his mechanician, Juanelo; and such the famous Breguet was to Wellington, who delighted not only in'his works but in his conversation. Well knew the veteran porter that M. Breguet was to be let in at any hour. The Duke seldom had less than half-a-dozen watches • going at once ; and when he travelled, stowed away as many more in a portmanteau made to fit his carriage. He was curious about the exact time, which, like Mr. Stirling’s hero, he could never get any two watches to keep, possibly because he wound, or forgot to wind, them up himself. In London, he f relied on an old clock in his hall, which, like that at the Horse Guards, was always right. With all bis partiality for Breguet, his favourite watch was one of old-fashioned English make ; it once belonged to Tippo Saib, and had been the companion of all his own campaigns from Seringapatam onwards. Wc almost fancy he would, have risked giving a battle rather than loose it. Colonel Gurwood used to relate how, when hard pressed during some retrogade movement, the Duke, having occasion to alight, left it on the ground, anl did not miss It until he had ridden three miles, when he went back, amid the wondering defilers, and fortunately found it. A second watch had an odd history. This was ordered of Breguet by Napoleon, who designed it for the fob of his brother Joseph, and as a delicate attention directed a miniature map of Spain to ba wrought in niello on one side, with the imperial and roval arms on the other. Unluckily, just as It was finished, the Duke drove Joseph out ofhis kinglom; and the Emperor, finding the times out”of joint, refused to take it or pay for it. At the peace It was bought from Breguet by Sir E. Paget, and presented to the Duke. He had another, which the same artist made for Junot, the marshal so trounced by hi u in Portugal; this is quite an horological curiosity—of which two only were ever constructed —marking the lunar and weekly movements. Latterly the Duke usually wore monlres de touche , of which he had many, contrived by Breguet, wrh certain studs or knobs, by which he could feel what o’clock it was, without the apparent rudeness of pulling out his watch; accordingly, when he would be merely fumbling in his pocket, he was really finding out how he killed the enemy, Time. The rnantlepiece we have just mentioned served him as a shelf to put away odds and ends ; above it he hung a drawing of Lady Jersey, a profile relievo plaster-cast of Lady Douro, and another of Jenny Lind. Hero, below these, he had stowed away some casts —one of Napoleon, with his eagle look when consul ; others of the Chancellors Brougham and Lyndhurst, with full-bottomed wigs by D’Orsay ; also, to keep these venerable objects company, a Bhuddist idol, in alabaster and taken at Ava, and given him with the kettle drums. This is the only relic the conqueror of Assay possessed of the East, where his star, too, arose—l hat India where he lived so long and did so much, which he remembered so accurately, and on which be wrote to Lord Derby a most vigorous and lucid memorandum, three weeks only before his death, and at a moment when he was pronounced by Manchester oracles to he “ overcome with childish timidity and imbecility of mind and purpose.” The other article on Manvel's “ Wellington,” leads ns back to the scenes of his great battles, and introduces us to MS. notes of numerous conversations made bv an early and intimate friend of the Duke’s, in which the warrior expressed his own opinion of his own actions, and those of his great opponents. We could fill our newspaper with important extracts. We have not room now; before next week every one will have read and reread the Wellingtoniana of the last Quarterly,

ASSAYS. I was indebted for my success at Assaye to a very ordinary exercise of common sense. The Mahratta chiefs whom I was marching to overtake had made a hasty retreat with their infantry and guns, and had got round behind a river on my right, leaving me exposed to an overwhelming force of native cavalry. To get rid of these gentlemen and to get at the others, I had no chance but getting over the river also; but my native guides all assured me that the river was impassable in this paxt; and the superior force of the enemy would not permit me to have it examined. I was rather puzzled ; hut at last I resolved to sec what I could of the river myself, and so, with my most intelligent guides and an escort of (I think) all my cavalry, 1 pushed forward till I could sec with my glass one village on the right or near bank of the river, and another village exactly opposite on the other bank, and I immediately said to myself, that men could not have built two villages so close to one another on opposite sides of a stream, without some daily means ofcommunication either by boats or ford—most probably by the latter. My guides still persisted that there were neither; but on my owu conjecture, or rather reasoning, I took the desperate, as it seemed, resolution of marching for the river, and I was right. I found a passage, crossed my army over, had no more to fear from the enemy’s cloud of cavalry, and my force, small as it was, was just enough to till the space between that r.ver and another stream that fell into it thereabouts and on which Assaye stood, so that both my flanks were secure. And there I fought and won the battle, the bloodiest for the number that I ever saw; and this was all from the common sense of guessing that men did not build villages on opposite sides of a stream without some means of communication between them.