Of  the  capture,  the  trial,  the  death  of  his  adherents,  Horace
Walpole  has  left  the  most  graphic  and  therefore  touching  ac-
count that  has  been  given  ;  whilst  he  calls  a  '  rebellion  on  the
defensive'  a  'despicable  affair.'  Humane,  he  reverted  with
horror  to  the  atrocities  of  General  Hawley,  *  the  Chief  Justice,'
as  he  was  designated,  who  had  a  '  passion  for  frequent  and
sudden  executions.'  When  this  savage  commander  gained  in-
telligence of  a  French  spy  coming  over,  he  displayed  him  at
once  before  the  army  on  a  gallows,  dangling  in  his  muflf  and
boots.  When  one  of  the  surgeons  begged  for  the  body  of  a
deserter  to  dissect,  '  Well,' said  the  wretch,  'but  you  must  let
me  have  the  skeleton  to  hang  up  in  the  guard-room.'  Such  was
the  temper  of  the  times ;  vice,  childishness,  levity  at  court,  bru-
tality in  the  camp,  were  the  order  of  the  day.  Horace,  even
Horace,  worldly  in  all,  indifferent  as  to  good  and  bad,  seems  to
have  been  heart  sick.  His  brother's  matrimonial  infidelity  vexed
him  also  sorely.  Lady  Orford,  *  tired,'  as  he  expresses  it,  of
'  sublunary  affairs,'  was  trying  to  come  to  an  arrangement  with
her  husband,  from  whom  she  had  been  long  separated;  the
price  was  to  be,  he  fancied,  ;^2,ooo  a  year.  Meantime,  during
the  convulsive  state  of  political  affairs,  he  interested  himself


A,  Paper  House,  301

continually  in  the  improvement  of  Strawberry  Hill.  There  was
a  rival  building,  Mr.  Bateman's  Monastery,  at  Old  Windsor,
which  is  said  to  have  had  more  uniformity  of  design  than
Strawberry  Hill.  Horace  used  indeed  to  call  the  house  of
which  he  became  so  proud  a  paper  house ;  the  walls  were  at
first  so  slight,  and  the  roof  so  insecure  in  heavy  rains.  Never-
theless, his  days  were  passed  as  peacefully  there  as  the  prema-
ture infirmities  which  came  upon  him  would  permit

From  the  age  of  twenty-five  his  fingers  were  enlarged  and
deformed  by  chalk-stones,  which  were  discharged  twice  a  year.
