Then, doctor, when I recollect the letter he wrote to Edward Bouverie, in which he said that he could not come down to the ball which Bouverie had invited him to, for that his only corbeau coat was so bad he was ashamed to appear in it, I reflect what a rise he has had in the world. Bouverie said—'You would like to dance with him amazingly, Lady Hester: he is a good fellow.'
"He was at first, doctor, nothing but what hundreds of others are in a country town—a man who danced, and drank hard. His star has done every thing for him; for he is not a great general.[1] He is no tactician, nor has he any of those great qualities that make a Caesar, or a Pompey, or even a Buonaparte. As for the battle of Waterloo, both French and English have told me that it was a lucky battle for him, but nothing more. I don't think he acted well at Paris: nor did the soldiers like him."
- ↑ There is a strong resemblance between Lady Hester's character of the Duke of Wellington and that of Frederick the Great of Prussia: for see what Lord Malmesbury says of the latter, in his Diaries and Correspondence, vol. i., p. 8:— "His fort is not so much his courage, nor what we generally understand by conduct; but it consists in a surprising discernment, in the day of battle, how to gain the most advantageous ground, where to place the proper sort of arms, whether horse or foot, and in the quickest coup d'œil to distinguish the weak part of the enemy.
