"Do you know," said one of the most influential and accomplished noblemen of the country to me, one day at his sumptuous table--"how many of the lords-lieutenant do you think have left a popular recollection behind them?"
I professed my ignorance, but enumerated some names remarkable for intelligence and vigour of administration.
"Oh," said my entertainer, "that was not the question! Great statesmen and showy governors, capital rulers of the country and bold managers of our factions, we have had in sufficient succession, but I speak of the faculty of being remembered; the talent of making a public impression; the power of escaping that national oblivion into which mere official services, let them be of what magnitude they may, inevitably drop when their performer has disappeared. Well, then, I shall tell you. _Two_, and no more."
I begged to know the names of those "discoverers of the grand secret, the philosopher's stone of popularity," the alchemists who had power to fix the floating essence of the Irish mind!
"Chesterfield and Townshend. Chesterfield, regarded as a fop in England, was a daring, steady, and subtle governor of the unruly spirits of Ireland, in one of the most hazardous periods. That the throne of the Brunswicks did not see an Irish revolt at the moment when it saw a Scottish invasion, was the service of Chesterfield. But he ruled not by his wisdom, but by his wit. He broke down faction by _bon-mots_; he extinguished conspiracy by passing compliments; he administered the sternest law with the most polished smile; and cut down rebellion by quotations from La Fontaine, and _calembourgs_ from Scarron. But with these fortunate pleasantries he combined public and solid services. He threw a large portion of the crown lands in the neighbourhood of the capital into a park for the recreation of the citizens, and thus gave one of the earliest and most munificent examples of regard for the health and enjoyment of the people; a more enduring monument of his statesmanship could not have been offered to the gratitude of the country."
Of the Marquis Townshend I had heard as a gallant soldier, and a stirring viceroy, but I still had to learn the source of his popularity.