the manufacturers immediately removed, and were soon
followed by the owners of the trading vessels, and
the merchants; and thus basely deprived of those advantages
from which arose their ancient opulence and splendour,
they sank with rapidity into that insignificance and
poverty which have unfortunately remained their inseparable
companions up to the present hour. Among the
princes who have executed the high and honourable office
of Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, we find the names
of the brave and unfortunate Harold, in the time of
the Confessor, and Edward, Prince of Wales, in the
time of Henry III. Henry V., when Prince of Wales,
held this office, which was afterwards filled by Humphry,
Duke of Gloucester. James II., when Duke of York,
was Lord Warden, as was also Prince George of Denmark,
with many other princes of the royal blood. In
celebrated names among the nobility, the catalogue
of Lords Warden is eminently rich. The family
of Fiennes occurs frequently, as does also that of
Montfort. Hugh Bigod; several of the family of
Cobham, as well as the names of Burghersh, De Grey,
Beauchamp, Basset, and De Burgh, are studded over
the calendar, in the early reigns. Edward, Lord
Zouch, and George, Duke of Buckingham, were Lords
Warden in the reign of James I.; since that period
the office has been filled by the Duke of Ormond; the
Earl of Holdernesse, whose attention to the advantages
of the ports was great; Lord North, the late Mr. Pitt,
whose affability and condescension, added to a real
regard for the prosperity of the Cinque Ports, and
an unremitted attention to the duties of the Wardenship,
gained him universal esteem; and lastly, by that honest
and respected stateman, the late Earl of Liverpool.
The mantle of the ports has now fallen on his Grace
the Duke of Wellington, than whose name there does
not exist a greater in the catalogue of Lords Warden.
The public spirit displayed by the Duke, since his
wardenship, cannot be too widely known, nor too highly
applauded,—his grace having paid into the
Treasury, for the public service, the whole amount
of the proceeds of his office, as Lord Warden, thus
furnishing a noble example of magnanimity and disinterestedness.
[6] We believe that measures
are in progress for re-establishing
the
commercial importance of Sandwich, by the restoration
of
the
once celebrated haven. The town, we may add, is
noble in
its
decay; for, among the jurats and burgesses are several
worthy
and opulent retired merchants, who would doubtless
rejoice
in the revival of Sandwich, for the welfare of their
more
aspiring townsmen,—Ed. M.
* * * *
*
DRYBURGH ABBEY.
[The clever stanzas transferred from a late number
of the Literary Gazette to No. 572 of the
Mirror, are from the spirited pen of Mr. Charles
Swain: they are the most poetical and appropriate
of the tributes yet inscribed to the memory of Sir
Walter Scott, although this is but mean praise compared
with their merit. In the Gazette of Saturday
last, the following additions are suggested by two
different correspondents, “though,” as
the editor observes, “they are offered with
great modesty by their authors.”]