Note 226 — Chapter XI

Sir Francis Dashwood’s want of knowledge of finance opened a fine field for the wits of the day, and was of course greatly exaggerated. One of them describes him as “a man to whom a sum of five figures was an impenetrable secret.” His vocation, certainly, was not to the Exchequer; and he was unfortunate in having Mr. Legge for his predecessor. There were other high offices of the Government which he would have filled with credit, for he had respectable talents, was “spirited, frank, and manly,” and had gained the consideration of the House. (Smollet.) He was the only son of Sir Francis Dashwood, Baronet, M.P. for Winchelsea, by Lady Mary Fane, sister of the Earl of Westmoreland, often mentioned in these Memoirs. In his youth he had travelled much, especially in Italy, and passed some time at Rome, where he was long recollected from the following anecdote, which made a great noise at the time. “It was on Good Friday, when each person who attends the service in the Sistine Chapel, as he enters, takes a small scourge from an attendant at the door. The chapel is dimly lighted, and there are three candles which are extinguished by the priest, one by one: at the putting out of the first, the penitents take off one part of their dress; at the next still more; and, in the darkness which follows the extinguishing of the third candle, lay on their own shoulders, with groans and lamentations. Sir Francis Dashwood, thinking this mere stage effect, entered with others, dressed in a large watchman’s coat; demurely took his scourge from the priest, and advanced to the end of the chapel; where, on the darkness ensuing, he drew from beneath his coat an English horsewhip and flogged right and left quite down the chapel and made his escape, the congregation exclaiming ‘Il diavolo! il diavolo!’ and thinking the Evil one was upon them with a vengeance! The consequence of this frolic might have been serious to him, had he not immediately fled the Papal dominions.”—(Private Information.) His political life was by no means discreditable; and, in the unfortunate affair of Admiral Byng, he exhibited kindness of feeling not less than tact and decision, which Walpole has elsewhere handsomely noticed.—Memoirs, ii. p. 145. He had a taste for the arts, and brought sculptors and painters from Italy to decorate his country-seat at West Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire, where he laid out an extensive park with skill and effect, and built a church and mausoleum. His private life was reported to be very licentious. He married the widow of Sir Richard Ellys, Baronet, by whom he had no children, and died in 1781. The peerage, to which his claim is mentioned in a following page, descended to the Stapylton family.—E.