Chapter XX (3)

[218] The Duke of Newcastle, besides having joined Lord Bute against Mr. Pitt at the beginning of the reign, had personally offended the latter, by contriving to have his American pension paid at the Treasury, which subjected it to great deductions.

[219] George Bussy Villiers, only son of William Earl of Jersey.

[220] An interesting account of the debate, and especially of Mr. Pitt’s speech, is given in a note to a letter of Mr. Pitt to Lady Chatham.--Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 363. It agrees generally with the text; indeed, many of the expressions are identical.--E.

[221] Mr. Pitt, however, with less kindness, said, in reply to Conway’s defence (on the ground of defective information) against the charge of having given such tardy notice to the House of the disturbances in America, that “The excuse to be a valid one, must be a just one. This must appear from the papers now before the House.”--(Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 101.)--E.

[222] Sir Francis Dashwood, Lord Despencer.

[223] Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax, First Commissioner of the Treasury under George I.

[224] Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, Lord Treasurer to Queen Anne.

[225] Robert Walpole, Earl of Orford, Prime Minister to George I. and George II.

[226] Sir William Draper, created Knight of the Bath for the conquest of the Manillas.--[The credit he had gained by his conduct there, and at the capture of Fort St. George, he lost by various weaknesses, and especially by his gross flattery of Mr. Pitt and Lord Granby. In 1779 he was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Minorca, and held that office at the time of its capture in 1782, when he exhibited twenty-nine charges against General Murray, his superior in command; the only result of which was, a reprimand to himself. He died at Bath, in 1787. Sir William Draper had been a fellow of King’s College, Cambridge, in whose noble chapel the standards taken at the Manillas are still preserved. See more of him in Wraxall’s Posthumous Memoirs, vol. ii. pp. 186–7. Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 326. Walpole’s Letters to Mann, vol. iii. p. 386.--E.]

[227] Dowdeswell.

[228] These papers are printed in the Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 112.--E.

[229] Mr. Huske was M. P. for Malden. He died in 1773.--E.

[230] Sir John Cust.

[231] It was not strictly a new paper, but a series of occasional letters in the daily papers. Lord Sandwich will again be found a persecutor of the press in 1773; for printers were alternately, as they served his purposes, his tools or his prey.--[Mr. Scott afterwards received from Lord Sandwich the lucrative appointment of chaplain to Greenwich Hospital. He was more respectable in his profession than might have been expected from his having such a patron, and an accomplished scholar. See an anecdote to his honour, in Twiss’s Life of Lord Eldon.--E.]

[232] The club in Albemarle Street, erected by the late Opposition, now Ministers.

[233] To the bar of the House, whither members are ordered when they violate the rules or privileges of Parliament.

[234] Mrs. Burke was a Presbyterian; the belief, however, of her being a Papist was very general.--E.

[235] A lively description of Burke, as a speaker in the House of Commons, is given in Wraxall’s Hist. Mem. v. ii. p. 35.--E.

[236] William Burke was M. P. for Bedwin, in Wiltshire. He shared all his cousin’s fortunes, and lived with him on terms of the most intimate friendship. When the prospects of the Whigs seemed to be hopeless, he went to India; and through the support of Mr. Francis, obtained some lucrative offices. He was a person of considerable accomplishments. He survived Mr. Burke, and died in 1798.--E.

[237] This division was the result of a junction of the friends of the late ministers with the friends of Lord Bute.--(Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 380.)--E.

[238] Eldest son of Lord Bute.

[239] Lord George Sackville was intimate with Wedderburne, who had been counsel for him on his trial.

[240] Sir William Burnaby had been Admiral and Commander-in-Chief on the West India station. He was knighted in 1754, and made a baronet in 1767.--E.

[241] I have not been able to find another report of this important debate.--E.

[242] The fall of the Ministers was so much expected, that it was said, “They were dead, and only lying in state; and that Charles Townshend [who never spoke for them] was one of their mutes.”

[243] Walpole takes no notice of the debate in the House of Lords on the American Resolutions. It took place on the 10th of February, and will be found in the Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 168. The speeches of Lord Camden and Lord Northington are eloquent and interesting.--E.

[244] Prime Minister of Portugal.

[245] Mr. Frederick Vane, M. P. for Durham.--E.

[246] Whatever might be Lord Rockingham’s exultation at having carried a measure on which he considered the safety of the empire to depend, he was so far from being blind to his own precarious position, that a few days after, on the 26th, he made overtures to Mr. Pitt expressing an earnest desire to transfer the Government to him. The letters that passed on this occasion are given in Lord Chatham’s Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 397.--E.

[247] Mr. Fuller, no doubt, was a hearty well-wisher of the repeal. He was a sensible man, and his opinion carried additional weight from the decided and independent tone in which he delivered it; and Almon says, that after his death it was discovered that he had been for many years in the receipt of a pension from the Government of 500_l._ a year, a fact that explains the sudden decline of his zeal mentioned by Burke, Correspondence, ii. 8.--E.

[248] Dr. Hay was a man given up to his pleasures.

[249] Some political writers, opposed to the Rockingham Ministry, have condemned and ridiculed this bill as inconsistent with the principle, and calculated to defeat the object of the repeal of the Stamp Act. Indeed, they have gone so far as to say that it raised an insurmountable barrier to the settlement of these unhappy differences. However unjust the charge may be, the bill proved a fertile experiment to maintain the dignity of the country, and the best defence of the measure is to be found in the state of political parties, which rendered it apparently impossible to obtain the repeal without this concession to the feelings of the King, and to public opinion. The Colonies, also, gave themselves, at that time, little concern about abstract resolutions of right, so long as the same were not carried into practice. The joy with which the Repeal Act was received in America seems to have been unqualified, and some years elapsed before any serious objections were taken against the Declaratory Act. Even in 1775, Burke writing to his Committee at Bristol, observes, that it had not yet become a grievance with the Colonists.--E.

[250] Lord Rockingham gave the place to Mr. Milbank, and was justified in so doing, for the patronage did not belong to the Lord-Lieutenant, who was very indiscreet to have a difference with Lord Rockingham on such a subject.--E.

[251] See pp. 184–187, 202, 203, supra.--E.

[252] Stephen Fox.

[253] Mary, eldest daughter of the Earl of Ossory, by Lady Evelyn Leveson, youngest daughter of John first Earl Gower.

[254] There is no such prohibition in the Navigation Act, but the Act of 6 Geo. III. c. 62, seems to imply the possession of a monopoly of the cotton trade by our West India Islands. No cotton was at that time cultivated in North America. In 1843 our importation of cotton from the United States exceeded 574,000,000 lbs., whilst from our West India Islands it actually did not reach 2,000,000 lbs.--E.

[255] The Duke of Richmond had married Lady Mary Bruce, daughter by her first husband of Lady Ailesbury, Conway’s wife.

[256] Henry Arthur Herbert had married Barbara, niece of the last Marquis of Powis, and had been created Earl of Powis on the accession of the fortune to him and her.

[257] This was the lady celebrated by Pope, who first ambitioned the Crown of Poland, then sought a fortune in the mines of the Asturias, where she met the Comte de Gages. She then was reduced to such extreme poverty, that the young Pretender arriving in Spain, and visiting her, she received him in bed, not having clothes to put on, and he gave her his coat to rise in. She retired to Paris, and was at last harboured in the Temple by the Prince of Conti, where she died not long after the transaction and lawsuit I have mentioned in the text. The Comte de Gages had likewise retired to Paris, and died there a little before Lady Mary Herbert, who lived to August, 1775.

[258] Richard Viscount Howe, an Admiral, Treasurer of the Navy, and a man of most intrepid bravery, as all his brothers were, but not very bright, though shrewd enough when his interest was concerned. [He was personally attached to Pitt, and probably accepted office with his consent. If he paid an undue attention to his own interest it was to very little purpose, for although he was frugal in his habits, and had many opportunities of enriching himself, he died poor.--E.]

[259] He was much connected with the Duke of York, being of the same profession.

[260] Lord Rockingham had reason to complain of Dyson’s conduct, as the King had in some degree answered for the latter when the Government was formed, and in consequence he had been allowed to remain in office. There were others of the Government whose votes reflected blame only on Lord Rockingham himself; for what can be said of his suffering Lord Barrington to become Secretary at War, with the express understanding that he might continue his opposition to the course pursued by the Government on such questions as the American Stamp Act and General Warrants?--(Political Life of Lord Barrington, p. 119.)--E.

[261] Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland.

[262] One was the establishment of a civil government in Canada, a plan for which had lain before the Chancellor for some months, and in which he did nothing [except declaring his entire disapprobation of the plan, and urging that no proposition should be sanctioned by the Cabinet until they had obtained a complete code of the laws of Canada.--1 Adolphus, 226.] It remained unsettled till the year 1774, when the famous bill, called the Quebec Bill, in favour of Popery, was passed, and, agreeably to the supposed author Lord Mansfield’s arbitrary principles, took away decisions by juries.

[263] It appears that Lord Northington’s notification to the King was on the 5th of July.--(Lord Henley’s Life of Northington.) We learn from the same writer that the bad state of Lord Northington’s health, and his frequent disagreements with his colleagues, had for some months made him desirous of an honourable and quiet retreat. There is no doubt, both from his own letters, and the traditions still extant at the bar, that his habits of hard labour and extreme conviviality had by this time undermined his constitution much to the deterioration of his temper, and he perhaps suspected slights that were never intended. Moreover, the scrupulous sense of public duty, the natural reserve and strict propriety of deportment which characterized Lord Rockingham and Mr. Conway were by no means to his taste. He must have felt even less easy with such associates, than his successor Lord Thurlow did in a later day with Mr. Pitt; and, like him, his usual course in the Cabinet was to originate nothing, and to oppose everything. The commercial treaty with Russia, a measure of unquestionable benefit, nearly fell to the ground, owing to his unreasonable and obstinate opposition. He would rarely listen to remonstrances from his colleagues, and was on such cold terms with them as probably justified him in his own mind in breaking up the Cabinet so unceremoniously. He was too fearless to stoop to intrigue, and there was no necessity for it on this occasion. His communications with Mr. Pitt, on the formation of the new Government, are given in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 434.--E.

[264] These words ceased to be true in the year 1783.

[265] That Mr. Pitt’s indisposition was no pretence, is proved by his letters to Lady Chatham. He says on the 15th of July, evidently to calm her anxiety,--“In a word, three hot nights in town rendered a retreat hither [Hampstead] necessary, where I brought yesterday a feverish heat and much bile, and have almost lost it already.” Throughout their correspondence his health is a constant topic, and the extreme delicacy of his nervous system certainly rendered his acceptance of office a most imprudent act.--E.

[266] In a letter of explanation to Lady Chatham, written a fortnight after his interview with Mr. Pitt at Hampstead, Lord Temple admits that his separation from Mr. George Grenville was conditional upon “a public and general union of parties taking place.” This union had long been one of the great objects of Mr. Pitt’s ambition, but was at this time wholly impracticable, as Lord Temple well knew; and taken together with the proposal of Lord Lyttelton for President of the Council, the admission goes far to support Walpole’s statement, that Lord Temple had determined not to take office without his brother. Indeed the connections which Lord Temple had lately formed, and not less than the opinions he had expressed in Parliament, must have rendered his acceptance of Mr. Pitt’s overtures out of the question, unless, to use his own words, he had chosen “to be stuck into the Ministry as a great cypher at the head of the Treasury.”--(Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 468.)--E.

[267] Nevertheless, had their former connection remained unbroken, Lord Temple might have again proved a valuable colleague to Mr. Pitt. The restless spirit and defective temper, that hurried him when in opposition into excesses so prejudicial to his character, had not prevented his identifying himself completely with Mr. Pitt while in office in all great questions of public policy, and though he had no claim to superior merit as a speaker, his knowledge of the world, fixedness of purpose, and close attention to the details of business, had often compensated for the absence of those qualities in Mr. Pitt. Above all, he was really loved and trusted by him, and through Lady Chatham’s intervention, had access to him when it was denied to every one else. Neither of them prospered after their separation, and Lord Temple had the mortification of finding himself alternately neglected, distrusted, and opposed by the associates of his earlier days during the remainder of his life.--E.

[268] I had written _Pitt_ by mistake, and forget now whom Lord Temple pretended to have recommended. Most probably it was the Duke of Bedford.

[269] A pamphlet in defence, or rather in praise, of the part taken by Lord Temple in those negotiations was soon afterwards published, under the title of “An Inquiry into the Conduct of a late Right Honourable Commoner.” It is justly described by Lord Chesterfield as “scurrilous and scandalous, and betraying private conversation.” It is believed to have been written by Mr. Humphry Cotes, but Lord Temple was suspected to have furnished the materials; and it probably is to this discreditable piece of revenge, more than to the other libels in which Lord Temple was concerned, that Lord Rockingham alluded when he noticed some years afterwards the objection of the Whigs to act under his Lordship.--E.

[270] Two letters, from Mr. Townshend to Mr. Pitt, on the offer of the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, are given in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. pp. 456, 464.--E.

[271] Sir Charles Pratt, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas.

[272] He was Lord Chamberlain, and had married the only daughter of the late Duke of Devonshire, niece of Lord John Cavendish.

[273] Lady Henrietta Harley, sole daughter of Edward second Earl of Oxford, and widow of William third Duke of Portland.

[274] They contested the Parliamentary interest of the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland, where their estates lay. More of this rivalship will appear hereafter.

[275] Sir James Lowther had married Lady Mary Stuart, eldest daughter of the Earl of Bute.

[276] Francis Russell, Marquis of Tavistock, only son of John Duke of Bedford.

[277] Richard Vernon, Esq., had married the Countess-dowager of Ossory, youngest daughter of John first Earl Gower.

[278] He continued the leader of the Rockingham party in the House of Commons until his death, which took place at Nice in 1775. He left a family of eleven children, of whom one of his younger sons, the Rev. Dr. Dowdeswell, Canon of Christ Church, and Rector of Stansford Rivers, is the present possessor of his estates, having succeeded General Dowdeswell, an elder brother.--E.

[279] Neither had he neglected his interests whilst he held the Great Seal. He had actually given a great sinecure to a trustee for his three daughters.--E.

[280] Mr. Burke’s well-known tract,--a masterpiece of its kind.--E.

[281] The pamphlet has been noticed in p. 345. An attack on Lord Temple also appeared, most bitter and personal, which was ascribed to Mr. Pitt. A curious extract from it is given in Belsham’s History, vol. i. p. 210.--E.

[282] Brother of the Earl of Hardwicke and Charles Yorke.

[283] The Cabinet Council is composed of the First Lord of the Treasury, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the two Secretaries of State, the Lord President, and the Commander-in-Chief; others are now and then added. Lord Chatham, as first Minister, was now necessarily one.

[284] Admiral Augustus Keppel, brother of Lord Albemarle.

[285] Son of the Comte de Virri, the late Envoy from Turin. Baron de la Perriere, who succeeded to his father’s title, married Miss Speed, an Englishwoman, mentioned in Mr. Gray’s long story, and was afterwards ambassador at Madrid and Paris.

[286] Joseph, second son of the Empress Queen Maria Theresa, and of Francis Duke of Lorrain, and Emperor.

[287] Count Kaunitz did not retire; he preserved his influence with occasional fluctuations during the life of Joseph, and he continued nominal Prime Minister until his own death in 1794.--E.

[288] Hans Stanley, employed to negotiate the late peace.

[289] Sir George Maccartney had travelled with Lord Holland’s eldest son. The Czarina obtained a Polish blue riband for him, which he afterwards laid aside on being made Knight of the Bath, while Secretary in Ireland to Lord Townshend, to whom he was recommended by Lord Bute, whose second daughter, Lady Jane Stuart, he married. [He subsequently filled many other employments, having been in succession Governor of Grenada, Governor of Madras, Ambassador to China, and Governor of the Cape of Good Hope. In 1794–5 he was created Earl Maccartney, and in 1796 an English Peer. He died in 1806. He had the merit of being amiable, disinterested, and well informed. His life has been written by his secretary, Mr. John Barrow, in 2 vols. 4to.--E.]

[290] The letters that passed between Lord Chatham and his colleagues on the proposed Northern Alliance may be seen in the second volume of his Correspondence. The scheme was a noble one, and had probably been contemplated by Mr. Pitt during his former Administration, as it certainly would have been an appropriate termination of his brilliant prosecution of the war. Unhappily, Lord Bute’s diplomacy had altered the feeling of foreign powers towards this country, and the King of Prussia, especially, was thoroughly alienated from British connections--partly from personal resentment, partly from distrust of the strength of the Government. His Majesty received the proposal most ungraciously; and it certainly reflects no credit on Lord Chatham’s discretion, to have engaged in this difficult negotiation so precipitately. He had not even consulted Sir Andrew Mitchell, the minister at Berlin--his personal friend, and the person, above others, best qualified to furnish correct information as to the views of the King of Prussia.--E.

[291] George Brudenel, Earl of Cardigan, had married the second daughter and co-heiress of the last Duke of Montagu, and had taken the name of Montagu.

[292] Sir T. Robinson, Lord Grantham, formerly Secretary of State.

[293] Vide Parl. Hist. p. 251, for an eloquent summary of the arguments against the suspending and dispensing prerogative.--E.

[294] Henry Clinton, Earl of Lincoln, Knight of the Garter, and afterwards Duke of Newcastle.

[295] John, only son of Sir John Shelley, (whom he succeeded in the baronetage,) by Margaret Pelham, his second wife, sister of Thomas Duke of Newcastle.

[296] Sir John Shelley had also a personal claim on Lord Chatham, for, although on confidential terms with Lord Temple, he had not followed that nobleman into opposition. He died in 1783.--E.

[297] George third Lord Edgcumbe, [and first Earl Edgcumbe, distinguished himself on some occasions in the navy, and rose to the rank of Rear-Admiral of the Blue in 1762. Before entering the House of Lords, which he did in 1761, he sat in the Commons for Fowey. At his death, which happened in 1795, he was Admiral of the Blue, Lord-Lieutenant of the County of Cornwall, &c. &c.--E.]

[298] This letter, a very creditable one to Mr. Conway’s feelings and good sense, is printed in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 126.--E.

[299] Francis Seymour Conway, son of Francis Earl of Hertford.

[300] Lord Edgcumbe had great weight in Devonshire and Cornwall.

[301] It was a wise intention in no light. Parties are the preservative of a free Government. The King and Lord Mansfield succeeded, though Lord Chatham did not, in breaking all parties; and what was the consequence? that everybody ran to Court, and voted for whatever the Court desired. Lord Chatham, who forfeited his popularity, and set all parties at defiance, sank into an individual of no importance.

[302] It did avail so much, that Grenville fabricated, during his opposition, the famous bill for trying elections by select Committees, likely to give a sore wound to the influence of the Crown, but which, hoping to return to power, he limited in its duration; but it has since been made permanent.

[303] The Duke of Grafton.

[304] Lord Chatham did not long preserve his power, and Lord Edgcumbe soon came into place again, having first revenged himself on the Earl in this humorous epigram:

Says Gouty[B] to Gawkee,[C] pray what do you mean?
Says Gawkee to Gouty, to mob King and Queen.
Says Gawkee to Gouty, pray what’s your intention?
Says Gouty to Gawkee, to double my pension.

[B] Lord Chatham.

[C] Lord Temple.

[305] By Mr. Richard Bentley, son of Dr. Bentley.

[306] According to Mr. Flood, there was little concert, and not much ability shown by the Government in this debate, except in the speech of Townshend, which was “very artful, conciliatory, able, and eloquent. He stated the matter quite anew, disclaiming the officious expressions used by Beckford.”--(Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 144, note.)--E.

[307] Of these were the two Onslows, the Townshends, and T. Pelham, all connected with and related to the Duke of Newcastle, who, though sedulous in promoting the resignations, could not prevail on his own family to quit, some of them having during their opposition attached themselves particularly to Lord Chatham. A few more were friends of the Duke of Grafton. Yet with these losses, Lord Rockingham’s party remained a very respectable body for numbers and property. The weakness and incorrigible ambition of their chief, the obstinacy of Lord John Cavendish, the want of judgment in Burke, their own too great delicacy, and the abandoned venality of the age, reduced them to be of no consequence, as will appear: but the Duke of Newcastle’s impotent lust of power, Lord Holland’s daring and well-timed profligacy, Lord Chatham’s haughty folly, and Lord Temple’s unprincipled and selfish thirst of greatness, had baffled all opposition, had counterworked Lord Bute’s incapacity and cowardice; and altogether so smoothed the way, that Lord Mansfield’s superior cowardice and superior abilities at last ventured to act and effect almost all the mischief he burnt to execute against the noblest and happiest Constitution in the world.--Sept. 16th, 1774.

[308] A spirited character of Saunders is given in Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 394. His services at Quebec had endeared him to Lord Chatham, and their political connection was renewed upon his Lordship’s retirement from office. A pleasing letter from him is printed in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 231, on his presenting his portrait for the ball-room at Burton Pynsent in 1772. He died three years after, deservedly lamented both in his profession and by the country.--E.

[309] The Duke of Bedford left an interesting account of this negotiation in his private journal. See Cavendish’s debates, vol. i. pp. 591, 596, giving more full details than this book could admit. It confirms the essential parts of Walpole’s narrative, though the reader must draw his own inferences as to the motives of the parties in the transaction.--E.

[310] The King, too, ascribed the Duke’s refusal entirely to the interference of the persons around him.--E.

[311] Thomas Brand, of the Hoo in Hertfordshire, had married Lady Caroline Pierpoint, half aunt of the Duchess of Bedford. Mr. Brand was an old Whig, but had deserted that party in hopes of getting a peerage by the Duke of Bedford’s interest. When the Duke joined the Court after this, he did obtain a promise that Brand should be a Baron on the first creation, but the latter died before that event arrived.

[312] See Walpole’s Letters to Sir Horace Mann, vol. i. p. 320.--E.

[313] Nugent was immediately after created an Irish Peer, by the title of Viscount Clare. [His coarse, clever sayings are frequently recorded in Walpole’s Correspondence. He was the friend and patron of Goldsmith, who dedicated to him the amusing _jeu d’esprit_ the “Haunch of Venison,” and he aspired to be a poet himself, with indifferent success. The Ode to Pulteney, however, contains some spirited lines, and it was therefore pronounced by Gray not to be his. His daughter married in 1775 the first Marquis of Buckingham, to whose interest with Mr. Pitt he owed his elevation to an earldom in 1776. He died in 1788, having survived his son, Colonel Nugent. The present Lord Nugent is his grandson, and has succeeded to his Irish Barony.--E.]

[314] I include Lord Bute’s faction in the standing force of the Crown, and the Scotch in both: but the facility with which the Duke of Bedford had been ready to abandon Grenville, created a new party, or sub-division, that of Grenville and Lord Temple, and their few friends; for though on the failure of the treaty the outside of union was preserved, they evidently remained two distinct factions, as appeared more than once: nor did Lord Temple ever forgive the intended separation, regarding himself and his brother as one, though the Bedfords had frequently told Grenville that they did not look on themselves as connected with Lord Temple, who had opposed them when they were in power.

[315] See an account of this speech in a note to Lord Chatham’s Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 145.--E.

[316] If this supposition be true, it is an extraordinary coincidence that the Duke of Richmond should, eleven years later, have made the speech which unquestionably hastened Lord Chatham’s death.--E.

[317] A Scotch Peer cannot be made an English one by the act of Union; this is evaded sometimes, as in Lord Lorne’s case, by the heir-apparent being created an English Peer. Lord Lorne seemed not to care whom he courted or quitted, so he did but obtain his end. [This disability, which the decision of the House of Lords in 1711 attached to the Scotch Peerage, was removed in 1782, when the point was referred to the Judges, and they delivered an unanimous opinion that the Peers of Scotland are not disabled from receiving, subsequently to the Union, a patent of Peerage of Great Britain.] (Journals of the Lords, 6 June, 1782; Burnet’s Own Times, 586; 1 Peere Williams, 582; Somerville’s Queen Anne, 459.)--E.

[318] The disgraceful practice of nominating Dissenters as Sheriffs, solely with the object of extorting the fines payable on their refusal to act, continued until the spirited resistance of Mr. Evans. The Corporation obtained a judgment against him in the Lord Mayor’s Court, which they expected to be as effectual in his case as it had proved with other contumacious Dissenters; but he appealed to the higher City Courts, and having failed there, carried his plea before the Judge Delegates, who, after a deliberate hearing, decided in his favour. The Corporation then, in turn, appealed to the House of Lords, and the Judges being consulted, Mr. Baron Perrot, the Judge who had distinguished himself by his panegyric on Lord Bute, was the only authority on the Bench that supported the views of the Corporation. The House of Lords accordingly confirmed the sentence of the Delegates. Lord Mansfield’s speech on the occasion, a composition of great ability and eloquence, is reported in the Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 317.--E.

[319] The fact, as I have since learnt from Rigby’s own account, who bragged of it long afterwards, stood thus. He and Wedderburne went to Grenville at Wootton, before the Parliament met, and proposed to him to try to take off two shillings in the pound. Grenville, who not only knew the impossibility of sparing so much, and the mischief the country would suffer, but flattered himself he should soon be Minister again, vehemently opposed the plan; however, as they persisted, he compromised the matter, by making them promise they would confine the reduction to one shilling, for which he not only voted but spoke ably, though so much against his opinion. Perhaps he would have done less hurt, if he had joined in the attempt to reduce it two shillings in the pound, which would have appeared so capital a mischief, that it might possibly have miscarried; and, indeed, supposing a possibility of so much conscientiousness in that or the next Parliament, is paying a compliment to them that may be thought to be overstrained.

[320] Lord Chatham’s letter to the Duke of Grafton of the 23rd of February, in Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 218.--E.

[321] Mr. Dowdeswell shared the prejudice entertained by most country gentlemen against the land-tax, probably as much as the resentment felt by the Rockingham party against Lord Chatham.--E.

[322] Sir Edmund Isham, Bart., M. P. for Northamptonshire. He died in 1772.--E.

[323] Sir Roger Newdigate, Bart., M. P. for the University of Oxford, and the founder of the prize which bears his name. He died in 1806, aged 87.--E.

[324] What was the context, but that Lord Chatham and Grenville were honester men when Ministers than when patriots?

[325] Quotation of Pitt on Grenville in a debate mentioned before.

[326] See Letters to Sir Horace Mann, vol. i. p. 326.--E.

[327] Sir William Maynard, M. P. for Essex, died in 1772.--E.

[328] Colonel Henry St. John, brother of Frederick Viscount Bolingbroke. [Many of his letters are given in the Selwyn Correspondence. They are smart and lively. He lived among the wits of his day, and was liked by them. He died in 1818.--E.]

[329] Charles Sloane Cadogan, only son of Charles Lord Cadogan. I have said he was attached to Grenville; it was because he thought Grenville likely to come into power again; but when deserted by the Bedfords, Cadogan paid his court to Lord Gower. When Lord North became Minister, he became so servile to him, that being out shooting in Norfolk during the Newmarket season, it was a joke with the persons who returned thence to examine the game going to London, and at every inn was a parcel directed by Cadogan to Lord North. [He married a daughter of Walpole’s favourite sister, Lady Maria Churchill, from whom he was afterwards divorced--a circumstance that ought to be weighed against the severity of this note.--E.]

[330] He was made Master of the Mint; and in 1774, when the light guineas were called in and recoined, he was computed to get 30,000_l._ by his profits on the recoinage.

[331] Several letters between Lord Chatham and his colleagues at this time in confirmation of the statement in the text are given in the third volume of the Chatham Correspondence.--E.

[332] See vol. iii. of these Memoirs.--E.

[333] Robert Jones, Esq., M. P. for Huntingdon, died in 1774.--E.

[334] Luke Scrafton, for some years Governor of Bengal. He was the author of “Reflections on the Government of Hindostan, with a short sketch of the History of Bengal, from the year 1739 to 1756; with an Account of the English Affairs to 1758,” 8vo., London, 1762. A second edition was printed in 1770. See an account of his controversy with Mr. Vansittart, in Nichols’s “Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century,” vol. ix. p. 573, and in the Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. xxxiv. p. 55.--E.

[335] This was written in October, 1769.

[336] I am assured by my friend Lieutenant-General Sir Richard Bourke, the editor of Mr. Burke’s Correspondence, that this charge is unfounded, and utterly at variance with the statements of Mr. Burke’s private affairs, to be found in his papers.--E.

[337] Henry Lyttelton, formerly Governor of Carolina, and youngest brother of George Lord Lyttelton.

[338] Francis Russell, only son by Gertrude Leveson, the Duke’s second wife.

[339] They were called, in the satires of the time, _the Bloomsbury Gang_, Bedford House standing in Bloomsbury Square: of these the chief were Earl Gower, Lord Sandwich, and Rigby. Sandwich gloried in his artifices; Rigby was not ashamed of his, but veiled them for better use; Lord Gower had neither feeling, shame, nor remorse. All three were men of parts, and agreeable. Lord Weymouth became an accession, and inferior to none of them in their worse faults; he brought pride into the account, and a less proportion of parts.

[340] Lady Tavistock died in 1768 at Lisbon, where she had been sent for the recovery of her health. Hers was really a case of broken heart. From the hour that her husband’s death was made known to her, she drooped until she sank into what she truly designated “the welcome grave.”--E.

[341] Walpole’s hatred of the Duke and Duchess of Bedford must have been intense, or his sagacity could have scarcely overlooked, that in censuring Junius he condemns himself. Perhaps he is the more blameable of the two. Junius may have believed the Duke to have been a bad man. Walpole has elsewhere described him as having a good heart. He knew the facts urged by Junius in support of the charge of the Duke being an unnatural parent to be untrue; and yet he not only leaves them uncontradicted, but frames his narration so as to facilitate their belief. The Duke’s memory has been repeatedly vindicated from this cruel aspersion, and never with more generous and indignant eloquence than lately by Lord Brougham.--(Political Sketches, vol. iii.) It has always been understood in the quarters likely to be the best informed, that he felt his son’s loss deeply to the last hour of his life. Instead, however, of yielding to his grief, he endeavoured to employ his thoughts on public business, and the natural fervour of his disposition insensibly engaged him in the scenes before him perhaps more deeply than he was aware of. The meeting he attended at the India House must, as appears from the Company’s books, have been that of the 8th of April, which determined the course to be taken by the Company on the Government propositions: a great question, in which he took the liveliest interest. The force of mind he thus displayed is noticed with commendation in a letter written at the time by David Hume, who, from his connection with Conway, is assuredly an impartial witness.--(Hume to M. de Barbantine, Cav. Debates, vol. i. p. 601.) The absurd charge brought by Junius against the Duchess, of making money by Lord Tavistock’s wardrobe, originated in its having been sold for the benefit of his valet and Lady Tavistock’s maid, according to the general practice of that day.--E.

[342] He was brother of the Member for Berkshire, and of Miss Vansittart, favourite of the Princess of Wales, and was lost not long after in a voyage to India, along with Mr. Scrafton, author of an excellent tract on Indian affairs.

[343] He not only risked, but lost it in 1783.

[344] Three Lords of the Bedchamber, the Earls of Coventry, Eglinton, and Buckinghamshire, were also in the minority. (See Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii.) The Duke of Bedford notices the Debate in his Journal as if he had not felt much interest in the matter. (Cavendish’s Debates, vol. i. p. 601.)--E.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained; occurrences of inconsistent hyphenation have not been changed.

Text always spelled “Massachusets” that way.

Text refers to “Count d’Estain” and “Count d’Estaign”; to “Lord Despenser” and “Lord Despencer”; all variations retained here.

Page x (Contents): Chapter XVIII begins on page 389, not page 394.

Page 129: Opening quotation mark has no matching closing mark.

Page 132: “because copied from” was printed that way.

Page 186: Two paragraphs end with commas. This appears to be deliberate, as they lead naturally into the paragraphs that follow them. Paragraphs on other pages occasionally end without periods when leading into what follows.

Page 320: “haughty ought of place” was printed that way.

Page 304: Closing quotation mark has no matching opening mark.

Page 370: “and the King Lord Gower” was printed that way; the entire sentence seems to be improperly formed.

Page 427: “antichamber” was printed that way.

Page 250: “Being pushed too home” was printed that way.