ILLUSTRATIONS.

VOL. I.
George II.Frontispiece.
Mr. Pelhamp. 378
VOL. II.
Mr. FoxFrontispiece.
Duke of Bedford270
VOL. III.
Mr. Pitt[Frontispiece.]
Duke of Newcastle[182]

MEMOIRS

OF THE REIGN OF

KING GEORGE THE SECOND.

[CHAPTER I.]

Dismissal and Resignation of Ministers—Parliamentary Inquiries into the loss of Minorca—Mr. Pitt’s Power and Popularity—Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Fox—Mr. Pitt’s conduct on the Inquiries—Passing of the Militia Bill—Great success of the King of Prussia—Various Plans for an Administration—Vote for a Million—Bill for regulating the payment of the Wages of Seamen—Duke of Newcastle’s irresolution—Rupture of the negotiation between him and Pitt—His Projects and Difficulties.

April 5th.—Lord Holderness went to Lord Temple to notify to him his dismission. Legge prevailed on Pitt and the rest not to resign, but to be turned out. The Duke of Devonshire had offered Legge to remain; but though he was never tardy at abandoning his friends for a richer prospect, nobody was more steady when it would hurt him to desert. The next night, Mr. Pitt was discarded: and then George Grenville and the others resigned. Charles Townshend alone took time to consider: the income of his place was large, and he did not love Pitt. After an uncertainty of near three weeks, he resigned; but by a letter to the Duke of Devonshire avoided as much as possible to have it thought that he quitted from attachment to Pitt. Resigning with him, and not for him, Townshend thought entitled him to be restored with Pitt, yet would not subject him to the King’s displeasure.

All men were curious to see the new Administration. None was formed. Lord Egremont had consented to accept the Seals of Secretary of State, but soon desired to be excused. He had miscarried with Lord Granville, had not succeeded better by assiduous court to Newcastle, and now attaching himself to Fox, had his hopes soon blasted with this blossom of an Administration. Doddington, who had gone in and out too often to lose any reputation by one more promotion or disgrace, was ready to take anything. Sir George Lee, who could not give up the hopes of being Prime Minister, though never thought of but when he could not be so, prepared to accept the Chancellorship of the Exchequer; and Lord Winchelsea, uniform in detesting the Grenvilles, immediately entered upon his old office, the Admiralty, with a motley board, composed of Boscawen, (one of the last set,) Rowley, (of the foregoing,) Moyston, his own nephew, Lord Carysfort, and young Sandys. Elliot was offered to remain, but refused; and W. Gerard Hamilton was designed for the seventh.

Yet an Admiralty did not make an Administration. No man of abilities or reputation would enlist—even Sir Thomas Robinson refused to take the Seals again. Yet the Duke embarked with satisfaction, telling Mr. Conway, the King could not be in a worse situation than he had been—“Yes, Sir,” said Conway, “but he will, if Mr. Pitt gets the better.” And Fox, to gratify at least some of his views in this revolution, procured a grant for himself and his two sons of the reversion of Doddington’s place of Clerk of the Pells in Ireland. The King had forbidden the Duke, who negotiated this business, to mention the Peerage for Lady Caroline, which he would never grant; but he would give him Doddington’s place for his child—“Say children, Sir,” replied the Duke. “With all my heart,” said the King; “it is the same thing to me.” He cared not how many reversions he granted from his successor. Still it was impossible for Fox himself to accept any ministerial post till the inquiries were at an end; the whole tempest would have been directed at his head.

Indeed many had such intentions: at a meeting of Pitt’s friends and the Tories, it was agreed to push the scrutiny into the military part with great vehemence. Charles Townshend accepted the office of manager: and George, on moving for more papers, made severe remarks on the want of miners at Minorca; which Fox excused, saying, it was hoped that the Minorchese, who had assisted in digging the mines, would have contributed to their defence. To keep miners there on the establishment had been thought too expensive. “Are they more expensive to the Government,” replied Townshend, “than sinecures?” alluding to Fox’s new reversion. Pitt, at the meeting I have mentioned, promised his support, but feared he should not be able to speak five minutes for his cough. He was aware that Newcastle had left too little power to Fox in their joint Administration, for it to be possible with any degree of decency to brand the one, and slide over the errors of the other, with whom Pitt wished to unite. Yet the temper of the nation left him master to take whatever resolution he pleased. The rashness of throwing Government into imminent confusion at such a juncture, struck both the enemies and friends of Fox. His ambition was glaring; his interestedness, not even specious. Pitt had acted during his short reign with a haughty reserve, that, if it had kept off dependents and attachments, at least had left him all the air of patriot privacy; and having luckily from the King’s dislike of him, and from the shortness of the time, been dipped but in few ungracious businesses, he came back to the mob scarce

“—— shorn of his beams.”

The stocks fell; the Common Council voted the Freedom of the City both to Pitt and Legge;[1] Sir John Barnard alone gave a negative. Allen of Bath procured them the same honour from thence; and for some weeks it rained gold boxes: Chester, Worcester, Norwich, Bedford, Salisbury, Yarmouth, Tewkesbury, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Stirling, and other populous and chief towns following the example. Exeter, with singular affectation, sent boxes of heart of oak. On the other hand, a paper was affixed to the gate of St. James’s, with these words, “A Secretary of State much wanted; honesty not necessary; no principles will be treated with.”

Such venom was not likely to bias Newcastle to Mr. Fox. It was the King’s wish that they should unite; and many messages passed; but in vain. It was pretended that the Duke had promised his Majesty never to join Pitt, unless by command. The King said, he would abdicate sooner than give him such command; and complaining bitterly of his ingratitude; imputing to him a refusal made by Lord Duplin to be made Chancellor of the Exchequer; and his leaving his Majesty at the mercy of Mr. Pitt, by not uniting with Fox. His Grace, who scrupled not to wipe out one imputation by deserving another, wrote a penitential letter, and sent it by Munchausen, lamenting his disgrace, after so many years of service, and hoping, when the inquiries should be at an end, that he might again have admission to the closet, where he should be ready to protest and promise whatever his Majesty expected. He had scarcely written this letter, but he laboured anew to obstruct the junction of his friends with Fox. In general, they outran his intentions: Lord Lincoln hated Fox; the little tools feared him. Murray and Hume Campbell and Arundel sincerely wished to bring them together.

The Princess, who looked on any settlement in which Fox was concerned as an establishment of the Duke’s power, frowned on the new revolution; and though Fox made very humble overtures to Leicester House, they were flatly rejected. Pitt grew less and less austere to Newcastle; and now, when this vain man was arrived at the period of detected misgovernment with regard to his country, of ingratitude and disobedience to his master, of caprice, duplicity, and irresolution towards all factions; when under prosecution by Parliament, and frowned on by his sovereign; at this instant were the hopes, the vows of all men addressed to him! The outcast of the Ministry, the scorn of the Court, the jest of the people, was the arbiter of Britain: her King, her patriots, her factions, waited to see into what scale he would fling his influence!

In the meantime, the inquiries began, April 19th. I shall give but a summary account of them: it would be ridiculous to enter into the detail of a pantomime, from which nothing was intended, expected, or produced. The Townshends pretended to be managers against the Ministers: Hume Campbell and Lord Royston acted with spirit and sense for their friends: Ellis was agent for Fox. The latter himself meddled a little, pointing out where inconveniences might arrive to Government from probing intelligence too nicely. The examination began with reading all the papers in order; intelligence, letters, orders, &c. But no kind of check had been held over the offices from whence the materials came. The clerks had been left at liberty to omit, abridge, secrete, what they pleased. No questions were asked, no proofs of authenticity demanded, no witnesses examined; and, for fear of discovering our channels of intelligence, no names were inserted in the extracts. And as the offices had been suffered to curtail at their discretion, so they had had as impartial liberty to send as much useless and perplexing lumber as they could amass. The very dates of the letters filled three and twenty sheets of paper! All this was read over in a hurry, yet was so tiresome, that before half a day was wasted, the House was almost empty. Yet three or four hundred men were supposed to extract a judgment from so crude and slovenly a process!

Pitt, it was expected, would take advantage of illness, and not appear. But he refined on that old finesse; and pretending to wave the care of a broken constitution, when his country demanded his service, and as a pledge of his sincerity in the scrutiny, he came to the discussion in all the studied apparatus of a theatric valetudinarian. The weather was unseasonably warm; yet he was dressed in an old coat and waistcoat of beaver laced with gold: over that, a red surtout, the right arm lined with fur, and appendent with many black ribands, to indicate his inability of drawing it over his right arm, which hung in a crape sling, but which, in the warmth of speaking, he drew out with unlucky activity, and brandished as usual. On his legs were riding stockings. In short, no aspiring Cardinal ever coughed for the Tiara with more specious debility. This mummery was covered over with candour: he acquiesced in every softening term proposed by the advocates of the late criminals: his justice shrunk behind apprehensions of personality: moderation was the sole virtue of a censor. The loss of Minorca he avowed he meant to charge on the whole Government—for the whole Government could not be punished. On the second day, indeed, he trespassed a little upon all these gentle virtues, and threatened to secede, and publish to the world the iniquity of the majority: but recollecting how much more useful to him the majority might be than the world, he recomposed himself, and was content that the majority should be responsible for whatever defects the public might find in the judgment given by the House.

George Townshend proposed several resolutions: the drift of all was to show that the Administration had chosen to believe a threatened invasion on Great Britain, rather than a design on Minorca. These motions were contested, modified, balanced, by appendent questions proposed by the Courtiers. Henley, the Attorney-General, scrupled not in the very outset to propose approbation. Pitt said he should prefer printing the examination, and leaving the public to judge for themselves. Hume Campbell pleaded that such procedure in the House of Commons would be abdicating their share of Government. The Ministerial party endeavoured, though with ostentatious decency, to load the late Admiral; but in general their arguments tended to nothing but to prove that Minorca had been lost by the common course of office. The questions of the Opposition were corrected till all sting was taken out of them; and still others were coupled to them, that made the votes of the House seem a mere set of questions and answers, in which the whole advantage remained to the respondent.

These things passed not without divisions, but as the majority felt itself a majority, it was not modest; it stated roundly in favour of its principals. Yet on the last day of the Committee, the Courtiers moving a resolution, that no greater force could have been sent to the Mediterranean under Mr. Byng, Triumph itself blushed at so palpable a falsehood, and the victorious majority shrunk to 78, many retiring, and many of the more independent sort joining the minority. By this might be seen what Mr. Pitt had in his power, had he exerted himself. The alarm, however, was so great, that a conclusive vote of acquittal, nay, of approbation, which it had been determined should be proposed by Lord Granby and Lord George Cavendish, was dropped with evident marks of dismay; and the late Cabinet, to their great disappointment, were forced to sit down contented, without receiving the thanks of the House of Commons for the loss of Minorca.

The conclusion of the inquiries, however, from which at least it had been supposed a new Administration would arise, facilitated nothing. No approbation given pointed out nobody as deserving power again: nobody being stigmatized, nobody seemed excluded. Pitt had declined triumph, consequently had gained none. A field of negotiation was still open, till three men who knew, hated, and could not trust one another, might settle some such plan of agreement as would still leave those who should unite the hopes and the prospect of betraying or overpowering their new allies.

In the meantime, as if to show how long a great nation can carry on itself without any Government, there were no Ministers, even in the midst of a formidable war, but those baby politicians, the Duke of Devonshire and Lord Holderness: the former with much importance declaring, that he would retain the Treasury but till some new system should be completed: yet he was delighted with the plaything of power, and wished his holidays might be protracted. For the King himself, his very office seemed annihilated. While the three factions were caballing, he had not even an option. Whatever Administration should be settled, he was to receive when presented to him. Lord Mansfield held the Seals of the Exchequer pro tempore; and the House of Commons was so devoid of a Minister, that the office of proposing the Ways and Means devolved on Nugent, one of the Lords of the Treasury.

The House of Lords were employed on the militia. Lord Hardwicke opposed, but would not divide against it. The Duke of Bedford and Lord Temple joined to support it; and it passed at last by 64 to 48.

While this ridiculous scene was acting at home, our foreign affairs wore a more respectable aspect. Count Rantzau, the Danish Minister, mentioned to Lady Yarmouth, on the part of France, a neutrality for Hanover. She discreetly refused to meddle in it. He then, in concert with the Minister of the Empress-Queen, proposed it in form, but the terms[2] were so humiliating, that the King rejected them with dignity and scorn. In truth, as Elector, his situation deserved compassion. At this instant, the French had seized in their own name the county of Bentheim, a purchase his Majesty had made himself: the rest of his territories they pretended to hold for the Empress-Queen. Under this depression, news came of a great victory obtained by the King of Prussia over the Austrians. He had planned his measures with such intelligence, that he previously ventured to send the King word, that he should make four attacks at once on the quarters of the enemy, and expected to find them unprepared. He confirmed his designs by success, carried every attack, possessed himself of their magazines, and when he dispatched the courier, was within thirty miles of Prague, hoping to be master of Bohemia by the 15th of the month, and to be able to detach a body of twenty-five thousand men to support the Duke of Cumberland. The Austrian Generals disagreed; their Foot behaved ill: in general, their troops thought the Prussians irresistible.

The Hero-King, who dared to prophesy, because he left so little to chance, pursued his blow; Marshal Brown retiring to the other side of Prague. The King of Prussia with a strong Army on one side, Marshal Schwerin at the head of another from behind, fell on Brown at once, forced his camp, and took it with all his tents, baggage, and 250 pieces of cannon. Prince Charles, Brown, and Lucchesi, were wounded, and shut up in Prague. The King of Prussia lost little in numbers, exceedingly in one man, Marshal Schwerin, who making his attack before his second line was formed, and seeing his first line repulsed, seized a pair of colours, and fell with them in his hand. The glory of the day, that thus remained indubitably with the King, did not recompense him for the loss of such a servant.

The primate of Ireland, who suspected that he should have little part in the Bedford Administration, had stayed in England to negotiate between Newcastle and Pitt, hoping that if Fox was entirely set aside here, the Duke of Bedford might in pique resign his new empire before he took possession of it; at least, would not be countenanced in any depression of him (the Primate). Lord George Sackville laboured in the same cause; and about the second week in May an interview was brought about between Pitt and Lord Hardwicke—as the latter said, by chance. Pitt insisted that Newcastle should not interfere in the House of Commons, nor with the province of Secretary of State; that is, with neither domestic nor foreign affairs, but should confine himself to the Treasury; yet there too Pitt pretended to place George Grenville as Chancellor of the Exchequer, with Potter and James Grenville. Legge, whom he meant to remove, having conceived insuperable aversion to him since harnessed with himself in the trammels of popularity, he named for the head of the Admiralty, with a Peerage. For Lord Temple he demanded the Garter and some Post in the Cabinet. The terms were lofty; yet considering his interest in the people, and his experience of Newcastle’s engrossing chicanery, he was justifiable in endeavouring to clip the wings of so volatile a constitution.

The death of the Duke of Grafton, who had so often transacted Newcastle’s variations, arrived now to facilitate his re-establishment. The Duke of Devonshire was charmed with the bubbles of the Chamberlain’s office, and in three days accepted the White Stick and Golden Key, leaving the Treasury open. Yet in a week more the treaty between Newcastle and Pitt was broken off. Newcastle had negotiated for support, not for a master. Lord Hardwicke, notwithstanding his predilection for Pitt, owned that Fox was the more practicable: and George Grenville, finding that the coalition was impeded by what was demanded for him, desired to wave the Exchequer. But Pitt, not apt to bend to difficulties, replied to this concession, that it became Mr. Grenville to make it, but he himself should not relax.

During this parley, the King demanded support from the two Houses. Lord Waldegrave moved the Address, and a million was proposed. Lord Temple would have reduced it to 300,000l. Lord Holderness pleaded his Majesty’s noble refusal of a neutrality for Hanover, and the claim he had to assistance. Lord Temple would have restricted the money to English purposes. The Duke of Bedford supported the Motion of the Court, reflected on Pitt’s all-sufficience, and the Address passed without a division. In the other House it occasioned a good Debate, though no division. Nugent expatiated on the King’s merit to Britain: that he had said, “While Europe is in danger, Hanover shall not be safe.”

Pitt dropped several artful sentences, hostile to those that had been or might be Ministers, convertible into excuses for himself, if he should again become a Minister. He said, he should not oppose the gross sum upon any foot but on the gift being offered without an iota of restriction: that indeed he had predicted his own fate when he acted on the restrictive plan: that he would support whoever had contributed to set this Government going again: that everybody was free to speak his sentiments on this measure, for no man could tell who would be Minister, who would be trusted with this million: that if it was to be confined to Great Britain and America, he would consent to give a million: but now this might be dispensed to the troops of Hanover, though we had already given them 200,000l. He had heard of his own all-sufficience; he knew our insufficience. This might be the plan of a few great Lords who did not mind tossing in one or two hundred thousand pounds more: but the people had lost all confidence, seeing how surreptitiously their money was taken and given.

He would not ask a question on the victory, the news of which were arrived that morning—he did not wish to relax, because the King of Prussia was successful. That King, who saw all, did all, knew all, did everything, was everything! If you would deal with such great masses, and not take little things, and think they would make a great one, there might still be hopes—don’t go on subsidizing little Princes here and there, and fancy that all together they will make a King of Prussia. That Prince had never asked a subsidy, at least while he had had any part in the Administration; yet had raised the spirits of everybody, who hoped for a decent end of the war; for they were offensive operations that must bring about a peace. For the King, he said, though his Majesty did not serve so absolutely for nothing as the King of Prussia did, nor were the coffers of Hanover so exhausted but they might stop a gap till next winter, yet their Majesties had gone hand in hand together: but he dreaded the war being transferred to Flanders—he had rather feed it in Germany. If the King’s Hanoverian ministers had been negligent in their preparations, this victory would not repair their remissness: the Duke’s authority must fetch up their negligence.

He hoped the Ministers would not go to market this summer for German Princes, with whom we should find ourselves hampered next winter. Had any illumination broken in upon that poor piddling plan, which carried the approbation of a whole nation along with it? The King of Prussia with 170,000 men was worth giving one or two hundred thousand pounds to—but don’t let a conciliabulum of Ministers, when they happen to dine together, settle another subsidiary plan, at once minute and extravagant. Were he Minister, he would have deprecated this measure, nay, would have said more against it, than he would say in the House of Commons. He added some hints on his own popularity, and on the independence of the country gentlemen who favoured him. Fox took up some of Pitt’s expressions: if a conciliabulum might not decide our measures, he hoped at least one man should not dictate them. With regard to independence, he supposed every man there was independent—but who were these particularly applauded for their independence? Were they those, who, two years ago, lay under the irremissible crime of being Tories? or, who this year had the unknown merit of being so? These and other taunts drew on some warmth. Conway, too, offended Pitt by vindicating the Duke of Devonshire, whom Pitt had seemed to censure as concerned in what he called this surreptitious vote of credit. Lord George Sackville naturally closed with Pitt, when Conway seemed to debate with Fox:—Charles Townshend and Lord Egmont had another squabble; and at last the million was voted. In one of the Debates at this time, Pitt talked much on Ximenes, who, he afterwards owned to Fox, was his favourite character.

Another Bill, brought in by George Grenville on a good-natured principle, called out the passions and feelings of men at this extraordinary crisis. It was the custom in the Navy not to pay punctually the wages of the seamen, but to keep back some part, lest the natural profuseness of that wandering people should disperse them as often as they were masters of a little sum. Grenville proposed more frequent terms of payment. The superiors of that class in the House of Commons, who, according to the nature of mankind, liked that others should endure what they had endured, and who are apt to attribute their own proficience to an education under which they had begun with suffering, had opposed this compassionate reformation; and indeed the profession were but too well founded in the advantages resulting from the established hardships! Fox divided against the Bill, though without speaking; and it was carried in that House by above 60 to 42.

When it came to the Lords, it was warmly opposed by Lord Winchelsea. The Duke of Bedford, too honest to be always biassed by faction, supported it against his friends, as he had the Militia Bill. Lord Denbigh, a man whose parts were better than his character, spoke out in very plain terms: he said, he should be for measures, not men: good measures he would support, whoever proposed them, be his name William, Holles, or even Harry—and observing all the Bishops withdrawn but two, he supposed, he said, they were gone to dinner—he hoped they would not return to vote! The Dukes of Newcastle and Devonshire, Lord Hardwicke, and many others had retired, which gave but too fair a handle for that satire on the Bench. The Bill was rejected by 23 to 18.

The inter-ministerium (if I may be permitted to use a new word on a new occasion; and truly as there never was such a being as the Duke of Newcastle, one may be allowed to describe him, his actions, and their consequences in a novel language,) had now lasted seven weeks. On the last rupture of the treaty with Pitt, his Grace thought he had determined to take the sole burthen of the State upon himself. He even sent his Majesty word that he would be at Kensington on the 24th, and would declare his final resolution—but he put the King off; he had fixed on nothing—and while he prevented any other man from having power, his own idea of being Minister was in a manner answered. Lord Lincoln, Lady Catherine Pelham, and Lord Ashburnham, the private chorus, that had not the less part in the drama for being cyphers, earnestly dissuaded him from coming in again without an union with Leicester House. To advise him to be governed by his fears, was governing him. He reverted to another interview with Pitt at Lord Royston’s, where Lord Hardwicke was present.

Pitt, the more he foresaw incompliance on the Duke’s part, knew how much more grace he should wear (if forced to come to public explanation), by stipulating some advantages to his country, asked if they meant to send abroad any part of the new granted million, as Lord Granville and Fox had declared for doing. Newcastle said, he was not bound by their declarations—“and you, Mr. Pitt, you are not bound against sending any of it, are you?” Pitt replied he was; “and you, my lord, though you are not bound to send any more money abroad, are not you inclined to it?” Newcastle would not explain. Lord Hardwicke proposed to wave this point ad referendum; knowing how easily they should settle the nation’s concerns, if they could agree upon their own. They then passed to the article of Chancellor of the Exchequer. Pitt urged that he had had it before for one of his friends; Newcastle, that it would mark his having no power at the Treasury. Neither would yield. Even on the first Lord of the Admiralty, Newcastle haggled, pretending the King would not be brought to dismiss Lord Winchelsea.

They parted in discontent; though the Duke, in all his messages by the Primate, Lord George Sackville, and others, had promised how reasonable he would be. This was exactly the manner in which he had formerly treated Fox, departing from his own concessions before he had time to ratify them. Lord Hardwicke behaved more uniformly; declared he would not take the Seals again; desired nobody should be displaced for him; if the Presidentship of the Council, or the Privy Seal should be vacant, he would gladly accept either: for Lord Anson he peremptorily insisted on the Treasurership of the Navy. Pitt now found his error; by facilitating Newcastle’s escape from the inquiries, he remained at the mercy of that Duke, not the Duke at his.

May 27th.—The Duke of Newcastle did go to Kensington, and after a long audience, promised to be sole Minister, permitting Fox to be Paymaster, but with no power. Sir Thomas Robinson was to be Secretary of State, Sir George Lee, Chancellor of the Exchequer. Hume Campbell modestly asked the Treasurership of the Navy[3] under this Ministry, in addition to his office of Lord Register—and probably would have had it, or something equivalent: Newcastle’s greatest want now was of men who would take anything to support him. Lord Egmont was much solicited to be of the band; but he, the great opposer of the Duke of Cumberland and Fox, would have stipulated for more power to the latter, and did insist on a Peerage for himself, which would have destroyed his whole utility: it was not in the placid House of Lords that Newcastle expected to be worried. The Duke of Dorset was to be displaced (for Lord George Sackville had been designed for Pitt’s Secretary at War), Lord Gower was to be Master of the Horse, and Lord Hardwicke Privy Seal. The Duke of Newcastle was to retire to Claremont for two or three days, and take a final inspiration from his oracles.