CHAPTER III.
Account of the Negotiations between the Duke of Grafton’s Administration and Lord Rockingham, Mr. Grenville, and the Bedford Party; and their final Failure.
1767.
The negotiation with the Bedfords continuing, Lord Northington thrust himself into it, and prevailed on the King to allow a place to Grenville, provided it was not the Treasury; and Grenville had acquiesced. Lord Temple put off his journey into the country. Alarmed at this, I went to Lord Holland, where finding Mr. Mackenzie, I communicated my suspicions to both, knowing how much Lord Bute would dread such a coalition; but it came to nothing. Lord Gower said there must be great alterations: Grenville would support without a place, but Lord Temple must have a considerable one, (though acquiescing in Grafton’s retaining the Treasury,) and an equal share of power as he had demanded from Lord Chatham. The Duke of Grafton said, he would have nothing to do with such conditions; yet he was exasperated against Lord Chatham, who would neither resign nor come forth, yet was continually sending Dr. Addington privately to the King to assure his Majesty he should be able to appear in a month or two. The King offered the Duke to nominate to all places, if he would remain; but he refused, and said he had sacrificed himself for Lord Chatham, who had given him such a dose that nothing should prevail on him to be minister longer. He was not less enraged at Charles Townshend, with whom he declared he would not sit in Council. He made the same declaration against the Duke of Richmond. This increased Conway’s difficulties. The Rockinghams offended him as deeply, by meditating to place Lord Albemarle, a younger general, at the head of the army. Conway complained too of the King’s acquiescing to re-admit Grenville; he had been told at Court, he said, that he must stay to exclude Grenville; now even to Grenville the door was open. However, the alarm I had given remedied much: Lord Bute came to town, and Mackenzie put off his journey to Scotland. Lord Northington pressing the Bedfords on the King, received so sharp a reprimand, that he left Court, nor would stay to read the King’s speech to the Council, which Conway was obliged to do.
Amidst this confusion the Parliament rose on the 2nd of July, after one of the longest sessions that was almost ever known. The City bestowed its freedom on Charles Townshend for his behaviour on the East India business and the Dividend Bill, for which in truth he had deserved nothing but censure. Somebody, a little more sagacious, inserted in the papers the following epigram:—
The joke of Townshend’s box is little known;
Great judgment in the thing the cits have shown.
This compliment was an expedient clever
To rid them of the like expense for ever.
Of so burlesque a choice th’ example sure
For city-boxes must all longing cure.
The honour’d ostracism at Athens fell
Soon as Hyperbolus had got the shell.
As times show men, the fluctuation and difficulties of those I am describing brought forth some symptoms, though not so fully as it appeared afterwards, of the singular cast of the Duke of Grafton’s mind. Hitherto he had passed for a man of much obstinacy and firmness, of strict honour, devoid of ambition, and though reserved, more diffident than designing. He retained so much of this character, as to justify those who had mistaken the rest. If he precipitated himself into the most sudden and inextricable contradictions, at least he pursued the object of the moment with inflexible ardour. If he abandoned himself to total negligence of business in pursuit of his sports and pleasures, the love of power never quitted him; and when his will was disputed, no man was more imperiously arbitrary. If his designs were not deeply laid, at least they were conducted in profound silence. He rarely pardoned those who did not guess his inclination: it was necessary to guess, so rare was any instance of his unbosoming himself to either friends or confidants. Why his honour had been so highly rated, I can less account; except that he had advertised it, and that obstinate young men are apt to have high notions before they have practised the world and essayed their own virtue.
Mr. Conway telling the Duke that Lord Rockingham desired to treat with his Grace, he commissioned Conway to bring them together. In the mean time Lord Gower reproaching the Duke with negotiating at once with the Bedfords and Rockinghams, as Conway had foreseen, the Duke denied even to Conway the having authorized him to settle a meeting. We were struck with this, and recollected how easily his Grace had been engaged by Lord Chatham to accept the Treasury, after the most vehement protestations against it; and how often and how lightly of late he had refused, and then consented to remain there. Now, on having seen the King at Richmond, his Grace protested against holding the Treasury if Lord Temple was to be associated to equal power.
On the 5th of July the King sent likewise for Conway to Richmond, and showed him all Lord Chatham’s letters.[23] His Majesty had sent for the latter; Lady Chatham wrote to the King that it was impossible for her lord even to write. In the evening the King had offered to go to him. Lord Chatham himself then wrote to decline that honour, pleading his health was worse than ever. His Majesty then asked Conway’s advice. The latter proposed taking Lord Rockingham’s party. The King listened, but asking what the Marquis himself would expect, and Conway replying, the Treasury, the King seemed surprised, protested he had heard no mention of that, and asked, what was then to become of the Duke of Grafton? There seemed some mystery in this behaviour. Either Grafton had kept his eye on the Treasury, or the King had suffered him to allure Lord Rockingham with false hopes. The King and the Duke had misunderstood or deceived each other; which was the more likely, the characters of both will tell. One point, however, was clear, that the King had had the shrewdness to penetrate the Duke’s character earlier than anybody else had, and had found that of all the various ministers he had tried, no man would be more pliant in the closet or give him less trouble. In truth the Duke was the reverse of Grenville; acquiesced in whatever his Majesty proposed, and ever was as ready to leave the room as the King was desirous he should. He was just the minister whose facility and indolence suited the views of the King, the Princess, and the Favourite.
His Majesty next commissioned Conway to treat with Lord Rockingham, with no restrictions but that the Duke of Grafton and the Chancellor should be retained in the Administration, though the Treasury should be ceded to Rockingham. Whether the King forgot having allowed this last condition to be offered, or hoped to evade it, the following negotiations made it plain that he had never intended to fulfil it, if he could form any system without being reduced to that necessity. Two reasons combined to rivet in his Majesty an aversion to having Lord Rockingham for his First Minister; the one general and permanent, the other temporary: the Marquis and his party had and did persist in the exclusion of Lord Bute and his connection. If possessed of power at the eve of a new Parliament, he would be able to influence the elections to the exclusion of that connection. The King was not desirous of giving himself a minister who would thus be master both of him and the Parliament.
Mr. Conway having sent for the Duke of Richmond back to London, I was desired to meet him on the subject. I was averse, as having no opinion of the abilities of that party; yet yielded, as it was thought I had most weight of any man with that Duke; but though I loved and esteemed him, I knew how much he was swayed by the intemperate and inconsiderate folly of the Cavendishes; and I accordingly declared that, should the negotiation succeed, I would have nothing farther to do with that set. When Mr. Conway had opened the proposal to the Duke, the first difficulty that started was on Lord Camden. The Duke said, they would not put a negative on him, but he would be the King’s man. I asked if they expected that every man should depend on King Rockingham, and nobody on King George? “But,” said the Duke, “he will be Lord Bute’s man, as Lord Northington had been.” I said, “If Lord Bute desires to make another breach, will he ever want a tool?” “Oh! but they must have a permanency.” “I know none,” I said, “but holding the Government for life by patent.” The Duke said, a junction with the Bedfords would secure it. “How,” said I, “my lord, will their coming under you make them less impatient to be above you? But have they in their negotiation stipulated anything for your friends? Ask them; if they cannot say they did, it will be proof they did not. You have insisted on Mr. Conway’s resigning: here he is, on the point of doing so; and now you do not know what to do with him. Will you refuse the Government now when it is offered, and yet continue to oppose and impede it?” The Duke said, he had not opposed everything last session more than Mr. Conway. “No!” said Conway, eagerly and with warmth; “what does your Grace think of the land-tax?” In short, we could come to no agreement. Conway was much hurt, yet persisted in his intention of resigning, though his brother and I painted to him his obligations to the Duke of Grafton, and the unreasonableness of those who claimed his promise, though they knew not to what end; and who adhered to their resolution of proposing to the Bedfords to join them, though Conway declared against that junction, and though they had no reason to expect the King would admit them on these terms.
As we had not been able to settle even preliminaries, the King again pressed the Duke of Grafton to undertake the whole, and remain at the head of the Treasury, promising him his fullest support. The Duke replied, with vehemence, that if his Majesty proposed his being minister, he would take his horse, ride out of England, and never return. This peremptory, and, as the King thought, invincible repugnance, suggested a new plan to his Majesty, at which Mr. Conway and I were more disturbed than at all the other difficulties. It was to make Lord Hertford minister, who, we knew, was too fond of his interest, to be proper for that post. Fortunately Lord Hertford, sensible of his own unfitness, started, and said it was impossible. The King said, “You all give me advice, but none of you will serve me in my necessity.” Lord Hertford recommended Lord Egmont. “He will never accept the Treasury,” said the King, “but you may confer with him; I give you full power to do what you please.” Lord Hertford said, he himself never spoke in Parliament, and consequently could not be proper for his Majesty’s service. Yet he feared losing the King’s favour by refusing; and by expressions, which his son Lord Beauchamp dropped, we feared he would consent to take the Treasury for a time, on the grant of a ducal title. I told him there were but three options: to take the Rockinghams, and get rid of them again as soon as possible; to engage Mr. Conway to accept the Treasury, which I could scarce think practicable; or to place the Duke of Northumberland there, since, if Lord Bute would govern, he and his friends ought to stand in the front of the battle, instead of exposing others to danger for him. It would, besides, encourage others to list, as marking certainly that the King’s favour would accompany the Administration. Lord Hertford said, the King would not take that step before the new elections, lest the unpopularity should affect them; though no doubt he would willingly make the Duke of Northumberland minister afterwards.
I went at night to Lord Holland. He ranted for an hour; said the King might make a page[24] first minister, and could maintain him so; that Mr. Conway, when turned out, ought never to have been replaced; that it had been wrong to restore General A’Court and others; and that a king of England could always make what ministry he pleased;—he had forgotten that himself had tried for six weeks in the last reign with all the influence of the Crown, and could not succeed. All I could get from him was, that Lord Bute had not seen the King in private for two years—an assertion I believed as much as the rest.
In the meantime Lord Rockingham, on the strength of the overtures made to him, had sent a formal message to Woburn to invite the Bedfords to enter into the Administration with him. The Duke of Bedford returned for answer, that he was not averse to Lord Rockingham having the Treasury; for the rest, he would consult his friends.
If Lord Rockingham thus exceeded the offers made to him, the King laboured no less to prevent their taking place. The Queen asked Colonel Fitzroy if he had any weight with his brother, and whether the Duke of Grafton would leave the King in that distress? The King told Fitzroy he had rather see the devil in his closet than Mr. Grenville.
Lord Rockingham himself then went to Woburn, whence Rigby had been despatched to settle measures with Mr. Grenville. The answer given to the Marquis was, that Lord Temple and Mr. Grenville desired nothing for themselves; would support the future Administration, and hoped their friends would be taken care of; but could give no further answer, till they knew if the bottom was to be wide enough.[25] This oracular and evasive reply did not yet open the eyes of the Marquis, who had so fixed it in his idea that Bute would betray him, and, indeed, had made it so natural he should, that the most flimsy veil could hide from him what no art ought to have been able to conceal. What imaginable reason ought to have persuaded Rockingham that Grenville was willing to be his substitute?
This negotiation, and these general terms, Lord Rockingham communicated to the Duke of Grafton; who, whether offended at the indecency to the King, or affronted at the slight put on himself by their treating through him for his own place, grew much reconciled to keeping it himself. The Duke said to Lord Rockingham:—“Your Lordship would not leave his Majesty one nomination. He had excepted nobody but the Chancellor, and I told your Lordship he ordered me to except myself too; but I told you from myself I would give up the Treasury to you. By the terms you now ask, you certainly do not mean to come in.” Lord Rockingham had sense or irresolution enough almost to own he did not. On the report of this conference, the King said he would be at liberty to alter, accept, or reject any part of their plan as he should see cause.
The negotiation having gone so far, it was necessary to proceed till it should produce either agreement or rupture. The Duke of Grafton and Mr. Conway accordingly were empowered by his Majesty to treat in form with the Marquis. On the 15th of July they asked his terms. He spoke vaguely, but highly. At night, Lord Hertford showed me the following notes of a letter, which he, his brother, and the Duke had drawn to send in the Duke’s name to the Marquis:—
“My dear Lord,—After having delivered to his Majesty the answer which your Lordship communicated to General Conway and myself this morning, I was commanded to acquaint your Lordship that the King will expect to receive from your Lordship the plan on which you and your friends would propose to come in, in order to extend and strengthen his Administration, that his Majesty may be enabled to judge how far the same shall appear consistent with his Majesty’s honour and the public service.”
I by no means liked this letter. Grenville and Rigby I knew wished to prevent Rockingham’s acceptance, as they must come in under him, or remain out of place. If he declined, they would become more united, and Grenville would attain the ascendant. A list I could not imagine they would deliver, which would disgust all that were to be proscribed; nor could they easily agree to form a list. All they could wish was, an opportunity to break off the treaty, and impute the rupture to the King’s defence of Lord Bute’s tools. This letter furnished every one of these opportunities. To extend and strengthen, implied a resolution of retaining the present system, of which both the Rockinghams and the Bedfords complained. Consistent with his honour, bespoke fidelity to Lord Bute’s friends; and expect, sounded harsh and peremptory. Mr. Conway had already objected to that word. I wished to have the letter so expressed that the King’s friends might be able to show it, and exasperate mankind against the unreasonableness of the Opposition. I accordingly altered it thus:—
“My dear Lord,—After having delivered to his Majesty the answer which your Lordship communicated to General Conway and myself this morning, I was commanded to acquaint your Lordship that the King wishes your Lordship would specify to him the plan on which you and your friends would propose to come in, in order to form an extensive and solid Administration; that his Majesty may be enabled to judge how far the same may be advantageous to his Majesty’s and the public service.”
These corrections were approved by the Duke, Lord Hertford, and Mr. Conway; yet the Duke came and told me the next day that he had restored the words extend and strengthen the Administration. This had been done no doubt by his Majesty’s order; but though I wished, as much as his Majesty, to break off the negotiation, I saw how improper the method was: it was treating for a change and refusing to make it at the same time. Accordingly Lord Rockingham returned an answer as understanding it in that manner; but, withal, nothing could surpass the insolence of that answer. It was long, and, in our hurry, I forgot to keep a copy of it; but it concluded with hoping his Grace had explained to the King that he (Rockingham) had laid down for a principle that this Administration was at an end; and, therefore, if his Majesty liked he should form a new one, he desired previously to have an interview with his Majesty.
Impertinent as the body of the letter and the assumption to himself of forming an Administration were, it seemed but reasonable that the King should see the man whom he had sent for to be his minister: and to have refused him an audience on the arrogance of his style, would, probably, be falling into the snare they had laid for breaking off the treaty. Under this dilemma, the Duke of Grafton desired me to draw up an answer. I did, and was so lucky as not only to please all the persons concerned—the King, the Duke, and Mr. Conway, but to embarrass Lord Rockingham and his Council so entirely, that they could neither answer it nor get out of the perplexity with tolerable honour or conduct. Here is the letter:—
“My dear Lord,—I have laid your Lordship’s letter before his Majesty, and have the satisfaction of acquainting your Lordship that his Majesty’s gracious sentiments concur with your Lordship’s in regard to the forming a comprehensive plan of administration; and that his Majesty, desirous of uniting the hearts of all his subjects, is ready and willing to appoint such a comprehensive Administration as may exclude no denomination of men attached to his person and government. When your Lordship is prepared to offer a plan of administration formed on these views, his Majesty is willing your Lordship should yourself lay the same before him for his consideration.”
Lord Rockingham having received this letter, owned to the Duke of Grafton and Mr. Conway that it was the most artful letter he ever saw, and would puzzle him and his friends to answer. The Chancellor told Lord Hertford he never saw anything so ably drawn; not a word could be mended. As it passed for the Duke of Grafton’s composition, I allowed for what quantity of applause might be attributed to that belief. The letter, however, remained unanswered: Lord Rockingham only pressing the Duke for an audience of a quarter of an hour with the King; but the Duke told him it could not be obtained.
At night, Mr. Conway and I going home with Lord Hertford to supper, the latter found a most pathetic letter from the King, which said the Duke of Grafton had just been with him, and had peremptorily declared he would not go on without Mr. Conway; and therefore his Majesty called upon Mr. Conway, in the most earnest manner, not to leave him exposed to Lord Rockingham, who had insulted him so much. The Duke of Grafton, the latter said too, had promised the King to desire Mr. Walpole would use all his interest with Mr. Conway; to whom his Majesty engaged to give the Blues on Lord Ligonier’s death, and any civil place, if he did not like that of Secretary of State. Mr. Conway cried out at once, it was impossible. I immediately saw that if I persuaded him then to stay, he would dispute, and thence would confirm himself in his resolution. I determined, therefore, to let the first burst of his feeling pass over without contradiction, that I might work on him another way. I walked about the room with as melancholy an air as I could put on, only dropping now and then, that it was the most serious crisis I ever knew. At supper I spoke not a word. When the servants were retired, his brother, Lady Hertford, and his own wife, Lady Ailesbury, attacked him in the most eager manner, pressing him to comply with the King. He resisted as firmly; I jogged Lord Hertford privately, who understood me, and said no more: but the two ladies were out of patience, thinking me on Mr. Conway’s side. Still I would not speak, but seemed to be lost in thought, though I attended to every word he said, to learn where his principal objection lay, and soon found it was to Lord Chatham. When we rose up to go away, the ladies pressed me to give my opinion, which I had expected, and intended to bring them to do. I then spoke with tears in my eyes; said I was sensible of the honour the King had done me; but, for the King nor anybody, would I give Mr. Conway any advice in so important a moment, till I had considered the question most cooly and thoroughly. He was much pleased, and said that was very fair. I then knew I should do what I would; Lord Hertford proposed that he and his brother should go early the next morning to the Duke of Grafton, but I shifted that off, and winked to Lord Hertford, who then said, he would go first, and Mr. Conway should come to me in the morning to talk the matter over. The moment I got home, I wrote back to Lord Hertford to explain my meaning, and desired he would not come to me till an hour after the time appointed for meeting his brother at my house.
The next day (the 18th), Mr. Conway came to me, I told him he had convinced me that while the treaty was going on, he could not with honour engage to the King to undertake a share of the Administration, which would encourage the King to break off the treaty: but if Lord Rockingham and his friends continued unreasonable, I thought him bound in honour to extricate the King from the difficulties in which he had, by his promise of resignation, involved him. That if he (Conway) refused, his Majesty, rather than give up all Lord Bute’s friends, would certainly set up some one of them: such a step would drive the Opposition into the last violences, and might end in a civil war. That the nation was now quiet and satisfied; and that all sober men, not ranked in any faction, would not bear to see the King taken prisoner. That all men saw through the pretences of the several factions; that all danger of arbitrary power was over, when the most Lord Bute pretended was, to save a few of his friends from being displaced: but that another danger was growing upon us, a danger I had always feared as much as the power of the Crown,—danger from aristocracy, and from those confederacies of great lords. I showed him that the present dissatisfactions were nothing but combinations of interested and ambitious men; that Lord Rockingham and his party had deserted their principles by adopting Grenville and the Bedfords, who had been the instruments of Lord Bute’s bad measures, besides having been criminal in other excesses without his participation. I dwelt on the outrageous behaviour of the Duke of Richmond the day before, who had told me that if Conway should refuse to act with Grenville when united with them (the Rockinghams), they would bid him go about his business; and that he himself would tell Conway so to his face (the greatest excess, in truth, of which I ever knew the Duke of Richmond guilty; whose friendly heart was uncommonly unaccustomed to resent a difference of opinion in those he loved, and who in a few days after this heat gave a clear proof of his firm attachment to Conway). I continued to say to the latter, that I saw he must do something, though I did not well know what: if anything, I thought that, to show he did not act from interest, and to strike a great stroke in character, he must resume the seals of Secretary of State, but refuse the salary. The Rockinghams might then say what they pleased; that I myself had always defied all parties on the strength of my disinterestedness: and I then offered him half my fortune, which he generously refused, but he was exceedingly struck—as I knew he would be—by a proposal that would place his virtue in so fair a light. How well soever I knew the method of drawing him to my opinion, it is but justice to say that, had I been so inclined, I never could have swayed him to any wrong act; nor had I so often occasion to lead him towards my sentiments as to fix his irresolution, which wandered constantly from one doubt to another, and paid too much deference to what men would say of him. This was the case in the transaction I am relating. Lord Rockingham and his friends did not weigh a moment what Mr. Conway owed to the King, to the Duke of Grafton, to his country, or to himself. They availed themselves of what had been more a threat than a promise, in order to blow up the Administration and create confusion. To Conway they had not paid the least deference, acquiesced in nothing he proposed to them or for them, and most arrogantly pretended to involve him, against his repeated declaration, in a system composed for their own convenience, and by their own wilful blindness with his and their country’s most grievous enemies. Could I employ too much art to set him above such treatment? He told me he had had some such thought as I mentioned, and would certainly follow my advice; but he would resign first on the next Wednesday (this was Friday), and then he should be able to talk with more authority to the Rockinghams. We agreed to keep this a secret from all the world; and I was only to give the Duke of Grafton and Lord Hertford hopes. I said, he might be sure I would keep the secret for my own sake; circumstances might change, and I would not pledge myself to the King, and be reproached afterwards if he was disappointed. I said, too, that I would not go to Court (as I ought to have done after the King’s letter), that I might give no jealousy; but would let the King know the reason of my absenting myself. “I like policy,” said I, “but I will always speak truth, which I think the best policy.” Conway grew impatient at his brother’s not coming, and went to the Duke of Richmond. Lord Hertford arrived the next moment. I bade him be satisfied, but would not tell him on what grounds. He did not approve his brother’s resigning, but I convinced him it was necessary to yield that point in order to carry the greater. We agreed, indeed, that to his brother he should not give it up, that his brother might not suspect our being too much in concert. We then went to him. The Duke of Richmond told him that they had sent for the Bedfords to town. Lord Hertford and I disputed about the resignation before Mr. Conway; and as I wanted to prepare the Duke of Grafton, I said I was sure I could convince the last. Lord Hertford said I could not. “Well,” said I, two or three times, “you shall see I can. I will go to him—shall I?” Conway said, “Well, go.” Lord Hertford kept his brother in dispute. I went, gave the Duke hopes; told him, he himself must retain his place, but must let Mr. Conway resign. He said, if it would satisfy Mr. Conway’s delicacy, he would. I thus carried all my points, and knew I was doing right. At the same time I must confess there was a moment in which, reflecting on my success, and on the important service I had rendered to the King in so distressful and critical an hour, I was tempted to think of myself. I saw I might have written to the King, or asked an audience, or made any terms I pleased for myself. My brother had just been at the point of death, and presented me with the near prospect of losing half my income. What would remain, would depend on the will of every succeeding First Lord of the Treasury; and it was determined in my own breast that I would pay court to none. I resisted, however; and in this favourable shining hour, resolved to make no one advantage for myself. I scorned to tell either my friend or myself, and sat down contented with having done the best for him, and with shutting the door against a crew I hated or despised: yet I had one more struggle to come before the victory was complete.
At night the two brothers and I saw the Duke of Grafton again. Our intelligence agreed that Grenville had said to his friends that he had reserved himself at liberty to oppose. This showed what headlong voluntary dupes Lord Rockingham and his friends had made themselves.
On the 20th, a meeting was held at the Duke of Newcastle’s, of Lord Rockingham, the Duke of Richmond and Dowdeswell, with Newcastle himself, on one part; and of the Duke of Bedford, Lord Weymouth, and Rigby on the other. The Duke of Bedford had powers from Grenville to act for him, but did not seem to like Lord Rockingham’s taking on himself to name to places. On the latter asking what friends they wished to prefer, Rigby said, with his cavalier bluntness, “Take the Court Calendar and give them one, two, three thousand pounds a-year.” Bedford observed that they had said nothing on measures: Mr. Grenville would insist on the sovereignty of this country over America being asserted. Lord Rockingham replied, he would never allow it to be a question whether he had given up this country: he never had. The Duke insisted on a declaration. The Duke of Richmond said, “We may as well demand one from you, that you never will disturb that country again.” Neither would yield. However, though they could not agree on measures, as the distribution of places was more the object of their thoughts and of their meeting, they reverted to that topic. Lord Rockingham named Mr. Conway; Bedford started; said, he had no notion of Conway; had thought he was to return to the military line. The Duke of Richmond said, it was true Mr. Conway did not desire a civil place; did not know whether he would be persuaded to accept one; but they were so bound to him for his resignation, and thought him so able, they must insist. The Duke of Bedford said, Conway was an officer sans tache, but not a minister sans tache. Rigby said, not one of the present Cabinet should be saved. Dowdeswell asked, “What! not one?”—“No”—“What! not Charles Townshend?” “Oh!” said Rigby, “that is different; besides, he has been in opposition.” “So has Conway,” said Dowdeswell; “he has voted twice against the Court, Townshend but once.” “But,” said Rigby, “Conway is Bute’s man.” “Pray,” said Dowdeswell, “is not Charles Townshend Bute’s?” “Ay, but Conway is governed by his brother Hertford, who is Bute’s.” “So is Charles Townshend by his brother,[26] who is Bute’s.” “But Lady Ailesbury[27] is a Scotchwoman.” “So is Lady Dalkeith.[28]” From this dialogue the assembly fell to wrangle, and broke up quarrelling. So high did the heats go, that the Cavendishes ran about the town, publishing the issue of the conference, and taxing the Bedfords with treachery.
Notwithstanding this, the same evening the Duke of Bedford sent to desire another interview, to which Lord Rockingham yielded; but the Duke of Richmond refused to be present. So much, however, were the minds on both sides ulcerated by former and recent disputes, and so incompatible were their views, that the second meeting broke up in a final quarrel; and Lord Rockingham released the other party from all their engagements. The Duke of Bedford desired they might still continue friends—that was, at least, agree to oppose together. Lord Rockingham said, No; they were broken for ever.[29]
It was at this meeting that the Duke of Newcastle appeared for the last time[30] in a political light. Age and feebleness at length wore out that busy passion for intrigue, which power had not been able to satiate, nor disgrace correct. He languished above a year longer, but was heard of no more on the scene of affairs.
Chance and folly having thus dispersed those clouds that were only formidable by their assemblage, the task grew easier to re-establish some serenity; yet the principal actor could not help distinguishing his superior absurdity before the act was closed.
The Duke of Richmond acquainted me, on the 22nd, that Lord Rockingham was going to the King to thank his Majesty for his gracious offers, to ask pardon for having dealt with Grenville and the Bedfords, and to acquaint him that he could not undertake the Administration. One should rather have expected that when he confessed his error in applying to them, he would propose to accept without them. I said, not with much ardour, that I hoped they would now accept alone; and I asked what was to become of Conway? The Duke replied, They had told him he must go on. “Well, my lord,” said I, “but then you cannot continue to oppose.” “No,” replied the Duke, “if the King should offer us full power, he might be sure now that we could not make use of it against his friends; yet I do not know whether we should undertake. I think we must at least allow our friends to take on with the Court.” I commended this noble behaviour, and approved the admission of their friends; but their first thoughts had been too right to last.
Lord Rockingham went to Court, and asked an audience; but instead of the decent part he had meditated, he sillily entered into former complaints against Lord Bute. The King, as unnecessarily frank, owned that he had never intended to give him the Treasury, but to keep the Duke of Grafton. Thus they parted, each more soured than they had met. The King complained that Lord Rockingham had taxed him with breach of his word, and that he had not offered to accept without Grenville, &c. Lord Rockingham, that the King had not asked him to undertake—as if the language he had held, had been conciliatory. His party resented highly what they called the King’s insincerity; and the Duke of Richmond, dining with Conway and me, expressed the utmost warmth, declaring they would accept nothing under as full powers as had been granted to Lord Chatham. Conway endeavoured to moderate; but as I could go farther than it was proper for Conway to do, I ridiculed the ascribing as much importance to Lord Rockingham as to Lord Chatham; and said the former could only compose an Administration in dumb show, so few of the party being speakers, and none of any rank among them, but his Grace, having any parts. I asked how they could treat Mr. Conway so ill? They had called on him to resign; had that very morning acknowledged he must stay, and had advised him to stay; and now the Duke said, they had only meant he should stay just for the present moment. But there was no allaying the Duke’s heat; and indeed, unless they would have acquiesced in the only rational plan, a junction with the Administration, without insisting on the pre-eminence of Rockingham, it was indifferent to me whether they were pacified or not. The difficulty, however, was increased to Conway by the regard they had paid to him, and which had widened their breach with the Bedfords. But besides their having allowed the necessity of his staying in place, their struggle for him was not only what he had deserved at their hands, but had much the appearance of having been but a decent tribute, since they had owned to the Bedfords that they doubted his accession; and what was yet stranger, they had stickled for him, when they were morally certain he was not only averse to, but would not accede to, their coalition with Grenville. Every part of the miscarriage had flowed from their own fault. They had conjoined men to their plan without the King’s leave, even without asking it, had refused on the terms he had offered; and had concluded by affronting him to his face; had owned they had no excuse for opposing any longer; and now were desirous Mr. Conway should oppose with them, only because they had been to blame. Such inconsistencies could not be wiped out by their having made use of his name against his consent. Yet, as Conway’s delicacy was great, I told the Duke of Grafton, when he sent for me the next morning, that it was of absolute necessity that his Majesty should once more offer the Administration in form to Lord Rockingham, as nothing but the positive refusal of the latter would induce Mr. Conway to go on. I knew, I said, it was not very civil to his Grace to advise him to propose again a successor to himself; but my confidence that Rockingham would again refuse, and the benefits resulting thence, encouraged me to press that advice. The Duke, though disinclined to the measure, was persuaded. I sent Lord Hertford to the King with the same counsel; said, I was sure they would refuse; if they did, I besought his Majesty to express no resentment, but to soothe them, and say, that though they would not undertake the Administration, he yet hoped they would support it, and suffer their friends to enlist, which at least would produce a defection from their party.
The Duke acquainted the King with my advice, who expressed extreme repugnance to it, yet consented to follow it, though it was very grievous, he said, to humble himself again to Lord Rockingham, who, but the preceding day, had taxed him with an ancient breach of promise. To Lord Hertford his Majesty observed, that it was very extraordinary advice to come from me. Lord Hertford explained that my reasons were founded upon the hopes of carrying Mr. Conway clearly from Lord Rockingham, on a new refusal of the latter; and for fear his Majesty should be reduced, if Conway wavered, again to deliver himself up to Mr. Grenville. The King replied, he would sooner meet Grenville at the end of his sword than let him into his closet; and that there must be men in England who would form an Administration for him, and not let him be reduced to that mortification. His Majesty would not yield to send for Lord Rockingham, but allowed the offer to be once more renewed,—a consent from which I drew a remarkable observation: as his Majesty yielded on the first proposal (for he saw the Duke before the conversation with Lord Hertford), it was plain he did not always consult the Princess or Lord Bute, having now allowed the Duke to make the offer, before the latter quitted the closet.
The Duke, Mr. Conway, and I, consulted on the best method of delivering the message. Conway thought it was best to do it, as I had advised, in a free, friendly way, exhorting the Marquis to let them all re-unite in their old system; and Conway added, “If they refuse, your Grace and I must then do the best we can.”
At night, the Duke, Conway, and Lord Rockingham met. The Duke, in the King’s name, offered him the Treasury, in the amicable way agreed on. Lord Rockingham was all reserve, and would only say, this was no message. The Duke offended, and naturally cold and shy, would not repeat positively that it was; and thus the meeting broke off.[31]
Having engaged the King and Duke in so bold and hazardous a step, I trembled lest it should take another turn than I expected: and though my advice had not been completely followed, yet as it sufficed to disgust Conway, I rejoiced that it had ended so fortunately, especially as I doubted from recollecting circumstances and from Lord Rockingham’s demand of a precise message, whether he would not have accepted; in which case the King would probably have flown off and Conway have been offended the other way, if the terms, when offered and accepted, had not been granted. That Rockingham fluctuated between ambition and distrust was evident, for late that very night the Duke of Richmond came to Lord Hertford’s door and sent for me down to his chariot, when, though ashamed of the silly message imposed upon him, he made me this frantic and impertinent proposal from Lord Rockingham, which I was desired to deliver to Mr. Conway,—that the latter would engage the King to allow the Marquis to try again to get the Bedfords—the Bedfords whom, two days before, Rockingham and all his party had absolutely broken with, and published as the most treacherous of men, and who had proscribed Conway himself. Should the Bedfords again refuse, the Marquis notified that he would then deign to accept the Administration. I neither wished his acceptance, nor chose to run any farther risks of it. Conway, to whom I communicated it, treated this senseless proposal as it deserved; and the Duke of Richmond did not attempt to defend it.[32]