CHAPTER XII.
Election of Pope Ganganelli.—Quarrel between the French and Russian Ambassadors.—Agitation in the Country after the Rising of Parliament.—Lord Chatham Appears at the King’s Levee.—Supposed Motive of his Reappearance.—State of the Country.—Horne’s Libel on Onslow.—Popular Excitement.—Aspersions on Lord Holland.—Petition from Westminster to Dissolve the Parliament.—Dr. Musgrave’s Pretended Discovery.—Russian Project to Attack Constantinople by Sea.—Conquest of Corsica.—Petition against the Parliament.—Indolence of the Duke of Grafton.—Disturbance at the Execution of two Rioters.—Affairs of Ireland.—Prosecution of Vaughan.—Remonstrance of Junius to the King.—Story of the Duke of Gloucester and Maria Walpole.
1769.
I must now turn to foreign affairs, or events connected with them.
In the conclave, the Jesuitic party, alarmed at the demand made by the Bourbon Crowns of suppression of the Jesuits, had fixed on Cardinal Chigi for Pope—but miscarried. The French and Spanish Ambassadors told that faction, that had they elected him, they alone would have enjoyed him; insinuating that he would not have been acknowledged by the allied Crowns. Cardinal Bernis was dispatched to Rome, with orders to put a negative on any candidate but Cardinal Ganganelli; and succeeding, was named Ambassador to the new pontiff.[225] He was a Roman monk of the lowest extraction, and had exercised all the affected virtues of his order with a perseverance worthy of the ambition of Sixtus Quintus. But though his success was adequate, the times demanded talents of another complexion; and though Ganganelli’s address was as well suited to retrieve the affairs of the Church as some of his ablest predecessors had been to build up its greatness, yet no abilities could reconcile the blackest and most revengeful set of men to their own destruction; and though Ganganelli endeavoured by temporising and delays, to ward off the blow that would deprive the papal Throne of its most trusty satellites, yet the two Crowns at last forced from him the fatal Bull that abolished the order and exposed the Pope to the vengeance of the Jesuits, who became his assassins, when, in spite of himself, he had been obliged to discard them as his champions.[226]
The ball at Court on the King’s birth-night was disturbed by a quarrel for place between the Russian and French Ambassadors. France yields the precedence to nobody but to the Emperor of Germany; and the Comte du Châtelet, their Minister here, had received positive orders not to give place to the Russian. Du Châtelet was enough disposed to assume any airs of superiority: at Vienna, on a former embassy, he had embroiled his court with the Imperial by wrong-headed insolence. He was warm, captious, and personally brave. Count Czernichew was magnificent and ostentatious, but profuse of civilities and attentions, and no ways quarrelsome. He was sitting next to Count Seilern, the Imperial Ambassador. Du Châtelet came behind, and crowded himself in between them, taking place above Czernichew. This occasioned much pushing and struggling, and the Russian told the Frenchman he was very impertinent, and then quitted the bench. As they left the room when the ball was finished, Count Czernichew’s coach drawing up, he offered to set Du Châtelet at home, which was accepted; but, being entered, Du Châtelet proposed that they should decide the quarrel with their swords; and they endeavoured to go into St. James’s Park, but the gates were shut. It was said that Du Châtelet made apologies for his behaviour, and declared that he had meant no personal rudeness. On the other hand, he was allowed to have shown most spirit throughout the dispute; yet he was not without much anxiety how his conduct would be regarded at home, where it was rather wished to soften the Court of Russia, now beginning to triumph over the Turks. But Du Châtelet had two powerful mediators—the eagerness of the Duc de Choiseul to humble the Czarina, and his inclination for Madame du Châtelet, not only the favourite of his all-powerful sister, the Duchess de Grammont, but her secret rival with him. Madame du Châtelet was a handsome and very sensible woman, but of an indolence beyond example. The Duc de Choiseul liked her, and she was far from averse to him, yet had resisted his love and that liberality and power which had thrown every other French woman he had a mind to into his arms. Du Châtelet, indeed, had chosen not to leave her exposed to too great temptation; and, notwithstanding her extreme indifference, which here only served to give offence, had obliged her to attend him on his embassy.[227] Count Czernichew was recalled, with apparent dissatisfaction.[228] He was not fortunate in his embassies: he had been nominated to that of China, but the Chinese monarch forbade his approach, declaring he would have no alliance with a murderess. Du Châtelet’s intemperance in the King’s presence was very ill taken here, where his frowardness, and his wife’s disgusting coldness, had raised no prejudice in their favour. The King took every opportunity to distinguish the Russian by the most marked civilities; and it was proposed to signify the royal displeasure by acquainting the foreign Ministers that there was no rank in the box allotted to them at the balls at Court; and that his Majesty gave that notice from having been extremely offended at what had passed. Lord Hertford, as Lord Chamberlain, was to give the notice; but fearing it was too strongly worded not to give great disgust in France, he refused to make the notification, unless authorised by the Privy Council. On this the message was reconsidered, and the latter part was changed for the words to prevent disagreeable altercations for the future,—a medium still liable to ridicule; for how could a ball at Court be a private ball, when everybody was taken out to dance by the Lord Chamberlain according to their rank? It was, in effect, depriving the foreign ministers alone of rank on those occasions.[229]
This squabble, and almost every other business of more importance, was forgotten in the stormy scene that succeeded the rising of Parliament. Wilkes on his part, Lord Shelburne and Beckford on theirs, laboured incessantly during the whole summer to spread the flame of dissatisfaction on the violent measure of forcing Lutterell into Parliament; and though it caught not universally, the spirit of remonstrating and petitioning made such progress in several counties and boroughs, as alarmed the Court, and still more the sober part of mankind; who, though disapproving the conduct of the Administration, were apprehensive of such tumults, if not risings, as might, by not being strong enough to correct, throw additional power into the hands of the Crown—a prospect that, perhaps, lessened the panic of the Court, otherwise sufficiently apt to tremble. The Supporters of the Bill of Rights circulated a letter, recommending subscriptions for Wilkes; but found men more willing to sign remonstrances than to contribute their money. Townshend and Sawbridge were chosen Aldermen of London and Sheriffs of Middlesex.
The same day, the livery of London determined to petition the King on grievances; and on the 5th of July their petition was delivered to him by the Lord Mayor, Beckford, and three more, but was received with the utmost coldness and neglect.
Two days after, the Court was surprised with a more unexpected phenomenon. Lord Chatham appeared at the King’s levee when it was thought he would never produce himself again, or was not fit to be produced in public. He was perfectly well, and had grown fat. The Duke of Grafton had just time to apprise the King of this mysterious visit. The King was very gracious, and whispered him to come into the closet after the levee, which he did, and staid there twenty minutes. Much silence was observed on what passed; though by degrees it was affirmed that the conversation was only general and indifferent. Yet hints were dropped that the King, sounding Lord Chatham on the Middlesex election, the opinion he gave was not favourable to his Majesty’s wishes.[230] The active part taken by Lord Shelburne, Beckford, and Calcraft, made this greatly probable; and his Lordship’s subsequent conduct corroborated the idea. Still was Lord Chatham very desirous of recovering his power; and it was not his style to be harsh in the closet.[231] It was remarked, too, that, not to embitter his reception, he had come when Lord Temple[232] was detained at Stowe, by entertaining there several of the foreign ministers. Lord Chatham lingered affectedly, in the outward room, after his audience, as if to display the recovery of his health and understanding. To the Duke of Grafton and the Bedfords he was awkward and cool; embraced Lord Granby and General Harvey[233] (a personal military favourite of the King), and was very civil to Lord Hertford and Mr. Conway. In the evening he returned to Hayes.
Whatever were the motives of his re-appearance, the prospect certainly favoured him, whether he had a mind to present himself as a mediator to the fears of the Court, or as a Captain-General to the Opposition. His creatures governed the City: Lord Granby, influenced by Calcraft, and dreading the loss of popularity, talked of resigning. The Chancellor was disgusted with Grafton, whose marriage had hurt him at Court. Ireland, by the absurd conduct of Lord Townshend, was in confusion; and the Bedfords were pressing to send Lord Sandwich thither, which would have increased the ill-humour. And though the Ministers had thoughts of giving satisfaction to the Colonies, yet, having refused to give that assurance in Parliament, the Americans would no longer trust them. The Virginians had voted the right of taxation to be in themselves, and resolved on a petition against our sending for the criminals to be tried in England,—a violent measure, dictated by rashness, and, almost as soon as announced, dropped by timidity. Great divisions reigned in the East India Company, in which Lord Clive and Sir Laurence Dundas were contending to engross sole power, the Company having more places to bestow than the First Lord of the Treasury; the exorbitant wealth of our empire going hand-in-hand with the advance of prerogative, in the views of most of our patriots. Wilkes, in the meantime, whatever were his views, had honesty enough not to smother his private resentments; and, at this very moment, published an envenomed pamphlet against Lord Chatham. It was unjustly silent on his merits and services, but touched with truth the defective parts of his character.
A former friend of Wilkes, who had abandoned him, was more cruelly, because more iniquitously, treated. Among the rabble of Wilkes’s agents was one Horne, parson of Brentford. He was son of the poulterer to the Princess of Wales; but, whether from principle, vanity, or want of more decent means to attempt distinguishing himself, he had attached himself to that demagogue; and, with slender parts, had become his scribe in composing scurrilities for the newspapers, and his factor at all popular meetings.[234] In other respects his morals were not reproached; though, as came out afterwards he had, to please Wilkes, ridiculed his Lords the Bishops, and, to please himself, indulged in more foppery than became his profession. He now infamously aspersed Mr. Onslow,[235] one of the Lords of the Treasury, as having accepted 1000l. to procure a place for a person in the West Indies,—a transaction which was proved to have been a gross imposition on the person who paid the bribe, and in which Mr. Onslow had in no shape been concerned, till the defrauded person applied to him for redress. Horne impudently avowed the printed charge to be his; for which Onslow prosecuted, and cast him in damages at the assizes in Surrey.[236]
Some damp, too, was thrown on the zeal of the Opposition, by the refusal of Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk, Lincolnshire, and Kent, to join in the popular petitions. The city of Bristol, on the other hand, determined to petition, and voted their contempt to their member, Lord Clare: but the most grievous outrage fell on the Duke of Bedford. He was Lord-Lieutenant of Devonshire, had a great estate in the county, and exercised most signal charity there. In order to prevent a petition of the county, he went down thither; but while he was at prayers in the Cathedral of Exeter, a tumultuous mob assembled, pouring out execrations on him; and had not the bishop conducted him by a private passage to the palace, his life had been in danger. At Honiton, the fury of the people rose to such a height, that they pelted him with stones, and set bull-dogs at him.[237]
In the meantime, Lord Bute returned privately to England from the waters of Barege, which, it was given out, had perfectly restored his health; but the temper of the times not favouring his timidity, or the latter renewing his disorder, he, in a short time, retired to Italy. The Court of France, however, not being the dupe of his pretended loss of credit, gave him the same guard, at his lodgings at Barege, as attended the Comtesse de la Marche, a Princess of the blood; and his vanity was so weak as to accept this safe homage.
His faithful devotee, Lord Holland, was scarce less obnoxious to the City. The contemptuous flippancy of his sons, and his own[238] indiscreet interference in behalf of Lutterell, had brought him again on the stage, which he pretended to have quitted. The multiplicity and difficulty of his accounts as Paymaster during the war had prevented their being liquidated. The Barons of the Exchequer had called on him to make them up. He had obtained from the Crown a delay of process, pleading the impediments he received from the proper officers in Germany. This was, probably, true. It is also probable, that he was not impatient to be disburthened of such large sums,[239] on which he made considerable interest. The petition from Middlesex had made this one of their charges, in their bill of grievances, and described Lord Holland as the defaulter for unaccounted millions. Touched to the quick at this imputation, he wrote a civil letter to the Lord Mayor, complaining of the aspersion, and referring him for the falsehood of the accusation to Alderman Beckford, whom Lord Holland said he had satisfied of the injustice of it. The Mayor returned only a card, to say he was not answerable for the contents of the petition; yet he had harangued on it, as well as presented it. Beckford advertised that Lord Holland had sent him his defence, but that it had not satisfied him. Lord Holland then published a justification in the papers. Indeed, the violence of the petition was much blamed; and, as if conscious of it, the authors had neither ventured to sign or date it.
Whatever had been Lord Chatham’s views in going to Court, it appeared that now, at least, his part was taken. A reconciliation was made between him and Mr. Grenville, which, though never cordial, served at least to alarm the Bedfords, who, according to their laudable practice, made immediate overtures to the three brothers,[240] offering to be content to save Lord Gower, Rigby, and one or two more of their friends at most; in which number they were careful not to stipulate for their ally, the Duke of Grafton. These overtures, though renewed at different times, were rejected. As if to condemn themselves more, they published a severe pamphlet against the political conduct of Lord Chatham.
Wiltshire and Worcestershire then agreed on a petition, and one from Surrey was presented. But the capital stroke was struck by the electors of Westminster, who petitioned the king to dissolve the Parliament,—a step not only absurd, but of most dangerous precedent. To require him to dissolve an assembly so obsequious, and of whom they complained for humouring his vengeance, was on the face of it ridiculous and void of all probability of success. A refusal, indeed, they might wish to receive, as it would but inflame their grievance: but on pretence of violated liberty to seek for redress from the Throne, the aggressor against the bulwark of liberty, however then betrayed to the Crown, was as noxious a measure as could have been devised. What King but might obtain some servile addresses against the most incorruptible House of Commons? Was prerogative the champion to resort to in defence of injured freedom? The invitation sent to the Danes by our short-sighted and ignorant ancestors, and the expedient of calling over the heir of the Crown of France by the barons in the reign of King John, were scarce more big with folly and indiscretion. What could triumphant rebellion have demanded more of a King than to dissolve one Parliament and expose himself to a new election amidst enraged subjects? It was the act of a rash multitude—yet did not want abettors, who ought to have acted on sounder and soberer principles. Was this, alas! a moment to fill the nation with tumult and disorder? Was the constitution so gone (and nobody thinks worse than I do of the provocation given by the Court in the case of Lutterell) that anarchy was the sole engine left that could restore it? Could Lord Chatham, or Lord Temple, or Grenville (of whom the former had lost their popularity, and the latter never had any) hope to
“Ride in the whirlwind, and direct the storm?”
No—Wilkes and every turbulent agitator in the several counties would have risen on the froth of a cauldron composed of such pernicious ingredients. The intrusion of Lutterell was not an evil adequate to such remedies. True patriots will bear with some ills, and temporize till a fitter opportunity. Nor would the remedy have been remote, would the plaintiffs have had virtue to wait and avail themselves of it. Would the people resist corruption, and elect none but men of virtue and principle, the election of another Parliament would furnish redress. Corrupt members must be the consequence of corrupt constituents. The people had not virtue, nor their leaders patience to profit of, or wait for, so constitutional a remedy.
Lord Shelburne attacked the Duke of Bedford in his own town of Bedford, and carried a mayor against him. The celebrated Junius published an infamous attack on the same Duke, on the insult he had received in Devonshire, by justifying which the writer gave a riot the air of premeditated assassination.[241] Sir William Draper, a brave officer, attached to the Duke and Lord Granby, who had been abused by the same author, but not of sound intellects, published, with his name, a challenge to the dark satirist,[242] which the latter answered with parts, and without any manly spirit. About the same time, one Dr. Musgrave, who had hawked about to Lord Chatham and other discontented great men, and to some Ministers, and been rejected by all, an offer of a discovery which he pretended to have made, that the late peace had been bought by France of the Princess Dowager, Lord Bute, and Lord Holland, now published this wild accusation, and cited the Chevalier D’Eon as one of his evidences. The latter, whose head had been turned by the vanity of being an under instrument in concluding that peace, flatly disavowed him; and though in the following winter he had his charge laid before Parliament, it was grounded on such paltry information, picked up in a French coffee-house, that faction itself could not countenance him; and the man and his accusation being voted infamous, were heard of no more.[243]
The young Emperor of Germany, Joseph the Second, now began to make himself noticed. Though behaving with perfect deference to, and appearing to live in cordial amity with, his mother, the Empress-queen, he discovered symptoms of not intending to waste his reign in inactivity. He gave great attention to the army; and, as a model of royal wisdom to be studied, had an interview with the King of Prussia; at which visit many passions must have been smothered on either side.
The Turks having met the Russian army in those vast plains that divide their empires, now recovered their superiority by the advantage of their cavalry, better suited to desultory war: but they had scarce stemmed the torrent of invasion, before the Czarina struck Europe with wonder and respect by a measure at once great, daring, and desperate. She notified her intention of sending a fleet to attack Constantinople itself. The idea was said to be her own, and she persisted against the advice of her Ministers. The length of the voyage, its dangers, and the almost hopeless prospect of success, were lost in the grandeur of the project. I was then at Paris: the French ministry were confounded, and dispatched couriers by land to rouse the Ottoman Monarch: French engineers followed to assist him in fortifying the approach to his capital, which lay, as he thought, securely surrounded by endless tracts of sea and land. The Duke of Choiseul, who had sown those seeds of wide-spread desolation, was confounded at seeing himself excelled in a nobler style. But few days before this intelligence reached him, he had had the vain levity, as I was supping with him at his own house, to send for the last Paris Gazette, which he had dictated himself, to prove the late victory of the Turks, and read it to the company. His invasion of Corsica, and the savage cruelties that were exercised there after the conquest, were puny consolations to his meddling ambition—yet was all the military glory that decorated his administration. The first advantages gained there by the French had been solemnized in a ridiculous manner by ostentatious inscriptions, that were soon followed by defeats; but hosts continually poured in on the abandoned islanders; and the deficiency of military skill in Pascal Paoli, the Dictator of the aspiring Republic, and even his want of valour, as the French themselves asserted, reduced Corsica beneath their yoke. Paoli, who aspired to power, not to the fame of virtue, distinguished between his country and his hopes, and not having fallen like Leonidas, did not despair like Cato. He made his escape and arrived in England, where his character had been so advantageously exaggerated by Mr. Boswell’s enthusiastic and entertaining account of him, that the Opposition were ready to receive and incorporate him in the list of popular tribunes. The Court artfully intercepted the project; and deeming patriots of all nations equally corruptible, bestowed a pension of 1000l. a-year on the unheroic fugitive. Themistocles accepted the gold of Xerxes, and excused himself from receiving a visit from Mrs. Macaulay, who had given him printed advice for settling a republic. I saw him soon after his arrival, dangling at Court. He was a man of decent deportment, vacant of all melancholy reflection, with as much ease as suited a prudence that seemed the utmost effort of a wary understanding, and so void of anything remarkable in his aspect, that being asked if I knew who it was, I judged him a Scottish officer (for he was sandy-complexioned and in regimentals) who was cautiously awaiting the moment of promotion. All his heroism consisted in bearing with composure the accounts of his friends being tortured and butchered, while he was sunk into a pensioner of that very Court that had proclaimed his valiant countrymen and associates rebels.[244]
Not so passive the English. The weavers mutinied against their masters, and many were killed by the guards. The Livery of London rejected Sir Henry Banks, a senior Alderman, for Lord Mayor; and Beckford and Trecothick being returned by them to the Court of Aldermen, and the former having the majority was elected a second time. He excused himself on pretence of age, which was but turned of sixty, and infirmities which he had not. He was pressed again to accept, and peremptorily refused the office; but the Sheriffs, with a train of coaches, entreating him, at the request of the Livery, not to deny himself to their wishes, he at last yielded. The Livery then inquired what answer had been returned to their petition? The Aldermen, to soften them, replied, that none had been given, but his Majesty would undoubtedly consider of the most constitutional means of redressing their grievances. They next called for Lord Holland’s letter to the Lord Mayor, who produced it; adding, that he did not know how Lord Holland, as a gentleman, could account for publishing his (the Mayor’s) letter—as if it was justifiable to tax that lord in a public manner, without process or proofs, of embezzling millions; and unjustifiable in him, in his own defence, to print the Lord Mayor’s evasion, I might almost say disavowal, of the charge! Sinking under the aspersion and loads of abuse, Lord Holland retired to France on pretence of conducting thither his wife’s sister, Lady Cecilia Lenox, who was dying, and died there, of a consumption. The City, as if he had fled from the charge, instructed their Members to endeavour a parliamentary inquiry into his conduct, and to impeach him if matter were found—but it came to nothing; and their silence cleared him.
The Marquis of Rockingham and the Cavendishes had kept aloof from the factious meetings of the rest of the Opposition, and given no countenance to the spirit of petitioning, which had now gained Hereford, Newcastle, and the counties of Gloucester and Cornwall. The Duke of Richmond, who was in France, where I was too, told me with satisfaction that his friends had resisted an example so inconsistent with the principles of liberty as appealing to the Crown against the House of Commons. Their resistance, however, was not stubborn enough to hold out against popularity, and the arts of a man who meant nothing less than to assert the constitution, and who made use of the grievance complained of to force the Crown to employ him, lucratively to himself, in every attack it meditated against the constitution. This was Alexander Wedderburne, whose name will be read with horror when this transaction is remembered, and compared with a change of conduct as sudden as the former, and as diametrically opposite to this parenthesis of affected zeal for liberty, and attended by the share he bore in lighting up a civil war, the view of which was to enslave America. Edmund Burke, too, had perhaps some influence in seducing the Whig lords into adoption of the popular measure. Not content with Lord Rockingham’s feeble politics, and hoping better from the union of the three brothers, he concerted with them the petition for Buckinghamshire; and he, Grenville, and Wedderburne drew another for Yorkshire, the ablest of all those performances; and the Marquis, the Cavendishes, and the worthy Sir George Saville, promoted that and another from Derbyshire. A patriot remonstrance composed by an Irishman born a papist, and by a Scottish creature of Lord Bute, was deservedly ridiculed.
The Ministers, who should have met the storm early, and who by calling the Parliament might have intercepted many petitions, sought to keep off the discussion there, and would not let it meet till after Christmas. The Duke of Grafton, who had been honoured with the Garter, and elected Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, could not bear the thoughts of business. He diverted himself in the country, coming to town but once a week, or once a fortnight, to sign papers[245] at the Treasury; and as seldom to the King. I could but reflect how different had been the application of Sir Robert Walpole, my father, who, without relaxation but for two fortnights in the year, found it difficult enough to govern the kingdom and keep Opposition at bay, though secure of the King, secure of peace with France by meeting as pacific dispositions in Cardinal Fleury, void of alarms from Ireland and America, that were as quiet as his own county of Norfolk, and called on for no attention to a new empire that had now accrued to us at the eastern boundary of the world. The consequences were such as might be expected. Walpole maintained the equilibrium; under Grafton everything fell into confusion. Were any representations made to him, he threatened to resign, affirming that he only retained his power, because his quitting at that crisis would produce a dissolution of Parliament, from which he foresaw the worst consequences. The only step he took was to advise with the Chancellor, who told him surlily, that his Grace had consulted him but twice last session, and then had acted directly contrary to his advice. He was as blunt with the King, who telling him he hoped there was no truth in what he saw in the papers that his Lordship had thoughts of resigning the Seals, he replied, There was universal discontent amongst the people. Yet Hussey, the Chancellor’s friend, was warm against the petitions, and said, if any body moved in Parliament, as Lord Chatham threatened to do, for a dissolution of Parliament, he would vote for sending that person to the Tower. Sir Walter Blacket told his constituents, at Newcastle, that he would cut off his hand rather than sign a petition to the King to interfere with a resolution of the House of Commons. In fact, the lower people alone, whom it was easy to lead, gave in to petitions. The gentry in general discouraged, yet dared not openly oppose them, either fearing for their future elections, or dreading the abuse that was cast on all who opposed the popular cry. Sawbridge and Calcraft obtained at Maidstone a petition from the county of Kent, though all the magistrates shrunk from it, two gentlemen only appearing there, and they dissenting. Sawbridge told the mob the King had abused his prerogative by pardoning murderers. Another demagogue was less successful—Mr. Thomas Pitt,[246] Grenville’s creature, having harangued the County of Cornwall in favour of a petition, was severely reproached with having sold his own borough of Old Sarum to a Scotch placeman; and for meaning less a redress of grievances than an opportunity of selling it again by a new general election. Townshend, no less hot than Sawbridge, abused in open court the courts of justice; and at a trial of some weavers for destroying looms, being desired by the judge to quiet a riot without doors, returned and denied there being any tumult. He and Sawbridge repairing to Spitalfields, the late principal scene of uproar, Sir Robert Darling, a justice, told them there had been no mob till their arrival; and if they would not retire, he would commit them, which they were forced to do; but being ordered to attend the execution of two condemned cutters, they refused, because the spot was not specified in the sentence—a sacrifice to the mob that scandalized the merchants, who had suffered by the late outrages, and were exposed to daily injuries. The criminals, however, were at last hanged; but the sheriffs fearing to be insulted by the populace, and to avoid being reduced to call in the military, went guarded by a crowd of constables, and were obliged to have the convicts hanged precipitately. Yet the mob pelted the sheriffs, cut down the gallows, carried it with one of the bodies to the house of the prosecutor, and destroyed his looms. A justice of peace sent for guards from the Tower, while Sawbridge pleaded to the rioters that he had done everything in his power to save the criminals—a proof that his objection to the spot of execution had been solely an evasion offered to popularity. The sheriffs were as negligent of their duty on being required to suppress the tumults on Wilkes’s[247] birthday, when many windows were broken for not being illuminated.
It was not so valuable a triumph as he expected, when, on November the 10th, Wilkes carried his long-protracted cause against Lord Halifax. The damages were laid at 20,000l.: the jury gave him 4000l. One of the books of the Treasury was produced, in which had been entered a promise by the now zealous patriot, Mr. Grenville, that Lord Halifax should be indemnified, if cast in the suit.[248] The jury having disappointed the expectations of the populace by so moderate a fine, were hissed, and forced to escape by a back way.
The graver citizens, who do not relish liberty at the risk of their property, grew alarmed at these wild proceedings, and began to wish again for the decorous ascendance of moneyed men. The first stand they made was in Broad Street Ward, where they elected one Rossiter Alderman against Bull, a man set up by the Supporters of the Bill of Rights. Soon afterwards, attempts being made to introduce new Common Councilmen into several wards, the richer citizens exerted themselves to disappoint, and did disappoint, many of the turbulent candidates.
The scene in Ireland was not less alarming than the ill humour in England. An augmentation of the forces was designed there. Lord Townshend, afraid of a remnant of popularity, forbore to announce it in his speech at opening the session. It was even omitted in the estimates of the army; the Ministers there not having then acquainted themselves with what the charge would amount to. The Opposition moved, and carried by 13, two questions for addressing the Lord-Lieutenant to know the reason of the omission. The augmentation, however, was carried by 170 to 50. In all other questions, the Viceroy was defeated, particularly in one very important to the Sovereignty of England. It is usual, on calling a new Parliament, to assign as the cause some bill sent over by the Privy Council. The English Government always take care it should be a money bill. This bill, now returned to them from England, the House of Commons in Ireland rejected. The blow struck at the whole constitution of Ireland, as regulated in subservience to England by Poyning’s Act. The same innovation had been made in the reign of King William. Lord Sidney, then Deputy of Ireland, immediately, without waiting for directions from England, prorogued their Parliament, after making a strong protest against the rejection. He kept it prorogued till April, however inconvenient to the Government; the King in the meantime having nothing but his hereditary revenue. The punishment, however, fell more heavy on the Opposition by the odium it drew on them from the public creditors and the pensioners of the Court, who all remained unpaid during the suspension of Parliament. The Duke of Leinster,[249] a weak man, who aspired to be Lord-Lieutenant; Lord Shannon,[250] son of the late Speaker, who wished to be one of the Lords Justices, and was very artful; and the present Speaker Ponsonby,[251] who coveted Lord Clanbrazil’s place[252] for two lives, were at the bottom of the new intrigues of the Opposition. The Duke of Grafton, the Chancellor Camden, and the English Council advised immediate prorogation; but Lord Hertford, better acquainted with Ireland, where his estate lay, and which kingdom he had governed, besought them to wait till the money-bills, which are always transmitted hither before Christmas, should arrive. This was sound advice; for, though the rash order was given, the money-bills, which were actually passed and on the road, did arrive before Lord Townshend could receive the command for prorogation, which, when he executed it, was no longer an impediment to the collection of the revenue.
In the beginning of December, the English Privy Council sat on the dissolution of the Parliament so much demanded. All were unanimous against it, yet the Chancellor peremptorily condemned the introduction of Lutterell. Mr. Conway, by my advice, proposed a popular declaration in the King’s Speech against unusual exertion of prerogative. Most of the Council approved the idea; and, at Mr. Conway’s request, I drew words for that purpose; but he had not weight enough with the Duke of Grafton to get them admitted, or the King had too much influence over his Grace not to overrule so unpalatable a condescension.
A momentary triumph the Duke obtained over the popular party. Vaughan, a sanctified leader of the Bill of Rights, offered him 5000l. for the reversion of a place in America. The Duke, who should only have exposed the man, prosecuted him: yet Vaughan had much to plead in his excuse. Great debts were owing to him in the colony, of which the place in question was the Register, who resided in England, whence it was difficult to get his debts, which amounted to 80,000l. registered; and, therefore, he had tried to purchase the place, which had been often sold, for his son.[253] The Duke’s over affectation of virtue drew on him from Junius a detection, in which his active aversion to corruption did not appear quite so pure as his passive. It was proved that he had bestowed on Colonel Burgoyne a place, which the latter was to sell to reimburse himself for the expenses of his election at Preston. Some other papers from the same hand fell cruelly on Burgoyne.
As the Session approached, Lord Chatham engaged with new warmth in promoting petitions. He asked Mr. Cholmondeley,[254] Member for Cheshire, why his county had not petitioned? and told him he himself would move for dissolution of the Parliament; and, if not able to stand on his legs, “I will speak,” said he, as he lay on his couch, “in this horizontal posture.” Calcraft was not less zealous, and more active. He and Sir Joseph Mawbey obtained a petition from the county of Essex, though neither High Sheriff, the Members, nor one gentleman of the county would attend the meeting, at the head of which they were forced to set Sir Robert Bernard, Knight for Huntingdonshire.
In the City, attempts were made to save three more condemned cutters of looms, and handbills were dispersed inviting the weavers to assemble on the morrow in Moorfields, in order to petition the King for a pardon; but Beckford, the new Lord Mayor, and the Sheriff Sawbridge went thither and persuaded them to disperse; and the cutters were hanged without disturbance.
These many essays towards an insurrection were crowned by the unparalleled remonstrance of Junius to the King, the most daring insult ever offered to a prince but in times of open rebellion, and aggravated by the many truths it contained. Nothing could exceed the singularity of this satire, but the impossibility of discovering the author. Three men were especially suspected, Wilkes, Edmund Burke, and William Gerard Hamilton. The desperate hardiness of the author in attacking men so great, so powerful, and some so brave, was reconcileable only to the situation of Wilkes; but the masterly talents that appeared in those writings were deemed superior to his abilities: yet in many of Junius’s letters an inequality was observed; and even in this remonstrance different hands seemed to have been employed. The laborious flow of style, and fertility of matter, made Burke believed the real Junius: yet he had not only constantly and solemnly denied any hand in those performances, but was not a man addicted to bitterness; nor could any one account for such indiscriminate attacks on men of such various descriptions and professions. Hamilton was most generally suspected. He, too, denied it—but his truth was not renowned. The quick intelligence of facts, and the researches into the arcana of every office, were far more uncommon than the invectives; and men wondered how any one possessed of such talents, could have the forbearance to write in a manner so desperate as to prevent his ever receiving personal applause for his writings: the venom was too black not to disgrace even his ashes.[255]
A North Briton, of very inferior or no merit, followed this remonstrance, and spared the two royal brothers no more than Junius had palliated the errors of the King. The Duke of Cumberland, a weak and debauched boy, was censured for an intrigue with a lady of rank, which became of public notoriety, and will be mentioned hereafter. The Duke of Gloucester, a virtuous, discreet, and unexceptionable Prince, had involved himself in a more serious affair; of which, as I can, I must give a more particular account than was known to others.
Maria Walpole, second natural daughter of my brother, Sir Edward, and one of the most beautiful of women, had been married, solely by my means, to James late Earl of Waldegrave, Governor to the King and Duke of York, an excellent man, but as old again as she was, and of no agreeable figure. Her passions were ambition and expense: she accepted his hand with pleasure, and by an effort less common, proved a meritorious wife. When after her year of widowhood she appeared again in the full lustre of her beauty, she was courted by the Duke of Portland; but the young Duke of Gloucester, who had gazed on her with desire during her husband’s life, now openly showing himself her admirer, she slighted the subject, and aspired to the brother of the Crown. Her obligations to me, and my fondness for her, authorized me to interpose my advice, which was kindly but unwillingly received. I did not desist; but pointing out the improbabilities of marriage, the little likelihood of the King’s consent, and the chance of being sent to Hanover separated from her children,[256] on whom she doated, the last reason alone prevailed on the fond mother, and she yielded to copy a letter I wrote for her to the Duke of Gloucester, in which she renounced his acquaintance in the no new terms of not being of rank to be his wife, and too considerable to be his mistress. A short fortnight baffled all my prudence. The Prince renewed his visits with more assiduity after that little interval, and Lady Waldegrave received him without disguise. My part was soon taken. I had done my duty—a second attempt had been hopeless folly. Though often pressed to sup with her, when I knew the Duke was to be there, I steadily refused, and never once mentioned his name to her afterwards, though as their union grew more serious, she affectedly named him to me, called him the Duke, and related to me private anecdotes of the royal family, which she could have received but from him. It was in vain; I studiously avoided him. She brought him to see my house, but I happened not to be at home; he came again, alone; I left the house. He then desisted, for I never staid for his court, which followed the Princess Dowager’s, but retired as soon as she had spoken to me. This, as may be supposed, cooled my niece’s affection for me; but being determined not to have the air of being convenient to her from flattery, if she was not married, and having no authority to ask her the question on which she had refused to satisfy her father, I preferred my honour to her favour, and left her to her own conduct. Indeed my own father’s obligations to the royal family forbad me to endeavour to place a natural daughter of our house so near the Throne. To my brother the Duke was profuse of civilities, which I pressed him to decline; and even advised him not to see his daughter, unless she would own her marriage, which might oblige the Duke, in vindication of her character, to avow her for his wife. Married, I had no doubt they were. Both the Duke and she were remarkably religious; and neither of them dissolute enough to live, as they did at last, with all the liberties of marriage. The King and Queen denied their legal union, yet the respect with which they treated her spoke the contrary; and the homage which all men and all women paid her by a fortune singular to her, assured the opinion of her virtue, and made it believed that the King, privy to their secret, had exacted a promise of their not divulging it. By degrees her situation became still less problematic; and both the Duke and she affectedly took all occasions of intimating it by a formal declaration. At first she had houses, or lodgings, in the palaces nearest to his residence; and the latter were furnished from the royal wardrobe without limitation. She changed her liveries to a compound of the royal—was covered with jewels—the Duke’s gentlemen and equerries handed her to her chair in public—his equipages were dispatched for her—his sister, the Queen of Denmark, sent her presents by him, and she quitted all assemblies at nine at night, saying, “You know I must go.” At St. Leonard’s Hill, in Windsor Forest, near his own lodge at Cranbourn, he built her a palace, and lay there every night: his picture and Lord Waldegrave’s she showed in her bedchamber. These were not the symptoms of a dissoluble connection! Once they both seemed, in 1766, to be impatient of ascertaining her rank. She had obtained lodgings in the most inner court of the palace at Hampton, and demanded permission of Lord Hertford, Lord Chamberlain, for her coach to drive into it, an honour peculiar to the royal family. He, feeling the delicacy of the proposal, which would have amounted to a declaration, unless a like permission had been indulged to other countesses residing there, delayed mentioning it to the King, to whom he knew the request would be unwelcome. Lady Waldegrave sent to the Chamberlain’s office to know if it was granted. Lord Hertford then was obliged to speak. The King peremptorily refused, saying, he would not break through old orders. Afraid of shocking her, Lord Hertford begged I would acquaint Lady Waldegrave. I flatly refused to meddle in the business. In the meantime the Dukes of Gloucester and Cumberland went to Hampton Court. The former asked Ely, of the Chamberlain’s office, if the request was granted; and being told Lord Hertford was to ask it of his Majesty, the Duke, losing his usual temper, said passionately, “Lord Hertford might have done it without speaking to the King (which would have been rash indeed!)—but that not only Lady Waldegrave’s coach should drive in, but that she herself should go up the Queen’s staircase.” This being reported to Lord Hertford, he again pressed me to interpose; but I again refused: but, lest the Duke should resent it, I advised him to write to my niece: but she threw up her lodgings, when she could not carry the point she had aimed at. She obtained, however, about a year after, a sort of equivocal acknowledgment of what she was. The Duke of Gloucester gave a ball to the King and Queen, to which nobody, without exception, but certain of their servants and their husbands, and wives, and children, were admitted: yet Lady Waldegrave and her eldest daughter appeared there. She could have no pretension to be present, being attached by no post to either King or Queen; and it spoke itself, that the Duke could not have proposed to introduce his mistress[257] to an entertainment dedicated to the Queen. The Princess Dowager (and she was then believed to be the principal obstacle to the publicity of the marriage) alone treated Lady Waldegrave with coldness[258]—another presumption of their being married. His declining health often carried the Duke abroad. The Great Duke, with whom he contracted a friendship, told Lady Hamilton, wife of our Minister at Naples, that the Duke had owned his marriage to him. It was this union that was censured in the North Briton, as threatening a revival of the feuds of the two roses, by a Prince of the blood marrying a subject.
END OF THE THIRD VOLUME.
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