FIVE-GUINEA PIECE OF GEORGE I.
Whilst Walpole was thus labouring to secure the peace of Europe, Bolingbroke was as industriously at work to undermine him. He had cultivated his intimacy with the Duchess of Kendal still more diligently, and by liberal bribes, and more liberal promises if he succeeded in once more regaining power, he had brought her to exert her influence with the king in his favour. This most sordid and rapacious of mistresses, who looked on England only as a country to be managed for her benefit, ventured at length to put into the king's hand a memorial drawn up for her by Bolingbroke, demonstrating that the country must be absolutely ruined if Walpole continued in office. The stratagem was too palpable. Whilst she talked only, her suggestions might pass for her own, but the style of the document must have at once caused the king's suspicion of its true source. He put the paper into Walpole's hand. Walpole, after interrogating the two Turks, who were always in attendance on the king, and on their denying all knowledge of the means by which the missive reached the royal person, went directly to the Duchess and charged her with the fact. She did not deny it. Walpole advised the king to admit Bolingbroke to the audience which he solicited in the memorial, trusting that the king's dislike of him would prevail in the interview. The result appeared to be of that kind; nevertheless, Walpole was far from being secure in his own mind. He knew that the mistress would be continually returning to the charge in favour of her friend and paymaster, though she enjoyed a pension from Government of seven thousand five hundred pounds; and he even contemplated retiring with a peerage, but was dissuaded from this by the Princess of Wales and the Duke of Devonshire. On the other hand, Bolingbroke was in the highest expectation of his speedy restoration not only to rank but to office.
The deaths of monarchs, however, were peculiarly fatal to this ambitious man; that of Queen Anne had precipitated him from power, and rescued his country from the ruin he prepared for it; that of George now came as opportunely to prevent the national calamity of his ministry. George set out for Hanover on the 3rd of June, accompanied, as usual, by Townshend and the Duchess of Kendal. Just before his departure the youthful Horace Walpole saw him for the first and last time. When the king was come down to supper, Lady Walsingham took Walpole into the Duchess's ante-room, where George and his favourite were alone. Walpole knelt and kissed the king's hand. George appeared in his usual health.
In his impatience to reach his beloved Hanover, the king had out-travelled his Minister and the mistress, and reached Delden on the 8th late at night. The next morning he proceeded again so early as four o'clock, and was pressing onward, when in the forenoon he was seized with a fit of apoplexy in his coach, and on arriving at Ippenburen he was observed to be quite comatose—his eyes fixed, his hands motionless, and his tongue hanging from his mouth. His attendants wished to remain at Ippenburen to procure medical assistance; but this seemed to rouse him, and he managed to articulate, "Osnabrück! Osnabrück!" The only chance for his life, if there was any, depended on instant surgical aid; they went in obedience to his command, and on arriving at Osnabrück he was found quite dead on the 9th of June, 1727.
CHAPTER III.
THE REIGN OF GEORGE II.
Accession of George II.—Characters of the King and Queen—Adroit Tactics of Walpole—Rise and Fall of Compton—Attitude of the Opposition—Congress of Soissons—Causes of Dispute with Spain—Stanhope's successful Negotiations with King Philip—Retirement of Townshend—Walpole Supreme—Peace Abroad and at Home—Walpole's System of Wholesale Bribery and Corruption—The Public Prisons—Duel between Pulteney and Lord Hervey—The Excise Scheme—Great Outcry—Withdrawal of the Bill—Walpole's Vengeance—Attack on the Septennial Act—Wyndham's Speech—Depression of the Opposition—Definitive Peace of Vienna—Gin Act—The Porteous Riots—The Prince of Wales and the Opposition—Application for an Increase of his Allowance—Birth of George III.—Death of Queen Caroline—Attempt to Reduce the Army—Disputes with Spain—"Jenkins' Ear"—Walpole's Negotiations—Secession of the Opposition—Further Difficulties with Spain—Declaration of War—Privateers and Reprisals—Vernon's Victory—Frederick invades Silesia—Assistance of England—Parliament Meets—Sandys' Motion—Walpole's Defence—Disasters of Maria Theresa—She throws herself on the Magyars—Misfortunes of the English Fleets—Vernon Repulsed from Carthagena—Power slips from the Hands of Walpole—His Last Battles—The Chippenham Election Petition—His Fall.
George II. was born in 1683, and was, consequently, in his forty-fourth year when he ascended the throne. In 1705 he married the Princess Caroline Wilhelmina of Anspach, who was born in the year before himself, by whom he had now four children—Frederick Prince of Wales, born in 1707, William Duke of Cumberland, born in 1721, and two daughters.