Fortunately, however, this solution of the difficulty was rendered unnecessary. A compromise, as usual, afforded a convenient escape to all parties, without disappointing any; and by an ingenious re-distribution of three or four regiments (devised by His Majesty himself), Taylor was provided for elsewhere, and Nugent obtained his lieutenant-colonelcy. There was great difficulty, nevertheless, in bringing His Majesty to this point. He had made up his mind to give the vacant regiment to Taylor, and would hear of no one else. "I am truly sorry to say," observes Mr. Pitt, in the course of the negotiations, "that he seems thoroughly determined not to yield, and I am sure no consideration will induce him to agree to any other arrangement." Had it depended solely on the disposition of the King, the difference would never have been adjusted, and Lord Buckingham, stung by these repeated indignities, might have thrown up his Government at a conjuncture when his retirement must have plunged the country into anarchy. How seriously this step was contemplated by him and Mr. Grenville will appear from the following correspondence:
MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.
Whitehall, April 7th, 1789.
My dear Brother,
I have just received your letter of the 3rd, and though I have nothing new to say to you upon the point of Captain Taylor, he not having yet sent his answer, I cannot help writing a few lines, lest you think the subject is out of my mind. With respect to the promotions of peerage, the fault, if there is any, is mine; because I felt, and still continue to feel, that under the present circumstances, and till this business of Taylor is settled, the other ought to be postponed; nor can I imagine any real inconvenience to arise from it. I am, however, by no means sanguine in my expectations of the event of this business. I have already expressed to you my sense of the King's treatment of you in this instance, and my determination to abide by any measures that you may think it right to take in this situation. I cannot, however, in justice to you or to myself, avoid saying, that I most sincerely wish you to consider well the step which you are about to take; and that not only with a reference to your present situation or to your immediate feelings, but with a view to the interpretation which the public will put upon it, and with a view to any future political object of ours. With respect to the latter, I am persuaded you must see that it is impossible for you to resign the Lord-Lieutenancy of Ireland at this time, and on this ground, without making up your mind at the same moment finally to renounce all ideas of our taking any part hereafter as public men in this country. If you will consider what our situation would be, after such a step, with the King, with the Prince, with Pitt's friends, and with Fox, and lastly with the public at large, you will, I am sure, think that the consequence which I state is not overstrained.
I can, without affectation, assure you, that though I am not indifferent either to the recollection of what we have already done, or to the prospects which are now before us; yet that I could perfectly well make up my mind to a different line of life, and that I am confident I possess sufficient resources within myself to reconcile myself to such a step, provided it were taken for an object which I felt to be tanti. And such I certainly do consider the object of marking to you, and to the world, and of discharging, in a manner satisfactory to my own feelings, my gratitude and affectionate attachment to you, in an instance where I entirely agree with you in thinking you ill-treated, at a time when you had deserved best.
It remains, therefore, for you to consider what step it may be best for you to take under all the present circumstances. Even if your mind should ultimately lean to the idea of resigning, I should certainly strongly press you not to carry this idea into effect till you have closed your session in Ireland; and in this advice, at least, I am certainly disinterested, because my situation would, in the interim, be more disagreeable and embarrassing than it could be under any other circumstances. But I am sure that if you were to quit immediately, as you now talk of doing, you never could induce any one to believe that this step was not taken with a view to escape from present difficulties, instead of being intended to mark your sense of personal ill-treatment; and that when the impression of the present moment upon your feelings was over, you never would forgive yourself for having concluded the transactions of this winter by such a termination.
I have only to add that I am not indifferent, and that I am persuaded you are not, to the public consequences of our conduct. It is one of the circumstances which are necessarily attendant upon a public situation and a public line of life, that a person who is engaged in it cannot act even in those points which most nearly concern himself without producing consequences which are often of great public importance. It will certainly not be a pleasant reflection to me to have materially contributed to the overthrow of that system of public men and public measures which I believe to be of the utmost importance to the welfare and prosperity of my country. On the best reflection which I can give to the subject, weighing what I owe to you and to myself, and what I owe to others, I shall feel myself justified, whatever may be the consequences; but certainly my feelings upon them will be such as to prevent my ever again putting myself into a similar situation, even if the circumstances to which I have alluded in the beginning of this letter did not, as they probably will, render such an event absolutely impossible.
When I speak of contributing to the overthrow of the present system you certainly understand me to refer to the probable consequences of our withdrawing ourselves from it, and not to any idea of your being led, which I am persuaded is impossible, to contribute actively to the triumph of a most wicked and profligate faction. I should feel that I gave you just cause of offence, if I thought it necessary to say, that this is a point to which no consideration could lead me.
You will excuse me if I have said so much in this letter upon my own subject, in treating of a point which relates to your conduct and to your situation. I feel that the two subjects are too intimately connected for me to speak of them separately, and I felt that you could not but be desirous, in the moment of deciding a step so interesting to us both, that I should open my heart to you in as free and unrestrained a manner as I have now done.
One thing more I must recommend to your serious consideration. Nothing is clearer to my mind than the propriety of the step you have taken in dismissing Ponsonby, of the intimation which you have given to Lord Shannon of the necessary consequences of his present conduct, and of the measures you have adopted for securing to yourself efficient assistance by the removal of Fitzherbert, and by the nomination of Hobart on the persuasion which you entertain of his ability to serve you. But I must entreat you to reflect that this line of conduct is only to be justified on the supposition of your being to remain in Ireland; while, on the other hand, entertaining as you now do the idea of quitting your situation, it is surely a duty which you owe to yourself, as well as to the public, to leave to your successor his decision as free and open as your own is now, on points which may be of such infinite importance to his Government. To have failed in this instance would, I am sure, much add to the many grounds of regret which will press themselves upon your mind.