On this second occasion (May 12, 1755) Pitt formally declared their connection at an end. Fox asked if Pitt suspected him of ill faith in the recent negotiations. Pitt, on his honour, held him blameless. 'Then,' asked Fox, 'are our lines incompatible?' 'Not incompatible, but convergent,' a word that Fox professed not to understand. In the future it was possible they might act together, not now. On this or some proximate occasion, Pitt blurted out what was at least one cause of offence. 'Here is the Duke of Cumberland King and you his minister.' The Duke, like Fox himself, was only an ordinary member of the Council of Regency, so that Pitt's taunt was absurd. But Pitt was looking to the young court of Leicester House which detested and distrusted Cumberland; hence this outburst of jealousy and wrath. Pitt indeed, the day before, had seen the Princess of Wales; who, it was presumed, had insisted on an open and immediate rupture with Fox as the price of her support. But beneath all there was we think, in spite of all professions, undying suspicion of Fox's rectitude in the recent negotiation with Newcastle.[281]
CHAPTER XVIII.
It was soon clear to Newcastle that Fox after all might not suffice, and that Pitt must be again approached. The King, then in Hanover and beyond Newcastle's control, was negotiating new treaties of subsidy on behalf of his German dominions; one with Hesse-Cassel for a contingent of 12,000 men to act in defence of Hanover or Great Britain, the other with Russia for an army of 40,000 men for the defence of Hanover. It was terrible for the Duke to contemplate what Pitt might say and do with regard to such unpopular and indefensible instruments. Moreover, Pitt was now supported by the court, every day more and more important, of Leicester House. It was probably Hardwicke, who as the moving brain of the Cabinet saw the vital importance of securing Pitt, and who was, we think, sincerely favourable to Pitt's pretensions, if only from hatred of Fox, who suggested these negotiations; and it was his son Charles Yorke who entered upon them. Yorke was to act as a skirmisher, to get in touch with Pitt, and to report on the temper in which he found him. They met on July 6 (1755), and talked over the abortive conference with Walpole. Pitt declared that he had then waived the immediate bestowal of the Secretaryship of State, but had asked not merely that Newcastle should speak on his behalf before the King left for Hanover, and urge that he was the proper person to lead the debates in the House of Commons; but that Lady Yarmouth should also be interested in his cause, so that she might use her influence with the King during their stay abroad.
Of Newcastle himself he spoke with supreme disdain. It was a waste of time to bring him assurances of friendship and confidence from Newcastle. All that was over. He would never owe Newcastle a favour, he would accept nothing as an obligation to Newcastle. This is not in Yorke's account, because probably it would be shown to Newcastle. But it comes authentically enough from Pitt's brother-in-law, James Grenville, to Bubb. If Newcastle were really in earnest, he would say that he could listen to no proposition but this: 'This is our policy; and the post of Secretary of State, in which you shall support it, is destined for you.'
Yorke reported to his father, and Hardwicke saw Pitt on August 8 (1755), with power to offer a seat in the Cabinet. After compliments, to use Eastern language, which were usually the preface of such interviews, in which both parties assured each other of high mutual esteem, which Pitt went so far on this occasion as to declare for Newcastle, in strange contrast with his language to Yorke, they came at once to the point. Before he could take what was required, 'a clear, active, and cordial part in support of the King's measures in the House of Commons,' Pitt desired to know what those measures might be. Hardwicke at once specified them. 'Twas all open and above board; the support of the maritime and American war, in which we were going to be engaged, and the defence of the King's German dominions, if attacked on account of the English cause. The maritime and American war he came roundly into, tho' very orderly, and allowed the principle and obligation of honour and justice as to the other, but argued strongly as to the practicability of it. That subsidiary treaties would not go down; the nation could not hear' (obviously 'bear') them. That they were a connection and a chain, and would end in a general plan for the Continent which the country would (obviously 'could') not possibly support.' Then he went into financial considerations. The maritime and American war would alone add two millions a year to the National Debt, which could not bear an addition of one million. He would treat Hanover like any other foreign dependency of the British Crown; the worst that could happen was that it should be occupied by the enemy for a time and restored at a peace, and that then compensation might be given to the King. As to the subsidies, Hessian and Russian, he asked questions but did not commit himself. But he inquired, with peculiar emphasis, what others, such as Fox, Legge, Lee, and Egmont, thought of them. At last he said he must consult his friends, one of whom, Legge, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, he was about to visit. But why, asked Hardwicke, should he not see Newcastle himself? 'With all my heart, if he would see me,' replied Pitt. To the offer of a seat in the Cabinet he said neither yea nor nay, but he was, thought Hardwicke, gratified by the overture.[282]
One cannot but note the strange contrast between Pitt's language about Newcastle to Hardwicke and that which he had used to Yorke. 'He expressed great regard for your Grace and me.' But this was the base coinage in political use at that time, and Pitt had by this time become a master of dissimulation. Fox hated Newcastle to the full as much as did Pitt. In truth, every one seems to have secretly hated or despised him, or both; a melancholy reward for an industrious ministerial existence. But so great was his political influence that scarce any one could afford to say so.
One Minister was now, however, to display a rare courage, and to oppose both the King and his Minister on a critical point. In the middle of August, after the conversation with Hardwicke, the treaty of subsidy with Hesse-Cassel arrived for the necessary confirmations. When it came before Legge as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he, no doubt with the connivance of Pitt, flatly refused his signature. Newcastle had always distrusted Legge, as, indeed, he distrusted everybody, and had given him the seals of the Exchequer with great reluctance. He was now aghast. War was imminent; the King would soon return with his pockets full of odious treaties of subsidy; Fox was still a malcontent; Legge was in open revolt; it was evident that he must face the formidable interview with Pitt. So he expressed the necessary wish, though one may guess his reluctance, and Pitt saw the Duke on September 2 (1755) for two hours and a half. The record of this interview is contained in a long letter from Newcastle to Hardwicke,[283] couched in the quavering notes of a distracted Minister. It begins with a wail of despair, the reluctant acknowledgment of the paramount importance of Pitt. 'I never sat down to write to your lordship with more melancholy apprehensions for the Publick than at present. I see nothing but confusion and it is beyond me to point out a remedy.'
This was the result of Pitt's verbal refusal to join him, made by a Minister who held the great mass of the House of Commons in the hollow of his hand, who clung to office as to life, and yet, though he knew Pitt was indispensable to its retention, would not once more, as in 1746, face his Sovereign and say so. Nothing can better illustrate the trembling plank on which the Duke was content to walk, wavering and helpless, depending only on Hardwicke's counsel and his own jobs. He did not dare face the King, he was bullied by the disorderly chiefs in the House of Commons, and he was always chaffering, but always afraid. So he and his like are satisfied to bear the yoke for the semblance of power.