COALITION BETWEEN PITT AND ADDINGTON.
At the close of this year Pitt felt his ministerial condition to be one of extreme difficulty. Under these circumstances he was compelled to make peace with Addington, who had carried with him a considerable force to the mixed opposition. It is said that the king insisted upon this reconciliation; and it appears to be proved, not only by expressions used by Pitt himself in hisletters to Wilberforce, but from the fact that Addington was raised to the peerage as Viscount Sidmouth of Sidmouth. He was brought into the cabinet as president of the council, in the room of the Duke of Portland, who resigned office on account of age and infirmity. At the same time Lord Mulgrave was appointed secretary of state for the foreign department, in the place of Lord Harrowby, who was suffering from a severe illness; and the Earl of Buckinghamshire took Lord Mulgrave’s post, as chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.
A.D. 1805
Parliament was opened by the king in person on the 15th of January. In his speech the king announced that preparations for invasion were still carried on by France with unceasing activity; and that Spain, under French control, had declared war against this country. But his majesty was still confident of ultimate success; for after referring to the skill and intrepidity of the British navy, the formidable state of the army, and the general ardour manifested by all classes of his subjects, he characterized the intended invasion as “presumptuous and desperate.” The usual addresses were passed unanimously in both houses.
ARMY AND NAVY ESTIMATES, ETC.
On the 23rd of January the commons voted 120,000 men, including marines, for the service of the navy during the present year. A few days after the secretary at war moved the army estimates, which amounted to £12,395,490 for 312,000 men under various heads of service; on which occasion lie stated that in the United Kingdom there were 600,000 men in arms, including volunteers, of whom 240,000 were fit for active and immediate service. The budget was opened on the 13th of February, when the supplies stated amounted to £44,500,000 for Great Britain and Ireland. The ways and means comprised a loan of £20,000,000 for Great Britain, and £2,500,000 for Ireland; and a considerable addition was made to the war-taxes. Thus the income-tax was raised to six and a quarter per cent., and the salt-duty was augmented by one-half. The new taxes were estimated at £1,000,000; yet Pitt, while thus adding to the public burden, and while war menaced England on every hand, congratulated the house on the increasing prosperity of the country. At this time, however, the prime minister had lost much of his usual confidence, arising partly from his declining health. Although in the prime of life, Pitt, from the task which he had undertaken, and which he so energetically performed, was now in constitution a worn-out man. The burden of office was too great for his strength; and it had become manifest that he would never arrive at the allotted age of man.