For six weeks this insurrection was neglected; and two regiments of dragoons, that were sent against them, proved unequal to the work. At last the House of Commons took up the affair, and foot being ordered out against the seditious, the matter was quashed, though not entirely suppressed, till the Earl of Hertford[196] was Lord Lieutenant, who refusing to pardon some of the chiefs, notwithstanding very considerable intercession, an end was put to the affair—but unless that country is more civilized and reclaimed from barbarism, or better guarded before another war breaks out, it will probably be selected by France and Spain for the first scene of their operations. At the time of which I have been speaking, France was more earnest to make a general peace, than to incense us by opening a war within our very gates,[197] and which might have made it dangerous for the Favourite to second their views.
He was hotly pushing his schemes to projection; and resolved not only to make the peace, but to be indisputably first minister when it should be made. Mr. Pitt was removed, who could have obstructed the first object; but while the Duke of Newcastle held the Treasury, there was a division of power, which all the lustre of favour could not entirely surmount. They who looked forward, bowed to the idol; but they who held by gratifications to the Treasury, could not but kiss the hand that dealt the bribe. At first it was designed by disgusts to drive the Duke to resign. Elliot and Oswald[198] were instructed to treat him rudely at his own board: but an old minister or an old mistress endure many shocks before they can be shaken off:[199] nor could all his own treacheries persuade the Duke of Newcastle that Lord Bute could so soon forget how instrumental his Grace had been in undermining Mr. Pitt. He still had a mind to be of the plot, though himself was become the object of it.
Newcastle’s friends were quicker sighted; and foreseeing that they must again range under Mr. Pitt, if cast off by the Court, they began to have doubts and difficulties—and did but hasten their fall, by daring to resume a right of opinion. The expense of the Portuguese war administered their first pretence of complaint, and the protection given to the King of Prussia by the Czar, changed the posture of his affairs so advantageously, that it had no gross appearance, when the Dukes of Cumberland, Newcastle, Devonshire, and their faction grew earnest for the continuance of the war in Germany. The Duke of Bedford, who was more than half-gained to the Court, but who always added some contradiction of his own, was averse to both wars, Portuguese and German; and Fox, who was willing to preserve an interest in the Duke of Cumberland, had a difficult part to act. He said to me, “The Duke of Devonshire says it is a Tory measure to abandon the Continent; for my part I do not know who are Whigs; they bore the partiality of the Pelhams[200] to the Tories, and Mr. Pitt’s declaration in their favour, who had complained that they enjoyed none of the favours of Government.” Lord Mansfield would have preserved Newcastle to the Court, but Lord Hardwicke pulled the other way. Lord Lincoln[201] was devoted to Pitt, and wished to unite him and his uncle Newcastle. The Duke of Devonshire advised the latter to resign; but so great was his inclination to keep even the dregs of power with the dregs of life, and so great his fear of being called to account for the waste of money on the German war, that though the King, as a fresh affront, declared seven new peers, without acquainting him, he not only overlooked it, but begged his cousin, Mr. Pelham,[202] might be added to the number, and got the barony of Pelham bestowed on himself, with reversion to that relation.
I am forced to detail these intrigues, because the moment was critical, and because it gave birth to a new party, and to many subsequent events. The Court was the more stiff, because they had conveyed a message through Count Virri,[203] the Sardinian minister in England, to the Bailli de Solar,[204] the Sardinian minister at Paris, desiring to renew the negotiation where it had been broken off. Lord Bute had gone farther: he had ordered Sir Joseph Yorke to treat privately with the Court of Vienna, without the knowledge of the King of Prussia. For some time the Court of Vienna did not vouchsafe an answer. To the confusion of the Favourite, the first news he had of any answer to come, was from the Baron de Knyphausen, the King of Prussia’s minister here.[205]
April 28th, the new peers kissed hands. Lord[206] Wentworth and Sir William Courtenay,[207] Tories, were made Viscounts. Lord Egmont,[208] Lord Milton,[209] Lord Brudenel, the Duke of Newcastle, Sir Edward Hussy Montagu,[210] Mr. Vernon,[211] of Sudbury, and Mr. Lane,[212] the two latter Tories, were made Barons, and Lady Caroline Fox, a Baroness. Lord Ligonier’s Irish peerage was entailed on his nephew. Mr. Vernon,[213] clerk of the Council, and Mr. Olmius,[214] were created Irish Barons. The Prince of Mecklenburg,[215] brother of the Queen, was made a Major-General. Lord Bute had often waved her request. She was advised to apply to the Princess, and the favour was immediately granted. Soon after, Buckingham House[216] was purchased and bestowed on her Majesty, St. James’s not seeming a prison strait enough. There the King and Queen lived in the strictest privacy, attended absolutely by none but menial servants; and never came to the palace but for the hours of levies and drawing-rooms. The King’s younger brothers were kept, till they came of age, in as rigid durance. Prince Henry, the third, a very lively lad, being asked if he had been confined with the epidemic cold, replied, “Confined! that I am, without any cold;” and soon after, when the Garter was bestowed on Prince William and Lord Bute, Prince Henry said, “I suppose Mr. Mackenzie[217] and I shall have the green ribands.”
CHAPTER XI.
Debate in the House of Commons on a Vote of Credit and the Support of Portugal.—The German War.—Pitt’s Speech.—Colonel Barré’s Reply to Mr. Pitt.—Lord Bute’s Ambition.—The Duke of Newcastle’s Resignation.—Fox and the Duke of Devonshire.—Ingratitude of the Clergy to Newcastle.—Unwise conduct of Lord Bute.—He is declared First Lord of the Treasury.—Sir Francis Dashwood, Chancellor of the Exchequer.—His unfitness for that Office.—His general Character.—His establishment of a Society of Young Travellers.
May 12th. The House of Commons debated on a vote of credit, and the support of Portugal. Glover the poet pleaded against Portugal’s claim to our assistance, from their many infractions of treaties, from their cramping our trade, and from the impossibilities our merchants had found of obtaining redress; a complaint that seemed to bear hard on the late ministry: to which he added reflections on the extravagance of the German war, which, contrary to the professions of ministers, had grown from £200,000 to six or seven millions. Pitt was offended, and corrected Glover, who threw his information on some nameless merchants, by whom he had been told that their remonstrances on the difficulties of the Portuguese trade had not been read by the ministers. Wilkes censured the weakness and irresolution of the ministry; their abandoning Belleisle, and neglecting to send over the officers to Germany. It was even said, he affirmed, that they had been humiliating themselves at the Court of Vienna. Legge more gently, and Beckford with more rhodomontade, pressed the same accusations. The latter was for invading Spain by sea; declared that the City suspected the ministry of wavering, and demanded to have their old minister again. Grenville answered finely, and compared the smallness of the sum demanded, £300,000, with the expense in Germany. Belleisle had cost more than what was now asked for Portugal. That Court knew how we were embarrassed, and asked not more than she knew we could give. What proof was there of irresolution? was not Martinico conquered? was not the Havannah likely to follow? or did Beckford think that great words, blustered in Parliament, constituted resolution? Fluctuating reports were rather owing to stockjobbers than to fluctuation in the measures of Government. He affirmed that not one step had been taken at Vienna derogatory to any of our connections. We had only tried to feel how they relished the family-compact among the Bourbons. But whether the resolution was taken to recall our troops from Germany, or at all events to go on, would it be prudent to declare which was to be the measure?
Lord George Sackville was liberal in blaming the expense of the German war, which he compared with that of Queen Anne; the whole of which, he maintained, except in 1711 and 1712, did not amount to what this German war had cost alone, though we had then employed more British and other troops than at present. Queen Anne’s war had never exceeded eight millions, including garrisons, fleet, &c. The expense of 172,000 men from 1709 to 1711 had not gone beyond what one year had recently cost in Germany. If there had not been new inventions for expense, we should not now be ready to beg peace.