VI.
In the summer of 1771, the Duke of Grafton was again induced to join the Administration, and he accepted the Privy Seal in the hope that he might prevent the quarrel with America from proceeding to extremities. But when he discovered that, in opposition to his earnest remonstrances, Government resisted all conciliation, were determined upon coercive measures, and would pay no regard even to the petition brought over by Mr. Penn in 1775, which was emphatically called the Olive Branch; and finally withdrew from that Administration; and having, in a private audience, explained to the Monarch his views of the state and dangers of the country if the present measures were pursued,—he became a temperate but firm opposer of the Ministry which lost America.
In the year 1782, the Duke of Grafton accepted the Office of Privy Seal under the Administration of Lord Rockingham, and retained his situation after the death of that truly patriotic nobleman and the resignation of Mr. Fox. Upon the accession of the Coalition Ministry in 1783, he resigned his office, and never afterwards resumed his seat in the Cabinet.[221]
FOOTNOTES
[1] Lord Weymouth was governed by Wood (author of the editions of Palmyra and Balbec), his secretary, who was suspected of having, in concert with Sullivan, betrayed the East India Company at the last peace. Wood was a great stockjobber, and now, and in the following year, was vehemently accused of bending the bow of war towards the butt of his interest. This was the more suspected, as, though we had now been the aggressors, France had for some time winked at the insult offered to their ship, and wished to receive no answer to their memorial, when Wood persisted in making a reply—which lowered the stocks. He who thus lowered them, could raise them again when he pleased.
[2] Mainon D’Invau saw that, with a Court so entirely demoralized as that of Louis the Fifteenth, any extensive financial reforms were impracticable. He had the disinterestedness to refuse the pension usually enjoyed by Ministers en retraite.—E.
[3] The Princess of Beauvau told me this story of him when he was Vice-Chancellor:—She found fault with the situation of his house; Maupeou replied he could see the Hôtel de Choiseul from the windows of his garrets, and that was felicity enough.
[4] Madame d’Esparbès, a woman of quality, was one of the mistresses that succeeded Madame de Pompadour, and hated the Duc de Choiseul. As he was one day coming down the great staircase at Versailles he met her going to the King. He took her by the hand, told her he knew her designs, led her down, returned to the King, and obtained an order for her appearing no more at Court. When Madame du Barry became the favourite mistress, by the intrigues of Maréchal de Richelieu, the Duc de Choiseul, seeing her pass through the gallery at Versailles, said to the Maréchal, “N’est ce pas Madame de Maintenon qui passe?”—a satire on Richelieu, who was so old as to remember the latter, for paying court in the dregs of life to the former, and marking his contempt for both the mistress and her flatterer.
[5] See the character of Choiseul, supra, vol. ii. p. 243.
[6] I one evening heard the Maréchal relate the histories of his five imprisonments in the Bastille. The first was for having, at fifteen, hid himself under the bed of the Duchess of Burgundy, the King’s mother. The second, I think, was for following the Regent’s daughter in the dress of a footman when she went to marry the Duke of Modena. I forget the others, or he had not time to finish them, for though he related well, he was not concise.