As success had given spirit to the Court, and had converted their fears into vengeance, another victim was marked; this was the Earl of Huntingdon, Groom of the Stole, a man too much vaunted for talents which he had proved he did not possess, and destitute of that wealth and interest which so often supply the want of talents. By affecting personal attachment to the King, he had escaped in all the late changes; though his post would often have accommodated the Administration; but the vanity of his royal descent[36] having prompted him to ask the title of Duke of Clarence, and a refusal following, he had flattered himself with obtaining it, as so many other titles had been wrenched from the Crown by Opposition. He absented himself on the first day of the session, and kept away his relation, Earl Ferrers. The King, glad of an opportunity of getting rid of him, too harshly sent for the golden key. Yet few pitied Lord Huntingdon, as few had pitied the Duke of Northumberland, who had both paid profuse court to Lord Bute, and had both deserted or duped him.[37] The post of Groom of the Stole was given to Lord Bristol, who rejoiced to find himself in so secure a harbour, and piously vowed not to risk himself by any want of the most servile assiduity and attendance. Lord Coventry[38] took occasion, as first Peer in the Bedchamber, to resent Lord Bristol’s preferment; but was, in truth, devoted to Lord Temple, and desirous of quitting the Court; as did the Duke of Manchester, too, another of the Bedchamber. The Duke of Beaufort was a greater loss. He had been the first convert of his family from Jacobitism, and now gave up Master of the Horse to the Queen, on some private dissatisfactions; yet, however, did not differ with the Court.
Severely as Lord Camden and Lord Huntingdon had been treated, no endeavours were spared to preserve Lord Granby. The Duke of Grafton stooped to every kind of intercession, but found the haughtiness with which he had behaved to Calcraft returned tenfold by the arrogance of that minion of fortune, who, to ensure Lord Granby’s dependence and resignation, now lent him sixteen thousand pounds, additional, to a great debt already contracted. Lord Granby accordingly, on the 17th, resigned his post of Commander-in-Chief and Master of the Ordnance, retaining nothing but his regiment of Blue Guards. Lord Chatham was not less in the power of the usurer Calcraft—so low had those two men, who had sat at the top of the world, reduced themselves by their dissipations! Lord Granby’s part was the weaker, as he recanted a vote he had not understood, for reasons he understood as little.
On the 15th, Lord Rockingham requiring to have the Lords summoned for a motion he intended to make, the Duke of Grafton desired it might be postponed, and that the House would adjourn for a week; meaning, that the dismission of the Chancellor would deprive them of a Speaker for some days. Lord Shelburne opposed the delay with much violence, and said the cause demanded accusation, as the Chancellor had been dismissed for a single vote; but no wretch would be found vile enough to accept the Seals in his room. This was thrown out to deter Yorke; and not a syllable of threat could be levelled at his timidity without effect.
After struggling with all the convulsions of ambition, interest, fear, honour, dread of abuse, and, above all, with the difficulty of refusing the object of his whole life’s wishes, and with the despair of recovering the instant if once suffered to escape, Charles Yorke, having taken three days to consider, refused to accept the Seals of Chancellor. It saved some distress to the Ministers that Sir John Cust, Speaker of the Commons, being seized with a paralytic stroke, sent his resignation to the House, which adjourned to the 22nd, and gave time for making new arrangements, when so many parts of Government were unhinged. In no light was Sir John Cust a loss. His want of parts and spirit had been very prejudicial. He had no authority; and by his sufferance of Barré’s, Burke’s, and Saville’s insults, which he ought to have checked, had endangered the country itself. He died unlamented a few days after.[39]
The wanton insolence of the Court on the first day’s victory, was well nigh costing them a total defeat. They had dismissed the Chancellor without being provided with a successor. Mr. Conway acquainted me, in the greatest secrecy, that the Duke of Grafton, dismayed at Yorke’s refusal of the Great Seal, would give up the Administration. Not a lawyer could be found able enough—or if able, bold enough—or if bold, decent enough—to fill the employment. Norton had all the requisites of knowledge and capacity, but wanted even the semblance of integrity, though for that reason, was probably the secret wish of the Court. He was enraged at the preference given to Yorke; yet nobody dared to propose him, even when Yorke had refused. Sir Eardley Wilmot had character and abilities, but wanted health. The Attorney-General, De Grey, wanted health and weight, and yet asked too extravagant terms. Dunning, the Solicitor-General, had taken the same part as his friends, Lord Camden and Lord Shelburne. Hussey, so far from being inclined to accept the office, determined to resign with his friend, Lord Camden, though earnest against the dissolution of the Parliament. Of Lord Mansfield, there could be no question; when the post was dangerous, his cowardice was too well known to give hopes that he could be pressed to defend it. In this exigence, Grafton’s courage was not more conspicuous. His first thought, without consulting the King’s inclination, was to offer the Administration to Lord Chatham or Lord Rockingham; but inclining to the latter. He had desired Mr. Conway to come to him in the evening and meet Lord Gower, Lord Weymouth, and Lord North, in the most private manner, for consultation. Conway went away in haste to Court, promising to return and dine with me, that he might consider what advice he would give to the Duke at night; but what was my astonishment, when, in two hours, Mr. Onslow came and told me that Mr. Yorke had accepted the Seals! He had been with the King over night (without the knowledge of the Duke of Grafton), and had again declined; but being pressed to reconsider, and returning in the morning, the King had so overwhelmed him with flatteries, entreaties, prayers, and at last with commands and threats, of never giving him the post if not accepted now, that the poor man sunk under the importunity, though he had given a solemn promise to his brother, Lord Hardwicke and Lord Rockingham, that he would not yield. He betrayed, however, none of the rapaciousness of the times, nor exacted but one condition, the grant of which fixed his irresolution. The Chancellor must of necessity be a peer, or cannot sit in the House of Lords. The Coronet was announced to Yorke; but he slighted it as of no consequence to his eldest son, who would, probably, succeed his uncle, Lord Hardwicke, the latter having been long married, and having only two daughters. But Mr. Yorke himself had a second wife, a very beautiful woman, and by her had another son. She, it is supposed, urged him to accept the Chancery, as the King offered, or consented, that the new peerage should descend to her son, and not to the eldest. The rest of his story was indeed melancholy, and his fate so rapid, as to intercept the completion of his elevation.[40]
He kissed the King’s hand on the Thursday; and from Court drove to his brother, Lord Hardwicke’s—the precise steps of the tragedy have never been ascertained. Lord Rockingham was with the Earl. By some it was affirmed, that both the Marquis and the Earl received the unhappy renegade with bitter reproaches. Others, whom I rather believe, maintained that the Marquis left the House directly;[41] and that Lord Hardwicke refused to hear his brother’s excuses, and retiring from the room, shut himself into another chamber, obdurately denying Mr. Yorke an audience. At night it was whispered that the agitation of his mind, working on a most sanguine habit of body, inflamed of late by excessive indulgence both in meats and wine, had occasioned the bursting of a bloodvessel; and the attendance of surgeons was accounted for, by the necessity of bleeding him four times on Friday. Certain it is that he expired on the Saturday between four and six in the evening. His servants, in the first confusion, had dropped too much to leave it in the family’s power to stifle the truth: and though they endeavoured to colour over the catastrophe by declaring the accident natural, the want of evidence and of the testimony of surgeons to colour the tale given out, and which they never took any public method of authenticating, convinced everybody that he had fallen by his own hand—whether on his sword, or by a razor, was uncertain.
Yorke’s speeches in Parliament had for some time, though not so soon as they ought, fallen into total disesteem. At the bar, his practice had declined from a habit of gluttony and intemperance, as I have mentioned. Yet, as a lawyer, his opinion had been in so high repute, that he was reported to have received an hundred thousand guineas in fees. In truth, his chief practice had flourished while his father was not only Lord Chancellor, but a very powerful Minister. Yorke’s parts were by no means shining. His manner was precise and yet diffuse, and his matter more sententious than instructive. His conduct was timid, irresolute, often influenced by his profession, oftener by his interest. He sacrificed his character to his ambition of the Great Seal, and his life to his repentance of having attained it.
Two days after Yorke’s death the Great Seal was put into commission in the hands of Baron Smythe and the Judges Aston and Bathurst. Sir Fletcher Norton had been made easy for the preference of Yorke, by the promise of the Speaker’s chair—and now, by an unwonted fit of decency, said he would not profit of the Government’s distress, but would remain Speaker. He was accordingly proposed by Lord North and Mr. Rigby. Lord John Cavendish, to the surprise of everybody, proposed Thomas Townshend the younger, but confessing he had not communicated his intention to the person he named. Lord George Sackville concurred with Lord John, and both threw out as many indirect aspersions on Norton as they could with any tolerable decency—the only reason probably for opposing him; and that they might deny his being unanimously elected. Townshend declared with astonishment, that he had not only never thought of the office, but knew himself totally unfit for it, and besought them to excuse him. He and his family voted for Norton, who was chosen by 237 to 121, and who, with a manliness at least in his profligacy, took possession of his post, without acting those stale affectations of modesty with which other Speakers have been wont to get themselves forced into the chair.
The very day on which Yorke died, Dunning, the Solicitor-General, and James Grenville (unwillingly, to gratify the violence of his brothers) declared they would resign their places. That of Master of the Horse to the Queen, was given to Lord Waldegrave.[42]
There also remained vacant, the posts of Commander-in-Chief and Master of the Ordnance. Foreseeing that the latter, if not the former, would be offered to General Conway, fearing it would involve him deeper with the Court, and desirous that he should preserve his character of disinterestedness, I early begged him to accept neither, as it would not become him to profit of Lord Granby’s spoils, with whom he had lived in friendship, and which would render him unpopular. He was overjoyed at hearing this opinion, as it was his own. Accordingly, when the King offered him the Ordnance, he desired to be excused, but offered to do the whole business of Master without taking the salary; adding, that if his Majesty would appoint no Master, he thought he could make advantageous improvements in the office. Lord Granby, too, would be less desperate, if he saw his posts not filled up. The King told Conway he was a phenomenon; that there was no satisfying other people, but he would not take even what was offered to him[43]—but as it suited the King’s views better to find men mercenary than disinterested, this virtue, as will appear, did not long make impression on him. He consented to Conway’s plan, and told him at the same time that Lord Granby had been agitated even to tears when he resigned, and had told his Majesty that he did not mean opposition: that, indeed, in cases of state, he must follow Lord Chatham; and Lord Camden in those of law. The King owned to Conway, that he had frightened Yorke into accepting the Seals by reproaching him with refusing to serve in that distress of Government, and by assuring him it was the last time the Seals should ever be offered to him.