"Tried by your country! To your people's love,
Amiable prince, so soon appeal;
Stay till the tender sentiments improve,
Ripening to gratitude from zeal.
Years hence (yet, ah! too soon) shall Britain see
The trial of thy virtue past;
Who could believe that your first wish would be
What all believe will be your last."[148]
A rift in the lute showed itself very soon, for almost immediately after the accession of George III, the ascendancy of Lord Bute was displayed in so many ways that it became obvious to all observers. There was some surprise when the name of the Duke of Cumberland was struck out of the liturgy, and a great deal of indignation when the favourite was made Ranger of Richmond Park in the place of Princess Amelia, who, Huish says, "was literally turned out;" but the indignation of the latter was certainly misplaced, for the Princess resigned the post as the result of a quarrel about a right of way with the townsfolk of Richmond. From the beginning of the new reign the City of London was suspicious of Lord Bute, and that powerful corporation was at no pains to disguise its feelings. "The City have a mind to be out of humour; a paper has been fixed in the Royal Exchange with these words—'No Government! No Scotch Minister! No Lord George Sackville'[149]—two hints totally unfounded, and the other scarce true. No petticoat ever governed less; it is left at Leicester House—for the King himself, he seems all good nature, and wishing to satisfy everybody; all his speeches are obliging. I saw him on the throne, where he's all graceful and genteel; sits with dignity, and reads his answers to addresses well."[150] So Horace Walpole wrote early in November, 1760; but it must be admitted that that usually keen observer did not display his usual prescience, for the "Scotch Minister" might have been sighted on the political horizon.
Indeed, almost at once negotiations were set on foot to place Bute at the head of affairs. "Lord Bute came to me by appointment, and stayed a great while," Dodington records so early in the new reign as November 29, 1760. "I pressed him much to take the Secretary's office, and provide otherwise for Lord Holdernesse; he hesitated for some time, and then said, if that was the only difficulty, it would be easily removed, for Lord Holdernesse was ready at his desire to quarrel with his fellow-ministers (on account of the slights and ill-usage which he had daily experienced), and go to the King, and throw up in seeming anger, and then he (Bute) might come in without seeming to displace anybody."[151] Bute required little persuasion to accept office, for his desire was to displace the Prime Minister and reign in his stead, and his object was so little disguised that when some time before he had been congratulated upon his appointment as Groom of the Stole to the then Prince of Wales, he had replied, he could feel no pleasure while the Duke of Newcastle was Minister.
The King threw the full weight of his influence into the scale in Bute's favour, and at the end of January, 1761, the Duke of Newcastle told the Marquis of Rockingham, "We have received a message from the King, of great importance; he wishes that the Earl of Holdernesse may resign the place of Secretary of State for the Northern Department, and receive in lieu of it the Wardenship of the Cinque Ports, and that the Earl of Bute may be appointed Secretary of State for the Northern Department, in place of the Earl of Holdernesse."[152] An animated discussion followed the royal message. Lord Hardwicke was in favour of carrying out the King's wish, on the ground that this was the first instance in which the King had interfered in the nomination of ministers, and that resistance might excite ill-will towards the present holders of office; but the Marquis of Rockingham, who realized it was the King's ultimate intention to dismiss the existing Cabinet, urged his colleagues to consider how, if they admitted in February, 1761, that the Earl of Bute was fit to be a Secretary of State, they could say in the following year he was not fit to be Prime Minister.[153] In the end, however, Lord Holdernesse retired in favour of Lord Bute.
This, as Lord Rockingham had foreseen, was regarded by the King as a first step only: he was not content with having placed Bute in the Ministry, he desired to make him Prime Minister. To achieve this object, however, it was necessary to get rid of Pitt, and in this the King had the assistance of the Duke of Newcastle, who scarcely felt himself the chief of the administration that bore his name so long as Pitt, with his great talents and reputation, was in the Ministry. An opportunity soon presented itself. When Pitt, hearing of the "Family Compact" between France and Spain in August, 1761, desired to withdraw the British Ambassador from Madrid, his proposal, supported by Lord Temple and James Grenville, was overruled by Henry Fox, George Grenville, Lord Hardwicke, the Duke of Bedford,[154] and Lord Bute. Finding his influence declining, he threatened to resign, a course that was represented to the King as dangerous to the common weal, "I am determined not to be the only slave in a country," the monarch declared, "where it is my wish to see all the people free." When Pitt found his colleagues had formed a cabal with the object to compel him to retire and that he was powerless to overcome their opposition, he and Lord Temple tendered their resignation on October 5 to the King. The King received Pitt graciously, courteously expressed his regrets at the loss of so able a minister (whom he had assisted to drive from office), expressed approval of the views of his remaining ministers, and in conclusion offered the bestowal of any rewards in the power of the Crown. "I confess, Sire," it is recorded that Pitt replied, overcome by the monarch's kindness, "I had but too much reason to expect your Majesty's displeasure. I did not come prepared for this exceeding goodness; pardon me, Sire, it overpowers, oppresses me." Then, the chroniclers agree, the Great Commoner burst into tears, but before he left the royal presence he had accepted a peerage for his wife and a pension for two lives of £3,000 a year. "It is difficult to say," Walpole remarked, "which exulted most on the occasion, France, Spain, or Lord Bute, for Mr. Pitt was the common enemy of all three."
The behaviour of Pitt's colleagues was resented by the public, and the Corporation of London passed a vote of thanks to the ex-minister, while many who had seen an evil omen in the falling of a large jewel from the crown during the coronation, now declared that their fear had been fulfilled.
"When first, portentous, it was known,
Great George had jostled from his crown
The brightest diamond there;
The omen-mongers, one and all,
Foretold some mischief must befall,
Some loss beyond compare.
Some fear this gem is Hanover,
Whilst others wish to God it were;
Each strives the nail to hit
One guesses that, another this,
All mighty wise, yet all amiss;
For, ah! who thought of Pitt?"[155]
On the other hand, caricaturists and pamphleteers in the pay of Bute exulted in cartoon and verse at the downfall of the Great Commoner, and poured scorn on him for accepting favours at the King's hands.
"Three thousand a year's no contemptible thing
To accept from the hands of a patriot king,
(With thanks, to the bargain, for service and merit),
Which he, wife and son, all three shall inherit
With limited honours to her and her heirs.
So farewell to old England. Adieu to all cares."[156]