Pitt, driven into war against his will, was sincerely anxious for peace. He had entered on the war for political reasons, and would not be deterred from negotiation by dislike of the French republican government. His views were not shared by all his colleagues; Windham and Pitt's whig supporters generally were averse from peace because they desired the overthrow of the revolutionary system. The king fully sympathised with them, and their sentiments were stimulated and expressed by Burke, whose first Letter on a Regicide Peace appeared in the autumn. Pitt believed that the new French government would be willing to treat, and that it would remain in power, so that a stable peace might be hoped for. The king's speech at the opening of parliament in October, 1795, stated that the government would be willing to treat, and this was emphatically declared in a royal message to parliament on December 8. Sorely against the king's will, an attempt at negotiation was made in the early spring through Wickham, the British ambassador at Berne. His overtures were scornfully rejected, the directors replying that no proposition for the surrender of any of the countries declared by France to be "re-united" to herself would be entertained. This was final; for England was bound by treaty to maintain the integrity of the Austrian dominions, and could treat only on the basis of the surrender of the Austrian Netherlands by France.
In July the cabinet determined to make another attempt. A strong party in France desired peace, and the friends and agents of the British government abroad represented that the directors would be unable to resist its demands. The expenses of the war were enormous, for Austria clamoured for financial support; and it seemed possible that the emperor, pressed by the double French invasion of Germany and by Bonaparte's victories in Italy, might make a separate peace.[267] England's naval successes had given her much that Pitt could offer. And he would offer much, for he was in earnest in his attempt. If it did not succeed he would at least show the nation that he desired peace, and the rejection of his offers would wound its pride, rouse its spirit, and encourage it to bear the burden of the war. George believed that the attempt would fail, and consented to it because he reckoned that its failure would have this effect on the nation. In September the cabinet requested the Danish ambassador in Paris to ask for a passport for an English minister. The directors rejected his mediation, but the strength of the peace party prevented them from declining all negotiation, and they offered to receive a minister if the British government made an official request. Great Britain was, in fact, to sue for peace. The government acquiesced, and Malmesbury was sent over to Paris. England offered all that she had conquered from France for a peace which should include her allies, if France would surrender the Austrian Netherlands either to the emperor or in exchange for some equivalent which he would accept, and restore the Milanese. The surrender of the Netherlands was refused, and on December 19 Malmesbury was ordered to leave Paris in twenty-four hours. This abrupt termination was connected with the death of Catherine of Russia on November 17, soon after she had agreed to support Austria with an army of 60,000 men to be paid by England. Her half-crazy son and successor, Paul, declared himself neutral. On the part of the directory, however, the negotiations were illusory, undertaken merely to appease domestic discontent. The French declared that England's offers were insincere. Fox and his party adopted the same line, and their attacks on the government left them with thirty-seven supporters in the commons and eight in the lords.
This ineffectual negotiation roughly coincides with the beginning of an awful period of stress and depression. The directory designed to isolate England, reduce her to bankruptcy by destroying her commerce, and complete her ruin by invasion. Already Austria, her one efficient ally, was nearly exhausted; her commerce was shut out from the Mediterranean, and, though vigorously pushed in other quarters, was constantly harassed, and a plan of invasion was ripe for prosecution. Pitt met the prospect of invasion by proposals for increasing the army and navy by parochial levies, and for the formation of militia reserves and irregular cavalry. Fox asserted that the French did not contemplate an invasion, and that the immediate duty of parliament was to guard the freedom of the people against its domestic enemies, the ministers. This disgraceful speech roused the indignation of the peace-loving Wilberforce, who declared that Fox and his friends seemed to wish that just so much evil should befall their country as would bring them into office. Though the government easily carried its proposals for defence, it was embarrassed by financial difficulties. Pitt had granted an advance of £1,200,000 to the emperor without the consent of parliament. He was justly blamed for this unconstitutional act, and eighty-one members voted against the government. In his budget of December 7 he proposed another loan of £18,000,000. The public debt already exceeded £400,000,000; the 3 per cents. had fallen with its growth, and in September were at 53. In the dangerous position of the country, financiers would have declined the loan, and Pitt offered it to the public at 5 per cent. and £112 10s. stock for £100 money. Liberal as these terms may seem, they were exiguous at that critical time, and the stock was at 4 per cent. discount before the deposit was paid. Pitt, however, appealed to the loyalty of the country. Patriotic enthusiasm was aroused, and the "loyalty loan" was promptly subscribed. Twenty-nine new items of taxation were imposed during the session; one of them raised the stamp duty on newspapers, which Pitt described as a luxury, from 2d. to 3½d., and was calculated to produce £114,000.
RELIGIOUS FEUD IN IRELAND.
The threats of invasion were not vain; a descent on Ireland was attempted. The government, though withholding emancipation, had made an effort to conciliate the catholics. While the penal code was in force Irish priests were educated abroad. Burke held that they required a special education, and that seminaries should be established for them in Ireland as a means of keeping them from disloyalty. The destruction of the French seminaries by the republicans left no choice between a priesthood educated at home and one without education, and therefore likely to be dangerous to civil order. Camden met the difficulty by favouring the foundation of the college of Maynooth. Religious animosity had broken out afresh since the recall of Fitzwilliam, and many outrages were committed on both sides. On September 1, 1795, the defenders and peep-of-day boys fought near a village called Diamond, in Armagh, and the defenders were worsted with some slaughter. Immediately afterwards the Orange society was founded to maintain the protestant cause. In 1796 protestant mobs assuming the name of Orangemen, persecuted the catholics in Armagh, and drove them from their homes, bidding them go "to hell or Connaught". The magistrates gave the catholics little help, and the government minimised the outrages of the protestants.
Religious hatred changed the position of parties. The United Irishmen no longer attempted to unite men of the two religions; they encouraged the catholics to believe that the protestants were determined to destroy them and conquer the land for themselves. There was much anarchy. Catholic disloyalty was increased by the feeling that the government favoured the Orangemen, and attacks were made on royal troops in Connaught. A stringent insurrection act was passed, which gave the magistrates power to send on board the fleet those attending unlawful assemblies or otherwise acting disloyally, and in the autumn the habeas corpus act was suspended. Corps of yeomanry and infantry were formed by the gentry for their own protection, and were accepted by the crown. The defenders coalesced with the United Irishmen, and the society adopted a military organisation. On different pretexts, such as a potato-digging, funerals, or football matches, large bodies of men assembled in military array; guns were collected, and pike-heads forged. Leading members of the United Irishmen pressed the directory to send an expedition to Ireland, representing that the catholic peasantry and the dissenters of Ulster were alike ripe for revolt. Among the most active of these agents were Wolfe Tone, Arthur O'Connor, and Lord Edward Fitzgerald, a son of the Duke of Leinster, a young man of romantic disposition and no special abilities, who had married a lady of great beauty, well known in French society, Pamela, supposed to be a daughter of Madame de Genlis by the Duke of Orleans.
The directors appointed Hoche to command an invading force, and a fleet of seventeen ships of the line, thirteen frigates, and other vessels sailed from Brest on December 15 with 15,000 troops and a supply of arms for distribution. Though an invasion was expected, the fleet met with no enemy, and evaded a squadron which was on the look-out off Ushant. Some of the ships, however, were separated from the others, and one of seventy-four guns was wrecked through the incapacity of the French naval officers. On the 21st thirty-five ships of the fleet arrived at the mouth of Bantry bay, "in most delicious weather," wrote Tone, who accompanied the expedition. Then the wind changed and blew hard. Only fifteen ships managed to enter the bay, and five of them were forced by the gale to put out to sea again. The ship on which Hoche sailed did not arrive. No landing was effected, and, on January 17, the battered fleet returned to Brest, less five ships lost, six captured by some British ships lying at Cork, and one of seventy-four guns, which was attacked on its way home by two English frigates off Ushant, driven ashore, and wrecked.
If the wind had remained light and favourable, or if the French had been better seamen, and their force had landed, Ireland would probably have been conquered for a time, for the country was drained of regular troops. Between Bantry and Cork were only 4,000 men hastily collected at Bandon, and stores and artillery were virtually non-existent. That a French fleet should have been able to leave Brest, remain five days on the Irish coast, and return without being attacked by the channel fleet caused great alarm in England, and was due to Bridport's slackness. The Irish of all classes behaved with exemplary loyalty; the country people afforded every assistance in their power to the troops at Bandon, and no symptom of disaffection appeared in Dublin. It was evident that many who had joined the disloyal societies had been driven to do so by fear, and that the catholics as a body were not as yet ready to revolt.[268] Either merely to harass England, or to prove the feasibility of a more serious invasion, two frigates and two other vessels were despatched from Brest in February with about 1,200 men, half of them convicts. After destroying some merchantmen in the Bristol channel, they anchored in Fishguard bay. The troops landed on the 23rd, and were, it is said, much alarmed through mistaking a body of Welshwomen in their red cloaks and beaver hats for soldiers. The next day Lord Cawdor, captain of the Pembrokeshire yeomanry, appeared with a force of local troops and country folk, and they at once surrendered. The two frigates which brought them were captured on their way back to Brest.
SUSPENSION OF CASH PAYMENTS.
The expenses of the war, loans and subsidies to foreign princes, and bills drawn by British agents abroad caused a continual drain of specie from the bank of England. By 1795 the exchange became unfavourable, and since then the drain had been enormous. Pitt anticipated taxes and borrowed heavily. Believing that an invasion was imminent, many small tradesmen and others were eager to turn their property into cash; a run on country banks set in, and some failed. The bank of England was pressed for gold. On Saturday, February 25, the floating debt owed to it by government was about £7,500,000, and its stock of coin and bullion, which in 1794 was over £8,500,000, was reduced to £1,272,000; and a sharp run was expected on Monday. The bank itself, and the private banks which depended on it, were threatened with immediate stoppage, and the consequences to the country would have been disastrous. The directors applied to Pitt. He called the king to London; a privy council was held on Sunday, and an order was issued suspending cash payments at the bank until the will of parliament was expressed. The leading merchants and bankers at once declared that they would accept bank of England notes.