Mr. Pitt was not long in the House of Commons before he took a part in the debates: I was present the first time he spoke, and I well recollect the effect produced on the whole House; his friends had expected much from him, but he surpassed all their expectations, and Mr. Hatsell, the chief clerk and a few of the older members who recollected his father, declared that Mr. Pitt gave indications of being his superior. I remember to this day the great pain I suffered from finding myself compelled by my judgment to vote against him on the second occasion of his coming forward, when the question was whether some Commissioners of public accounts should, or should not, be members of Parliament: indeed I never can forget the mixed emotions I experienced when my feelings had all the warmth and freshness of early youth, between my admiration of his powers, my sympathy with his rising reputation, and hopes of his anticipated greatness, while I nevertheless deemed it my duty in this instance to deny him my support.
Mr. Pitt was a decided and warm opponent of Lord North's administration; so indeed were most of our society, though I occasionally supported him. From the first, however, I concurred with Mr. Pitt in opposing the American War, and we rejoiced together in putting an end to it in about March, 1782, when Lord North's ministry terminated; and after a painful, and I think considerable, interval, during which it was said the King had even talked of going over to Hanover, and was supposed at last to yield to the counsels of the Earl of Mansfield, a new administration was formed consisting of the Rockingham and Shelburne parties, the Marquis of Rockingham being First Lord of the Treasury, and Lord Shelburne and Mr. Fox the two Secretaries of State. But though the parties had combined together against their common enemy, no sooner had he been removed than mutual jealousies immediately began to show themselves between the Rockingham and Shelburne parties. I well remember attending by invitation at Mr. Thomas Townshend's, since Lord Sydney, with Mr. Pitt and most of the young members who had voted with the Opposition, when Mr. Fox with apparent reluctance stated that Lord Rockingham had not then been admitted into the King's presence, but had only received communications through Lord Shelburne; and little circumstances soon afterwards arose which plainly indicated the mutual distrust of the two parties. Lord Rockingham's constitution was much shaken, and after a short illness his death took place before the end of the session of Parliament, about the middle of June, 1782.[13] Mr. Pitt had taken occasion to declare in the House of Commons that he would accept no subordinate situation, otherwise there is no doubt he would have been offered a seat at the Treasury Board, or indeed any office out of the Cabinet; but on Lord Rockingham's death, notwithstanding Mr. Fox's endeavour to prevent a rupture by declaring that no disunion existed,[14] the disagreement between the parties, of which so many symptoms had before manifested themselves, became complete and notorious. Lord Shelburne being invited by the King to supply Lord Rockingham's place, Mr. Fox with most of the Rockingham's party retired from office, and Mr. Pitt accepted the offer made him by Lord Shelburne of becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer: he had completed his twenty-third year the 28th of May preceding.
There was more than one day of debate even during that session, in which Mr. Pitt indicated that gravity and dignity which became the high station which he had assumed at so early an age. He continued in office till the ensuing winter, when, after peace had been made both with America and her continental allies France and Spain, Lord Shelburne's administration was removed through the unprincipled coalition between Lord North and Mr. Fox and their respective parties. It was supposed to have been brought about in a great degree through the influence of Lord North's eldest son, who had maintained a friendly acquaintance with Mr. Fox, a man the fascination of whose manners and temper was such as to render it impossible for any one to maintain a personal intercourse with him without conceiving for him sincere and even affectionate attachment. I seconded the motion for the address on the peace, and I well remember a little before the business began writing a note in my place with a pencil to Bankes, who was, I saw, at a little distance, inquiring of him whether a union between North and Fox was really formed, and whether I might publicly notice it; "Yes," he replied, "the more strongly the better." Mr. Pitt on that night was very unwell; he was obliged to retire from the House into Solomon's Porch by a violent sickness at the very moment when Mr. Fox was speaking. He himself afterwards replied in a speech of some hours' length, but he certainly on that night fell short of our expectations; a second discussion, however, took place a few days after, and his speech on that occasion was one of the finest that was ever made in Parliament, both in point of argument and power of oratory. I never shall forget the impression produced by that part of it in which he spoke of his own retirement, closing with that passage out of Horace, "Laudo manentem," &c., though I must add that I retain no recollection whatever of the circumstance mentioned by Sir N. Wraxall; indeed I cannot but be strongly persuaded that he must have been misinformed. Well also do I remember our all going to Mr. Pitt's from the House of Commons after our defeat about eight in the morning, where a dinner had been waiting for us from eleven or twelve the preceding night, and where we all laughed heartily at some characteristic traits exhibited by Lord Stanhope,[15] then Lord Mahon. An administration was then formed of which the Duke of Portland was at the head, and Lord North and Mr. Fox joint Secretaries of State. It was in the autumn of this year, 1783, during the recess of Parliament, that I accompanied Mr. Pitt and Mr. Eliot, who afterwards became his brother-in-law, to France: our plan was to spend a few weeks in a provincial town, there to acquire something of the language, and afterwards to make a short stay at Paris. Accordingly we went to Rheims, where we continued for about six weeks. It was not until we were on the point of going abroad (when Mr. Eliot came out of Cornwall, Mr. Pitt from seeing his mother in Somersetshire, and I met them both at Sittingbourne) that we recollected that we were unprovided with letters of recommendation, which each of the party had perhaps trusted to the other for obtaining. Accordingly we requested Mr. Smith to obtain them for us of Mr. Thellusson, afterwards Lord Rendlesham, who, we knew, had correspondencies all over France. Thellusson replied that he would gladly do his best for us, but that he rather conceived from circumstances that his correspondent at Rheims was not a person of any commercial distinction. We, however, abided by our decision in favour of Rheims. The day after we arrived there, having sent our letter of recommendation the preceding evening to the person to whom it was addressed, we were waited upon by a very well-behaved man with a velvet coat, a bag, and sword, who conversed with us for a short time. The next day we repaid his visit, and were a good deal surprised to find that he was a very little grocer, his very small shop being separated by a partition from his very small room. But he was an unaffected, well-behaved man, and he offered to render us every service in his power, but stated distinctly that he was not acquainted with the higher people of the place and neighbourhood. For a few days we lived very comfortably together, but no French was learned except from the grammar, we not having a single French acquaintance. At length we desired our friend the épicier to mention us to the Lieutenant of Police, who, I think we had made out, had been employed to collect evidence in the great Douglas cause, and was therefore likely to know something of our country and its inhabitants. This expedient answered its intended purpose, though somewhat slowly and by degrees. The Lieutenant of Police, Du Chatel, an intelligent and apparently a respectable family man, came to visit us, and he having stated to the Archbishop of Rheims, the present Cardinal de Perigord, whose palace was about a mile from the city, that three English Members of Parliament were then residing in it, one of whom was Mr. Pitt, who had recently been Chancellor of the Exchequer, his Grace sent his Grand Vicaire, the Abbé de la Garde, to ascertain the truth or falsehood of this statement. The Abbé executed his commission with great address, and reporting in our favour, we soon received an invitation to the Archbishop's table, followed by the expression of a wish that during the remainder of our stay at Rheims we would take up our residence in his palace. This we declined, but we occasionally dined with him, and from the time of our having been noticed by the Lieutenant we received continual invitations, chiefly to supper, from the gentry in and about the place. They were chiefly persons whose land produced the wine of the country, which, without scruple, they sold on their own account. And I remember the widow of the former Marshal Detrée intimating a wish that Mr. Pitt would become her customer.
Thence we went to Paris, having an opportunity during that time of spending four or five days at Fontainebleau, where the whole Court was assembled. There we were every evening at the parties of one or other of the French Ministers, in whose apartments we also dined—the Queen being always among the company present in the evening, and mixing in conversation with the greatest affability; there were also Madame la Princesse de Lamballe, M. Segur, M. de Castres, &c. Mr. George Ellis, who spoke French admirably, was in high favour for the elegance of his manners and the ease and brilliancy of his wit; and Mr. Pitt, though his imperfect knowledge of French prevented his doing justice to his sentiments, was yet able to give some impression of his superior powers—his language, so far as it did extend, being remarkable, I was assured, for its propriety and purity. There M. le Marquis de la Fayette appeared with a somewhat affected simplicity of manner, and I remember the fine ladies on one occasion dragging him to the card-table, while he shrugged up his shoulders and apparently resisted their importunities that he would join their party: very few, however, played at cards, the Queen, I think, never. During our stay at Paris we dined one day with M. le Marquis de la Fayette with a very small party, one of whom was Dr. Franklin; and it is due to M. le Marquis de la Fayette to declare that the opinion which we all formed of his principles and sentiments, so far as such a slight acquaintance could enable us to form a judgment, was certainly favourable, and his family appeared to be conducted more in the style of an English house than any other French family which we visited. We commonly supped in different parties, and I recollect one night when we English manifested our too common indisposition to conform ourselves to foreign customs, or rather to put ourselves out of our own way, by all going together to one table, to the number of twelve or fourteen of us, and admitting only one Frenchman, the Marquis de Noailles, M. de la Fayette's brother-in-law, who spoke our own language like an Englishman, and appeared more than any of the other French to be one of ourselves. We, however, who were all young men, were more excusable than our Ambassador at the Court of France, who, I remember, joined our party.
It was at Paris, in October, that Mr. Pitt first became acquainted with Mr. Rose, who was introduced to him by Lord Thurlow, whose fellow-traveller he was on the Continent; and it was then, or immediately afterwards, that it was suggested to the late Lord Camden by Mr. Walpole, a particular friend of M. Necker's, that if Mr. Pitt should be disposed to offer his hand to Mademoiselle N., afterwards Madame de Staël, such was the respect entertained for him by M. and Madame Necker, that he had no doubt the proposal would be accepted.
We returned from France about November. Circumstances then soon commenced which issued in the turning out of the Fox administration, the King resenting grievously, as was said, the treatment he experienced from them, especially in what regarded the settlement of the Prince of Wales. I need only allude to the long course of political contention which took place in the winter of 1783-84, when at length Mr. Pitt became First Lord of the Treasury; and after a violent struggle, the King dissolved the Parliament about March, and in the new House of Commons a decisive majority attested the truth of Mr. Pitt's assertion that he possessed the confidence of his country. In many counties and cities the friends of Mr. Fox were turned out, thence denominated Fox's Martyrs.[16] I myself became member for Yorkshire in the place of Mr. Foljambe, Sir George Savile's nephew, who had succeeded that excellent public man in the representation of the county not many weeks before. I may be allowed to take this occasion of mentioning a circumstance honourable to myself, since it is much more honourable to him, that some years after he came to York on purpose to support me in my contest for the county. It is remarkable that Lord Stanhope first foresaw the necessity there would be for Mr. Pitt's continuing in office notwithstanding his being out-voted in the House of Commons, maintaining that the Opposition would not venture to refuse the supplies, and that at the proper moment he should dissolve the Parliament.[17]
And now having traced Mr. Pitt's course from childhood to the period when he commenced his administration of sixteen or seventeen years during times the most stormy and dangerous almost ever experienced by this country, it may be no improper occasion for describing his character, and specifying the leading talents, dispositions, and qualifications by which he was distinguished. But before I proceed to this delineation it may be right to mention that seldom has any man had a better opportunity of knowing another than I have possessed of being thoroughly acquainted with Mr. Pitt. For weeks and months together I have spent hours with him every morning while he was transacting his common business with his secretaries. Hundreds of times, probably, I have called him out of bed, and have, in short, seen him in every situation and in his most unreserved moments. As he knew I should not ask anything of him, and as he reposed so much confidence in me as to be persuaded that I should never use any information I might obtain from him for any unfair purpose, he talked freely before me of men and things, of actual, meditated, or questionable appointments and plans, projects, speculations, &c., &c. No man, it has been said, is a hero to his valet de chambre, and if, with all the opportunities I enjoyed of seeing Mr. Pitt in his most inartificial and unguarded moments, he nevertheless appeared to me to be a man of extraordinary intellectual and moral powers, it is due to him that it should be known that this opinion was formed by one in whose instance Mr. Pitt's character was subjected to its most severe test, which Rochefoucault appeared to think could be stood by no human hero.
Mr. Pitt's intellectual powers were of the highest order, and in private no less than in public, when he was explaining his sentiments in any complicated question and stating the arguments on both sides, it was impossible not to admire the clearness of his conceptions, the precision with which he contemplated every particular object, and a variety of objects, without confusion. They who have had occasion to discuss political questions with him in private will acknowledge that there never was a fairer reasoner, never anyone more promptly recognising, and allowing its full weight to every consideration and argument which was urged against the opinion he had embraced. You always saw where you differed from him and why. The difference arose commonly from his sanguine temper leading him to give credit to information which others might distrust, and to expect that doubtful contingencies would have a more favourable issue than others might venture to anticipate. I never met with any man who combined in an equal degree this extraordinary precision of understanding with the same intuitive apprehension of every shade of opinion, or of feeling, which might be indicated by those with whom he was conversant. In taking an estimate of Mr. Pitt's intellectual powers, his extraordinary memory ought to be specially noticed. It was indeed remarkable for two excellencies which are seldom found united in the same person—a facility of receiving impressions, and a firmness and precision in retaining them. His great rival, Mr. Fox, was also endowed with a memory which to myself used to appear perfectly wonderful. Often in the earlier part of my Parliamentary life I have heard him (Fox) at a very late hour speak, without having taken any notes, for two or three hours, noticing every material argument that had been urged by every speaker of the opposite party: this he commonly did in the order in which those arguments had been delivered, whereas it was rather Mr. Pitt's habit to form the plan of a speech in his mind while the debate was going forward, and to distribute his comments on the various statements and remarks of his opponents according to the arrangement which he had made. Such was his (Pitt's) recollection of the great classical authors of antiquity that scarcely a passage could be quoted of their works, whether in verse or prose, with which he was not so familiar as to be able to take up the clue and go on with what immediately followed. This was particularly the case in the works of Virgil, Horace, and Cicero, and I am assured that he was also scarcely less familiar with Homer and Thucydides.
He had considerable powers of imagination and much ready wit, but this quality appeared more to arise from every idea, and every expression that belonged to it, being at once present to his mind, so as to enable him at will to make such combinations as suited the purpose of the moment, than as if his mind was only conscious at the time of that particular coruscation which the collision of objects caused to flash before the mental eye. It arose out of this distinctive peculiarity that he was not carried away by his own wit, though he could at any time command its exercise, and no man, perhaps, at proper seasons ever indulged more freely or happily in that playful facetiousness which gratifies all without wounding any. He had great natural courage and fortitude, and though always of a disordered stomach and gouty tendencies (on account of which port wine had been recommended to him in his earliest youth, and drinking French wine for a day or two would at any time produce gouty pains in the extremities), yet his bodily temperament never produced the smallest appearance of mental weakness or sinking. I think it was from this source, combined with that of his naturally sanguine temper, that though manifestly showing how deeply he felt on public affairs, he never was harassed or distressed by them, and till his last illness, when his bodily powers were almost utterly exhausted, his inward emotions never appeared to cloud his spirits, or affect his temper. Always he was ready in the little intervals of a busy man to indulge in those sallies of wit and good humour which were naturally called forth.
Excepting only the cases of those who have had reason to apprehend the loss of life or liberty, never was a public man in circumstances more harassing than those of Mr. Pitt in 1784: for several weeks the fate of his administration and that of his opponents were trembling on the beam, sometimes one scale preponderating, sometimes the other; almost daily it appeared doubtful whether he was to continue Prime Minister or retire into private life. Yet though then not five-and-twenty I do not believe that the anxiety of his situation ever kept him awake for a single minute, or ever appeared to sadden or cast a gloom over his hours of relaxation.