Secretary of State's Office, Whitehall,
April 5th, 1783.
My Lord,
I must beg your Excellency's permission to accompany the
despatches which are going to Ireland, by a few lines in a
private letter, to express my great concern to find, upon my
entrance into this office, that your Excellency has taken a
resolution to quit your Government. The important station which
you now fill never, I believe, required more discretion and more
firmness than at the present moment; and there was, perhaps,
never more difficulty in finding any person capable and willing
to succeed to an office of such consequence, and to give to His
Majesty and to the people of Ireland the satisfaction which your
Excellency has done.
If, in the situation in which His Majesty has been pleased to
place me, I can be of any service to your Excellency, I hope
that you will command me without scruple; and be assured that I
shall rejoice in every opportunity of showing the respect with
which I have the honour to be,
My Lord,
Your Excellency's most faithful, humble servant,
North.
The Administration had hardly entered upon its functions, when its
overthrow became an object of speculation. Everybody saw that it could
not stand. It began in a false position, and had not the power to
recover itself. General Cuninghame writes to Lord Temple, on the 9th of
April: "Lord North will not be called to the House of Peers till the
question on Representation has been discussed in the Commons, then that
House will be left entirely to Mr. Fox, and from that moment many wise
men already begin to date his downfall. I do not meet with any who think
the present arrangement looks permanent. Nobody now pretends to guess
who will go to Ireland. The Duke of Devonshire has put himself entirely
out of the question, and Lord Fitzwilliam still declines it." This
intelligence is corroborated by Mr. Grenville.