REIGN OF GEORGE III. (_continued_).
Rodney takes St. Eustatia--Destruction of Dutch Commerce--Loss
of Minorca--Naval Actions--Meeting of Parliament--Vehemence
of the Opposition--Losses in the West Indies--Breaking up of
the Ministry--Their Defeat on Conway's Motion--Lord North's
Resignation--Shelburne refuses the Premiership--New Whig
Government--Agitation in Ireland--Grattan's Motion for Legislative
Independence--The Volunteer Meeting at Dungannon--Grattan's
Motion carried--Demands of the Irish Parliament conceded--Flood's
Agitation--Economic Reforms--Pitt's Motion for Parliamentary
Reform--Unsuccessful Negotiations for Peace--Rodney's Victory
over De Grasse--Lord Howe's Exploits--The Siege and Relief of
Gibraltar--Negotiations for Peace--Folly of Oswald and Duplicity
of Shelburne--The Negotiations continued--Franklin throws over
Vergennes--Conclusion of a Secret Treaty between England and
America--Fate of the American Royalists--Announcement of the
Peace in Parliament--Terms of Peace with France, Spain, and
Holland--Opposition to the Peace--Coalition of Fox and North--Fall
of Shelburne--Pitt's Attempt to form a Ministry--The Coalition
in Office--Reform and the Prince of Wales--Fox's India Bill--Its
Introduction--Progress of the Measure--The King's Letter to
Temple--Reception of the News in the Commons--Dismissal of the
Ministry--Pitt forms a Cabinet--Factious Opposition of Fox--Pitt's
India Bill--He refuses to divulge his Intentions--The Tide
begins to Turn--Attempt at a Coalition--Increasing Popularity of
Pitt--Fox's Resolution--The Dissolution--"Fox's Martyrs."
There were other transactions besides those of the American campaign,
during the year, which demand notice. Rodney co-operated with a body
of troops under General Vaughan in an attempt to recover the island
of St. Vincent, which the French had taken in the previous year, but
they were not successful. They then turned their attack on the island
of St. Eustatia, belonging to the Dutch, and the governor not having
heard the news of the war, they met with no resistance. The capture
was a most valuable one; the whole island seemed one great store of
Dutch and American products and goods. There were one hundred and
fifty merchant vessels in the harbour all secured, besides six ships
of war and a fleet of thirty Dutch West Indiamen, which had just left,
but which were sent after and brought back. The value of the whole
prize was estimated at three millions eight hundred thousand pounds.
A large quantity of the merchandise belonged to Englishmen, who were
engaged thus in supplying the Americans through this channel. Rodney
confiscated the whole of it. In vain did the owners demand, through
the Assembly of St. Kitt's, the restoration of those goods; Rodney
would not listen to them. Besides St. Eustatia, the small neighbouring
islands of St. Martin and Saba, and the Dutch settlements on the rivers
of Demerara and Essequibo, in Guiana, were taken with their ships and
property. The Dutch trade in these parts received a mortal blow. On
the other hand, the French, under the Marquis de Bouillé, captured the
island of Tobago.
The English now began to contemplate taking the Cape of Good Hope
from the Dutch. General Johnstone was dispatched in April with five
ships of the line, some frigates, and smaller vessels, having on board
General Medows and three regiments for this purpose; but encountering
Admiral Suffren in the way, after an indecisive action, Johnstone fell
in with and took a Dutch East Indiaman of great value, and learned
through it that Suffren had managed to reach the Cape and give the
alarm, and that the Cape was put into strong defence. Johnstone,
therefore, made for Saldanha Bay, where he learned that a number of
other Dutch East Indiamen were lying. Four of these he secured; the
rest were run ashore by their commanders and burnt. During the autumn
both Dutch and French suffered much from the British on the coasts of
Coromandel and the island of Sumatra. They also took from the Dutch
Negapatam, Penang, and other places.
Meanwhile, Florida Blanca had planned the capture of Minorca. He
prevailed on France, though with difficulty, to assist. The Duke de
Crillon, a Frenchman, was made commander of the expedition, and on
the 22nd of July the united fleets of France and Spain sailed out of
Cadiz Bay, and stretched out into the ocean, as if intending to make a
descent on England. The main part of the fleet did, in fact, sail into
the English Channel. But they did not venture to attack Admiral Darby,
and contented themselves with picking up a number of merchant vessels;
and again dissensions and disease breaking out, this great fleet
separated, and each nation returned to its respective ports, without
effecting anything worthy of such an armament. But a lesser portion of
this fleet, on coming out of harbour, carrying eight thousand troops,
stores, and ordnance, had passed through the Straits of Gibraltar, and
appeared suddenly before Port Mahon. On the 19th of August the troops
were landed near Port Mahon, and, being favoured by the inhabitants,
once under the sway of Spain, and good Catholics, they soon invested
the fort, and compelled General Murray, who formerly so bravely
defended Quebec, to retire to Fort St. Philip, leaving the town of Port
Mahon in their possession. Despite the resolute defence of his men,
Murray was forced to surrender the island.
[Illustration: EDMUND BURKE. (_After the portrait by George Romney._)]
There were various actions at sea, in one quarter or other. Sir
Hyde Parker, convoying a merchant fleet from the Baltic, on the 5th
of August fell in with Admiral Zouttman near the Dogger Bank, also
convoying a fleet of Dutch traders. An engagement took place, Zouttman
having a few men-of-war more than Parker. The engagement was terrible.
The ships on both sides were severely damaged, and the _Hollandia_--a
sixty-four-gun ship of Zouttman's--went down with all its crew. Many
of the other ships were with difficulty kept afloat. On reaching the
Nore, the king and the Prince of Wales went on board, where they
highly complimented both Parker and the rest of the officers. On the
12th of December Admiral Kempenfeldt, with thirteen ships-of-the-line,
discovered, off Ushant, the French fleet, under De Guichen, convoying
a fleet of transports and merchantmen, bound, some for the East and
others for the West Indies, with troops and stores. The fleet of De
Guichen was far superior to that of Kempenfeldt, but, the convoy being
at a considerable distance from the transports and traders, Kempenfeldt
adroitly made himself master of twenty sail of these vessels, and
sailed off with them; and within a few days afterwards he captured
five more of these ships. There were also other fights of minor
importance.
On the 27th of November, only two days after the receipt of the news
of the surrender of Lord Cornwallis, Parliament met. The king adverted
to the unhappy event, but still declared that he should be betraying
his trust, as sovereign of a free people, if he did not refuse to give
up the contest; that he still trusted in Divine Providence, and he
called for fresh, animated, and united exertions. He turned with more
satisfaction to the successes in the East Indies, and the safe arrival
of our principal mercantile fleets. In the Lords, the Earl of Shelburne
attacked the Address, supported by the Duke of Richmond and the Lords
Camden and Rockingham; but the most tempestuous burst of indignant
eloquence from the Opposition took place in the Commons. Fox asserted
that he had listened to the Address with horror and amazement. He
declared himself confounded at the hardihood of Ministers, after such a
consummation of their imbecile management, who dared to look the House
of Commons in the face. He would not say that they were paid by France,
for it was not possible for him to prove the fact; but, if they were
not, he avowed that they deserved to be, for they had served the French
monarch more faithfully and successfully than ever Ministers served a
master. He especially singled out Lord Sandwich for reprobation, as the
author of the wretched condition of our fleets, which were inferior in
number of ships and their appointments to those of the enemy all over
the globe. He called on the House to insist on the total and immediate
change of Ministers, and urged the adoption of measures which should,
if possible, repair the incalculable injuries they had inflicted on
the nation. The Ministers, however, had strength enough to carry the
Address by two hundred and eighteen votes against one hundred and
twenty-nine; but the debate was resumed on the Address being reported,
and then William Pitt delivered a most scathing speech, declaring that
so far from our being warranted in pressing this ruinous war, he was
satisfied that, if he went from one end of the Treasury bench to the
other, such was the condition of the Ministry, he should find that
there was not one man who could trust his neighbour; and the truth
of this was becoming strikingly evident. Dundas, the Lord Advocate,
hitherto one of the staunchest supporters of Lord North, spoke now as
in astonishment at the language of the Ministers, declaring that some
of them in Council clearly did not give their honest opinions. There
were other like symptoms of defection; the sensitive placemen saw that
the end of the North Administration was at hand. Lord North, perceiving
the ground failing beneath him, lowered his tone, and, on Sir James
Lowther, seconded by Mr. Powys, proposing a resolution that the war
against America had been an utter failure, he explained that he did not
advocate, in future, a continental warfare there, a marching of troops
through the provinces, from north to south, but only the retention of
ports on the coast, for the protection of our fleets in those seas, and
the repulse of the French and Spaniards. Parliament was adjourned on
the 20th of December till the 21st of January, and thus closed the year
1781.
Ill news flowed in apace from all quarters during the recess. The
Marquis de Bouillé had surprised and retaken St. Eustatia. The new
conquests in Demerara and Essequibo had also been retaken. Bouillé
having secured St. Eustatia, next turned his arms against the old and
valuable island of St. Kitt's. He then landed eight thousand men at
Basseterre, the capital, whose movements were protected by the fleet
under De Grasse. General Fraser and Governor Shirley took post on the
rugged heights of Brimstone Hill, and made a stout defence, whilst Sir
Samuel Hood, who had followed De Grasse from the Chesapeake, boldly
interposed between the French admiral and the French troops on shore.
Hood twice beat off De Grasse; but the British fleet and army were much
too inconsiderable to maintain the conquest. The island was finally
taken, and after it the smaller ones of Nevis and Montserrat, so that
of all the Leeward Islands we had only Barbadoes and Antigua left.
These dispiriting losses, combined with the fall of Minorca, stimulated
the public and the mercantile bodies to petition earnestly for the
termination of the American war; and Parliament met at the appointed
time amid numbers of such demands. Petitions came from the cities of
London and Westminster, and many other towns and counties, bearing
rather the features of remonstrances. No sooner did the House meet than
Fox moved for an inquiry into the causes of the constant failure of our
fleets in these enterprises, on which so much had depended. The object
was to crush Lord Sandwich, the head of the Admiralty. Fox's motion
was rejected, but only by a majority of twenty-two. The strength of
Ministers was fast ebbing.
The first symptom of the breaking up was the necessity felt for the
dismissal of Lord George Germaine, who had contributed so essentially
to the defeats in America. But even then the king would not consent
that he should resign without conferring a peerage on him, observing,
"No one can then say he is disgraced." No quiet was now allowed to the
declining Ministers. Fox, on the 20th of February, strongly seconded
by William Pitt, made another attack on Lord Sandwich, this time
including the whole Board of Admiralty; and the motion was only lost
by nineteen. Another, and perhaps more formidable, enemy now stood
forward. This was General Conway, who enjoyed the highest esteem of
the House, and had been the first to propose the abolition of the
fatal Stamp Act. He moved, on the 22nd of February, that the House
should address his Majesty, entreating that he would "listen to the
advice of his Commons, that the war on the continent of North America
might no longer be pursued for the impracticable purpose of reducing
the inhabitants of that country to obedience by force." After a great
debate, the House divided two hours after midnight, and Ministers
were reduced to a majority of one, the votes being one hundred and
ninety-four against one hundred and ninety-three. Five days after,
General Conway again moved that any further attempts against America
would weaken the efforts of England against her European enemies, and,
by further irritating the colonies, render the desired peace more
difficult. The resolution was carried against Government by two hundred
and thirty-four against two hundred and fifteen. Finally, on the 15th
of March Sir John Rous moved a vote of want of confidence, which was
again lost by a minority of only nine. It was instantly determined to
renew this motion through Lord Surrey; and Lord North saw so clearly
that nothing could now avert his fall, that he implored the king most
earnestly to accept his resignation. George sent for Lord North on the
20th, and addressed him in these words:--"Considering the temper of the
House, I thought the Administration at an end." Lord North instantly
seized on the words, saying:--"Then, sire, had I not better state the
fact at once?" The king consented, and North hurried down to the House
of Commons in his court-dress, as he was.
It was five o'clock--the House densely crowded; for Lord Surrey was
going to make the great Opposition motion of want of confidence, and
only waited for the arrival of the Minister. As North hurried up the
House, there were loud cries of "Order! order! Places! places!" North
no sooner reached the Treasury bench than he rose to make his important
disclosure; but the Opposition called vociferously for Lord Surrey,
while the Ministerial members called for Lord North. Fox then moved
that "Lord Surrey do speak first," but North instantly exclaimed, "I
rise to speak to that motion." Being now obliged to hear him, for
he was perfectly in order, he observed, that, had they suffered him
at once to proceed, he might have saved them much useless noise and
confusion, for, without any disrespect to the noble lord, he was going
to show that his motion was quite unnecessary, as the Ministers had
resigned, and that that resignation was accepted by the king! He had
only wanted to announce that fact, and to move an adjournment of a
few days, in order to make the necessary arrangements for the new
Administration. Never was there a more profound surprise. The House
was adjourned for five days, and the members prepared to depart and
spread the news. But it proved a wild, snowy evening; the carriages had
not been ordered till midnight, and whilst the members were standing
about in crowds waiting for their equipages, rather than walk home
through the snow, Lord North, who had kept his carriage, put three or
four of his friends into it, and, bowing to the other members, said,
laughingly, "You see, gentlemen, the advantage of being in the secret.
Good night!"
The king, in the first instance, applied to Lord Shelburne to form
a Ministry; but he was bound by engagements to Wentworth House, and
honourably refused to take the lead. George then tried Lord Gower
as ineffectually, and so was compelled to send for Lord Rockingham,
who accepted office, on the condition that peace should be made
with America, including the acknowledgment of its independence, if
unavoidable; administrative reform, on the basis of Mr. Burke's three
Bills; and the expulsion of contractors from Parliament, and revenue
officers from the exercise of the elective franchise. The king stood
strongly on the retention of Lord Chancellor Thurlow and Lord Stormont
in their offices. Rockingham, with reluctance, conceded the retention
of Thurlow, but refused that of Stormont. The choice of Lord Rockingham
was such as could only have been made where family influence and party
cliques had more weight than the proper object of a Minister--the able
management of national affairs. Rockingham, though a very honourable
man, was never a man of any ability, and though now only fifty-two,
his health and faculties, such as they were, were fast failing. Besides
this, there was a violent jealousy between him and Lord Shelburne,
who became his colleague, and brought in half of the Cabinet. The
shape which the Ministry eventually assumed was this:--Lord Rockingham
became First Lord of the Treasury and Premier; the Earl of Shelburne
and Charles Fox, Secretaries of State; Thurlow, Lord Chancellor;
Camden, notwithstanding his age, President of the Council; Duke of
Grafton, Privy Seal; Lord John Cavendish, Chancellor of the Exchequer;
Keppel--made a viscount--First Lord of the Admiralty; General Conway,
Commander of the Forces; the Duke of Richmond, Master-General of
Ordnance; Dunning--as Lord Ashburton--Chancellor of the Duchy of
Lancaster. Burke was not admitted to the Cabinet, for the Whigs were
too great sticklers for birth and family; but his indispensable ability
insured him the Paymastership of the Forces--by far the most lucrative
office in the hands of Government, but the salary of which he was
pledged to reduce by his Bill. Pitt was offered a place as Lord of the
Treasury; but he had already declared, on the 8th of March, on the
debate on Lord John Cavendish's motion, that he would never accept a
subordinate situation. Dundas remained in office, as Lord Advocate, and
John Lee was made Solicitor-General. Such was the new Administration:
it embraced, as leaders, five Rockinghamites and five Shelburnites.
The eleventh member of the Cabinet, Thurlow, belonged to neither side,
but was the king's man. Fox saw himself in office with him with great
repugnance, and Burke felt the slight put upon him in excluding him
from the Cabinet.
On the 28th of March the Ministry, as completed, was announced in the
House, and the writs for the re-elections having been issued, the
House adjourned for the Easter holidays, and on the 8th of April met
for business. The first affairs which engaged the attention of the new
Administration were those of Ireland. We have already seen that, in
1778, the Irish, encouraged by the events in North America, and by Lord
North's conciliatory proposals to Congress, appealed to the British
Government for the removal of unjust restrictions from themselves,
and how free trade was granted them in 1780. These concessions
were received in Ireland with testimonies of loud approbation and
professions of loyalty; but they only encouraged the patriot party to
fresh demands. These were for the repeal of the two obnoxious Acts
which conferred the legislative supremacy regarding Irish affairs on
England. These Acts were--first, Poynings' Act, so called from Sir
Edward Poynings, and passed in the reign of Henry VII., which gave to
the English Privy Council the right to see, alter, or suppress any Bill
before the Irish Parliament, money Bills excepted; the second was an
Act of George I., which asserted in the strongest terms the right of
the king, Lords, and Commons of England to legislate for Ireland.
Grattan determined to call these Acts in question in the Irish
Parliament, and at least abolish them there. This alarmed even
Burke, who, writing to Ireland, said, "Will no one stop that madman,
Grattan?" But Grattan, on the 19th of April, 1780, submitted to the
Irish House of Commons a resolution asserting the perfect legislative
independence of Ireland. He did not carry his motion then, but his
speech--in his own opinion, the finest he ever made--had a wonderful
effect on the Irish public. Other matters connected with sugar duties,
and an Irish Mutiny Bill, in which Grattan took the lead, fanned the
popular flame, and the Volunteer body at the same time continued to
assume such rapidly growing activity that it was deemed necessary
by Government to send over the Earl of Carlisle to supersede the
Earl of Buckinghamshire, and to give him an able secretary in Mr.
Eden. But this did not prevent the Irish Volunteers from meeting at
Dungannon on the 15th of February, 1782. There were two hundred and
forty-two delegates, with their general-in-chief, Lord Charlemont,
at their head, and they unanimously passed a resolution prepared by
Grattan, "That a claim of any body of men other than the King, Lords,
and Commons of Ireland, to bind this kingdom, is unconstitutional,
illegal, and a grievance." On the 22nd, Grattan moved a similar
resolution in the Irish House of Commons, which was only got rid of
by the Attorney-General asking for some time to consider it. Two days
only before Grattan had made his motion on Irish rights, that is, on
the 20th of February, he seconded a Bill for further relief of Roman
Catholics in Ireland, introduced by Mr. Gardiner. The Bill was passed,
and wonderfully increased the influence of Grattan by adding the
grateful support of all the Catholics. Such was the tone of Ireland,
and such the transcendent influence of Grattan there, when the new Whig
Ministry assumed office.
Grattan had given notice that on the 16th of April he would move
for the utter repeal of the Acts destructive of the independent
legislative rights of Ireland. On the appointed day, the House of
Commons having been expressly summoned by the Speaker, Grattan rose,
and, assuming the question already as carried, began, "I am now to
address a free people. Ages have passed away, and this is the first
moment in which you could be distinguished by that appellation. I have
found Ireland on her knees; I have watched over her with an eternal
solicitude; I have traced her progress from injury to arms, from arms
to liberty. Spirit of Swift! spirit of Molyneux! your genius has
prevailed! Ireland is now a nation. In that new character I hail her,
and, bowing to her august presence, I say, ESTO PERPETUA!" The speech
was received with thunders of applause. It concluded with an Address to
the Crown, declaring in the plainest, boldest language, that no body
of men, except the Irish Parliament, had a right to make laws by which
that nation could be bound. The Address was carried by acclamation; it
was carried with nearly equal enthusiasm by the Lords, and then both
Houses adjourned to await the decision of the Parliament and Ministry
of Great Britain.
[Illustration: HENRY GRATTAN.]
This was a serious position of affairs for the consideration of the
new Whig Ministry. They were called on to declare, either that Ireland
was part of the empire, and subject to the same laws, as regarded the
empire, as Great Britain, or that it was distinctly a separate empire
under the same king, just as Hanover was. The Ministry of Rockingham
have been severely blamed by one political party, and highly lauded by
another, for conceding the claims of Ireland on that head so readily;
for they came to the conclusion to yield them fully. They were by
no means blind to the difficulties of the case, and to the evils
that might arise from a decision either way. But the case with the
present Ministry was one of simple necessity. England had committed
the great error of refusing all concession to demanded rights in the
case of America, and now lay apparently too exhausted by the fight to
compel submission, with all Europe in arms against her. Ireland, aware
of this, was in arms, and determined to profit by the crisis. Fox,
therefore, on the 17th of May, announced the intention of Ministers
at once to acknowledge the independence of Ireland by repealing the
Act of the 6th of George I. Fox, in his speech, declared that it was
far better to have the Irish willing subjects to the Crown than bitter
enemies. The Bill repealing the 6th of George I. accordingly passed
both Houses as a matter of course, and the effect upon Ireland was
such, that in the first ebullition of the national joy the Irish House
of Commons voted one hundred thousand pounds to raise twenty thousand
seamen. The Irish Commons, moreover, offered to grant Grattan, for his
patriotic and successful exertions in this cause, a similar sum, to
purchase him an estate. Grattan--though a poor man, his income at that
time scarcely exceeding five hundred pounds a year--disinterestedly
refused such a sum, and was only with difficulty induced ultimately to
accept half of it.
There were not wanting, however, those who strove to disturb the
joy of Ireland, and the peace of England thus acquired, by sowing
suspicions of the sincerity of England, and representing that the
independence granted was spurious rather than real. Amongst these,
Flood, the rival of Grattan in political and Parliamentary life, took
the lead. He seized on every little circumstance to create doubts of
the English carrying out the concession faithfully. He caught at an
imprudent motion of the Earl of Abingdon, in the Peers, and still more
vivaciously at the decision of an appeal from Ireland, in the Court
of King's Bench, by Lord Mansfield. The case had remained over, and
it was deemed impracticable to send it back to Ireland, though nearly
finished before the Act of Repeal. Fox explained the case, and made
the most explicit declaration of the "full, complete, absolute, and
perpetual surrender of the British legislative and judicial supremacy
over Ireland." But the suspicions had been too adroitly infused to be
removed without a fresh and still more positive Act, which was passed
in the next Session.
The claims of Ireland seeming, for the moment, to be happily satisfied,
Ministers now proceeded to carry out those reforms for which they had
loudly called during the many years that they had been in opposition.
They adopted and introduced the Bills of Sir Philip Clerke and Mr.
Carew for excluding contractors from the House of Commons, and revenue
officers from voting at elections. The Bill against the contractors
passed the Commons with little difficulty; but the Ministers
immediately felt the mischief of allowing Lord Thurlow to retain his
place of Chancellor. He opposed the measure vehemently, and divided
the House upon it. Lord Mansfield gave it his cordial resistance, and
the new Lord Ashburton, though created by the present Administration,
tacked to it a clause exempting all gentlemen who merely contracted
for the produce of their estates. The clause, however, was lopped away
again on the return of the Bill to the Commons, and the Act passed
without it. The Bill for disqualifying revenue officers was opposed
with equal pertinacity by Thurlow and Mansfield; though Lord Rockingham
stated that the elections in seventy boroughs depended chiefly on
revenue officers, and that nearly twelve thousand of such officers
created by the late Ministry had votes in other places. The Bill
passed, after exempting all officers who held their posts for life,
and therefore were charitably supposed to be beyond the reach of undue
influence, as if no such thing as promotion had its effect.
On the 15th of April a message was sent down to both Houses from the
king, in conformity with his pledge to the new Ministry, with regard
to Mr. Burke's plan of economical reform, which it proposed should
be a measure of effectual retrenchment, and to include his Majesty's
own Civil List. Lord Shelburne, in communicating it to the Lords,
assured the House that this was no mere ministerial message, but was
the genuine language of the king himself, proceeding from the heart.
Burke, in the Commons, used more exuberant terms of eulogy, declaring
that "it was the best of messages to the best of people from the
best of kings!" Early in May he moved for leave to bring in his Bill
on the subject, and then most of the promised wonders of reform and
retrenchment vanished. The duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster and the
principality of Wales were at once cut out of his scheme of reform. The
plan of supplying the Royal Household by contract was abandoned; the
Ordnance Office, in the hands of the Duke of Richmond, was not to be
touched, nor the Treasurer of the Household's office; and some other
of the royal establishments, which were mere sinecures, were left. But
he succeeded in lopping off the third Secretaryship of State, which
had been created for the American colonies, and was useless now they
were gone; the Lords of Trade and Plantations; the Lords of Police in
Scotland; the principal officers of the Great Wardrobe, Jewel Office,
Treasurer of the Chamber, Cofferer of the Household, six Clerks of the
Board of Green Cloth--in all, about a dozen offices were swept away.
The Pension List was vigorously revised. No pension was to exceed three
hundred pounds a year, and not more than six hundred pounds was to be
granted in pensions in any one year; the names of the persons to whom
they were granted were to be laid before Parliament within twenty days
after the beginning of each session, until the amount in the Pension
List should reach ninety thousand pounds. The Secret Service money was,
at the same time, limited; and a solemn oath was to be administered
to the Secretaries of State regarding its proper employment. It may
be imagined what were the consternation and the disgust of the large
class which had been revelling on these misappropriated funds of the
nation. Burke, in a letter, describes feelingly the gauntlet he had
to run in proceeding with his reform. "I was loaded," he says, "with
hatred for everything withheld, and with obloquy for everything given."
What, however, brought unjust odium on him, but just reproach on the
Cabinet, was, that Lord Rockingham made haste, before the Bill was
passed, to grant enormous pensions to his supporters and colleagues,
Lord Ashburton and Colonel Barré. The latter ardent patriot, who,
whilst Burke's Bill was in consideration, said it did not go far
enough in reform, now willingly pocketed three thousand two hundred
pounds a year, as a pension, besides the salary of his office. In the
House of Lords, Thurlow again attacked the Bill, supported by Lords
Mansfield and Loughborough; but it passed, and Burke immediately gave
an illustrious proof of his disinterestedness, by bringing in a Bill
for regulating and reducing the enormous emoluments of his own office,
the Paymastership of the Forces.
From economical and colonial, Ministers proceeded to Parliamentary
reform. Sir Harbord Harbord had introduced, before their accession to
office, a Bill to disfranchise the rotten borough of Cricklade, in
Wiltshire, as Shoreham had already been disfranchised. The new Ministry
supported it, with the exception of their strange colleague, Thurlow,
whom they ought to have insisted on being dismissed. Cricklade was a
thoroughly venal borough, regularly sold to some East Indian nabob;
and Mr. Frederick Montagu, in the debate, quoted Lord Chatham's
remark on Shoreham, which had also been the purchased lair of Indian
corruptionists, that he "was glad to find the borough of Shoreham
likely to be removed from Bengal to its ancient situation in the county
of Sussex."
The success with Cricklade encouraged William Pitt to bring forward a
motion for a general reform of Parliament. This he did on the 7th of
May, and was seconded by Wilkes's old ally, Alderman Sawbridge. Pitt
did not venture to talk of a Bill, but only to propose a Committee
to consider the subject. This was granted; but it was soon apparent
that nothing would be done. The Ministers were at variance on the
subject--some went one length, and some another; many of them were as
determined against all Parliamentary reform as any Tories. Rockingham,
the Prime Minister, especially, held much borough influence. He was
utterly opposed, in secret, to all such reforms. Pitt himself would
hear nothing of repealing the Septennial Act; but he was for sweeping
away rotten boroughs and transferring their votes to the counties;
he went for equalising the whole representation, for destroying the
influence of the Treasury and the hereditary right assumed by the
aristocracy, and, by disfranchising the rotten boroughs, for sweeping
the House of the creatures of the India House. He was zealously
supported by Fox, Sheridan, Sir George Savile; and the Duke of
Richmond, in the Lords, warmly commended the movement; but the motion
had the fate that might have been expected--it was negatived, though
only by twenty votes.
But the matters most important, and in which the Rockingham Ministry
succeeded the best, were those of attempting to accomplish the peace
with America, and with the Continental nations, on which they had so
long and so loudly insisted. Fox first tried his diplomatic genius
with the Dutch, whom he could, as he boasted, soon conciliate; but, to
his infinite chagrin, that calculating people were so elated by the
recent ill success of the English, and relied so completely on the
powerful fleets of France and Spain to protect their trade and islands,
that they returned a contemptuous answer, declaring that they could
not treat without their allies. Still more mortifying was his repulse
by the Americans. His offers of negotiations for peace were received
with a haughty indifference by Congress, and he was again referred
to France. Fox now had recourse to the mediations of Russia and
Prussia. But Frederick the Great declined to intervene, and the Czarina
Catherine coupled her offers of alliance with conditions which the king
and the majority of the Cabinet refused to accept, though Fox thought
they were reasonable.
Scarcely was the Rockingham Administration formed when they determined
to recall England's ablest admiral, Sir George Rodney, and they carried
this into execution in May of this year, and appointed Admiral Pigott
in his stead. Lord Keppel, who had shown himself so sensitive in his
own case, now he was at the head of the Admiralty not only recalled
Rodney because he was of another party, but he did it in the coldest
and most direct manner, through his secretary, Mr. Stephen. However,
before this order of recall was issued--the 1st of May--Rodney had
fought one of the greatest and most decisive battles which adorn the
history of our navy. He had gone in all haste to the West Indies, with
fourteen ships of the line, to join Sir Samuel Hood, who was vainly
contending against the fleet of De Grasse and a strong land force at
St. Christopher's. But, as De Grasse had landed eight thousand men,
under De Bouillé, and Hood had no land troops, he could not save the
island. After its capture Rodney fell in with him, and their united
fleet amounted to thirty-six ships of the line. It was well, for Hood
informed Rodney that De Grasse was intending to join the Spanish
general, Galvez, at St. Domingo, where they were to sail for a grand
attack on the chief of the British West India Islands, Jamaica, almost
the only island, excepting Barbadoes and Antigua, which Britain now
owned in that part of the globe. On the 8th of April he was signalled
that the French fleet was unmoored and proceeding to sea. Rodney
instantly put out, and the next morning discovered this fleet under
Dominica. The wind being in favour of De Grasse, he stood away for
Guadeloupe; but Rodney gave chase, and Hood's squadron getting far
in advance, De Grasse veered round in the hope of beating him before
the rest of Rodney's fleet could come up. Hood received the fire of
three men-of-war in the _Barfleur_, his ship, for some time; but he
stood bravely to the enemy, and the wind now favouring Rodney, he
came up and joined in the engagement. Several ships on each side were
so much damaged that they were almost useless, and Captain Bayne, of
the _Alfred_, was killed. The next morning the French were nearly
out of sight; but Rodney pressed after them, for he knew that if they
succeeded in joining the Spaniards, he should have sixty sail, instead
of thirty-six, to contend with.
On the evening of the 11th he had the satisfaction to find himself
close to the enemy, and at daybreak of the 12th the battle began. At
first there was so little wind that Rodney was unable to put into
execution his long-cherished scheme of breaking right through the
centre of the enemy's line, and beating one half before the other could
come to the rescue. About noon a breeze sprang up, and afforded the
long-desired opportunity. Rodney was now in the van, and after Captain
Gardiner, in the _Duke_, had made the first attempt and fallen back
disabled, Rodney's own ship, the _Formidable_, broke through, followed
by the _Namur_ and the _Canada_. The great end of Rodney was gained. He
had cut in two the vast fleet, and his ships doubling on one half threw
the whole into confusion. The half to the windward were terribly raked,
whilst the half to the leeward were unable to come up to their aid. The
battle, however, continued without respite from noon till evening, the
leeward half endeavouring to join and return to the charge, but without
being able. The most striking part of the action was the attack on the
great ship of De Grasse, the _Ville de Paris_. That huge vessel, the
pride of the French navy, towering over all far and near, attracted the
ambition of Captain Cornwallis, of the _Canada_, the brother of Lord
Cornwallis, to whose surrender De Grasse had so largely contributed.
Captain Cornwallis, as if determined on a noble revenge, attacked the
_Ville de Paris_ with fury, hugely as it towered above him, and so well
did he ply his guns that he soon reduced the monster almost to a wreck.
De Grasse fought desperately, but Hood coming up in the _Barfleur_,
about sunset, to the assistance of Cornwallis, De Grasse was compelled
to strike his flag. On board the _Ville de Paris_ were found thirty-six
chests of money, intended to pay the conquerors of Jamaica, and on
the other ships nearly all the battering trains for that purpose. The
remainder of the fleet made all sail, and Rodney pursued, but was
stopped by a calm of three days under Guadeloupe, and they escaped.
Rodney sailed to Jamaica, which he had thus saved, and was received
with acclamations of honour and gratitude. There, however, he received
the order for his recall, and returned home. To the eternal dishonour
of the Rockingham Administration, on receiving the news of this superb
and most important victory--a victory which at once restored the
drooping glories of Great Britain--they had not the pluck to cancel his
recall, though the feeling of the country compelled the Crown to grant
him a pension, and to raise him to the peerage by the title of Baron
Rodney.
[Illustration: THE ATTACK ON THE "VILLE DE PARIS." (_See p._ 292.)]
The prizes of Rodney, including the great _Ville de Paris_, on their
way home were assailed with a violent tempest, and went down, so that
the English people had not the gratification of seeing the largest
ship in the world, which had been captured by Rodney. The Dutch were
encouraged to attempt coming out of the Texel, and waylaying our
Baltic merchant fleet, but Lord Howe, with twelve sail-of-the-line,
was sent after them, and they quickly ran. His lordship remained there
blockading them till the 28th of June, when he was compelled to leave
his post and sail westward, with twenty-one ships-of-the-line and some
frigates, to watch the great combined fleet of France and Spain, which
had issued from Cadiz. The united fleet--thirty-six sail-of-the-line,
besides frigates--kept aloof, however, and allowed him safely to convoy
home the Jamaica merchant fleet, guarded by Sir Peter Parker.
No sooner did Howe return to port than he had orders to sail in aid of
Gibraltar, which was not only greatly in need of stores and provisions,
but was menaced by the combined armies and fleets of France and Spain
with one great and overwhelming attack. The evil fortune of England did
not yet, however, seem to have disappeared, for the _Royal George_,
the finest vessel in the service, went down in a sudden squall. But
this awful catastrophe did not hinder the sailing of Lord Howe. He had
by great exertion mustered a fleet of thirty-four sail-of-the-line,
and on the 11th of September steered out for Gibraltar. For upwards of
three years this famous rock had now been beleaguered. After the relief
thrown in by Admiral Darby, the Spaniards, despairing of reducing the
garrison by blockade, determined to destroy the town and works by a
terrific bombardment. This bombardment was, accordingly, opened with
unexampled fury, and continued incessantly for days and weeks. The
town was set on fire, and numbers of houses consumed; the damage done
to the ramparts and public buildings was appalling. General Elliot
displayed the utmost temper and skill during this bombardment, as he
did throughout the whole siege. He continued by night, and at other
opportunities, to repair actively the damages done; and, reserving his
fire for occasions when he saw a chance of doing particular damage, he
caused the enemy to wonder at the little impression that they made.
But, in the autumn of 1781, they resolved on a renewed attack of the
most vigorous kind. Elliot received information of this, and determined
to anticipate the plan. At midnight of the 26th of November he ordered
out all his grenadiers and light infantry, including the two veteran
regiments with which he had seen service in Germany so many years
ago, the 12th, and the regiment of General Hardenberg. Three hundred
sailors volunteered to accompany them, and the brave old general
himself could not stay behind. The detachment marched silently through
the soft sand, and entered the fourth line almost before the Spanish
sentinel was aware of them. In a very few minutes the enemy was in
full flight towards the village of Campo, and the English set to work,
under direction of the engineer officers, to destroy the works which
had cost the Spaniards such enormous labour to erect. The Spaniards for
several days appeared so stupefied that they allowed their works to
burn without any attempt to check the fire. In the following month of
December, however, they slowly resumed their bombardment. Nevertheless,
it was not till the spring of 1782 that the Spaniards were cheered by
the news that the Duke of Crillon was on his way to join them with the
army which had conquered Minorca.
In April De Crillon arrived, and was followed by the Spanish and French
troops from Minorca. From eighteen to twenty thousand men were added to
the army already encamped before the place, and the most able engineers
were engaged from almost all countries of Europe, at extravagant
salaries, and great rewards were offered for inventions which might
demolish the formidable works of the English on the rock. Nearly forty
thousand troops were now congregated against the old fortress. One
hundred and seventy pieces of heavy artillery were directed against
it, and immense stores of ammunition were accumulated for this final
and triumphant achievement. On the other hand, General Elliot had now
repaired and strengthened his defences more than ever. His garrison was
augmented to seven thousand men, including a marine brigade; eighty
pieces of cannon frowned from the walls, and the bulk of his men were
of the best and most seasoned kind.
[Illustration: THE DEFENCE OF GIBRALTAR BY LORD HEATHFIELD, 1782.
FROM THE PAINTING BY J. S. COPLEY, R.A., AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY.]
De Crillon, seeing that his bombardment from shore produced little
effect, determined to make the attack also from the sea. Amongst the
multiplicity of inventions which the offered rewards had produced,
the Chevalier D'Arcon, a French engineer, had produced a scheme which
excited the most confident expectations. The plan was to construct ten
monster floating batteries of such capacity that they should carry
the heaviest artillery, and so made and defended that they could be
neither sunk nor burnt. Loud was the clangour of hammer and saw,
and, as the secret could not be long preserved, equally busy was the
garrison within, preparing furnaces, and laying ready huge piles of
balls, to be discharged red-hot at these machines as soon as they
arrived. To constitute the intended batteries, ten large ships of from
six hundred to one thousand four hundred tons burden were cut down,
and made bombproof on the top. They were to be prevented from sinking
by the enormous thickness of the timber in their bottoms, and their
sides, which were to be six or seven feet thick, bolted, and covered
with raw hides. They were to be rendered more buoyant by thicknesses of
cork, and the interstices were to be filled with wet sand to prevent
combustion. There were to be plentiful supplies, by means of pumps,
pipes, and cisterns, of water, everywhere, to put out fire, for they
seem to have been aware of the burning balls that were being prepared
for them.
As a rumour of the approaching visit of Lord Howe had reached the
Spanish camp, all was in haste to anticipate his arrival, and take the
huge fortress before he could succour it. Accordingly the great united
fleet of Spain and France, which so lately had paraded in the English
Channel, sailed into Algeciras Bay, and on the 13th of September the
floating batteries were hauled out by a number of the ships, and
anchored at regular distances, within six hundred yards of the English
works. Whilst this extraordinary armada was approaching and disposing
itself, tremendous fire was kept up from the land, with three hundred
long guns and mortars, to divert the attention of the garrison; but
old General Elliot was ready with his red-hot balls, and, the moment
the floating batteries came within gunshot distance, he poured into
them a most destructive fire-hail. The Spaniards, notwithstanding,
placed and secured their monster machines in a very short time, and
then four hundred cannon from land and sea played on the old rock
simultaneously and incessantly. For some time the hot balls appeared
to do no damage. The timbers, being of green wood, closed up after the
balls, and so prevented their immediate ignition. In other cases, where
smoke appeared, the water-engines dashed in deluges, and extinguished
the nascent fire. But presently the fire from the batteries slackened;
it was discovered that the balls--which had many of them pierced into
the timbers three feet deep--were doing their work. The floating
battery commanded by the Prince of Nassau, on board of which was also
the engineer, D'Arcon, himself, was found smoking on the side facing
the rock, at two o'clock in the day. No water could reach the seat of
mischief, and by seven o'clock it had become so extensive as to cause
the firing to cease, and to turn the thoughts of all to endeavours for
escape. Rockets were thrown up as signals for the vessels to come up
and take off the crews. But this was found impracticable. The garrison
actually rained deluges of fire, and all approach to the monster
machines was cut off. No vessel could draw near, except at the penalty
of instant destruction. For four more hours the vaunted floating
batteries remained exposed to the pitiless pelting of the garrison.
Before midnight, the _Talla Piedra_, the greatest of the monster
machines, and the flagship, _Pastora_, at her side, were in full flame,
and by their light the indefatigable Elliot could see, with the more
precision, to point his guns. Seven of the ten floating machines were
now on fire; the guns aboard them had entirely ceased, and those on
land, as if struck with wonder and despair, had become silent too.
It might have been imagined that this magnificent and destructive
repulse would have convinced the allies that the siege was hopeless,
but they were pretty well informed that General Elliot had well nigh
exhausted his ammunition in this prodigal death-shower, and they
had still their great combined fleet, snug in the narrow bay, with
scouts in the Strait to prevent the carrying in of supplies. But
on the 24th of September news arrived at Madrid that the fleet of
Lord Howe was under weigh for Gibraltar. Howe's fleet of thirty-four
sail-of-the-line, six frigates, and three fire-ships, though in the
neighbourhood of one of fifty sail-of-the-line, besides a number of
frigates and smaller vessels, managed to get into the bay of Gibraltar
all safe, amid the wildest acclamations of soldiers and inhabitants. By
the 18th of October all the store-ships had discharged their cargoes,
and had passed through the Strait, and on the 19th Lord Howe followed
them with his fleet. The enemy's fleet then came out after him, and
the next day they were in the open ocean, and Howe proceeded to their
leeward to receive them. Some of their vessels had suffered in the
late gales, but they had still at least forty-four sail to Howe's
thirty-four, and, having the weather-gauge, had every advantage. But
after a partial firing, in which they received great damage from Howe,
they hauled off and got into Cadiz bay. Howe, then dispatching part of
his fleet to the West Indies and a second squadron to the Irish coast,
returned home himself. The news of the grand defence of Gibraltar
produced a wonderful rejoicing in England; thanks were voted by
Parliament to the officers and privates of the brave garrison; General
Elliot was invested with the Order of the Bath on the king's bastion in
sight of the works which he had preserved, and on his return, in 1787,
at the age of seventy, he was created a Peer as Lord Heathfield of
Gibraltar.
With these superb demonstrations on the part of England terminated
the war. Her enemies discovered that her hoped-for fall was yet far
off, and were much more inclined to listen to overtures of peace, of
which they were now all in great need. These negotiations had been
begun by Fox immediately on the accession of the Rockingham Ministry
to office. Unfortunately the division of work between two Secretaries
of State entailed a double negotiation. To Fox as Secretary of Foreign
Affairs fell the arrangements for peace with France and Spain and
Holland, to Lord Shelburne as Colonial Secretary fell all arrangements
connected with the colonies, that is, with the United States. It was
most important that the two Ministers should be in close accord.
Unfortunately their views differed widely. Fox was for the immediate
recognition of the independence of America; Shelburne urged that to
give independence at once was to throw away a trump card. Further,
Mr. Oswald, Shelburne's agent, was duped by Franklin into accepting
from him a paper, in which the surrender of Canada was laid down as
a basis of peace. This paper Shelburne probably showed to the king,
but, with great duplicity, refrained from mentioning its existence to
his colleagues. On the 8th of May Mr. Thomas Grenville, Fox's agent,
arrived at Paris, and negotiations were begun in real earnest. But
the naïve confession of Oswald that peace was absolutely necessary to
England greatly hampered his efforts, and in a conversation with Lord
Shelburne's envoy the existence of the Canada paper leaked out. Fox was
naturally furious, but the majority of the Cabinet were opposed to him,
and voted against his demand for the immediate recognition of American
independence. He only refrained from resigning because he would not
embitter Lord Rockingham's last moments in the world. Lord Shelburne
became Premier in July.
Upon the formation of the Shelburne Cabinet, and the news of Rodney's
victory over De Grasse, the negotiations were still continued, Mr.
Grenville only being recalled, and Mr. Alleyne Fitzherbert, afterwards
Lord St. Helens, being put in his place. France, Spain, Holland, were
all groaning under the cost and disasters of the war, yet keeping up an
air of indifference, in order to enhance their demands. The Americans
were more decided, for they were stimulated by the accounts of the
wretched condition of affairs at home. It was represented to Franklin
by Congress, that, however France or Spain might delay proposals
for peace, it was necessary for the United States. The position of
Franklin, nevertheless, was extremely difficult. There was the treaty
of alliance between France and the States of 1778, strictly stipulating
that neither party should conclude either peace or truce without the
other. What added to the difficulty was, that France had, within the
last two years, shown an unusual interest and activity of assistance.
Franklin, in order to strengthen his hands for the important crisis,
requested that other commissioners might be sent to Paris; and John Jay
quickly arrived from Spain, John Adams from Holland, and Henry Laurens
from London. The American Commissioners soon became strongly impressed
with the sentiment that France and Spain were keeping back a peace
solely for their own objects; and this was confirmed by a letter of
M. de Marbois, the secretary of the French legation at Philadelphia,
which had been seized by an English cruiser, and had been laid by
Mr. Fitzherbert before them. This letter appeared to be part of a
diplomatic correspondence between the French Minister, Vergennes, and
the French Minister in America, which threw contempt on the claim which
America set up to a share of the Newfoundland fisheries. It created
a strong belief that France was endeavouring to keep America in some
degree dependent on her; and Jay and Adams were extremely incensed at
Vergennes, and not only accused Franklin of being blindly subservient
to the French Court, but it made them resolve that no time should be
lost in effecting a separate treaty. Vergennes contended for the rights
of the Indian nations between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi, and
of Spain on the lower Mississippi, and this the American Commissioners
perceived to be an attempt to divide and weaken their territory. A
private and earnest negotiation for peace with England was therefore
entered upon as soon as a severe illness of Franklin permitted.
[Illustration: MAP OF THE UNITED STATES AT THE TIME WHEN THEY GAINED
THEIR INDEPENDENCE.]
There was no difficulty in these negotiations as to the full and entire
recognition of the independence of the States. The difficult points
were but two--one regarding the fishery, and the other regarding the
interests of the Royalists or Tories. The British Commissioners stood
out strongly for the free permission of all who had been engaged
in the war on the English side to return to their homes, and for
the restitution of all property confiscated in consequence of such
partisanship. The American Commissioners endeavoured to meet this
demand by saying the recommendations of Congress would have all the
effect that the English proposed. This the Commissioners regarded as
so many words, and they insisted so determinedly on this head, that
it appeared likely the negotiation would be broken off altogether. At
last Franklin said they would consent to allow for all losses suffered
by the Royalists, on condition that a debtor and a creditor account
was opened, and recompense made for the damages done by the Royalists
on the other side; commissioners to be appointed for the purpose of
settling all those claims. The English envoys saw at once that this was
a deception, that there would be no meeting, or no use in meeting, and
they therefore abandoned the point; and the question of the fishing
being in part conceded, the provisional articles were signed on the
30th of November, by the four American Commissioners on the one side,
and by Mr. Oswald on the other. In the preamble it was stated that
these articles were to be inserted in, and to constitute, a treaty of
peace, but that the treaty was not to be concluded until the terms of
peace had also been settled with France and Spain.
This proviso, however, by no means affected the treaty with America.
This secret treaty was made binding and effectual so far as America
and England were concerned. The first article acknowledged fully the
independence of the United States. The second fixed their boundaries,
much to the satisfaction of the Americans; and liberty was secured to
them to fish on the banks of Newfoundland, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence,
and wherever they had been accustomed to fish, but not to dry the fish
on any of the king's settled dominions in America. By the fourth,
fifth, and sixth articles it was engaged for Congress that it should
earnestly recommend to the several Legislatures to provide for the
restitution of all estates belonging to real British subjects who had
not borne arms against the Americans. All other persons were to be
allowed to go to any of the States and remain there for the settlement
of their affairs. Congress also engaged to recommend the restitution
of confiscated estates on the repayment of the sums for which they had
been sold; and no impediments were to be put in the way of recovering
real debts. All further confiscations and prosecutions were to cease.
By the seventh and eighth articles the King of England engaged to
withdraw his fleets and armies without causing any destruction of
property, or carrying away any negro slaves. By these articles, the
navigation of the Mississippi, from its source to the ocean, was to
remain for ever free and open to both parties. If West Florida happened
to be in the possession of Britain at the termination of a general
peace, a secret article determined its boundaries.
Such were the conditions on which this great contest was finally
terminated. The Americans clearly had matters almost entirely their own
way, for the English were desirous that everything should now be done
to conciliate their very positive and by no means modest kinsmen, the
citizens of the United States. It was, in truth, desirable to remove as
much as possible the rancour of the American mind, by concessions which
England could well afford, so as not to throw them wholly into the arms
of France. The conditions which the Americans, on their part, conceded
to the unfortunate Royalists consisted entirely of recommendations
from Congress to the individual States, and when it was recollected
how little regard they had paid to any engagements into which they had
entered during the war--with General Burgoyne, for example--the English
negotiators felt, as they consented to these articles, that, so far,
they would prove a mere dead letter. They could only console themselves
with the thought that they would have protected the unhappy Royalists,
whom Franklin and his colleagues bitterly and vindictively continued to
designate as traitors. Franklin showed, on this occasion, that he had
never forgotten the just chastisement which Wedderburn had inflicted
on him before the Privy Council for his concern in the purloining of
the private papers of Mr. Thomas Whateley, in 1774. On that occasion,
he laid aside the velvet court suit, in which he appeared before the
Council, and never put it on till now, when he appeared in it at the
signing of the Treaty of Independence.
On the 5th of December Parliament met, and the king, though not yet
able to announce the signing of the provisional treaty with France and
America, intimated pretty plainly the approach of that fact. Indeed,
Lord Shelburne had addressed a letter to the Lord Mayor of London
eight days before the articles with America were actually signed, that
this event was so near at hand that Parliament would be prorogued from
the time fixed for its meeting, the 26th of November, to the 5th of
December. It was, indeed, hoped that by that day the preliminaries with
France and Spain would be signed too. This not being so, the king could
only declare that conclusion as all but certain.
This announcement drew from the Opposition a torrent of abuse of
Ministers, who, in reality, had only been carrying out the very measure
which they had long recommended, and which Fox, in particular, had been
seriously endeavouring to accomplish whilst in office. Their censures
appeared to arise rather from the fact that the war was ended without
their mediation than from anything else. Fox upbraided Lord Shelburne
with having once said that, when the independence of America should
be admitted, the sun of England would have set. Yet this had been
the opinion not of Lord Shelburne merely, but of numbers who now saw
reason to doubt that gloomy view of things, and there was the less
reason for Fox to throw this in the face of the Prime Minister, as he
had been himself, whilst his colleague, earnestly labouring with him
for that end. Still he was naturally sore from Shelburne's successful
intrigues against his diplomacy. On the 18th of December he moved for
copies of such parts of the provisional treaty as related to American
independence; but in this he was supported by only forty-six members.
On the 26th the Houses adjourned for a month, for the Christmas recess,
and during this time the treaties with France and Spain made rapid
progress. The fact of America being now withdrawn from the quarrel,
coupled with the signs of returning vigour in England--Rodney's great
victory and the astonishing defence of Gibraltar--acted as a wonderful
stimulant to pacification. Spain still clung fondly to the hope of
receiving back Gibraltar, and this hope was for some time encouraged
by the apparent readiness of Lord Shelburne to comply with the desire,
as Chatham and Lord Stanhope had done before. But no sooner was this
question mooted in the House of Commons than the public voice denounced
it so energetically, that it was at once abandoned. On the 20th of
January, 1783, Mr. Fitzherbert signed, at Versailles, the preliminaries
of peace with the Comte de Vergennes, on the part of France, and with
D'Aranda, on the part of Spain. By the treaty with France, the right of
fishing off the coast of Newfoundland and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence
was restored, as granted by the Treaty of Utrecht; but the limits were
more accurately defined. The islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, on
the coast of Newfoundland, were ceded for drying of fish. In the West
Indies, England ceded Tobago, which France had taken, and restored St.
Lucia, but received back again Grenada, St. Vincent, Dominica, St.
Kitt's, Nevis, and Montserrat. In Africa, England gave up the river
Senegal and the island of Goree, but retained Fort St. James and the
river Gambia. In India, the French were allowed to recover Pondicherry
and Chandernagore, with the right to fortify the latter, and to carry
on their usual commerce. They regained also Mahé and the factory of
Surat, with their former privileges. The articles in the Treaty of
Utrecht, regarding the demolition of the fortifications of Dunkirk,
were abrogated. Spain was allowed to retain Minorca and both the
Floridas, but she agreed to restore Providence and the Bahamas. The
latter, however, had already been retaken by us. She granted to England
the right of cutting logwood in Honduras, but without the privilege
of erecting forts or stock-houses, which rendered the concession
worthless, for it had always been found that without these it was
impossible to carry on the trade. With the Dutch a truce was made
on the basis of mutual restoration, except as concerned the town of
Negapatam, which Holland ceded. The preliminaries, however, were not
settled till nearly eight months afterwards.
It was not to be wondered at that when, on the 24th of January, the
preliminaries of peace were laid on the tables of the two Houses,
there should be a violent denunciation of the large concessions made
by Ministers. Spain had been granted better terms than in any treaty
since that of St. Quentin. She had obtained the most desirable island
of Minorca, with the finest port on the Mediterranean. She had got the
Floridas, and had given up scarcely anything, whilst, had the British,
now freed from the dead weight of America, pursued the war against
her, she must soon have lost most of her valuable insular colonies.
France had given up more, but she recovered very important territories
which she had lost, and especially her settlements of Pondicherry and
Chandernagore, in the East Indies; but America had conceded nothing,
and yet had been allowed to determine her own frontier, and to share
the benefits of the fishing all round our own Transatlantic coasts.
A new and surprising phenomenon was discovered in the attacks upon
Ministers for these concessions: Fox and North were in coalition!
Fox, who so lately had declared North and his colleagues men "void
of every principle of honour and honesty," and who would consent,
should he ever make terms with them, to be called "the most infamous
of mankind," now as warmly declared that he had ever found Lord
North--this man void of honour and honesty--a man always "open and
sincere as a friend, honourable and manly as an enemy, above practising
subterfuges, tricks, and stratagems." Lord North, on his side,
repaid the compliments of Fox, growing enthusiastic on the genius,
eloquence, and generous nature of that statesman. "While I admire
the vast extent of his understanding," exclaimed North, "I can rely
on the goodness of his heart." The coalition was looked upon with
disfavour, but it was justified to a considerable extent during the
debate on the peace. Lord John Cavendish truly represented that France
and Spain were on the verge of ruin; that Holland was in an exhausted
and helpless condition; and that as for America, it was in the very
gulf of destitution, the people refusing to pay the taxes ordered by
Congress for the continuance of the war. And it was to such defeated
and demolished enemies that Ministers had conceded almost everything
they had asked. Lord North turned more particularly to the concession
made to the French in the East Indies. It was in that quarter, he said,
that he looked for a consolidated and expanding empire, calculated to
recompense us, and more than recompense us, for the loss of America.
From that splendid continent we had completely driven the French,
and the soundest policy dictated their continued firm exclusion from
it. Yet here had Ministers most fatally readmitted them, to renew
their old plots and alliances against us, by which they would to a
certainty continue to harass, thwart, and weaken us, till we once
more went through the ruinous and sanguinary process of expulsion. He
was equally severe on the surrender of Minorca and the Floridas to
Spain, and the admission of the unconceding, unconciliating Americans
to our own proper fishing grounds. Fox called on Ministers to produce
the treaty which he had sketched a few months before, and to see what
very different terms he had demanded, and would have exacted. That the
sense of the House went with these sentiments was shown by both the
amendments of the Coalition being carried by a majority of sixteen.
Lord John Cavendish moved another resolution strongly condemning the
terms of the treaty, but consented that the peace now made should
remain inviolate. This was also carried, by a majority of seventeen,
being two hundred and seven votes against one hundred and ninety.
This majority of the Coalition compelled Lord Shelburne to resign; but
the rest of the Administration remained in their places, in the hope
that Pitt would now take the Premiership. In fact, the king, on the
24th of February, sent for Pitt and proposed this to him; but Pitt was
too sensible of the impossibility of maintaining himself against the
present combination of parties. The next day Dundas moved and carried
an adjournment for three days, to give time for the arrangement of
a new Cabinet. Pitt continued to persist in declining to take the
Premiership, and on the 2nd or 3rd of March the king sent for Lord
North. His proposal was that North should resume the management of
affairs; but North insisted on bringing in his new friends, and to that
the king objected. Matters remained in this impracticable condition
till the 12th, when the king sent for North, and proposed that the Duke
of Portland should be asked to form an Administration; but this did
not at all advance matters, for Portland was equally determined with
North to maintain the Coalition, and the king was resolved to have
nothing to do with Fox, whilst Fox was equally determined not to admit
the king's friend, Lord Stormont, to any Cabinet of which he was a
member. On the 31st the announcement was made that Pitt had resigned,
and that the king was prepared to submit to the terms of the Coalition.
George, with deep and inward groans, submitted himself once more to the
slavery of the great Whig houses, and, as some small recompense, the
Coalition admitted Lord Stormont to a place in the Cabinet.
The new Administration arranged itself as follows:--The Duke of
Portland, First Lord of the Treasury; Lord North, Home Secretary;
Fox, Secretary for Foreign Affairs; the Earl of Carlisle, Privy Seal;
Lord John Cavendish, again Chancellor of the Exchequer; Admiral Lord
Keppel, the head of the Admiralty again; Lord Stormont, President
of the Council; the great stumbling block, Thurlow, removed from
the Woolsack, and the Great Seal put into commission; Burke again
Paymaster of the Forces, and his brother Richard as Secretary to the
Treasury in conjunction with Sheridan. Such was this strange and
medley association, well deserving Burke's own description of a former
Administration, as of a strange assemblage of creatures, "all pigging
together in one truckle-bed." Those who formed exclusively the Cabinet
were Portland, North, Fox, Cavendish, Carlisle, Keppel, and Stormont,
so that the great Whigs had taken care again to shut out Burke, who was
only a man of genius. Such an incongruous company could not long hold
together. The king did not conceal his indignation at seeing Fox in
office; the whole Court openly expressed its loathing of the anomalous
union; the country had no confidence in it; Fox felt that he had
wounded his popularity by his sudden and violent change.
At first the course of affairs was not eventful. On the 7th of May
Pitt moved a series of resolutions as the basis of a Bill for reform
of Parliament. The main features of this scheme were those of taking
measures against bribery and corruption; the disfranchisement of
boroughs when a majority of the electors was proved corrupt; and the
addition of a hundred new members to the House of Commons, nearly all
of them from the counties, except an additional member or two from the
metropolis.
On the 23rd of June the king sent down a message to the Commons,
recommending them to take into consideration a separate establishment
for the Prince of Wales, who had arrived at the age of twenty-one. This
young man, whose whole career proved to be one of reckless extravagance
and dissipation, was already notorious for his debauched habits, and
for his fast accumulating debts. He was a great companion of Fox, and
the gambling roués amongst whom that grand orator but spendthrift man
was accustomed to spend his time and money, and therefore, as a pet of
this Coalition Ministry, the Duke of Portland proposed to grant him
one hundred thousand pounds a year. The king, alarmed at the torrent
of extravagance and vice which such an income was certain to produce
in the prince's career, declared that he could not consent to burden
his people, and encourage the prince's habits of expense, by such
an allowance. He therefore requested that the grant should amount
only to fifty thousand pounds a year, paid out of the Civil List,
and fifty thousand pounds as an outfit from Parliamentary funds. The
Ministers were compelled to limit themselves to this, though the saving
was merely nominal, for the debts on the Civil List were again fast
accumulating, and the prince was not at all likely to hesitate to apply
to Parliament to wipe off his debts, as well as his father's when they
became troublesome to him. Resenting, however, the restraint attempted
to be put upon him by his father, the prince the more closely connected
himself with Fox and his party, and the country was again scandalised
by the repetition of the scenes enacted when Frederick, Prince of
Wales, father of George III., was the opponent of his own father,
George II., and the associate of his opponents. Such, indeed, had been
the family divisions in every reign since the Hanoverian succession. On
the 16th of July Parliament was prorogued.
[Illustration: THE MANSION HOUSE, LONDON, IN 1760.]
The regathering of Parliament, on the 11th of November, was
distinguished by two circumstances of very unequal interest. The
Prince of Wales, having arrived at his majority, took his seat as
Duke of Cornwall, as it was well known, intending to vote for a great
measure which Fox was introducing regarding India. We shall now almost
immediately enter on the narration of the important events which had
been transpiring in India during the American war. It is sufficient
here to observe that these were of a nature to give the most serious
concern and alarm to all well-wishers of the country, and of the
unfortunate natives of that magnificent peninsula. Fox's measure for
the reform and restraint of the East India Company was comprehended
in two Bills, the first proposing to vest the affairs of the Company
in the hands of sixteen directors, seven of them to be appointed by
Parliament, and afterwards sanctioned by the Crown, and nine of them to
be elected by the holders of stock. These were to remain in office four
years; the seven Parliament nominees to be invested with the management
of the territorial possessions and revenues of the Company; the nine
additional to conduct the commercial affairs of the Company under the
seven chief directors; and both classes of directors to be subject to
removal at the option of the king, on an address for the purpose from
either House of Parliament. The second Bill related principally to the
powers to be vested in the Governor-General and Council, and their
treatment of the natives.
The Bills were highly necessary, and, on the whole, well calculated
to nip in the bud those ever-growing abuses of India and its hundred
millions of people which, some seventy years later, compelled
Government to take the control out of the hands of a mere trading
company, whose only object was to coin as much money as possible out
of the country and the folk. But it needed no sagacity to see that the
means of defeat lay on the very surface of these Bills. Those whose
sordid interests were attacked had only to point to the fact that
Parliament, and not the Crown, was to be the governing party under
these Bills, in order to secure their rejection. This was quickly done
through a most ready agent. Thurlow had been removed by the Ministry
from the Woolsack, where he had remained as a steady opponent of all
the measures of his colleagues; and it required but a hint from the
India House, and he was at the ear of the king. Nothing was easier than
for Thurlow to inspire George III. with a deep jealousy of the measure,
as aiming at putting the whole government of India into the hands of
Parliament and of Ministers, and the effect was soon seen.
Fox introduced his first Bill on the 20th of November. All went
smoothly, and the second reading was ordered for that day week. Then
the storm burst. Mr. Grenville (afterwards Lord Grenville) described
the Bill as a scheme to put the Company into the hands of Ministers,
and to annihilate the prerogatives of the Crown at the same time. He
denounced it as one of the most daring and dangerous attempts that had
ever been brought into that House. He moved that it should lie over
till after Christmas, and there was a strong phalanx ready to support
him. Grenville did not press the motion to a division, and the Bill
was read a second time on the 27th, when a vehement and long debate
took place. Pitt put forth his whole strength against it, Fox for
it, and it was carried by two hundred and twenty-nine votes against
one hundred and twenty. On the 1st of December it was moved that the
Bill be committed, when the Opposition was equally determined. On
this occasion Burke, who had made himself profoundly acquainted with
Indian affairs, took the lead, and delivered one of his very finest
speeches, full of information and eloquence. Pitt resisted the going
into Committee with all his power, and pledged himself, if the House
would throw out the Bill, to bring in another just as efficacious, and
at the same time devoid of its danger. The debate, like the former
one, did not close till half-past four in the morning, and then it was
with a triumphant majority of two hundred and seventeen against one
hundred and three. The Bill, thus carried by such majorities through
the Commons, was carried up to the Lords, on the 9th of December,
by Fox, accompanied by a numerous body of the Commoners, and it was
considered as certain of passing there; but the king and his party,
exasperated at the resolute conduct of the Commons, had gone to such
lengths to quash the Bill in the Lords as are rarely resorted to by
the Crown. As in the Lower House, so here, it was allowed to be read
the first time without dividing; but it was attacked with an ominous
solemnity by Thurlow, the Duke of Richmond, and Lord Temple, who, since
his recall from the Lord-Lieutenancy of Ireland, had thrown himself
into the Opposition with peculiar vivacity. It was known that he had
been frequently closeted with the king of late, and he bluntly declared
the Bill infamous. As a matter of fact, he had urged the king to use
his personal influence with the House of Lords. Thurlow went further,
and, fixing one of his most solemn glances on the Prince of Wales, who
was sitting in the House to vote for the Bill, declared that if this
measure passed, the crown of England would not be worth wearing; and
that if the king allowed it to become law, he would, in fact, have
taken it from his head and put it on that of Mr. Fox. On the 15th, when
the Bill was proposed for the second reading, the royal proceedings
against it were brought at once to light. The Duke of Portland rose and
said, before going into the question, he was bound to notice a report
which was confidently in circulation, and which, if true, vitally
affected the constitution of the country. This was no less than that
the king had written a note to Lord Temple, stating that "his Majesty
would deem those who voted for the Bill not only not his friends, but
his enemies; and that if Lord Temple could put this into still stronger
language, he had full authority to do so."
The Duke of Richmond read a paragraph from a newspaper in which the
report was stated, naming Lord Temple without any disguise. On this
Temple rose, and admitted that he had given certain advice to the king,
but would neither admit nor deny that it was of the kind intimated
in the report. That the rumour was founded on truth, however, was
immediately shown by the division. Numbers of lords who had promised
Ministers to vote for the Bill withdrew their support; the Prince of
Wales declined voting; and the Opposition carried a resolution for
adjournment till the next day, in order to hear evidence in defence of
the East India Company. It was clear that the Bill had received its
death-blow, and would never pass the Lords after this expression of the
royal will, and on the 17th of December it was lost by nineteen votes.
Fox was very indignant, and made no scruple of attributing the conduct
of the king, not to mere report, but to fact. "There is," he said, "a
written record to be produced. This letter is not to be put in the
balance with the lie of the day;" whereupon he pulled from his pocket a
copy of the note said to have been written by the king to Lord Temple.
When he sat down, Mr. Grenville rose and stated that he had taken down
the words read as the king's note, and had shown them to his relative,
Lord Temple, who had authorised him to say that such words had never
been made use of by him. But Fox demanded whether Lord Temple had not
used words to that effect, and Grenville was silent. Fox continued
in a very fierce strain, denouncing back-stairs lords and bedchamber
politicians, and declared that the best-meant and best-concerted plans
of Ministers were subject to the blasting influence of a villainous
whisper. He added that he could not continue in office any longer
consistently either with his own honour or the interests of the nation.
He felt that he was goaded to it, and upbraided for not resigning
instantly; but a very honourable majority of that House stood pledged
to a great measure, and Ministers were equally bound not to abandon the
affairs of State in the midst of so much anarchy. These last words, and
the division, which was nearly two to one in favour of Ministers, left
it doubtful, after all, whether Fox and his colleagues would resign. As
such language, however, could not be used by Ministers with impunity,
and a dissolution of the Cabinet was probable, Erskine moved a
resolution, pledging the House to persevere in the endeavour to remedy
the abuses in the government of India, and declaring "that this House
will consider as an enemy to this country any person who shall presume
to advise his Majesty to prevent, or in any manner interrupt, the
discharge of this important duty." All strangers were excluded, but it
was ascertained that the motion was severely censured as an invasion of
the king's prerogative; yet the resolution was carried by one hundred
and forty-seven votes against seventy-three.
Strong as was the majority of Ministers, however, the king did not wait
for their resigning. The day after this debate (Thursday, December
18th), the king sent, at twelve o'clock at night, to Fox and Lord North
an order to surrender their seals of office to their Under-Secretaries,
as a personal interview, in the circumstances, would be disagreeable.
Fox instantly delivered up his; but Lord North was already in bed,
and had entrusted his seal to his son, Colonel North, who could not
be found for some time. The Seals were then delivered to Lord Temple,
who, on the following day, sent letters of dismissal to all the other
members of the coalition Cabinet. Pitt, though in his twenty-fifth
year only, was appointed first Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor
of the Exchequer, and on him devolved the duty of forming a new
Administration. Earl Gower was nominated President of the Council, and
Lord Temple one of the Secretaries of State. When the House of Commons
met in the afternoon, Fox imagined, from a motion of Dundas to proceed
to business without the usual adjournment on Saturday, that it was the
object of the new party to pass certain money Bills, and then resort
to a dissolution. Fox opposed the motion, declaring that a dissolution
at this moment would produce infinite damage to the service of the
nation, and that, should it take place in order to suit the convenience
of an ambitious young man (meaning Pitt), he would, immediately on the
meeting of the new House, move for an inquiry into the authors and
advisers of it, in order to bring them to punishment. This caused Lord
Temple, who had occasioned the breaking up of the Coalition, to resign
again immediately, declaring that he preferred meeting any aspersions
upon him in his private and individual capacity. This certainly removed
a great danger from his colleagues, although it rendered the task of
his friend and relative, Pitt, still more difficult, in having to form
an Administration alone. The Ministry was then filled up thus:--Lord
Sydney, Secretary of State for the Home Department; the Marquis of
Carmarthen for the Foreign; the Duke of Rutland, Lord Privy Seal;
Lord Gower became President of the Council; the Duke of Richmond,
Master-General of the Ordnance; Lord Thurlow again Chancellor; Lord
Howe, First Lord of the Admiralty. With the exception of Pitt, the
whole of the Cabinet was drawn from the House of Lords. When the
Commons met, on the 22nd, Mr. Bankes said he was authorised by Mr.
Pitt, who was not in the House, a new writ for Appleby being moved
for on his appointment to office, to say that he had no intention to
advise a dissolution. His Majesty, on the 24th of December, having also
assured the House that he would not interrupt their meeting after the
recess by either prorogation or dissolution, the House adjourned till
the 12th of January, 1784.
When Parliament reassembled, Fox seized the very earliest moment to
address the Chair and occupy the attention of the House. He rose at
the unusually early hour of half-past two o'clock in the day, before
the newly returned members had taken their oaths. Pitt himself was
in this predicament, but, as soon as he had taken his oath, he rose
to speak; but Fox contended that he was already in possession of the
House, and, though Pitt announced that he had a message from the king,
Fox persisted, and moved that the House should go into committee on
the state of the nation. This allowed Pitt to speak, who declared that
he had no objection to the committee; but he thought it more advisable
to go into the question of India, on which subject he proposed to
introduce a Bill. He then made some sharp remarks on the conduct of
Fox in thus seizing, by artifice, a precedence in speaking, and on
the petulance and clamour which the Opposition had displayed, and on
the violent and unprecedented nature of their conduct, by which they
hoped to inflame the spirit of the country and excite unnecessary
jealousies. In truth, Fox and his party were now running a most unwise
career. Possessed of a large majority, they were indignant that the
king should have dismissed them, and thought that they could outvote
the new Ministry, and drive them again from office. They had, no doubt,
such a majority; but, at the same time, they had the king resolute
against them. They had insulted him by their violent denunciations
of his letter, and they had not, in their anger, the discernment to
perceive that not only would this be made use of by their opponents to
injure them, both in Parliament and out of it, but their proceeding
with so much heat and violence was calculated to make them appear
factious--more concerned for their places than for the interests of the
country. All this took place; the king and Ministry saw how all this
would operate, and calmly awaited its effects. Fox and his party were,
however, blind to the signs of the times, and carried no less than five
resolutions against the Government.
When the House met again, Pitt moved for leave to bring in his Bill
for the better government and management of the affairs of the East
India Company. He was aware, he said, how certain men would triumph
when he informed them that he had based his intended measures on the
resolutions of the proprietors of India stock. He was so miserably
irresolute, he said, as not to venture on a Bill founded on violence
and disfranchisement. He was so weak as to pay respect to chartered
rights; and he had not disdained, in proposing a new system of
government, to consult those who had the greatest interest in the
matter, as well as the most experience in it. These were all hard hits
at Fox and his party. In his Bill he went on the principle of placing
the commerce of India chiefly under the control of the Company itself;
but the civil and military government, he admitted, required some other
control than that of the Company, yet even this, in his opinion, ought
to be established in accordance with the convictions of the Company. In
truth, it was a Bill rather calculated to win the good will of the East
India Company than to reform the abuses of that body and to protect the
interests of the natives. Fox, with as much truth as personal feeling,
designated the Bill as the wisdom of an individual opposed to the
collective wisdom of the Commons of England.
The Bill was suffered to pass the second reading, but was thrown out,
on the motion of its being committed, by two hundred and twenty-two
against two hundred and fourteen. Fox then gave notice of his intention
of bringing in a new Bill of his own on India, and demanded to know
from the Ministers whether he might expect to proceed in security with
it, or whether the House would be dissolved. Pitt did not answer; the
question was repeated by other members, but Pitt continued silent, till
General Conway said it was a new thing to see a Minister sitting in
sulky silence, and refusing to satisfy the reasonable desires of the
House. This brought out Pitt with an indignant denial; but he preserved
silence as to the probability of a dissolution.
[Illustration: CHARLES JAMES FOX. (_After the portrait by Sir Joshua
Reynolds._)]
These party tactics were continued with unwonted heat by the Opposition
on all occasions, till the House adjourned for three days, to meet
again on the 29th, the Opposition revelling in large majorities, though
they were aware that both the king and the House of Lords were adverse
to them. But the country was also growing weary of this unsatisfactory
position of things, and began to sympathise with the great patience
of Pitt rather than the tumultuous conduct of Fox and his friends.
Pitt, however, was strong in the assurance of the adhesion of the
Crown and the peerage, and saw unmistakable signs of revulsion in the
feeling of the public. The majorities of the Commons were becoming
every time less, and on the 16th of February the Corporation of London
had presented a strongly expressed address to the king, declaring its
approval of the late dismissal of Ministers, and its opinion that the
India Bill of Fox was an encroachment on the prerogative of the Crown.
Dr. Johnson also regarded it as a contest whether the nation should be
ruled by the sceptre of George III. or by the tongue of Mr. Fox.
Fox saw the growing change with alarm. He saw that all their
resolutions and addresses produced no effect on the Ministerial
party; and he did not dare to go further and pass a Bill, either
legislative or declaratory, for he felt that the Lords would throw it
out; and to stop the supplies, or delay the Mutiny Bill would probably
disgust and annihilate the very majority on which he depended. In
these circumstances, he probably saw with satisfaction an attempt at
coalition. Mr. Grosvenor, the member for Chester, during the three days
of the adjournment, called a meeting of members of both parties for the
purpose of seeing whether a coalition could not be formed, and thus
put an end to this violent contest. About seventy members met, and an
address to the Duke of Portland and Mr. Pitt was signed by fifty-four.
Pitt expressed his readiness to co-operate in such a plan, but the Duke
of Portland declared that the first indispensable step towards such a
measure must be the resignation of Ministers. This put an end to all
hope of success.
The feelings of the constituencies were undergoing a speedy change, and
the fact was now being rapidly proved. For three months, whilst the
Opposition in the House of Commons were exulting on their majority, the
majority amongst the people was sliding from them; and, whilst they
were straining every nerve to prevent the dissolution of Parliament,
they were only more securely preparing their own fall, for Pitt and the
Government had been zealously at work undermining them. The nation was
pleased at his bravery, and at his disinterestedness in refusing the
sinecure of the Clerkship of the Pells, though his private means were
scarcely £300 a year.
From the 11th of February to the 1st of March the struggle went on,
many endeavours being made, but without effect, to come to an agreement
between the parties. On the last day Fox moved that an Address be
carried up to the king by the whole House, representing the violence
done to the Constitution by a Minister retaining his place after a vote
of want of confidence by the Commons, and insisting strongly on the
right and duty of that House to advise his Majesty on the exercise of
his prerogative. Pitt replied that, by attempting to force the king
to decide contrary to his judgment, they were placing the sceptre
under the mace; but the resolution was carried by a majority, though
of twelve only, and on the 4th the Address was carried up, when the
king repeated that his sentiments remained the same. Fox, on the
return of the House, moved that this answer should not be taken into
consideration before the 8th, and till then the Mutiny Bill should
remain in abeyance. His object was to stave off a dissolution until the
25th, when the Mutiny Bill expired. By refusing to renew it, he hoped
to force his rival to resign. The House on the 8th was excessively
crowded, for a very warm debate was anticipated. When it came to
divide about midnight, Fox was found to have carried his resolution,
but only by a majority of one. This was the climax of defeat. The once
triumphant Opposition saw that all was over with them, and they gave up
the contest.
The supplies and the Mutiny Bill were now passed without much
difficulty, but Ministers did not venture to introduce an Appropriation
Bill. On the 23rd, Lord North, stating that the dissolution of
Parliament was confidently asserted out of doors, declared that such
a dissolution, without passing an Appropriation Bill, would be an
unparalleled insult to the House. He expressed his astonishment that
the Minister did not condescend to utter a syllable on the subject of
the proposed change. Pitt, now confident of his position, replied that
gentlemen might ask as many questions as they pleased; that he had
adopted a course which was advantageous to the country, and did not
feel bound to enter then into any explanations. All mystery, however,
was cleared up the next day, for the king went down to the House of
Lords and prorogued Parliament, announcing that he felt it his duty
to the Constitution and the country to convoke a new Parliament.
Accordingly, on the following day, the 25th of March, he dissolved
Parliament by proclamation.
When the new Parliament met, on the 18th of May, it was seen how
completely Fox and North had destroyed their prestige by their late
factious conduct, and how entirely Pitt had made himself master of the
situation. His patience and cool policy under the tempestuous assaults
of the Opposition had given the country a wonderful confidence in him.
One party extolled him as the staunch defender of the prerogative,
another as the champion of reform and enemy of aristocratic influence.
Not less than one hundred and sixty of the supporters of the late
Coalition Ministry had been rejected at the elections, and they were
held up to ridicule as "Fox's Martyrs."