1761.

PARALLEL WITH CARDINAL XIMENES.

243

can only point to Cardinal Ximenes. This resemblance would be the less surprising, since Pitt, at the outset of his administration, had once, in conversation with Fox, talked much of Ximenes, who, he owned, was his favour. ite character in History,*

* Lord Orford's Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 214.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE retirement of Pitt from the administration left a complete and undisputed ascendency to Bute. It was now his Lordship's object to strengthen himself by large and powerful connections. The Privy Seal was kept in reserve for the Duke of Bedford, while the Seals of Secretary were bestowed upon the Earl of Egremont, who had been intended for plenipotentiary at the Congress of Augsburg, but who was chiefly remarkable as the son of Sir William Wyndham.-In public life I have seen full as many men promoted for their fathers' talents as for their own.

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But the most pressing object with Lord Bute was to avert or soften the resentment which the removal of the Great Commoner might probably excite in the nation. As he writes to his friend Dodington at this juncture: "Indeed, my good Lord, my situation, at all times perilous, is become much more so, for I am no stranger to "the language held in this great city. Our darling's "resignation is owing to Lord Bute, who might have prevented it with the King, and he must answer for "all the consequences; '-which is, in other words, for "the miscarriage of another's system, that he (Pitt) him"self could not have prevented.” ""* Concurring with this motive in Lord Bute's own mind there was also, I doubt not, in the Royal breast a sincere anxiety to reward distinguished merit. Under these circumstances, on the very day after Pitt's resignation, Bute addressed a letter to him by the King's commands, declaring that His Majesty was desirous, nay, "impatient," to confer on him some mark of his Royal favour. His Majesty, continued Bute, requests some insight into Mr. Pitt's own views and wishes, and meanwhile proposes to him either

* To Lord Melcombe, October 8. 1761, printed in the Appendix to Mr. Adolphus's History of England.

1761.

BARONESS CHATHAM.

245

the government of Canada, combined with residence in England, and a salary of 5,000l. a year, or the Chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster, with as much of emolument and nearly as little of business. The reply of Pitt, after a profusion of obsequious thanks,-states him self" too proud to receive any mark of the King's coun "tenance and favour, but, above all, doubly happy could "I see those dearer to me than myself comprehended "in that monument of Royal approbation and goodness "with which His Majesty shall condescend to distinguish << me. - In compliance with the hint thus given, a peerage was conferred on Lady Hester, by the title of Baroness Chatham, with remainder to her issue male, and a pension of 3,000l. a year was granted to Pitt for three lives; namely, his own, Lady Chatham's, and their eldest son's.*

For receiving such favours upon his resignation Pitt has been often and severely blamed. We should, however, recollect that they did not in any degree fetter his freedom, nor restrain him from censuring,-whenever he thought fit to censure, -the measures of the administration; they were rewards for services past, not retainers for services to come. Nor does it appear on what ground either peerages or pensions could be defended if those men most worthy of them are to be held debarred from their acceptance. But the same sincerity which inclines me to vindicate the transaction itself, compels me to say that I think Pitt's own letters on this subject, which have been of late made public, unduly pompous in their language, and yet, at the same time, unduly humble in their tone.

Another step of Pitt on his resignation, which seems wanting in good taste, was his public announcement of his seven coach-horses for sale. His acknowledged public integrity did not require, and should rather have disdained, that ostentatious proof.

The bestowal of the title and the pension on the retiring Minister fully attained the object which Lord Bute had in view. He was enabled in the same Gazette to insert, first, the resignation, next, the honours and re

* The five letters on this subject are printed in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 146-153.

wards, and, lastly, a despatch from the Earl of Bristol, stating at large the favourable and pacific assurances of the Spanish Court. "These," says Burke, were the "barriers that were opposed against that torrent of po"pular rage which it was apprehended would proceed "from this resignation. And the truth is, they answered "their end perfectly; this torrent for some time was “beaten back, almost diverted into an opposite course." Only a few days afterwards Pitt found it necessary to publish a letter to his friend, Alderman Beckford, in which he complains of being "grossly misrepresented and "infamously traduced" in the City, and gives some explanations of his conduct. We find, from the correspondence of the time, that several men of cultivated minds, and lately warm admirers of Pitt, Horace Walpole, and Gray, the poet, for examples, - highly blamed his acceptance of the peerage and pension. "Oh that "foolishest of great men!" cries Gray.† "What!" cries Walpole, "to blast one's character for the sake of a paltry annuity and a long-necked peeress!" Sir Francis Delaval put the matter in another light. "Pitt," he said, "is a fool; if he had gone into the City, told them he "had a poor wife and children unprovided for, and had opened a subscription, he would have got 500,000l., in"stead of 3,000l. a year." Ere long, however, truth and justice began to prevail over these exaggerated first impressions. In the City, the stronghold of Pitt's popularity, it rapidly revived. The Common Council voted him an Address of thanks for his public services, and instructed their representatives in Parliament to follow his line of politics. And when on the 9th of November, — the Lord Mayor's day, -the Royal Family went in state to dine at Guildhall, the thickest crowds, and the loudest acclamations, were not for the young King or the new Queen. Most eyes and most voices were turned from their Majesties' state-coach to Pitt's plain chariot and pair, containing himself and Lord Temple. We are told by an eye-witness, that at every step the mob clustered

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*Annual Register 1761, part i. p. 45.

† Gray's Works, vol. iii. p. 265.

To the Countess of Ailesbury, October 10. 1761.

1761.

THE NEW PARLIAMENT MEETS.

247

round his carriage, "hung upon the wheels, hugged his "footmen, and even kissed his horses!"*

To parade such a triumph in the sight and to the depreciation of Royalty, partakes, I fear, a little of arrogance. Thus it appeared in Pitt's own deliberate opinion. Some years afterwards Alderman Beckford's letter of invitation was endorsed by Lady Chatham as follows: 'My Lord yielded for his friend's sake, but, as he always declared, both then and after, against his better judg"ment."†

On the 3d of November the new Parliament met. The first business of the House of Commons was of course the election of a Speaker. When Onslow had resigned at the close of the preceding Session, the person designed as his successor was Mr. George Grenville, next brother to Lord Temple, and at this time Treasurer of the Navy.‡ No Member could be better qualified for the vacant Chair; he had a high and well-deserved character for worth in private life, legal knowledge (for he had been bred to the law), courteous manners, and unwearied assiduity. To him the forms of the House of Commons were not merely a duty or a business, but a source of exquisite pleasure. "He seemed," says Burke, "to have no delight "out of the House, except in such things as in some way "related to the business that was to be done within it." § So much had his whole mind been cast in the mould of precedents and order that they had become to him almost a second nature. In the recent divisions of the Government he had estranged himself from his two kinsmen, and taken part actively with Bute. It was to him that on Pitt's resignation Bute looked for the main conduct of the Ministerial business in the House of Commons. Thus his thoughts became diverted from the vacant Chair, and turned towards high political office, for which his qualifications were not equally eminent. - In his stead, the election of Speaker fell upon Sir John Cust, Member for

* See a letter printed in the Annual Register, 1761, part i. p. 237.

† Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 165.

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George Grenville is to be Speaker"

Mann, on the 17th March 1761.

§ Speech on American Taxation, 1774.

writes Walpole to