1755.

THE DUCHESS OF BRUNSWICK.

53

since Fox drew with him to a great extent the House of Bedford. Yet far-sighted observers could already discern in it the tokens of approaching dissolution. When Lord Chesterfield was told of it, he exclaimed, that the Duke of Newcastle had turned out every body else, and now had turned out himself! *

But the ill-timed journey of the King last summer had been fruitful, not merely of Ministerial dissensions, but of Court cabals.- While at Hanover the Duchess of Brunswick with her two daughters paid His Majesty a visit; the King was charmed with the beauty, merit, and understanding of the elder Princess, and designed her as a suitable consort to the young Prince of Wales. He had no object apparently but his grandson's happiness, whom he desired to see settled before he died,—and no wish to force the Prince's inclinations should he find them averse to the match. But the Princess Dowager in England took alarm at the first rumours of the scheme. The domestic virtues of which her son gave early promise convinced her that he would soon become devoted to his bride,— above all to a bride so accomplished and so amiable; and she feared that her influence over him would decline in the same degree. These are the motives ascribed to her by several writers at the time, but it must be owned, on the other hand, that the King was not infallible in his predilections, and that the early youth of the Prince of Wales (only seventeen) might also suggest to an affectionate mother adequate grounds of objection. Certain it is that under her influence Prince George speedily imbibed the utmost aversion to the proposed alliance. Her conversation at this time with Dodington, next to Bute one of her most trusted friends, throws great light upon her feelings, while it also incidentally reveals her real opinion of her son. "The young woman is said to be "handsome, and to have all good qualities, but if she "takes after her mother she will never do here.""Pray

Madam," asked Dodington, "what is her mother? as I "know nothing at all about her?"—"Why,” replied the Princess Dowager, "her mother is the most intriguing, meddling, and also the most satirical, sarcastical person

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*H. Walpole to Sir H. Mann, Sept. 29. 1755.

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"in the world, and will always make mischief wherever "she comes. Such a character would not do with George; "it would not only hurt him in his public but make him uneasy in his private situation. He is not a wild dissipated boy, but good-natured and cheerful, with a "serious cast upon the whole. Those about him know "him no more than if they had never seen him.— His "education has given me much pain; his book-learning "I am no judge of, though I suppose it small or useless, "but I hope he may have been instructed in the general "understanding of things. I once desired Mr. "Stone to inform the Prince about the Constitution, but "he declined it to avoid giving jealousy to the Bishop of "Norwich. I mentioned it again, but he still declined it as not being his province.". "Pray Madam,” said Dodington, "what is his province?"- Her Royal Highness answered, "I do not know, unless it is to go before "the Prince upstairs, to walk with him sometimes, seldomer to ride with him, and now and then to dine with him."* Under these impressions the Princess Dowager set herself in direct opposition to the King. All the dutiful submission she had not only professed, but shown, since her husband's death, ceased at once and for ever. Surrendering herself to the guidance of Bute and Dodington, her former caution and prudence appeared to forsake her. She affected to treat with contempt the King's principal Ministers, while Pitt and Pitt's followers were most graciously received; nor did she scruple to connect herself, and, as far as she could prevail, connect her son,— with opposition cabals. Perhaps she flattered herself that these cabals might yet pass undiscovered; but the King had not been a week in England before he was thoroughly informed of every thing she did, and of most things she intended. After a short interval His Majesty sent for the Prince into his closet, not to propose the match, knowing it would be to little purpose, but to sound his grandson's views in reference to Hanover, and to caution him against evil advisers. The result of this interview proved far from satisfactory to the Royal grandsire. The Prince, deeply impressed with filial duty to his mother, heard all the King's representations with dis

* Dodington's Diary, August 6. 1755,

1755.

MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.

55

trust; he bowed and bowed again, but made scarce any answer. In the opinion of Lord Waldegrave, who, from his post in the Prince's Household, had the best means of judging, and whose high integrity is acknowledged by all parties, His Majesty here committed no small mistake; instead of thus sending for the Prince, he should have spoken firmly to the Dowager Princess, and told her that as she governed her son she should be held as answerable for his conduct.

It was at the crisis of such great and jarring interests, a war, though not declared, begun, a people roused from indifference to discontent, the Heir-Apparent again inclining to the side of Opposition,

- and a schism

breaking forth in the very heart of the Ministry, — that the Parliament met on the 13th of November. It was a day fraught with anxious hopes and fears to millions. The King's Speech and the Addresses moved in answer to it were such as to imply, at least, approbation of the treaties with Russia and Hesse. Against these, the Earls Temple and of Halifax declaimed in the Lords, but, besides Newcastle and Hardwicke, the Duke of Bedford spoke in their support, and no division ensued. In the Commons the debate, which commenced at two in the afternoon, continued till five the next morning, the longest yet on record, except that upon the Westminster Electon in 1741. Every variety of sentiment, every degree of talent, appeared in their turn. It was on this occasion that William Gerard Hamilton delivered his famous harangue. "He spoke for the first time," says an ear-witness," and was at once perfection; his "speech was set, and full of antitheses, but these anti"theses were full of argument; indeed his speech was "the most argumentative of the whole day, and he broke through the regularity of his own composition, answered "other people, and fell into his own track again with the ""* greatest ease." This high promise of excellence was, however, followed by no further efforts; the young orator was content with this fame, and with some lucrative offices it gained him in Ireland; and became known by the name of Single Speech Hamilton. Yet a volume he

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* H. Walpole to H. S. Conway, November 15. 1755.

has left of maxims for debating in the House of Commons proves how deeply and carefully he had made that subject his study.*

Philip Stanhope, the illegitimate son of Lord Chesterfield, also took part in this debate, having been most studiously trained and most anxiously exhorted by his father, but he failed, and never raised his voice in public again.

Dr. Lee (now become Sir George) spoke as representative of the Princess Dowager's sentiments, and as such was explicit against the Court. He said it was easy for the Ministers to produce unanimity by pursuing British measures,- —a high-sounding empty phrase, as was thought at the time, but, as it proved soon afterwards, a true prediction.

Murray with a master's touch painted the merits of the King, who might have ensured tranquillity to the evening of his life had he studied only his own repose; but His Majesty disdained such tranquillity as would entail greater difficulties on his successor and on his people.

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At length, after many other more or less interesting speeches, up rose Pitt, as Horace Walpole, who was present, well describes him,- haughty, defiant, conscious of recent injury and of supreme abilities. "He surpassed himself, and then I need not tell you that he surpassed "Cicero and Demosthenes. What a figure would they "with their formal, laboured, cabinet orations make by "the side of his manly vivacity and dashing eloquence "at one o'clock in the morning, after sitting in that heat "for eleven hours! He spoke above an hour and a half "with scarce a bad sentence."†-Such descriptions must make us more than ever regret the utter absence, or what is even worse—the glaring imperfection, of reports

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* This volume is entitled "Parliamentary Logic," and abounds in useful hints. How shrewd, for example, is the following: "State "what you censure by the soft name of those who would apologise for it." (p. 23.) Or this: "In putting a question to your adversary, let it be the last thing you say." (p. 24.) It is not strictly true that Hamilton never spoke a second time; there are two other harangues of his on Irish affairs, which he delivered at Dublin, and which are printed after the Logic (p. 137. and 165. ed. 1808). † H. Walpole to R. Bentley, November 16. 1755.

1755.

THE RHONE AND THE SAONE.

57

in that age. Of this splendid declamation against the treaties of subsidy by far the greater part has perished; one celebrated passage, however, on the coalition between Newcastle and Fox is happily preserved. "It strikes

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me now!" exclaimed Pitt, raising his hand suddenly to his forehead, "I remember that at Lyons I was taken "to see the conflux of the Rhone and Saone, -the one a "gentle, feeble, languid stream, and though languid of no depth the other a boisterous and impetuous tor66 rent, - but different as they are they meet at last, "and long," he added with bitter irony, "long may they "continue united to the comfort of each other, and to the glory, honour, and security of this nation!"†

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Fox, tired and unanimated, replied only in a few words. But the triumph of the division by no means followed the palm of oratory; 311 Members voted for the Address, and only 105 against it. — Next morning Fox received the Seals; a few days later Pitt, Legge, and George Grenville were dismissed from their places. The successor of Legge, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, was Sir George Lyttleton, in former years the friend and confederate of Pitt, but of late gradually estranged from him. Lord Barrington became Secretary at War in the place of Fox.

It has often been alleged without contradiction — and sometimes been urged as a reproach - that Pitt thus expelled from office consented to accept a pension of 1,000l. a year from the Crown. Some letters, however, which have hitherto remained unpublished, prove beyond all question, that the sum thus received was no pension from the Crown, but only a gift of friendship from Lord Temple, who most earnestly pressed it through his sister on his brother-in-law's acceptance. ‡

* Any one who gazes on the Saone, in almost any part of its course, will be struck with the aptness of Cæsar's description : "Flumen est Arar, quod per fines duorum et Sequanorum in "Rhodanum influit incredibili lenitate, ita ut oculis, in utram partem "fluat, judicari non possit." (De Bell. Gall. lib. i. c. 12.) † Lord Orford's Memoirs, vol. i. The two rivals were still, it appears, on familiar terms. After the debate Fox asked Pitt, "Who is the Rhone?" Pitt answered, “Is that a fair question?" Earl Temple to Lady Hester Pitt, November 20, and 21. 1755 See Appendix.

414. p.