Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third Volume II Part 7

The second: "That it is the right and duty of the Lords and Commons (describing them as in the preamble to the Bill of Rights) to provide the means of supplying the defect in the personal exercise, &c., in such manner as the exigency of the case may appear to them to require."

The third: "That for the above purpose, and for maintaining entire the const.i.tutional authority of His Majesty, it is necessary that the said Lords and Commons should determine on the means by which the royal a.s.sent may be given in Parliament to such Bill as may be pa.s.sed by the two Houses, respecting the exercise of the royal power, in the name and on the behalf of His Majesty, during the continuance of His Majesty's indisposition."

I believe I have given you very nearly the words, which I ought to remember, having employed very near the whole of two days in settling them with Pitt and our lawyers.

Our principle is, that the King's authority remains entire. That no legislative act can be done but with the formal sanction of his a.s.sent. That no person can take upon him to give that a.s.sent, except by the direction and authority of the two Houses, who have the right, in the present emergency, to act for the King; but must, even in doing that, adhere as nearly as possible to the forms of the Const.i.tution.

Fox opposed these resolutions, in one of the best speeches I ever heard from him; but I think indiscreetly supporting and enforcing all his old ground of the Prince of Wales's right. Towards the end, he made a violent personal attack on Pitt, intimating that he was desirous, through envy, to weaken the hands of those _who were to be his successors_. This opening was not neglected by Pitt, but laid hold of in a manner which enabled him to speak of his own conduct towards the King and the Prince, and towards the country in the present moment, and to contrast it with that of his opponents.

I never heard a finer burst of eloquence, nor witnessed such an impression as it produced. But you will know all this better from the papers.

The division exceeded our expectations. All the neutrals, and many of the wavering people, and some of the most timid of our friends, were against us, on the ground of the inexpediency of agitating this question. You will also naturally see that something is to be allowed for the impression of two Princes of the blood speaking; one of them to a.s.sure the country that the Prince of Wales would not urge this claim, and both beseeching, as a sort of personal point, that it might not be made necessary to come to a division upon the question. Still, however, the impression which the claim itself had made on the country, was such that it was a point of real duty to quiet people's minds upon it. But it cannot be surprising, that under all these circ.u.mstances, and under the fear of some unexplained danger, many people should be caught by a previous question. I was a little mortified at finding our friend Sir P. P. among these. I had no previous intimation of this till I saw him in the division, nor have I had any opportunity of conversing with him since. I am not sure that he did not think he ought to have been a Lord of the Admiralty instead of Lord Hood. It is either that, or his intercourse with some of the Independents.

On the whole, I think it better to leave him to himself, as I do not think I have sufficient influence over him to do any good, and the attempt might do harm. You know best how you stand in that respect. We have certainly no claim upon him beyond friends.h.i.+p and opinion.

Lord Lonsdale's people were against us, in consequence of a letter, written by the Prince of Wales himself, soliciting it as a personal favour. This, which I know _from authority_, may serve to give you an idea of the pains they had taken. They were so confident, that, on Sunday night, Fox a.s.sured the whole party, at a general meeting at Burlington House, that he had no doubt of beating us. I imagine that we are now sure of carrying our restrictions, and probably by a larger majority.

Lord Loraine has separated himself from the Duke of N.; in consequence of which, Rainsforth has vacated. We do not know who comes in, but Lord Loraine says it is a friend.

Gerard Hamilton is among the rats, which is no small amus.e.m.e.nt to me, who have frequently been abused by Pitt for my bad opinion of him, at the time that he was swallowing toads _a toute outrance_.

There are one or two more individual members in the House of Commons, but n.o.body of any consequence but the Duke of Queensbury, which, though everybody expected it, is nevertheless a thing that raises my indignation in no small degree.

The popular opinion shows itself every day more and more, and I have no doubt you will hear of addresses, &c. Fox's declaration of the Prince of Wales's right has been of no small service to us. Is it not wonderful that such great talents should be conducted with so little judgment?

Our mode of proceeding will now be to communicate these resolutions to the Lords; and when they have concurred in them, then to bring forward the plan; and lastly, to authorize the Lord Chancellor to put the Great Seal to a commission to His Royal Highness, to empower him to open the Parliament, and afterwards to another (at least, _I_ think they should be separate), authorizing him to give the royal a.s.sent to the Bill appointing him Regent.

You will easily see, that all this will be no very short proceeding. In the meantime, the prospect of the King's recovery is daily growing more favourable. Willis and Addington have both said, _separately_, that his emotion at seeing the Queen for the first time, and his subsequent agitation, instead of being discouraging, were symptoms highly favourable. He is now quite calm; and at three o'clock yesterday, the account which came from Willis was, that he was better than at any time since his illness.

It will be ridiculous if he should recover just in time to give the royal _dissent_ to the Regency Bill--which is not impossible. The more probable supposition is, that they will just have time to parcel out the spoils, to dismiss us, and to hold their offices about a month; and so will end (if this should happen) the third reign of King Charles III.

So little was said about Ireland, that it would have been an affectation in me to have talked about it; besides this, I had no opportunity of speaking that pleased me.

Ever most affectionately yours, W. W. G.

What I mentioned in my last about the four Princes, I now _know_ not to be true with respect to the Duke of Gloucester, who has held aloof from all cabal with them, and even declared in the House of Lords that he had done so.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Whitehall, Dec. 19th, 1788.

MY DEAR BROTHER,

I am very sorry that this letter must necessarily be so short, as I should have great pleasure if there was time to state to you the particulars of our triumph, and of the effect which it has produced, and which is indeed little less than miraculous. It certainly exceeded my expectations; but it was so infinitely beyond what our opponents had thought possible, that they are beat down by it beyond all description. I hope you will hear all this more particularly from others. I write now only for the purpose of sending you the following paragraph from a letter of Willis's to Pitt last night, which he showed me. W. is speaking of the effect of the blisters. He says: "From this, and from several other little occurrences in the course of these last three days, I am more than ever confirmed in my opinion that there can be no doubt of the King's entire recovery."

I know the pleasure which this will give you, and therefore send it, though in great haste.

Ever most affectionately yours, W. W. G.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Whitehall, Dec. 21st, 1788.

MY DEAR BROTHER,

I have delayed writing for these two or three last days, in hopes of being able to give you an account of the event of our second division, which has, as you will have seen, been deferred from day to day, and now is finally fixed for to-morrow. The adjournment on Friday was necessary, on account of Pitt's health. He had entirely lost the use of his voice by a cold, so that he could not have spoken five sentences together, and he was in other respects much exhausted. Our friends were a little chagrined at the delay; but it was unavoidable, and will not, I hope, be productive of any inconvenience.

Our next question is not a pleasant one. It turns on an abstruse maxim of law, which makes it necessary for us to take a very circuitous mode of doing a very plain thing. The necessity of it is forced upon us by our lawyers, whom we could not otherwise have satisfied, with regard to the second proposition which we have voted. I am indeed convinced, that, in strict law, they are right, and that the mode now proposed is the regular and proper mode of doing what is required to be done. At the same time, it would have been more agreeable to have had a more familiar and obvious measure to defend in such an a.s.sembly as the House of Commons.

We shall probably lose some individuals, both on this question, and on the subsequent question of restrictions; but we have some new recruits, who were absent by sickness, or other accidents; so that, on the whole, I hope the difference will not be considerable, though nothing can exceed their industry in canva.s.sing, except the open manner in which they offer every sort of bribe.

We have some idea of making the restrictions temporary, by which means they will certainly be much more palatable. You will observe that almost all the physicians seem to point out the probability of his recovering within a year or a year and a half, if at all. This seems to afford a real ground of expediency, besides giving a strong topic of argument for imposing the restrictions only for a similar time. This point is, however, not yet determined.

The accounts from Windsor for the last week, though they have varied, are yet, on the whole, less favourable than before. Willis ascribes this entirely to the effect of the blisters, which give him great pain; and Willis says _that_ is, on the whole, by no means an unfavourable symptom. The effect, however, which these accounts produce here, is injurious to us, and must be the same in Ireland. Our solid ground of hope does not appear to be in the smallest degree weakened.

You will see in the Opposition papers that they are beginning to abuse the Queen in the most open and scandalous manner. I collect from this that they have some information, on which they can depend, with respect to her sentiments, and I conjecture that they are such as we could wish.

If we were together, I could tell you some particulars of the Prince of Wales's behaviour towards the King and her, within these few days, that would make your blood run cold; but I dare not commit them to paper, because of my informant.

The demands of the Opposition appear to have risen and fallen with the bulletins; and according as the King was better or worse, the resistance to the limitations was faint or violent. The conduct pursued by the Prince's party to obtain votes and strengthen their parliamentary influence, is not shown in a very favourable light.

SIR WILLIAM YOUNG TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Stratton Street, Monday, Dec. 22nd, 1788.

MY DEAR LORD,

I should scarcely venture to antic.i.p.ate a subject, the event of which within twenty-four hours may belie any pretensions of political sagacity, might not the difference of one day's post from London eventually delay your receiving a letter for a week, should wind and sea prove perverse, as when I pa.s.sed my Christmas at Holyhead. This, and the anxiety for intelligence, which must necessarily arise from the suggestion in my note of Sat.u.r.day, induces me to pursue the matter I then opened, and the more especially as the circ.u.mstance, I foresaw, is now more than likely to occur. As I purpose closing this letter at the House of Commons, and the last moment which the post may allow me, I shall have to transmit fact in lieu of probability; at present, I state briefly my grounds for the latter--namely, that the specific great question, whether the Prince shall be Regent without any limitations, and invested with the full prerogatives of royalty, will be agitated and decided upon this Monday night. The turn of debate and temper of the House on Friday, which induced me to suppose such question might be pressed upon us, have induced others to press it. This morning a printed paper hath been sent to certain members, containing a motion for addressing, and an address at length to the Prince, corroborating what Mr. Steele told me yesterday, that _Fox's_ party had some design in view for Monday.

Letters having been sent in Fox's name to several members, requesting attendance and _an answer_; and that Mr. Pitt had written in like manner to such as he apprehended might be withdrawing for the Christmas holidays, with the same unusual request _of answer_. Two of these letters (pretty long), to Sir H.

Hoghton and to Mr. Pye, I afterwards had the perusal of.

The true friendly language, and which I openly hold, is that we shall be stronger on the division than before; such language is proper, because ordinary men consider numbers as a shelter for their opinions and conduct, and some even consider it as the test of truth. But this language hath not its origin in my judgment and feelings. There are circ.u.mstances which impress great doubt on my mind, whether the division can be so favourable to our wishes, as was the last. Taking the data of the examination of the physicians, the King's recovery therein presumed, gives a vantage-ground in argument for limitations. But I am sorry to say this ground is now shaken: the public is no longer sanguine in hopes, medical gentlemen have generally conspired to render the object of recovery much more doubtful at least, and the physicians about the King have had dissensions and disputes amongst themselves. It is now rumoured that Dr. Warren wishes to be re-examined. All this is indeed not before the House of Commons, and the report of the physicians is; I think, therefore, that though not so decisive, we yet shall have a considerable majority on the premises; but even for this dependant on other considerations--namely, how far apprehensions of the King's actual demise may operate from, I believe, the faithful report of the day, that a fever is come on, and that for a day or two past the King has had a constant sweating of the head, to which he was at no time before accustomed.

According to wishes or fears, men construe this crisis to portend health or decease; the political effect in the alternative, being in the first case uncertain, in the second case certain. The bent of this is against us, as few narrow motives and personal considerations may extend and favour the active spirit of subornation which stalks in open day, with each hand full of patents of honour and purses of money. Offers have been so prodigal that not fifty years of patronage could accomplish the performance.

Those gentlemen who have rejected these kind tenders of service speak openly, and no notice is taken. In these moments of public curiosity, it may not be so well to trust names to a letter. I could give you several.

The bearing of this letter is thus unfavourable to this night's debate terminating _fully_ as we could wish, though yet I think _for us_. Having thus far written, I shall pocket my paper for the purpose of adding what I can at the House of Commons.

House of Commons, Half-past Five, Monday, Dec. 22nd, 1788.

I dined at three, at a coffee-house, with my cousin, old William Lawrence, who called on me; Smith, member for Sudbury, leader of the Dissenters, joined us on the walk, and was of our dinner party. Lawrence said he wished a compromise, a _limited regency for a year_, and then to take up the business anew, if the King was not recovered, on the other ground, and _he_ is a leading country gentleman of their party, Smith is in an unqualified manner with us; and Thornton, whose place in the House is next to me, being equally staunch, I augur that we have all the Dissenters' interest with us. Indeed, generally speaking, the House looks better for us than I expected, and I doubt not our majority, yet thinking it will not be great; indeed the House is not nearly so full as it was on the late question, and the apprehensions I set out with of temporizers and s.h.i.+rkers, as we called them at Eton, seem confirmed.

Edmund Burke arose a little after four, and is speaking yet. He has been wilder than ever, and laid himself and party open more than ever speaker did. He is Folly personified, but shaking his cap and bells under the laurel of genius; among other things, he said Mr.

Pitt's proposals could not be adopted, as gentlemen, as _cavaliers_: the word will not be forgot.

Fox is present, but looks very ill. Pitt looks recovered. Your brother in high glee at Burke. Burke stated the Chancellor to be like to the G.o.d Priapus, and Pitt the carpenter. He run his idea to a charming extravagance, and finished by declaring that "he could not be a votary to Priapus, the false G.o.d! _vid._ Horace, &c."

The question is an amendment of Dempster's, to follow; the Lords and Commons, &c., determine "to address the Prince of Wales, to take on him the Regency, &c."

Adieu, my dear Lord. Your Marchioness in health, and a boy, and yourself in all good that Providence can dispense, is the prayer of your most faithfully affectionate and devoted friend, &c.