THE BISHOP OF GLOUCESTER TO MR. PITT.

Grosvenor Square, December 3rd, 1762.

HONOURED SIR,

ON my coming to town I thought it but decent, as I had not seen the Duke of Newcastle since his resignation, to wait upon him with my compliments, which I did yesterday; when he showed his confidence in me by the following commission, which he intrusted to me. He said I might be of use to the public by assuring you of his disposition towards you (whom he spoke of as all the world does); that you had acted together, generally with the same, though sometimes with different sentiments; but that now, if your joint endeavours to serve the public should point the same way, I was commissioned by his Grace to assure you, you should for the future have no reason to complain of his perfect accord and union with you.

This, I think, is the substance of what I had to say, without knowing further from his Grace,

The King's magnificent new coach might be supposed to have brought them together; but, what kept them there after the coach had gone back is, perhaps, not so satisfactory to think of. In short, Lord Bute was insulted, both going and coming from the house; and, towards evening, some soldiers were called in to support the constables in the discharge of their duty in clearing of the streets, so that the members might get away." -Mitchell MSS.

for what particular end and purpose I was to say it: but, if I be not mistaken, I think he said he had desired his royal highness, the Duke of Cumberland ('), to urge the same thing, with proper explanations.

Sir, your known goodness to me will be ready to pardon this impertinence. In these strange times I am sure but of one thing, your continued love and service of the public; but that one thing is a very great one, when I consider what a capacity is joined to that disposition. I have the honour to be, most dear Sir,

Your most obliged and

devoted servant,

W. GLOUCESTER.

(1) In a letter to General Conway, of the 29th of October, Horace Walpole says, "I have been in town but once since this last revolution, which has brought Mr. Fox again upon the scene; yet I have learned enough to confirm the opinion I had conceived, that the building is tottering, and that this last buttress will but push on its fall. Besides the clamorous opposition already encamped, the world talks of another, composed of names not so often in mutiny. What think you of the great duke, and the little duke, and the old duke, and the Derbyshire duke*, banded together against the Favourite?" And, on the 13th of November, Lord Chesterfield thus writes to his son:- — “I should naturally think, that this session will be a stormy one; that is, if Mr. Pitt takes an active part; but if he is pleased, as the ministers say he is, there is no other Æolus to blow a storm. The Dukes of Cumberland, Newcastle, and Devonshire have no better troops to attack with, than the militia; but Pitt alone is ipse agmen."

• The Dukes of Cumberland, Bedford, Newcastle, and Devonshire.

THE HON. THOMAS HERVEY (1) TO MR. PITT.

MY DEAR SIR,

Bond Street, December 5, 1762.

If any power were left me, either of mind or body, for such a disquisition, I could write very copiously to you concerning the present crisis. When I read the preliminaries of our precipitated peace, I could not avoid saying, to myself at least, what Antony says over the corpse of his friend Cæsar Alas, great Pitt! are all thy conquests, trophies, spoils, shrunk to this little measure? (2) For truth's sake, for your reputation's sake, and, above all, for the sake of your many staunch and invariable friends, recompense the cordial compliment I am making you, by testifying to the public, that you think with me upon this important measure.

(1) Second son of John, first earl of Bristol, and brother of the nobleman whose character Pope has delineated under the name of Sporus, and of the hon. Henry Hervey, the early friend of Dr. Johnson. He served in three parliaments for the borough of St. Edmundsbury, was surveyor of the royal gardens, and died in 1775. His celebrated Letter to Sir Thomas Hanmer, with whose wife he had eloped, appeared in 1742. Boswell, on the authority of Mr. Beauclerk, relates, that he had a great liking for Johnson, and had left him a legacy of fifty pounds, but afterwards gave it him in his lifetime. See Boswell's Johnson, vol. iii. p. 17. ed. 1835.

(2) "O mighty Cæsar! dost thou lie so low?

Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils,

Shrunk to this little measure?" -Julius Cæsar, act 3. sc. 1.

Exclusive of the considerations I have mentioned to you, the vanity of your opposition is as visible to me, as the vanity of all things was to Solomon; and therefore it is to be hoped, that you will not abide the issue of my prediction, till, like him, you find it verified by the test of experience. Had the Duke of Newcastle quitted his employment at the time of your resignation, his Grace had then made one right judgment of things before he died; and might have succeeded in that, which is not at present to be effected.

What part you intend to take upon this emergency is a point that puzzles our ablest politicians. New rumours and surmises are almost daily set on foot and circulated, and they are agreed in nothing, but their impatience for the event. (') You are still

(1) On the 9th of December, Mr. Pitt, although very ill, came down to the house, to state his objections to the preliminaries of peace. His speech, which lasted three hours and forty minutes, embraced every topic of objection. He declared, although he was at that instant suffering under the most excruciating torture, that he had determined, at the hazard of his life, to attend that day to raise up his voice, his hand, and his arm against the preliminary articles of a treaty, which obscured all the glories of the war, surrendered the dearest interests of the nation, and sacrificed the public faith by abandoning our allies. He proceeded to analyse every part of the stipulations; which he stigmatised in general with unqualified censure. The only particulars which met his approbation were the dereliction of North America by the French, and the restitution of Minorca. He expatiated at great length on the German connection; and affirmed, that the desertion of the King of Prussia was insidious, tricking, base, and treacherous. In conclusion, he said the terms of the proposed treaty met his most hearty disapprobation; for he saw in them the seeds of a future war. The peace was

beloved and reverenced by the patriot band, and still possessed of a dignity never conferred on any other man; that of being deemed, and even called, the people's minister. Your own firmness will keep firm this glorious basis; and as long as you continue to rest and build upon it, they that do not love you must ultimately find it necessary to have you. I am telling you these things, as the last efforts of my friendship; for I am wasting my life in such incessant constraint and pain, that, if you loved me as well as you do your wife and children, you would not wish the duration of it. Adieu. THO. HERVEY.

insecure, because it restored the enemy to her former greatness; it was inadequate, because the places retained were no equivalent for those surrendered. Mr. Pitt was so feeble at the beginning of his speech, that he was supported by two of his friends; but his pain increasing as he proceeded, he was allowed the unprecedented indulgence of delivering his sentiments sitting. ** Towards the close of his speech he was so ill that he could scarcely be heard. He intended to have spoken to some points relative to Spain, but was unable, and left the house in an agony of pain, before the division.

Mr. Hatsell, in the first edition of his "Precedents," says, "I remember two instances of the House's permitting members to speak sitting; one was Mr. Pitt, in his very long speech against the peace of 1762." To this passage, in subsequent editions, he added: -" Mr. Pitt spoke for three hours and forty minutes. This, at the time of the first publication of this volume, entitled me to call his speech very long. The later practice (contrary to the recommendation of Cicero, ut modo, ne sit infinitus; nam brevitas in sententia, senatoris laus est') has rendered this epithet improper." The speech of Mr. (now Lord) Brougham, in February 1828, on moving for a commission to enquire into the state of the common law courts, occupied nearly seven hours.