1758. may best serve to remove the prejudices or apprehensions which grants of that kind are apt to occasion. Your Grace has certainly done every thing on your part, which could be expected or required, in behalf of this country; and your representations upon this transaction cannot fail to operate in case of future applications for the like favours, where the merit and pretensions are less. If the revenue should fall short of the expenses incurred, there is no doubt that every article will be talked over, while the operation of supplying the deficiency is performing; but as to mine own private opinion, I am free to own, and shall be, if the matter comes in question, as free to declare, that this late grant from his Majesty is peculiarly free from objection, and should not either in decency or in justice be made the subject of particular complaint. It is my earnest wish, that there may be no necessity for a loan next session here. Some people, I know, treat it as a matter of indifference, and even of convenience; but I am greatly mistaken if the wisest of them could find the means of providing for it, if more should be wanted, than what could be answered by the revisal of those duties which were discontinued on the payment of the former debt; which duties were chiefly additional upon imported commodities already and now taxed. But if these (which amounted formerly to somewhat more than 20,000l. each year) should prove insufficient, I cannot see what new species of taxation could be invented. If the articles of com mon consumption were to be tried, I am confident the experiment would not answer. The substance and the manners of this country are not to be estimated by the efforts towards luxury and splendour made by a few in the metropolis. The bulk of the people are not regularly either lodged, clothed, or fed. And those things, which in England are called necessaries of life, are to us only accidents; and we can, and in many places do, subsist without them. The estates have risen within these thirty years to near double the value, but the condition of the occupiers of the land is not better than it was before that increase; nor can I imagine any resource for raising money here, but by an immediate tax upon the land. The monstrous debt of England, and the facility with which such sums are seemingly raised every year, is a problem far beyond my comprehension, and which I heartily wish I may never live to see solved. Mr. Rigby informed me (and I took care to inform Mr. Ponsonby) of your Grace's goodness to himself and his family upon the application made to you for the government of the county of Kilkenny; of which he is fully sensible. The present Earl of Besborough had wrote to his brother immediately after notice of his father's death, to desire that honour, which had been so many years in their family, might be continued in him: these things being left by your Grace to the disc: etion of the Lords Justices, I made no scruple of concurring at once in making the appointment; especially as it 1758. 1758. appeared to me perfectly natural, and so much of course, that no dissatisfaction could arise in any quarter from it: and I must say, that whoever made an application to your Grace upon that head must either have supposed you less informed of the true state of the country than you certainly are, or must himself have been less acquainted with your Grace's candour and love of justice than he ought to have been. I beg your Grace to be assured, that I will not, in the next trifling instance, use that share of power entrusted with me to any purpose different from what I think your Grace's own purpose would be were you actually present; and where I am doubtful, I shall always desire your Grace's directions before I agree to any act, which I must now do in a case of some consequence to me. The Lords Justices have received in form an application from the Earl of Belvedere, desiring to be appointed joint governor of the county of Westmeath with the Earl of Westmeath, who is now sole governor, by an appointment of the late Lords Justices under the Duke of Devonshire. Lord Belvedere's pretensions are, that the former appointment was partial, and an act of marked unkindness to him. That his estate in the county is four times greater than Lord Westmeath's; that his influence is in proportion greater, and sufficient to insure the election of two members to parliament; besides, that the very recent conversion from popery makes the preference more irksome. In addition to all which arguments, the claim of friendship with two of the Lords Justices was strongly urged. My 1758. answer was, that I acknowledged all the facts to be true, and admitted the tone of all the arguments; and that the bias of our private inclinations could not be doubted. But that I would not, in the case of my nearest friend, depart from the engagements I was under to your Grace; which bound me not to make any alteration in the situation of things here, especially in county matters, except where vacancies were necessarily to be filled up. I am sensible that Lord Belvedere will think me a cold friend, and that I am making my court to my enemies, whom he made his enemies, also, upon my account. I should certainly be very glad that your Grace might think it expedient to comply with his Lordship's request. What he urges with regard to his power in the county is undoubtedly true, both positively and comparatively; but I shall not presume to take any step in it, unless your Grace, after taking it into your consideration, should be pleased to intimate to me that it ought to be done. MR. RIGBY TO THE DUKE OF BEDFORD. Here is a phænomenon come in to dinner the Earl of Chesterfield, looking as well as I have seen him these many years. He says he shall not be perfectly so till Hazard comes in. He is as deaf as the die-box. I have a letter to-day from 1758. Sir Charles Williams from Bristol Wells, where he says he is gone to attend his daughter Essex's complaints. DUKE OF BEDFORD TO MR. SECRETARY PITT. Sir, Woburn Abbey, August 29. 1758. Upon my return to Kensington on Saturday last, Mr. Rigby acquainted me with the conversation you had had with him in relation to a body of troops, which you propose should be sent to secure our late acquired possessions at Senegal, and to make fresh conquests on the French in those parts. Mr. Rigby likewise informed me that you was pleased to add, you was sorry you had missed the opportunity of seeing me when I was at court on Thursday last, that you might then have communicated your thoughts to me on that subject, of pushing with vigour our conquests in Africa, which you believed was not disagreeable to my manner of thinking. Mr. Rigby did, indeed, very prudently answer, that he believed I should not disapprove of the measure, but of the manner of doing it, which, if it was still further to weaken Ireland, by taking from thence more infantry from that small body we had there at present, he feared that measure would be very disagreeable to me. As it is of very little consequence what my opinion is about the general measure, I shall confine myself to what |