selves at liberty to accept of any offers which might be made to them of public employments.'

Mr. Grenville replied, "That he left to his Grace's own judgment, whether, setting every private compact and agreement aside, the accession of his friends to the present Ministry, was not a breach of good faith to themselves, and to the public?"

Before these negotiations were concluded, Lord Chatham returned from Somersetshire to his old seat, at Hayes, in Kent; but so exceedingly ill and infirm, he was quite unable to transact any business. Early in the month of February 1768, the Privy Seal being officially necessary, was put into commission for a few weeks, but in the month of March it was re-delivered to him. The Duke' of Grafton, who had been to him the most obsequious of men, and was now proceeding at the helm without that pilot, whom he lately deemed indispensable, did not venture to turn him out,'

had been appointed separately and distinctly, for this departmentat a time of great inconvenience to his Majesty-when the Civil List was deeply in arrear. His Lordship's first important act of office, was sending Lord Bottetourt, Governor of Virginia; and his apology for it was, That the nomination came from a higher authority.

Lod Chesterfield says in his Letters, that Lord Bute was back wards and forwards at this time-from Luton to London.

though Lord Bristol and Lord Egmont were candidates for his place.

Parliament met on the 24th of November 1767, and was dissolved on the 12th of March 1768. Lord Chatham did not attend during the session.

A few weeks before the dissolution of Parliament, Mr. Wilkes returned again to England, and at the general election was elected Member for the county of Middlesex. All the circum stances of which have been amply related in several publications,

During the last year, the French Court purchased of the Genoese, the claim of that republic to the island of Corsica. And this year a French army landed on the island to take possession of it. This was an unprecedented kind of purchase. The French might, with the same propriety, have purchased the Spanish claim to the Netherlands, or Jamaica. This addition to the French monarchy alarmed the courts of London and Turin. Mr. George Pitt, (afterwards Lord Rivers), the British Minister at Turin, having resigned at the general election, on the promise of a peerage, the Ministry were divided on the appointment of a successor. Lord Lansdown, then Lord Shelburne, was for Lord

Tankerville*, and the Duke of Bedford for Sir V. Lynch. The latter was appointed. But this was not the only instance in which the Secretary of State had been over-ruled, in the affair of Corsica. He considered the accession of Corsica to France, an object of importance to Great-Britain; and being deeply impressed with this opinion, he instructed Lord Rochford, the British Minister at the French Court, to remonstrate strongly against this acquisition to France. The French Minister treated the remonstrance with contempt. The fact is, he knew the sentiments of the British Court better than the British Minister. In a short time, Lord Rochford found that his instructions were disavowed by his own court. Upon receiving this information, he resigned his diplomatic character, and returned to London. The Secretary of State now discovering the dupe he had been made, and the deceptions which had been practised upon him, resigned also t. When the court of Turin saw that the

* His Lordship was one of the five Lords who voted against the American Declaratory Bill in 1766. The other four were the Lords Cornwallis*, Torrington, Shelburne, and Camden.

+ But Sir John Macpherson, in his memorial [printed in the answer to the letter from Mahomet Ali Chan. Appendix, puge xii.] says, "the Earl of Shelburne was dismissed at the instigation of the

*For this vote Lord Chatham made Dr. Cornwallis Archbishop of Canterbury.

British cabinet were indifferent to the aggrandizement of France, the King of Sardinia immediately attached himself to the house of Bourbon. Upon the resignation of Lord Lansdown, Lord Rochford was made Secretary of State, in the month of October 1768. But to relieve the French Minister from the indelicacy of corresponding with a person whose veracity he had disputed, Lord Weymouth, now Lord Bath, was removed from the Northern, and placed in the Southern Department, and Lord Rochford was made successor to Lord Weymouth.

Lord Rochford was made Secretary of State through fear, not through friendship. The chiefs of the interior Cabinet dreaded his laying open the scene of negotiation at Paris. If he had laid this information before Parliament, the whole machinery of the ministry must have fallen to pieces. The system of a Double-Cabinet must have become so apparent to the whole nation, and the hypocrisy of

Duke of Grafton." We learn also from this memorial, That his Majesty was graciously pleased to receive from the Nabob of Arcot, whose forts are garrisoned by our troops, and whose army is commanded by our officers, a fine diamond ring, through the hands of Governor Palk. The world is not ignorant of many other magnificent presents from the East. But as the Governor was once in holy orders, the ceremony of investing the royal finger with this mystic sign of alliance, may be considered as something divine.

the Court so perfectly unveiled, that it may be presumed, from the ordinary feelings of mankind to repeated insults and indignities, that no man of the smallest spark of honour, who was not leagued with the Court, as party in some criminal transaction, or deeply distressed for the means of subsistence, would continue one moment to uphold, or connive at, a system, that had for its objects, the debasement of the English nobility, the extension of the power of the Crown, and the humiliation of the pride of the nation.But Lord ****** wanted another place, and upon condition of his silence, he was gratified. Thus the French got Corsica. What they gave for it, the prudence of the parties has hitherto concealed *

*On the first of August 1768, (the anniversary of the Hanoverian succeffion) Lord Bute fet out for the Bareges in the South of France. In the succeeding winter, a violent dispute arising between Lord Townshend, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and several of the great Lords of that kingdom, the ministry conceived it necessary to change the Lord Lieutenant; but they could not agree in the choice of a successor. The Duke of Bedford was for Lord Sandwich, and the Duke of Grafton for Lord Harcourt. The disagreement occasioned the return of Lord Bute, in the autumn of the year 1769. He settled the difference between these Dukes, by not accepting the recommendation of either; but continuing Lord Townshend, who had been appointed under his own influence. Their Graces submitted to his controul: and then he returned to the Continent. This accounts for Lord Townshend staying in Ireland four years, being the time of the usual residence of two Lord Lieutenants.