judge between us; but there is one fact, which, as it passed fifteen years ago, most people may not so well remember; though that, too, I discussed with him in the House of Commons without a reply, or the possibility of his making any. He has the impudence to say that the reduction of places that I made was not sufficient, and that more would have been made in Lord Rockingham's and his administration, if time had been given to them for that purpose. Both are absolutely false;-in the first place, any lessening of the reduction proposed in my original plan and that which appeared in the Act was not of my doing, but of his own and the cabinet to which he belonged; and I was no way consulted about it, though I certainly acquiesced in it, and, on the whole, thought it sufficient. In the next place, I do solemnly declare that I never heard him, nor anybody else of that cabinet, propose any reduction of offices, but of the two, were of opinion that the matter had been carried too far, rather than that it had fallen short of their mark. They must have thought that it did not fall short, because they knew very well that they never could have had an opportunity so favourable for reduction as during the dependence of that bill, and in the flood-tide of its popularity. Mr. Fox now thinks that neither this, nor the Pay Office Bill, nor the Contractors' Bill, which, though moved by another, was left wholly to my management, as it was originally schemed by myself, nor of Mr. Dowdeswel's and my plan, to his and our honour adopted by Mr. Crewe, were of the least significance in lessening the influence of the Crown in that House, and in the other, or in the Scotch election for peers by the abrogation of the Scotch Lords of Police. I know he told me, and that to the best of my recollection in the presence of others, that the Acts which he now finds to be so very frivolous were the means of turning out Lord Lansdowne, and that he had lost his question in the same number of votes as the places that had been suppressed. As to those that had been retained, he perfectly agreed with me both in the policy and the justice of retaining them, considering them, as I did, as right in themselves; and with regard to the holders in possession or reversion, as property, to all intents and purposes. I cannot say exactly in what form Mr. Rose put the recriminatory charge which he made on Mr. Fox with regard to the places

of that kind which Mr. Fox had held and disposed of. Mr. Fox's reply seems to indicate that he was charged with squandering away their income and value. If so, his reply was proper, because the charge was unparliamentary, and not at all to the purpose in argument. But if it was urged, as it ought to have been, that Mr. Fox had himself considered those places his property, as an argument ad hominem, it would have been conclusive against him. For if he sold that as property which was not such, by his own admission he was guilty of a fraud. But it were an endless task to go through all the nonsense and ribaldry which he chose to vent upon that occasion. As to his arguing for a change of his opinions from the greater burthens which now exist on the public, 't is perfectly absurd-First, because injustice is not less injustice, though it may admit some palliation on account of the necessities of those who are guilty of it; and next, because those remnants of remnants of sav ings, which Mr. Windham has so justly ridiculed, become more and more contemptible according to their disproportion to the weight of the charge which they are brought to counterpoise. He has used another argument which seems to have more weight, which is, that it may be necessary for maintaining the character and credit of the opposition; but at a miserably low ebb is that character and credit which is obliged to have recourse to such frauds and impostures. Mr. Pitt was very wrong in giving to them the countenance he had given, and which, after the able speech he had made, was no proper conclusion to be drawn from his arguments. Mr. Windham, in my opinion, even from what I see in the papers, never made a more able and eloquent speech. I particularly admire the manly tone of scorn with which he treated the miserable imposture of the motion. I thank him heartily for his speech, and subscribe an unfeigned assent and consent to all the articles of his creed. I forgot to say a word about fees, which it seems is one of the articles of charge against Mr. Windham's office. Whether they be exorbitant or not is more than I can judge, but that they are profitable to the officer is no objection, provided they are not onerous to the public, or oppressive to those that pay them. This was so much my principle upon the reform, that I carefully reserved the fees to the Pay Office; but in the progress of the

bill I was absolutely forced by the frauds of Colonel Barré, acting on the principles of Lord Shelburn, who attributed every sort of public evil to fees, in a famous speech of his, and by the unparalleled treachery of our own party I was beat out of my plan, and compelled, whether I would or not, to bring from that abolition a charge of £6000 a year, or rather more, upon the public, for the official expenses which before had cost nothing, except for the Paymaster's salary and some other salaries, which latter were insignificant. Whether the office has been impaired in its diligence and its spirit of accommodation from that time is more than I can positively say, but I believe that it has. I am sorry to have troubled you so much on these matters, but as they relate to facts which may not be so generally known, I wish you not to throw away this letter. I have no objection to your showing it to anybody, but do not desire it to be shown to any one but Lord Fitzwilliam and Mr. Windham. As to you, "Macte esto virtute tua "-do n't be discouraged from taking the independent line, which makes you vote with different men, but always upon the same principle, and not like these vile and most abject wretches who compose the armed neutrality; who, if they were not the most contemptible of the human race, would be the most odious. Thank God, you have but one political friendship to attend to, and in that you will never find any clashing with public principle.-As you are still solicitous about my health, I am to tell you that to-day has been one of my best days; and though I can't walk without an arm, I have moved about a good deal, at least a good deal for me. Flesh as before. Adieu. Yours ever,

E. B. P. S. Will the gentlemen do anything in my affair with Owen-or have they given it up? If they have given it up, why is it so ?

TO DR. LAURENCE.

Bath, 11th April, 1797, 5 o'clock.

MY DEAR LAURENCE,

This terrible war on the continent has come to a crisis. Whether our pacific war is come to its terrible crisis is a matter of great doubt; but unless God interposes in some

signal way, it must terminate in a peace which, like Scylla, has a thousand barking monsters of a thousand wars in its womb. God preserve us from such peace and such wars. As for himself, Windham is perfectly in the right to be governed by circumstances; but as for you, who act with no party and are in no office, your own honour and your personal reputation are the sole circumstances by which you are to be guided. Therefore profit of the first opening. If the emperor's defection is solely owing to the bad state of his own affairs, than which nothing I admit can appear worse, we have much to lament and nothing to blame; but if the spirit of the debates in the English parliament have tended to bring on despair, or if our want of a supply to his necessities has crippled his armaments, then we have at once to lament and to blame. However, there is the hand of God in this business, and there is an end of the system of Europe, taking in laws, manners, religion, and politics, in which I delighted so much. My poor son was called off in time-" ne quid tale videret."

I understand that Ellis spoke handsomely of me, for which I thank him; and do you so too, through yourself or any medium you can find. As to Windham, he never fails, but of this there is not a word; by our paper I should have thought he had not spoken: but it is no matter-all our plans are defeated by the settlement which the peace will make of the French system in the West Indies. Mr. Huddlestone's letter is very obliging, but I really wish him to keep all his sentiments concealed until he can get into the direction. Tell him that this is my opinion, and that then perhaps he may steal some little good; for we, who had for fourteen years struggled to do more, have been miserably defeated, if not with our own, yet with the national disgrace.

I wrote to Mr. Troward, and wonder you have not seen him. You had better call on him, as he lies directly in your way. Pray let me hear from you as often as you can, though it were but by a line. Your coming hither must be very inconvenient to you, and where is the use of your seeing me in the body of this death. In truth, I suffer very little pain, but I gain no strength at all. If I find any difference, it is that my little strength declines. Adieu. God bless you. Yours ever, E. B.

TO DR. LAURENCE.

MY DEAR LAURENCE,

Bath, 12th May, 1797.

The times are so deplorable, that I do not know how to write about them. Indeed I can hardly bear to think of them. In the selection of these mischiefs, those which have the most recently oppressed and overpowered, rather than exercised, the shattered remains of my understanding, are those of the navy and those of Ireland. As to the first, I shall say nothing, except this, that you must remember from the moment the true genius of this French revolution began to dawn upon my mind, I comprehended what it would be in its meridian; and that I have often said, that I should dread more from one or two maritime provinces in France, in which the spirit and principles of that revolution were established, than from the old French monarchy possessed of all that its ambition ever aspired to obtain; that we should begin to be infected in the first Nidus and hot-bed of their infection, the subordinate parts of our military force, and that I should not be surprised at seeing a French convoyed by a British navy to an attack upon this kingdom. I think you must remember the thing and the phrase. I trust in God that these mutineers may not as yet have imbrued their hands deeply in blood. If they have, we must expect the worst that can happen. Alas! for the mischiefs that are done by the newspapers, and by the imbecility of the ministers, who neither refuse nor modify any concession, nor execute with promptitude the resolutions they take through fear; but are hesitating and backward, even in their measures of retreat and flight: in truth, they know nothing of the manœuvre either in advance or retreat.

The other affair, hardly less perplexing, nor much less instantly urging, is that of Ireland.

Mr. Baldwin was here, and he spoke something, though indistinctly and confusedly, of a strong desire that he supposed the Duke of Portland to have for a reconciliation with Lord Fitzwilliam. Whether this is mere loose talk, such as I have uniformly heard from the day of the fatal rupture, is more than I know. My answer was, that while the cause of this calamitous rupture was yet in its operation, I had done