The war proceeded with varying fortunes, and the capture of New York by Howe encouraged the mother-country. Burgoyne's success at Philadelphia in June, 1777, delighted the King, who is said to have rushed into the Queen's room as soon as he heard of it, crying, "I have beat them! beatall the Americans!" But his pleasure was soon dashed by the news that on October 16, Burgoyne and his army capitulated at Saratoga, which, however, after the first shock, he pronounced "very serious, but not without remedy." After these distressing tidings became known in England, a friend of Lord North said to him, "My Lord, you must now see that the whole population of America is hostile to your designs." Lord North replied, "I see that as clearly as you do; and the King shall either consent to allow me to assure the House of Commons that some means shall be found to put an end to the war, or I will not continue to be his minister."[168]The King, however, was not to be moved from his purpose, and his appeal to North not to desert him in the hour of his trouble could not be disregarded by his faithful minister.
The situation was, indeed, distressing. "What a wretched piece of work do we seem to be making of it in America!" Gibbon wrote on April 13, 1777. "The greatest force which any European power ever ventured to transport into that continent is not strong enough ever to attack the enemy: the naval strength of Great Britain is not sufficient to prevent the Americans (they have almost lost the appellation of rebels) from receivingevery assistance that they wanted; and in the meantime you are obliged to call out the militia to defend your own coast against their privateers. You possibly may expect from me some account of the designs and policy of the French Court. I shall only say that I am not under any immediate apprehension of a war with France. It is much more pleasant as well as profitable to view in safety the raging of the tempest, occasionally to pick up some pieces of wreck, and to improve their trade, their agriculture and their finances while the two countries are 'lento collisa duella.' Far from taking any step to put an end to this astonishing dispute, I should not be surprised if next summer they were to lend their cordial assistance to England as the weaker party."[169]
It is beyond the scope of this work to trace the progress of the war, and it is for the military historian to criticise its conduct; but it was patent that the purchase of Hessian troops was a great diplomatic blunder. To invoke the aid of hired mercenaries was to make the breach irrevocable, as well as to set against the country employing them the sympathy of other nations. Frederick the Great said he "should make all the Hessian troops, marching through his dominions toAmerica, pay the usual cattle tax, because though human beings they had been sold as beasts." The case has been well put by Lord Mahon. "If any men were needed, was there any lack of them in England?" he asked, "was it wise to inform foreign states that we deemed ourselves thus dependent on foreign aid. Was it wise to hold forth to America the first example of obtaining assistance from abroad? Above all, if conciliation was the object full as much as conquest, how signal the imprudence thus in the midst of a civil strife, to thrust forward aliens to both parties, in blood, in language, and in manners."[170]Chatham inveighed against "the traffic and barter driven with every pitiful German prince that sells his subjects to the shambles of a foreign country. This mercenary aid on which you rely irritates to an incurable resentment the minds of your enemies. To overrun them with the mercenary sons of rapine and plunder; devoting them and their possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty! If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while there was a foreign troop in my country, I never would lay down my arms, never! never! never!"
Chatham's popularity, affected somewhat by his acceptance of a pension, had been greatly diminishedwhen he went to the House of Lords, but now, when the country was in danger, all eyes were turned on him as the only man who could conceivably extract from the situation peace with honour. "If there be a man who has served this nation with honour to himself and glory to his country," said George Grenville the younger in the House of Commons on February 11, 1778, "if there be a man who has carried the arms of Britain triumphant to every quarter of the globe beyond the most sanguine expectations of the people, if there be a man of whom the House of Bourbon stands more particularly in awe; if there be a man in this country who unites the confidence of England and America, is not he the proper person to treat with Americans, and not those who have uniformly deceived and oppressed them? There is not one present who is ignorant of the person to whom I allude. You all know I mean a noble, near relation, Lord Chatham." Many years later an able historian, reviewing the situation, repeated in no uncertain tone the substance of the speech of the promising young statesman. "There was one man to whom, in this hour of panic and consternation, the eyes of all patriotic Englishmen were turned," Lecky has written. "In Chatham England possessed a statesman whose genius in conducting a war was hardlyinferior to that of Marlborough in conducting an army. In France his name produced an almost superstitious terror."[171]
In America it was pronounced with the deepest affection and reverence. He had, in the great French war, secured the Anglo-Saxon preponderance in the colonies; he had defended the colonies in every stage of their controversy about the Stamp Act, and had fascinated them by the splendour of his genius. If any statesman could at the last moment conciliate them, dissolve the new alliance, and kindle into flame the loyalist feeling which undoubtedly existed largely in America, it was Chatham. If, on the other hand, conciliation proved impossible, no statesman could for a moment be compared to him in the management of a war.[172]
The state of affairs at home and abroad called for the strong hand of a great minister. British troops were confined in Philadelphia and New York; the navy had been starved; the commissariat of the troops in America was shamefully mismanaged. America, not slow to follow the example of the mother-countryto employ foreign troops, signed a treaty with France, the ratification of which by Congress took place on May 4, 1778.
"Thy triumphs, George, the western world resounds,And Europe scarce thy paperglorybounds!Paper that trumps abroad thy martial toils,And copious harvest of Canadian spoils:Tyrtæus-like, how Burgoyne fights his men,Belligerent alike withswordandpen!How Gates retires: and, as you rattle louder,One Arnold sickens at the smell of powder!How brave thine admirals! and so discreetThey never risk the honour of the fleet;Nor trust the dangers of the middle-main,Where Britain bids her thunder roar in vain;But wiselycoasting, give some privateerA broadside; making her both feel and hear.And sure, ifpapercan so cheaply win,The harmless war of paper is no sin.*****Proceed, great Sir! and, breaking all restraint,Embrace thescarlet whore, and be aSaintSwornto maintain th'established church, advanceThe cross of Rome, the miracles of France;And leave us, though our liberties be lost,In pious bills the privilege toroast.[173]In breaking oaths be like Alcides strong;Be weakly right, but obstinately wrong:[Pg 154]Be all the bigot martyr was before—A blessing for the nation yet in store!See otherHampdens, otherCromwellsrise,And moderntea-actsmimicship-supplies:Hark! the glad sounds revive ofmeandmine,[174]And stale prerogative ofright divine!One Revolution rais'd you to the Crown;Another Revolution may—Dethrone."[175]
"Thy triumphs, George, the western world resounds,And Europe scarce thy paperglorybounds!Paper that trumps abroad thy martial toils,And copious harvest of Canadian spoils:Tyrtæus-like, how Burgoyne fights his men,Belligerent alike withswordandpen!How Gates retires: and, as you rattle louder,One Arnold sickens at the smell of powder!How brave thine admirals! and so discreetThey never risk the honour of the fleet;Nor trust the dangers of the middle-main,Where Britain bids her thunder roar in vain;But wiselycoasting, give some privateerA broadside; making her both feel and hear.And sure, ifpapercan so cheaply win,The harmless war of paper is no sin.
*****
*****
Proceed, great Sir! and, breaking all restraint,Embrace thescarlet whore, and be aSaintSwornto maintain th'established church, advanceThe cross of Rome, the miracles of France;And leave us, though our liberties be lost,In pious bills the privilege toroast.[173]In breaking oaths be like Alcides strong;Be weakly right, but obstinately wrong:[Pg 154]Be all the bigot martyr was before—A blessing for the nation yet in store!See otherHampdens, otherCromwellsrise,And moderntea-actsmimicship-supplies:Hark! the glad sounds revive ofmeandmine,[174]And stale prerogative ofright divine!One Revolution rais'd you to the Crown;Another Revolution may—Dethrone."[175]
ENGLAND AND AMERICA. III: THE LOSS OF AMERICA
On May 17, 1778, Lord North, "with deep dejection in his countenance," had laid before the House of Commons a plan of conciliation, similar to Burke's resolution which two years earlier he had arrogantly rejected, in which a Bill was proposed to enable the King to appoint commissioners with sufficient powers to treat, consult and agree upon the means of quieting the disorders now subsisting in certain of the colonies in America. The three commissioners appointed had been unwisely chosen. Lord Carlisle, though clever enough, had hitherto been known only as a man of pleasure, and William Eden had recently denounced American Independence in the House of Commons; while George Johnstone, who was well acquainted with American affairs, was foolish enough at the outset, through an intermediary, to offer a bribe of £10,000 to Read, a leading member of Congress, "as a condition of bringing about a reunion between Great Britain and her colonies." Read announced this attempt upon his honesty in Congress. "I am not worth purchasing,but, such as I am," he said indignantly, "the King of Great Britain is not rich enough to do it."
Such a commission was foredoomed to failure. The whole country cried aloud for Chatham, and the public desire was endorsed by North, who again tendered his resignation to the King, who, however, would only consent to receive Chatham as a minister subordinate to North. "I declare in the strongest and most solemn manner," George wrote to his minister, "that though I do not object to your addressing yourself to Lord Chatham, yet that you must acquaint him that I shall never address myself to him but through you, and on a clear explanation that he is to step forth to support an administration wherein you are First Lord of the Treasury.... I will only add, to put before your eyes my most inward thoughts, that no advantage to this country, no present danger to myself, can ever make me address myself to Lord Chatham or any other branch of the Opposition.... Should Lord Chatham wish to see me before he gives his answer, I shall most certainly refuse it."[176]Chatham could not be expected to serve under North, and the negotiations ended forthwith, leaving behind them in many minds, however, the feeling that the final victoryof the Americans would not be an unmixed evil for the mother country, since, apparently, on the issue of the war depended the question, far more vital than the independence or subordination of the colonies, whether the King would be able to establish his system of government by personal influence. "I had as little doubt, but if the conquest of America should be achieved," said Walpole, "the moment of the victorious army's return would be that of the destruction of our liberty."[177]
No responsible statesman believed that England could succeed in enforcing her will upon the colonies, let the struggle end as it might. "As for conquering America, without foreign troops, it is entirely impossible; and I think it pretty near a certainty that the rebels will be in possession of all America by the Spring," Anthony Storer wrote to Lord Carlisle, on December 29, 1775. "By the news of Fort St. John's and Chambley, and the investiture of Quebec, their diligence and activity is wonderful, and it must end in the possession of all North America. They have taken a store-ship, and have several ships at sea.De peu à peu nous arrivons; if they go on so another year—fuit Ilium ingens gloria—we shall make but a paltry figure in the eyes of Europe. Cometo town, and be witness to the fall, or the re-establishment of our present Empire."
Fox thought that the best use that could be made of the success at Long Island would be to make conciliatory overtures. "It is become still more necessary than ever to produce some manifesto, petition, or public instrument upon the present situation of affairs; either to exhort his Majesty to make the only proper use of his victory, by seizing this opportunity of making advantageous offers of accommodation or to express openly and fairly to him the well-grounded apprehensions that every man must entertain from the power of the Crown in case his Majesty should be able to subdue the American Continent by the force of his army,"[178]Fox wrote on October 13, 1776, to Lord Rockingham; who, in his turn in 1778 said to Chatham, "I conceive that America will never again consent to this country's having actual power within that continent." "As to conquest, my Lords, it is impossible," Chatham, himself said in Parliament on May 30, 1777, speaking on his motion to stop hostilities.
Chatham, of course, had all along been opposed to the war. Speaking in 1775 of General Gage's inactivity, he said it could not be blamed, for it was inevitable. "But what a miserable condition isours, where disgrace is prudence, and where it is necessary to be contemptible!" he said. "You must repeal those Acts [the Boston Ports and Massachusetts Bay Bills], and youwillrepeal them. I pledge myself for it, that you will repeal them. I stake my reputation on it. I will consent to be taken for an idiot if they are not finally repealed. If," he concluded, with a grave warning, "if the ministers persevere in misleading the King, I will not say that they can alienate the affections of his subjects from the Crown; but I will affirm that they will make the crown not worth his wearing. I will not say that the King is betrayed; but I will pronounce that the kingdom is undone."[179]No wonder the King heaped upon the statesman, who endeavoured so eloquently to thwart his plans, every objectionable epithet; referred to him as "that perfidious man," and "a trumpet of sedition;" and said of his motion in 1777 to put an end to the war: "Lord Chatham's motion can have no other use but to convey some fresh fuel to the rebels. Like most of the other productions of that extraordinary brain, it contains nothing but specious words and malevolence."[180]
But while Chatham wished for peace, he had nodesire for unconditional surrender on the part of his country, and when on April 7, 1778, the Duke of Richmond moved the Independence of America, Chatham, protesting "against the dismemberment of this ancient and most noble monarchy," made the last of the long series of eloquent speeches that adorn the all-too-barren records of Parliamentary debates. "Before the Duke of Richmond began, Lord Chatham entered the House, leaning on the arms of his son William and his son-in-law, Lord Mahon. He bowed with much courtesy to the peers, who, standing up out of respect, made a lane for him to pass to his seat. He wore a suit of rich black velvet, and very full wig. He was covered up to the knees in flannel. He looked pale and emaciated, but his eyes retained all their native fire. When the Duke sat down, Lord Chatham rose to oppose the motion. He made a rhetorical speech, and declared it was probably the last time he should be able to enter the walls of the House. The Duke of Richmond replied with much tenderness. Chatham stood up again, attempted to speak, and sank down in an apoplectic fit."[181]He was removed to the house of one of the officers of Parliament, was in a few days sufficiently recovered to bear the journey to his seat at Hayes, and there diedon May 11. It is characteristic of George III that the only remark he madeà proposof the sudden illness of the great orator was an appeal to Lord North: "May not the political exit of Lord Chatham incline you to remain at the head of affairs?"[182]
After Chatham's death, Lord North, Burke, and Fox united to pay tribute to his career, while Parliament undertook to pay his debts, settled £4,000 a year for ever to the title of Chatham, and voted a public funeral. "I was rather surprised the House of Commons have unanimously voted an address for a public funeral and a monument in Westminster Abbey for Lord Chatham," wrote the ungenerous monarch, "but I trust it is voted as a testimony of gratitude for his rousing the nation at the beginning of the last war ... or this compliment, if paid to his general conduct, is rather an offensive measure to me personally."[183]The King's feelings were well known, with the result that the Court was sparsely represented at the funeral, and as Gibbon said indignantly, "Government tried to secure the double odium of suffering the thing to be done, and of not doing it with a good grace."
"I should have been greatly surprised at the inclinationexpressed by you to retire," George III had written to Lord North on January 31, 1778, "had I not known that, however you may now and then despond, yet that you have too much personal affection for me, and sense of honour, to allow such a thought to take any hold on your mind."[184]Now that Chatham had gone, North could no longer point with clearness to a successor. "The small party which Chatham had headed could not hope to form a government of themselves since they had lost their chief. The Whigs, under Lord Rockingham, had, in great measure, at least committed themselves to the independence of America, and on that ground Lord North could not but deprecate their return to power. There was henceforth no great statesman to lead to that middle path, that course of conciliation without compromise, which Chatham had pointed out, and perhaps might have trodden."[185]Circumstances alter cases, and the difficulty of naming a successor was so great that North yielded again to the King's commands and entreaties, and was prevailed upon to remain in office.
Slowly the rights which had caused the breach were abandoned. "I assure you, at least so it appears to me, that American politics are very muchaltered," Anthony Storer wrote to Lord Carlisle, on December 14, 1775. "Taxation and the exercise of it are totally renounced. You never hear the right mentioned, but in order to give it up."[186]The whole power of the Opposition was put forward to force the Government into a pacific path. "We have tried our strength," said Lord Camden; "we find ourselves incapable of conquest; and as we cannot subdue, we are determined to destroy."
While all England desired peace, the King was still determined to continue the war, unless the victorious colonists would surrender! "No man in my dominions desires solid peace more than I do," he wrote to Lord North on June 11, 1779. "But no inclination to get out of the present difficulties, which certainly keep my mind very far from a state of ease, can incline me to enter into the destruction of the empire. Lord North frequently says that the advantages to be gained by this contest could never repay the expense. I own that any way, be it ever so successful, if a person will sit down and weigh the expense, they will find, as in this last, that it has impoverished the state enriched; but this is only weighing such points in the scale of a tradesman behind his counter. It is necessary for those whom Providencehas placed in my station to weigh what expenses, though very great, are not sometimes necessary to prevent what would be more ruinous than any loss of money. The present contests with America I cannot help seeing as the most serious in which any country was ever engaged. It contains such a train of consequences that they must be examined to feel its real weight. Whether the laying a tax was deserving all the evils that have arisen from it I should suppose no man could allege without being thought fitter for Bedlam than a seat in the senate; but step by step the demands of America have risen. Independence is their object, which every man, not willing to sacrifice every object to a momentary and inglorious peace, must concur with me in thinking this country can never submit to. Should America succeed in that, the West Indies must follow, not in independence, but for their own interest they must become dependent on America. Ireland would soon follow, and this Island reduced to itself, would be a poor island indeed."[187]
After this definite declaration of the King's intention, the Prime Minister again made an effort to resign, only to have his application treated as his previous ones had been. "Lord North's application to resign within two days of the prorogationI can see in no other light than as a continuance of his resolution to retire whenever my affairs will permit it," George wrote to him on June 16, 1779, "for I never can think that he, who so handsomely stood forward on the desertion of the Duke of Grafton, would lose all that merit by following so undignified an example." Again North yielded to his royal master's expressed wish, and he was somewhat encouraged by the accession of strength to the King's party in the new Parliament, which was at once shown by the defeat of the proposal to re-elect Sir Fletcher Norton, who had angered George by his speech when presenting the Commons' grant in 1777.
The King, too, took heart again at the increase of his influence in the House of Commons. "I can never suppose this country so far lost to all ideas of self-importance as to be willing to grant American Independence,"[188]he wrote to Lord North in March, 1780; but everybody else realised that peace must be made at any cost. Though Parliament had been bought, the country was aroused; and, although the position of the Government was temporarily strengthened in October by the victory of Cornwallis over Gates in South Carolina, the surrender of the English General at Yorktown on October 19, 1781, sealed the fate ofthe ministry. The news arrived in England on November 25, 1781, two days before the meeting of Parliament, but even now the King would not yield: "The getting a peace at the expense of a separation from America is," he still declared, "a step to which no difficulties shall ever get me to be in the smallest degree an instrument."[189]Indeed, the only visible sign of his distress on receiving the news was shown by the omission in a letter to Lord George Germaine of the mention of the hour and minute of his writing, an observance he never omitted. "I have received, with sentiments of the deepest concern, the communication which Lord George Germaine has made me, of the unfortunate result of the operations in Virginia," he wrote. "I particularly lament it, on account of the consequences connected with it, and the difficulties which it may produce in carrying on the public business, or in repairing such a misfortune. But I trust that neither Lord George Germaine, nor any member of the Cabinet, will suppose, that it makes the smallest alteration in those principles of my conduct which have directed me in past time, and which will always continue to animate me under every event, in the prosecution of the present contest."[190]
"The aspect of affairs at the close of 1780 might indeed well have appalled an English statesman. Perfectly isolated in the world, England was confronted by the united arms of France, Spain, Holland, and America; while the Northern league threatened her, if not with another war, at least with the annihilation of the most powerful weapon of offence. At the same time, in Hindostan Hyder Ali was desolating the Carnatic and menacing Madras; and in Ireland the connexion was strained to its utmost limit, and all real power had passed into the hands of a volunteer force which was perfectly independent of the Government, and firmly resolved to remodel the constitution. At home there was no statesman in whom the country had any real confidence, and the whole ministry was weak, discredited and faint-hearted. Twelve millions had been added this year to the national debt, and the element of disorder was so strong that London itself had been for some days at the mercy of the mob."[191]But while George III insisted upon prosecuting the war—he had by his firmness broken up the Whig phalanx, was it conceivable that he should give way to the colonists?—and North, in spite of his better judgment supported him,[192]the Opposition, wasevery day gathering fresh adherents. "A sense of past error, and a conviction that the American war might terminate in further destruction to our armies, began from this time rapidly to insinuate itself into the minds of men. Their discourse was quite changed, though the majorities in Parliament were still quite ready to support the American War, while all the world was representing it to be the height of madness and folly."[193]"To-morrow," Selwyn wrote on June 11, 1781, to Lord Carlisle, "I find a motion is to come from Fox concerning America, to which he may, contrary to his expectation or wishes, find in the friends of Government an assent. People now seem by their discourse to despair more of that cause than ever. There has been wretched management, disgraceful politics, I am sure; where the principal blame is the Lord only knows; in many places, I am afraid."[194]
Fox on June 12 moved that the House should resolveitself into a Committee to consider the American War, at the same time moving a further resolution that the Government should take every possible measure to conclude peace with the colonies. "The only objection made to my motion," he declared in the course of debate, "is that it must lead to American independence. But I venture to assert thatwithin six months of the present day, ministers themselves will come forward to Parliament with some proposition of a similar nature. I know that such is their intention, I announce it to the House." The resolution was lost by 172 to 99; but the end was near."
"The attention of every one is confined to our situation in America," Anthony Storer wrote to Carlisle on November 26, 1781. "The Speech from the Throne contains the same resolution which appeared in times when we seemed to have a more favourable prospect of success, of continuing the war, and of claiming the aid of Parliament to support the rights of Great Britain." This was absurd and could not be countenanced. An address to the King moved by Conway on February 22, 1782, petitioning the King to stop the war, was only rejected by a single vote, and the Government were obliged to accept a resolution asserting the hopelessness of reducing America; whileon March 20, North anticipated a motion for his dismissal by announcing his resignation.
Under ministers pledged to peace, even the King saw that hostilities could not be continued. Lord Rockingham began negotiations with the United States, and these were brought to a successful conclusion by Lord Shelburne. The treaty was signed in 1783, and the blow was the greatest ever sustained by the King. "I that am born a gentleman," he said to Thurlow, "shall never rest my head on my last pillow in peace and quiet, as long as I remember the loss of my American colonies."
George contrived, however, by his tactful reply to the address of John Adams, on the arrival of the latter as the first Ambassador from the newly recognised United States to the Court of St. James's, to regain his dignity and to impress his old enemy as well as his subjects with the sense of his majesty that he could always introduce on occasions of state. "Sir," said Adams, when presenting his credentials, "the United States have appointed me their minister plenipotentiary to your Majesty, and have directed me to deliver to your Majesty this letter, which contains the evidence of it. It is in obedience to their express commands that I have the honour to assure your Majesty of their unanimous disposition to cultivate themost friendly and liberal intercourse between your Majesty's subjects and their citizens, and of their best wishes for your Majesty's health and happiness, and for that of your royal family. The appointment of a minister from the United States to your Majesty's Court will form an epoch in the history of England and America. I think myself more fortunate than all my fellow-citizens, in having the distinguished honour to stand in your Majesty's royal presence in a diplomatic character, and I shall esteem myself the happiest of men if I can be instrumental in recommending my country more and more to your Majesty's royal benevolence, and of restoring an entire esteem, confidence, and affection, or, in better words, 'the old good-nature and the good old humour,' between people who, though separated by an ocean, and under different governments, have the same language, a similar religion, a kindred blood. I beg your Majesty's permission to add that, although I have sometimes before been intrusted by my country, it was never in my whole life in a manner so agreeable to myself." To this George replied courteously, though the effort to be conciliatory must have cost him much: "Sir, the circumstances of this audience are so extraordinary, the language you have now held is so extremely proper, and the feelings you have discoveredso justly adapted to the occasion, that I must say, that I not only receive with pleasure the assurance of the friendly disposition of the United States, but that I am very glad the choice has fallen upon you to be their minister. I wish you, sir, to believe, and that it may be understood in America, that I have done nothing in the late contest but what I thought myself indispensably bound to do, by the duty which I owed to my people. I will be very frank with you. I was the last to conform to the separation; but the separation having been made, and having become inevitable, I have always said, as I say now, that I would be the first to meet the friendship of the United States as an independent power. The moment I see such sentiment and language as yours prevail, and a disposition to give this country the preference, that moment, I shall say, let the circumstances of language, religion and blood, have their natural lawful effect."[195]
CHARLES JAMES FOX AND WILLIAM PITT
Lord North had sent his resignation by messenger to Windsor on March 19, 1782, and George, who received the communication as he was going out hunting, sent back a verbal reply, "Tell him I shall be in town to-morrow morning and will then give an answer," after which he turned to the Duke of Dorset and Lord Hinchinbrook[196]and said calmly, "Lord North has sent in his resignation, but I shall not accept it." However, at the interview next day Lord North was firm, and nothing that the sovereign could say moved him from his purpose, for it was not only the adverse majority in the House of Commons which determined him, but the state of affairs in the colonies and abroad. "The nation, he knew well was universally weary of a war, the misfortunes which had attended which, though perhaps justly imputable to many other causes or persons, were attributed principally to his errors of management. He beheld himself now engaged in hostilities, direct or indirect, with half Europe, in addition toAmerica. Ireland, availing itself of our embarrassments, loudly demanded commercial and political emancipation. On every side, the Empire appeared crumbling into ruin. Minorca, long invested, had already surrendered, after a defence protracted to the last extremity. Gibraltar was closely besieged. In the East Indies, our difficulties, financial as well as military, threatened the total subversion of our wide extended authority in that quarter of the globe; where Hyder Ali, though expelled by Sir Eyre Coote from the vicinity of Madras, still maintained himself in the centre of the Carnatic. If the First Minister looked to the West Indies, the prospect appeared still more big with alarm. St. Christopher's attacked by the Marquis de Bouille, might be hourly expected to surrender; and he had already recaptured St. Eustatius, either by surprise, or by corrupting the officer who commanded the garrison. Of all the chain of Caribee Islands which had belonged to the Crown of Great Britain at the commencement of the war, only Antigua and Barbadoes remained."[197]
George III, however, did not hold that these considerations should weigh with his minister, whom henceforth he regarded as little better than a traitor. It was characteristic of the King thatin his anger he at once forgot the services of twelve years, and sought to avenge himself for the desertion, as he called it, by withholding the pension usually granted to a Prime Minister on retirement. Lord Chancellor Thurlow, who, apparently, had more consideration for George's reputation than the monarch himself, represented that Lord North was not opulent, that his father was still living, and that his sons had spent a great deal of money. "Lord North is no friend of mine," said the ungrateful King. "That may be so," replied Lord Thurlow, "but the world thinks otherwise: and your Majesty's character requires that Lord North should have the usual pension."[198]A pension of £4,000 a year was then reluctantly granted.
The resignation of Lord North was a great blow to his royal master, who saw that with the retirement of this minister would disappear the carefully built superstructure of government by personal influence. "He would cease to 'be King' in his own acceptance of the word, and would have to surrender the power for which he had been struggling for two-and-twenty years into the hands of the party most hateful to him."[199]"At last the fatal day has come," wrote George, who seriously thoughtof retiring to Hanover in preference to placing himself in the hands of the hated Opposition. "I would rather lose my crown than submit to the Opposition," he had declared; and on December 18, 1779, he had written to Lord Thurlow, "From the cold disdain with which I am treated, it is evident to me what treatment I am to expect from Opposition, if I was to call them now into my service. To obtain their support I must deliver up my person, my principles, my dominions into their hands."
The King, however, was not of a nature to surrender at discretion, and Thurlow was sent to Lord Rockingham to ascertain what terms of capitulation could be obtained for the sovereign. It is proof of the want of trust in George III that the Duke of Richmond, who had had much experience of the methods of the Court, should, with apologies for "this piece of impertinent advice," write in the following strain to Rockingham. "Let me beseech you not to think that any preliminary is opening, for I have good reason for believing nothing but trick is meant. For God's sake, your own and the country's sake, keep back and be very coy. Nothing but absolute necessity and severe pressure or force will induce the Court to come to you in such a manner as to enable you to do any good. These times are coming,and you must soon see all at your feet in the manner you would wish and with the full means to do what is right. In the meanwhile they will try all little tricks, and most amply try to flatter your prejudices, if they conceive you have any. If to anything like this you give way, you ruin yourself and them, and the kingdom into the bargain, whereas by firmness all will come right yet, and you will carry the nation with you with suchéclatas to ensure you the means of doing what you wish."[200]
Lord Rockingham took full advantage of this sage counsel, and to the overture of the King made reply, "that he was very willing to serve his Majesty but requested the honour of being admitted to a private audience before any administration should be arranged." This demand George ignored. "I told you that divisions would be attempted and so it has been," Walpole wrote on March 23. "Lord Rockingham's constitutional demands not proving palatable, on Thursday evening (21st) Lord Shelburne was sent for to a house in the Park, and, after a parley of three hours, declined. Next morning Lord Gower was tried, ditto. At four o'clock to-day, and this is Saturday, no new step has been taken: if the whole flag is not hung out this evening or to-morrow,I do not know what may happen on Monday."
Eventually, however, the King arranged the administration with Shelburne, and then sent him to inform Rockingham of the names of the cabinet ministers. This irregularity angered the latter, who seriously thought to decline to serve, for, as Admiral Keppel told Nicholls, he "thought that the King had manifested such personal dislike to him, by refusing him an audience, and arranging the administration with Lord Shelburne, that, in his own opinion, he was not a fit person to be in the King's service."[201]Besides this objection, Rockingham had no faith in Shelburne,[202]but the latter protested as a guarantee of good faith, "I passed my eldest to Lord Rockingham, which I had no occasion to do, for I might have been Prime Minister myself"; and, finally, persuaded by Fox, Burke, and the Duke of Richmond, Rockingham consented to accept office, and kissed hands on March 27. "I was abused for lying Gazettes," said Lord North, "but there are more liesin this one (containing the official announcement of the Whig Cabinet) than in all mine. Yesterday his Majesty waspleasedto appoint the Marquis of Rockingham, Mr. Charles Fox, the Duke of Richmond, etc., etc."
Parliament met on April 8, and a strange sight met the eyes of the onlookers. "Never was a more total change of costume beheld than the House of Commons presented to the eye when that assembly met for the despatch of business after the Easter recess. The Treasury Bench, as well as the places behind it, had been for so many years occupied by Lord North and his friends, that it became difficult to recognise them again in their new seats, dispersed over the Opposition benches, in great coats, frocks, and boots. Mr. Ellis himself appeared for the first time in his life in an undress. To contemplate the Ministers, their successors, emerged from their obscure lodgings, or from Brookes's, having thrown off their blue and buff uniforms; now ornamented with the appendages of dress, or returning from Court, decorated with swords, lace and hair-powder, excited still more astonishment."[203]
In the second Rockingham Administration Charles James Fox held the office of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and it cost George IIImuch to sanction this appointment, for he hated Fox more than even he hated Chatham, not only for his attitude in politics but also for the irregularity of his private life. "The King," wrote Wraxall, "who considered Fox as a man ruined in fortune, of relaxed morals, and surrounded with a crowd of followers resembling him in these particulars, deprecated as the severest misfortune to himself and to his subjects, the necessity of taking such a person, however eminent for capacity, into his confidence or councils."[204]It was inevitable, however, that Fox should hold high office, for he was undoubtedly the foremost man in the Rockingham party. Having entered Parliament in 1768, he had distinguished himself in the following year by a speech opposing the claim of Wilkes to take his seat as member for Middlesex. "It was all off-hand, all argumentative, in reply to Mr. Burke and Mr. Wedderburn, and excessively well indeed," said his proud father. "I hear it spoken of as an extraordinary thing, and I am, as you see, not a little pleased with it."