Undoubtedly Pitt and Grenville had become disgusted with the torpor of Artois and the follies of the French Royalists. In particular the absurd failure at Paris seems to have prompted the resolve of the Cabinet to withdraw the British troops from Yeu. Pitt's letters of the latter half of October also evince a desire to pave the way for some understanding with the French Directory. As that Government was firmly installed in power, an opportunity presented itself, for the first time since the opening of the war, of arranging a lasting peace. These hopes were to be blighted; but it is certain that Pitt cherished them; and, doubtless, among the motives operating in favour of peace the foremost was a feeling of disgust at the poltroonery of the French Princes and the incurable factiousness of their followers, in whom the faculties which command success were lost amidst vices and perversities sufficient to ruin the best of causes. Pitt continued to support the Chouans by money and arms; but, despite the frequent protests of Windham, not a British soldier was landed on that coast.[410]

FOOTNOTES:

[397] "F. O.," Holland, 57.

[398] "Cape Records," i, 98.

[399] "W. O.," vi, 67.

[400] "Cape Records," i, 17, 22.

[401] "Cape Records," i, 23-6, 138-40; Cory, "Rise of South Africa," i, ch. ii.

[402] "W. O.," i, 323. In "F. O.," Holland, 57, is a memorial of Elphinstone and Craig to Grenville, stating why they had detained at the Cape the U. S. ship "Argonaut," whose owners now prosecuted them for L100,000.

[403] "South Africa a Century ago." By Lady Anne Barnard.

[404] "F. O.," Prussia, 70. Pitt to Harrowby, 27th October 1805.

[405] "Nelson Despatches," ii, 5.

[406] "Corresp. of Sir John Sinclair," i, 141-3.

[407] Puisaye, "Mems.," ii, 594-603; Forneron, "Hist. des Emigres," ii, 13, 14.

[408] Cornwallis, "Corresp.," iii, 289.

[409] "F. O.," France, 44. Grenville to d'Harcourt, 19th June 1795.

[410] On 19th January 1798 Pitt, Windham, and Canning agreed to give L9,082 and L9,400 for the discharge of debts due for services of the Royalists in France, incurred in England and France respectively, leaving a balance of L8,000 for future payment. The following sums were paid to the Duc d'Harcourt for the support of "Monsieur": in 1796, L3,000; in 1797, L9,000; and after May 1798 at the rate of L500 per month (B.M. Add. MSS., 37844). I have not found the sums allowed to the Comte d'Artois.



CHAPTER XII

PITT AS WAR MINISTER (1793-8)

Si vous affaiblissez vos moyens en partageant vos forces, si vous rompez en Italie l'unite de la pensee militaire, je vous le dis avec douleur, vous aurez perdu la plus belle occasion d'imposer des lois a l'Italie.... La guerre est comme le gouvernement, c'est une affaire de tact.—NAPOLEON, Letters of 14th May 1796.

In estimating the services of Pitt as War Minister during the first phases of the conflict we must remember that the ambition of his life was to be a Peace Minister. Amidst the exhaustion caused by the American War, he deemed it essential to ensure the continuous growth of savings and investments which, under favourable conditions, advance at the rate of Compound Interest. His success in the time of peace 1783-93, may be measured by the fact that, despite the waste of war, the rate of progress was not seriously checked in the years 1793-6. A Scotsman, MacRitchie, who travelled through England in 1795[411] was surprised to find the large towns in a most flourishing state; and it is well known that the exports of cottons largely increased in the last decade of the century. Seeing that the war became "a contention of purse," the final triumph of England may be ascribed to the reserve of strength which Pitt had helped to assure. He did not live on to witness the issue of the economic struggle brought about by the Continental System of Napoleon. But a study of the commercial war of the years 1806-13 shows that Pitt's forethought enabled Britain to foil the persistent efforts of her mightiest enemy.

Military critics will, however, reply that Pitt's economies in the earlier period so far weakened her army as to lead to the failures of the Revolutionary War. There is some force in this contention. A closer examination, however, will reveal facts that necessarily weaken it. Firstly, England had never kept up a large army in time of peace. Dislike of a standing army was almost inconceivably strong; and it is certain that an attempt by Pitt to maintain an army in excess of the ordinary peace establishment would have aroused a powerful opposition. He therefore concentrated his efforts on the navy; and the maritime triumphs of the war were due in the last resort to his fostering care. As for the army, he kept it at its normal strength until the spring of the year 1792, when he decided to effect some reductions. In one sense this decision is creditable to him. It proves that he neither desired nor expected a rupture with France. In his view the risks of war were past. After his surrender to the Empress Catharine in 1791 peace seemed assured. Further, his decision to reduce the British Army was formed before the declaration of war by France against Austria (20th April 1792). After the rupture of France with Sardinia and Prussia it appeared the height of madness for a single disorganized State to enlarge the circle of its enemies. Consequently, up to the second week of November 1792, Pitt and Grenville were fully justified in expecting the duration of peace for Great Britain. Here, as at many points in the ensuing struggle, it was the impossible which happened.

Is Pitt to be blamed for effecting economies which led to a reduction of taxes and an alleviation of the burdens of the poor? The chief danger of the years 1791, 1792 came not from the French Jacobins, but from their British sympathizers; and experience warranted the belief that, with a lightening of the financial load, the nation would manifest its former loyalty. On 23rd August 1791 Grenville wrote: "Our only danger is at home, and for averting that danger, peace and economy are our best resources."[412] These considerations are political rather than military. But it is impossible to separate the two spheres. The strength of the army depends ultimately on the strength of the nation.

It is also well to remember that systematic preparation for war was an outcome of that struggle. Conscription was a bequest of the French Revolution. Planned first by Carnot, it was carried out by Dubois Crance and others in 1798. But in 1793 the days of large armies had not dawned. It was usual to maintain small forces of professional soldiers, together with a more or less inefficient militia. In England methods not unlike those of the age of Falstaff still held good. War was an adventure, not a science. In France first it became an intensely national effort. The Jacobins evoked the popular enthusiasm; the Committee of Public Safety embodied it in citizen armies; and the science of Carnot and Napoleon led them to victories which shattered the old-world systems and baffled the forecasts of Pitt.

Let us briefly survey the conduct of the war by Pitt in its chief stages up to the year 1798. The first period is from the declaration of war in February 1793, to the Battle of Fleurus, near the close of June 1794. At the outset he is alarmed by the irruption of Dumouriez into Holland, and hastily sends a small British force under the Duke of York, solely for the defence of Helvoetsluys and its neighbourhood. It answers its purpose; the French are held up at the Hollandsdiep, while the Austrians crush their main force at Neerwinden. Thereupon Coburg claims the Duke's assistance in driving the Republicans from the fortresses of French Flanders. Pitt and his colleagues give their assent, because the enterprise seems easy after the defection of Dumouriez, and Dunkirk is a tempting prize near to hand, but mainly owing to their urgent desire that Austria shall find her indemnity not in Bavaria, but in the French border fortresses. Thus, for reasons which are political, rather than military, the Cabinet embarks an insufficient force on what proves to be a lengthy and hazardous enterprise. Further, while the British push on, Prussia holds back; so that the Duke of York virtually takes the place of the Prussian contingent. Unaware of the duplicity of Berlin, and trusting that the Allies will soon master the border strongholds, Pitt and Dundas prepare to harry the coasts of France, and to secure her most valuable colony, Hayti. These are their chief aims in the war. But, while preparing maritime expeditions, they also drift into a continental campaign, from which they find it hard to withdraw.

The efforts put forth at Toulon and in Corsica were the outcome of the treaties with Austria, Sardinia, and Naples, which required the appearance of a British fleet off the coasts of France and Italy. While seeking to strengthen both the Coalition and the Royalists of Provence, Admiral Hood's force found an unexpected sphere of action at Toulon. In August 1793 that city admitted the British troops and a Spanish force a few days later. Thereupon Pitt claimed the help which he had a right to expect from his Allies. Naples and Sardinia sent contingents deficient in quality or numbers; and the Court of Vienna, after promising to send 5,000 troops from the Milanese, neglected to do so. Quarrels and suspicions hampered the defence; but the arrival of the Austrian contingent would probably have turned the scale. Owing to the length of time required for despatches from Toulon to reach London, Pitt and his colleagues did not hear of the remissness of Austria until 22nd December, that is, five days after the fall of that stronghold. Had they known it a month earlier, they could have sent thither the large force, then mustering in the Solent, which on 26th November set sail for the West Indies.

This seems an unpardonable diffusion of efforts. But Ministers must already have regretted their readiness to take up the duties incumbent on Prussia in Flanders; and doubtless they resolved not to play the part of the willing horse at Toulon. In the early days of every league there comes a time when an active Power must protest against the shifty ways which are the curse of Coalitions. Besides, Pitt had to keep in view the interests of Great Britain. These were, firstly, to guard the Low Countries against French aggression, and, secondly, to gain an indemnity for the expenses of the war either in the French West Indies, or in Corsica. The independence of the Low Countries was a European question. The maritime conquests concerned England alone. Were Britons to shelve their own interests for a question of international import? The statesman who does so will not long hold the reins at Westminster. Besides, no device for weakening France was deemed more effective than that of seizing her wealthiest group of colonies. On the other hand, there was pressing need of armed help for the Royalists of Brittany; and on this ground we must pronounce the West India enterprise ill timed. A still worse blunder was the continued inactivity of Moira's force in the Solent and the Channel Islands. The reports of an intended French invasion form a wholly inadequate excuse for his inaction. His troops could have rendered valuable service either in Brittany, Flanders, or at Toulon. The riddle of their inaction has never been solved. Ultimately the blame must rest with Pitt, Dundas, and Lord Chatham.[413]

In 1794 Pitt hoped to retrieve the failures of the first campaign and to wear down the French defence. For this purpose he liberally subsidized Austria and concluded with Prussia a treaty which, with better management, might have brought a second highly efficient army into Flanders. The compacts of that springtide warranted the hope that 340,000 allied troops would advance on the north and north-east frontiers of France. They were not forthcoming; but, even as it was, the Imperialists and the Duke of York routed the French levies in Flanders and seemed about to open the way to Paris. Earl Howe's victory, named "the glorious first of June," ensured supremacy in the Channel. Brittany and la Vendee were again aflame. The Union Jack replaced the tricolour on the strongholds of Corsica and in the most fertile parts of the West Indies. In April-May 1794 the collapse of the Jacobins seemed imminent.

But these early triumphs of the Allies were almost as fatal as their later disasters. Indeed they were largely the cause of them. Believing that they had the game in their hands, Prussia and Austria relaxed their efforts at the very time when France girded herself for a mightier struggle. Moreover, the emergence of the Polish Question in an acute phase served once again to distract the German rivals and to weaken their efforts in the West. Moreover, the Anglo-Prussian Treaty of May 1794 prescribing the valley of the Meuse as the sphere of action of the 62,400 Prussians subsidized by England and Holland was so rigid as to furnish their generals with good excuses for refusing to march from the Palatinate across the front of the French columns now pressing forward. The upshot was that England and the Dutch Republic got nothing in return for their subsidies, while the Prussians on their side chafed at the insistent demands from London and The Hague for the exact fulfilment of the bargain. The situation was annoying for military men; and the British Government erred in tying them down too stringently to a flank march, which was fraught with danger after the long delay of Pitt in ratifying the compact (6th-23rd May); while the postponement in the payment of the first subsidies gave the Prussians a good excuse for inaction.[414] His remonstrance to the Prussian envoy in London, at the close of September 1794, was also unwise. For it exceeded the more measured protests of Grenville, and furnished the Berlin Court with the desired excuse for recalling its troops from the Rhine. In short, the campaign of 1794 failed, not so much because the French were in superior force at the battles of Turcoing and Fleurus, as because the Allies at no point worked cordially together. The intrusion of political motives hampered their generals and turned what ought to have been an overwhelming triumph into a disgracefully tame retreat.

The disasters at Turcoing and Fleurus open up the second stage of the war. Realizing more and more the difficulty of defending Holland and Hanover, Pitt seeks to end that campaign and to concentrate on colonial enterprises and the war in Brittany and la Vendee. Experience of the utter weakness of his Administration for purposes of war also leads him to strengthen it at the time of the union with the Old Whigs. They demanded that their leader, the Duke of Portland, should take the Home Office. On Dundas demurring to this, Grenville generously assented to Pitt's suggestion that he should vacate the Foreign Office (6th July). Fortunately the Duke declined to take it; and Pitt resolved to make drastic changes, especially by curtailing the functions of the Secretary of State for Home Affairs, and creating a War Ministry of Cabinet rank. Some change was clearly requisite; for of late Dundas had supervised internal affairs, including those of Ireland, as well as the conduct of the war; as Treasurer of the Navy he managed its finances, and, as President of the India Board, he sought to control the affairs of that Empire. As for the War Office, it was a petty office, controlled by a nonentity, Sir Charles Yonge, who was soon to be transferred to the Mint.

In the haphazard allotment of military business to the Commander-in-Chief, Amherst, to the head clerk of the War Office, Yonge, and to the overworked pluralist, Dundas, we discern the causes of disaster. The war with France being unforeseen, Pitt had to put up with these quaint arrangements; but the reverses in Flanders and the incoming of the Portland Whigs now enabled him to reduce chaos to order. He insisted that the Secretary of State for Home Affairs should cease to direct the course of the war, but consented that colonial business should fall to his lot. On the other hand he greatly enlarged the functions of the War Office. His will prevailed. On 7th July Portland agreed to become Home Secretary, while his supporter, Windham, came into the re-organized War Office as Secretary at War, Dundas becoming Secretary of State for War and the Colonies. Despite the obvious need of specializing and strengthening these Departments, the resistance of Dundas was not easily overcome. His letter to Pitt on this subject betrays a curious cloudiness of vision on a subject where clearness is essential:

Wimbledon, July 9, 1794.[415]

... The idea of a War Minister as a separate Department you must on recollection be sensible cannot exist in this country. The operations of war are canvassed and adjusted in the Cabinet, and become the joint act of His Majesty's servants; and the Secy of State who holds the pen does no more than transmit their sentiments. I do not mean to say that there is not at all times in H. M.'s Councils some particular person who has, and ought to have, a leading and even an overruling ascendency in the conduct of public affairs; and that ascendency extends to war as it does to every other subject. Such you are at present as the Minister of the King. Such your father was as Secretary of State. Such you would be if you was Secretary of State, and such Mr. Fox would be if he was Secretary of State and the Duke of Bedford First Lord of the Treasury. In short it depends, and must ever depend, on other circumstances than the particular name by which a person is called; and if you was to have a Secretary of State for the War Department tomorrow, not a person living would ever look upon him, or any other person but you, as the War Minister. All modern wars are a contention of purse, and unless some very peculiar circumstance occurs to direct the lead into another channel, the Minister of Finance must be the Minister of War. Your father for obvious reasons was an exception to the rule.

It is impossible for any person to controvert the position I now state; and therefore, when you talk of a War Minister, you must mean a person to superintend the detail of the execution of the operations which are determined upon. But do you think it possible to persuade the public that such a separate Department can be necessary? Yourself, so far as a general superintendence is necessary, must take that into your own hands. If it was in the hands of any other, it would lead to a constant wrangling between him and the various Executive Boards.

The illogicality of this letter would be amusing if it had not been so disastrous. Because war depends ultimately on money, therefore (said Dundas) the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to control its operations and act virtually as Secretary of State for War. Then why not also as First Lord of the Admiralty? No sooner is the question formulated than we see that Dundas is confusing two very different things, namely, general financial control and the administration of military affairs. In fact, Dundas still clung to the old customs which allotted to the Secretaries of State wide and often overlapping duties. He did not see the need of a specialized and authoritative War Office, though the triumphs achieved by Carnot and the Committee of Public Safety during the past twelvemonth might have opened his eyes. Fortunately, Pitt discerned the necessity of strengthening that Department; and, as we have seen, he made Dundas and Windham War Ministers, with seats in the Cabinet. Thus from July 1794 military affairs had a chance of adequate treatment in that body; and Pitt deserves great credit for remodelling the Cabinet in a way suited to the exigencies of modern warfare.

Why did he not appoint that experienced soldier, the Marquis Cornwallis, Secretary of State for War? The answer is that he designed him as successor to the Duke of York in Flanders. As has already appeared, Pitt framed this resolve in February 1794, on the return of Cornwallis from India; and, though rebuffed then, he continued to revolve the matter until the beginning of the autumn, when the opposition of George III and of Francis II of Austria prevented the appointment of that experienced soldier to the supreme command of the Allies. As for the accession of Windham to the War Department, it seems to have been merely a device to satisfy the Old Whigs. Probably the question was not even discussed until 4th July, when the Duke of Portland first named it to Windham. As it finds no place in the Pitt-Grenville letters until 7th July, we may infer that Pitt and Dundas accepted Windham with some reluctance as an ardent partisan of Burke and the emigres. Windham now persistently urged an expedition to Brittany; and the Quiberon and Yeu enterprises were largely due to him. Pitt and Dundas, after their experience of the emigres, had no great hope in these efforts; and after the defection of Spain they discerned the increasing need of concentrating their efforts on home defence and operations which safeguarded British interests in the East and West Indies. To these causes may be ascribed their decision to withdraw the British force from the island of Yeu. The indignant letters of Windham to Pitt in 1796-8 show that, after the Yeu fiasco and the beginning of the peace negotiations with France, his advice was slighted. His moanings to Mrs. Crewe over the degeneracy of the age also tell their tale. In October 1796 he merely "drags on" at the War Office until he sees what turn things will take.

Pitt's determination to ensure efficiency in the services appears from two incidents of the closing weeks of 1794. He deposed Lord Chatham from the Admiralty in favour of the far more efficient Lord Spencer; and he removed the Duke of York from the command in Holland. Another change remains to be noted, namely, the retirement of the Master General of the Ordnance. The Duke of Richmond had for some time ceased to attend the meetings of the Cabinet. During six months Pitt put up with this peevishness; but on the receipt of alarming news from Holland, he exerted his authority. On 27th January 1795 he informed Richmond that his long absence from the Cabinet and his general aloofness would make his return unpleasant and "embarrassing to public business. This consideration," he added, "must decide my opinion ... and at this critical time it seems indispensable to make some such arrangement as shall substitute some other efficient military aid in so important a Department."[416] This cutting note produced the desired result. Richmond resigned and Cornwallis took his place at the Ordnance and in the Cabinet. No change was more beneficial. During the next three years the Ministry had the advice of the ablest soldier of the generation preceding that of Wellington. Unfortunately the Cornwallis letters are so few that his share in the shaping of war policy is unknown; but it is clear that he helped Ministers finally to override the resolve of the King to keep the relic of the British force for the defence of Hanover.[417]

To conclude the survey of these changes, we may note that the Duke of York, after returning from Holland, became Commander-in-Chief of the British army, a situation in which he earned general approbation. Thus, when it is asserted that Pitt altogether lacked his father's power of discerning military talents, the reply must be that he rendered an incalculable service by organizing a competent War Ministry, that he put the right men in the right place, though at the cost of offending the King, the Duke of York, a powerful nobleman, and his own brother; and that he quickly noted the transcendent abilities of Moore even when under censure for acts of disobedience in Corsica. The results attained by the elder Pitt were far more brilliant; for he came to the front at a time when the problems were far less difficult and illusory than those of the Revolutionary Era; but, if the very diverse conditions of their times be considered, the services of Pitt will not suffer by comparison even with those of his father.

* * * * *

The torpor of the Dutch in defending their country and the refusal of the Duke of Brunswick to organize the defence of North Germany virtually ended the war on that side. In one respect the defection of Prussia in April 1795 proved beneficial; for she undertook to keep the States of North and Central Germany entirely neutral. Had George III condescended at once to place his Electorate under her covering wing, the whole British and subsidized force might have been withdrawn in the spring of that year. Pride, however, for some time held him back from that politic but humiliating step. Consequently several battalions remained in Hanover for so long a time as to weaken the blow dealt at Paris through Quiberon. This was highly prejudicial to the Breton movement, which would have found in the troops detained in Germany the firm nucleus that was so much needed. Even after the ghastly failure at Quiberon, had the French emigre corps arrived at Spithead at the end of July instead of August, the expedition to the Vendean coast might have ended differently. It is usual to blame Pitt or Dundas for the delay in those preparations. But George must be held finally responsible. As to the Quiberon disaster, it has been proved to result from the hot-headedness of Puisaye, the criminal carelessness of Hervilly, and the ceaseless schisms of the Royalists.

With the alliance of the Dutch and French Republics in May 1795, and the almost open avowal of the French cause by the Court of Madrid in July, the war entered upon a third phase. Thenceforth the colonial motive was paramount at Westminster, for Pitt and his colleagues questioned the wisdom of holding Corsica. On the other hand they sought to safeguard India by seizing the Cape of Good Hope, and to preserve Hayti from the inroads of the French, to whom Spain handed over her possession, San Domingo. Unfortunately the greater the prominence accorded to colonial affairs, the wider grew the breach with Spain, until in October 1796 the Court of Madrid declared war. Is Pitt to be blamed for the rupture with Spain? From the standpoint of Burke and Windham he is open to grave censure. Surveying the course of events from their royalist minaret, these prophets ceased not to proclaim the restoration of the Bourbons to be the sole purpose of the war. Let there be no talk of indemnities. Be content with crushing Jacobinism and restoring order. Such was their contention; and much may be said for it.

On the other hand, we must remember that at first England was not a principal in the contest. It was thrust upon her by the aggressions of the Jacobins, and perforce she played a subordinate part in continental campaigns, the prizes of which Austria and Prussia had already marked out. The reproaches hurled by Burke and Windham were the outcome of ignorance as to the aims of the powerful Allies, whose co-operation, illusory though it came to be, was at that time deemed essential to success. Further, in striking at the French colonies, Pitt followed the course successfully adopted by England in several wars. But here again his difficulties were greater than those of Chatham. Indeed, they were enhanced by the triumphs of Chatham. Where now could he deal the most telling blow? Not against Canada; for his father had reft that prize. The French settlements in the East Indies were of small account. It was in Hayti, Martinique, and Guadeloupe that French commerce could be ruined. At them, therefore, he struck. But in so doing he reopened the old disputes with Spain. In vain did he seek to avert bickerings by suggesting a friendly understanding about Hayti. Godoy was determined to bicker. And, as the war changed its character, the old Latin affinities helped that adventurer to undermine the monarchical league and to draw back Spain to the traditional connection with France.

The Spanish declaration of war in October 1796 opens the fourth phase of the struggle. Thenceforth England stood on the defensive in Europe in order to guard and strengthen her Colonial Empire. She abandoned Corsica and Elba; she withdrew her fleet from the Mediterranean so that Ireland might be screened from attack. Pitt's views also underwent a change. Foreseeing the collapse of Austria, he sought to assure peace with France and Spain by conquering enough territory oversea to counterbalance the triumphs of Bonaparte and Moreau in Italy and the Rhineland. If he could not restore the Balance of Power on the Continent, he strove to safeguard British interests at all essential points. Failing to save Holland from the Jacobins' grip, he conquered and held the Cape. This was the bent of his policy during the peace overtures of the year 1796. He struggled on reluctantly with the war, opposing as inopportune the motions of Fox, Grey, or Wilberforce for peace, but ever hoping that France would be compelled by the pressure of bankruptcy to come to terms and surrender some of her continental conquests on consideration of recovering her colonies. Wilberforce heard him declare that he could almost calculate the time when her resources would be exhausted. On the philanthropist repeating this at a dinner party, one of his guests, de Lageard, wittily remarked: "I should like to know who was Chancellor of the Exchequer to Attila."[418] This remark shore asunder Pitt's financial arguments and reveals the weak point of his policy. He conducted the war as if it were a Seven Years' War. It was a Revolutionary War; and at this very time a greater than Attila was at hand. Bonaparte was preparing to use the spoils of Italy for the extension of the arena of strife. Nelson, then seeking to intercept the supplies of Bonaparte's army in the Riviera, foresaw the danger and thus graphically summarized it: "Italy is the gold mine; and if once entered, is without means of resistance." As by a flash we see in this remark and in that of de Lageard the miscalculation which was to ruin the life work of Pitt and almost ruin his country.

Despite the opposition of the King and Grenville to the negotiations for peace, Pitt held firm; and early in 1796 advances were made through Wickham, our enterprising envoy in Switzerland. They were foredoomed to failure; on 26th March the Directory declared its resolve to listen to no proposals involving the surrender of any of the lands incorporated in France by the terms of the constitution of 1795. This implied that she would retain the Rhine boundary, along with Savoy, Nice, and Avignon. Grenville received the news with satisfaction, remarking to Wickham that the Directory had acted clumsily and "in fact played our game better than we could have hoped."[419] The effect on public opinion was even better when it appeared that France expected England to surrender her colonial conquests. That France should gain enormously on land while the British acquisitions oversea were surrendered, was so monstrous a claim as to arouse the temper of the nation. Even Fox admitted that if France retained her conquests in Europe, England must keep those gained at sea. As Pitt pointed out in his speech of 10th May 1796, the French demands blighted all hope of peace; and we must struggle on, "waiting for the return of reason in our deluded enemy."

Pitt regarded the French conquest of Italy as counterbalanced by the triumph of Jervis and Nelson at Cape St. Vincent in February 1797; and he therefore refused to consider the cession of Gibraltar to Spain. Wholeheartedly he sought for peace in that year. But it was to be peace with honour. In fact, Great Britain fared better after 1796 than before. As Allies fell away or joined the enemy, her real strength began to appear. The reasons for the paradox are not far to seek. Open enemies are less dangerous than false friends. Further, the complexities of the war, resulting from the conflicting aims of the Allies, vanished. England therefore could act in the way in which Pitt would all along have preferred her to act, namely, against the enemy's colonies. In Europe her attitude was defensive; and for a time in the summer and autumn of 1796 fears of invasion were rife. Accordingly the Quarter-Master-General, Sir David Dundas, drew up a scheme of coast defence, especially for the district between Pegwell Bay and Pevensey Bay; he also devised measures for "driving" the country in front of the enemy. In November of that year he recommended the construction of batteries or entrenchments at Shooter's Hill, Blackheath, on the hills near Lee, Lewisham, Sydenham, Norwood, Streatham, Merton, and Wandsworth. The failure of Hoche's attempt at Bantry Bay and the victory off Cape St. Vincent somewhat assuaged these fears; but, owing to the alarming state of Ireland, England remained on the defensive through the years 1797-8, until Bonaparte's Egyptian expedition enabled her to strike a crushing blow at the chief colonial enterprise of her antagonist. That adventure, together with the aggressions of France at Rome and in Switzerland, aroused the anger or fear of Russia, Austria, and Naples, and thereby led up to the war of the Second Coalition.

* * * * *

Amidst the conflict of aims which distracted the Allies in the First Coalition, Pitt's foresight was not seldom at fault. But only those who have weighed the importance of the diplomatic issues at stake, and have noted their warping influence on military affairs, have the right to accuse him of blindness and presumption. The problem before him was of unexampled complexity, and its solution could be effected only by a succession of experiments. That he put forth too many efforts at one time may be granted; and yet in each case, if the details are fully known, the reasons for making the attempt seem adequate. Did not Chatham fail in most of the expeditions which he sent against the coasts of France? Even those who censure Pitt for his blunders in the war will admit that the inspiring influence of his personality and patriotism nerved the nation and Parliament for the struggle. True, the Opposition indulged in petty nagging and in ingeniously unpatriotic tactics; but they only served to throw up in bold relief the consistent and courageous conduct of the Prime Minister. It was an easy task to refute the peevish efforts of Fox to justify the French Jacobins alike before the war, throughout its course, and in their rejection of the British overtures for peace. But in every encounter Pitt won more than a personal triumph. He proved that the war was forced upon us; that on our side it was a defensive effort; and that despite the perverse conduct of Prussia and Spain, England had won notable gains oversea and might expect an advantageous peace, provided only that the nation persevered.

One question remains. Why did not Pitt call the nation to arms? The reasons for his caution are doubtless to be found in the ingrained conservatism of the English character, and in the political ferment which marked the years 1794-5. The mere proposal to merge Line, Militia, and Volunteers in one national array would have seemed mere madness. For the populace had recently been protesting against the facilities given to the loyal to arm and drill themselves. It was rumoured that, by way of retort, the men of Sheffield, Southwark, and Norwich secretly mustered for practice with pikes. In such circumstances, conscription might well spell Revolution. Here was the weak place in Pitt's armour. By parting company with the reformers, he had embittered no small section of his countrymen. In 1794, as we have seen, he was considered a reactionary and an oppressor. He therefore could not appeal to the nation, as Carnot did in France. Even his Bill of March 1794 for increasing the Militia by an extension of the old custom of the ballot or the drawing of lots produced some discontent. A similar proposal, passed a year earlier by the Dublin Parliament for raising 16,000 additional Militiamen in Ireland, led to widespread rioting, especially in Ulster. Not until 1797 did the Scottish Militia Act ensure the adoption of similar methods by Scotland, though regiments of Fencibles were raised in the meantime.

The preparations for national defence continued to proceed in these parochial ways. Pitt's authority at Westminster was at no time more firmly founded than at the time of the meeting of the new Parliament in the autumn of 1796. Yet the piecemeal methods went on as before. He proposed to raise by means of the ballot a levy of 15,000 men in order to recruit the navy and the Line regiments; and he further asked for a levy of 60,000 men as a Supplementary Militia, one tenth being embodied by turns so as not to withdraw from work too many hands at one time. Nor was this all. For the purpose of strengthening the irregular cavalry, he proposed that every person who kept ten horses should be required to furnish one horseman and a horse for such a corps, and those who owned more than ten horses were to subscribe a proportionate sum towards its maintenance. He also required gamekeepers and those who took out licenses to shoot either to serve on horseback or to find a substitute. In all he expected to raise 20,000 horsemen by these means.

The attitude of the House was on the whole highly favourable to these proposals. Fox accused Ministers of raising an invasion scare in order to compass their own nefarious designs; but Pitt's first proposals passed without a division; that on the cavalry by 140 votes to 30. Nevertheless, Pitt did nothing towards securing cohesion in these diverse forces, except by a provision which obliged Volunteers to enrol in the Supplementary Militia, to take the oath as such, and to train by turns for twenty days at a time in any part of the country, instead of training once or twice a week in their own towns. This must have been beneficial where it was carried out; but, as the Militia was controlled by the Home Office, it is doubtful whether enough energy was thrown into the scheme to ensure success.

These arrangements are miserably inadequate in comparison with the levee en masse of Carnot, which baffled the calculations of foreign statesmen, flung back the armies of the Coalition, and opened up the path of glory for Bonaparte. Here the popular armament did not become in any sense national until after the renewal of war in 1803. The possibilities open to England, even in that trying year 1795, were set forth by Major Cartwright in a suggestive pamphlet—"The Commonwealth in Danger." After pointing out that, having been deserted by Prussia and Spain, we must now depend on ourselves alone, he depicted the contrast between England and France. The French Republic, relying on the populace, had more than a million of men under arms. Great Britain was "a disarmed, defenceless, unprepared people, scarcely more capable of resisting a torrent of French invaders than the herds and flocks of Smithfield." How, then, could the danger be averted? Solely (he replied) by trusting the people and by reviving the ancient laws which compelled householders to bear arms. But this implied the concession of the franchise. Be bold, he said. Make the Kingdom a Commonwealth and the nation will be saved. He continued in these noteworthy words: "The enemy is at the gates, and we must be friends or perish. Adversity is a school of the sublime virtues. Necessity is an eloquent reconciler of differences.... By saying to Britain—Be an armed nation, she secures her defence and seals her freedom. A million of armed men, supporting the State with their purse, and defending it with their lives, will know that none have so great a stake as themselves in the Government.... Arming the people and reforming Parliament are inseparable."

At first sight this seems mere rhetoric, but on reflection it will appear the path of prudence. By the talisman of trust in the people France conjured up those armed hosts which overthrew old Europe. At the stamp of Napoleon's heel a new Europe arose, wherein the most potent defiance came from the peoples which drew upon their inmost reserves of strength. That these consist in men, not in money, is clear from the course of the struggle against the great Emperor. Spain, Russia, and Prussia adopted truly national systems of defence, and quickly forged to the front. Britain and Austria clung to their old systems, and, thanks to Wellington's genius and Metternich's diplomacy, they survived. But they did not play the decisive part which they might have done if George III and Pitt, Francis II and Thugut, had early determined to trust and arm their peoples. Unfortunately for England, she underwent no military disaster; and therefore Pitt was fain to plod along in the old paths and use the nation's wealth, not its manhood. He organized it piecemeal, on a class basis, instead of embattling it as a whole. In the main his failure to realize the possibilities of the situation arose from his abandonment of those invigorating principles which nerved him to the achievements of the earlier and better part of his career. It is conceivable that, had he retained the idealism of his youth and discovered a British Scharnhorst, Waterloo might have been fought in 1796 and won solely by British troops.

FOOTNOTES:

[411] "Diary of a Tour through Great Britain in 1795," by W. MacRitchie (1897).

[412] "Dropmore P.," ii, 172.

[413] In "H. O.," Geo. III (Domestic), 27, are Dundas's instructions to Moira, dated 20th November 1793, appointing him Major-General in an expedition to Guernsey, with Admiral MacBride, taking with him a Hessian corps as soon as it arrives. He is to seize St. Malo or any place near it suitable for helping the Royalists and harassing the enemy. If he deems success doubtful, he is to await reinforcements. The aim is to help the cause of Louis XVII and lead to a general pacification.

[414] "Malmesbury Diaries," iii, 96-8.

[415] Chevening MSS.

[416] Pretyman MSS.

[417] "Cornwallis Corresp.," ii, 289.

[418] "Life of Wilberforce," ii, 92.

[419] Sorel, v, 41; "Wickham Corresp.," i, 269-74, 343. Some mis-statements of Sorel may be noted here. On pp. 39, 40 of vol. v he states that Pitt was intent on acquiring Malta and Egypt (though he was then in doubt whether to retain Corsica): also that, after the insult to George III in London on 29th October 1795, Pitt proposed a loan of L18,000,000 and new taxes, which Parliament refused. The facts are that Pitt asked for that loan on 7th December 1796, and it was subscribed in twenty-two hours. On the same day Parliament voted the new taxes.



CHAPTER XIII

DEARTH AND DISCONTENT

The Waste Land Bill will turn the tide of our affairs and enable us to bear without difficulty the increased burdens of the war.—SINCLAIR TO PITT, 13th March 1796.

On 29th October 1795 occurred an event unparalleled within the memory of Englishmen then living. An immense crowd, filling the Mall, broke into loud hissing and hooting when George III left Buckingham House in the state carriage to proceed to Westminster for the opening of Parliament. The tumult reached its climax as the procession approached the Ordnance Office, when a small pebble, or marble, or shot from an air-gun, pierced the carriage window. The King immediately said to Westmorland, who sat opposite, "That's a shot," and, with the courage of his family, coolly leaned forward to examine the round hole in the glass. Similar scenes occurred on his return to St. James's Palace. The mob pressed forward with an eagerness which the Guards could scarcely restrain, calling out "Peace, Peace; Bread, Bread; No Pitt; No Famine." With some difficulty the gates of the Horse Guards were shut against them. Opposite Spring Gardens a stone struck the woodwork of the carriage; and the intrepid monarch alighted at St. James's amidst a commotion so wild that one of the horses took fright and flung down a groom, breaking his thigh. Thereafter the rabble set upon the state carriage, greatly damaging it; and when George later on proceeded in his private carriage to Buckingham House, he again ploughed his way through a din of curses. Pitt kept discreetly in the background, or he would have been roughly handled.

A loyalist caricature of the period gives an imaginative version of the incident. In it Pitt figures as the coachman whipping on the horses of the royal carriage amidst a shower of stones, eggs, and cats. The King sits inside absolutely passive, with large protruding eyes; Lansdowne, Bedford, Whitbread, and others strive to stop the wheels; Fox and Sheridan, armed with bludgeons, seek to force open the door; while Norfolk fires a blunderbuss at the King. The sketch illustrates the fierce partisanship of the time, which stooped to incredibly coarse charges. But scarcely less strange was the insinuation of Lansdowne, immediately after the affair, that Ministers had themselves planned it in order to alarm the public and perpetuate their despotic rule. The same insinuation found favour with Francis Place, a rabid tailor of Holborn, and a prominent member of the London Corresponding Society, who charged Pitt with imperilling the life of George III in order to keep office. "It is a curious circumstance," he wrote, "that Pitt carried all his obnoxious measures, silenced or kept down his opponents and raised vast sums of money by means of the alarms which he and his coadjutors had created. The war was commenced after an alarm had been created, and it was kept up by the same means."[420] Fox and his followers often uttered similar taunts.

The insults to the King were but the climax of an agitation which had previously gone to strange lengths. On 27th October 1795 the London Corresponding Society convened a monster meeting in the fields near Copenhagen House, Islington, in order to protest against the war and to press for annual Parliaments and universal suffrage. A crowd said to number nearly 150,000 persons assembled under the chairmanship of John Binns, and passed an "Address to the Nation," which concluded as follows: "If ever the British nation should loudly demand strong and decisive measures, we boldly answer, 'We have lives and are ready to devote them either separately or collectively for the salvation of our country.'" Outwardly the meeting was orderly, if that epithet can be applied to a monster meeting which advocated civil war. But probably less than one tenth of the assemblage heard the resolution. Equally threatening was a hand-bill circulated in London on the practice of "King-killing." Place says nothing about this, and ridicules the "Address to the Nation" as a foolish production, which he had opposed no less strongly than the convocation of the meeting. This was the usual attitude of Place. He sought to figure as the apostle of reasonableness, deprecating all unwise acts and frothy talk on the part of his associates, but minimizing the follies of British democrats, which he usually ascribed to the insidious advice of the emissaries of Pitt.

Let us enlarge our survey. From the Home Office Records it is clear that dear food and uncertain work had aggravated the political discontent of the years 1792-4, until the autumn of 1795 witnessed almost an epidemic of sedition. To take one significant episode. An inflammatory placard, dated Norwich, 16th October 1795, was widely circulated. That city, as we have seen, was a hotbed of Radicalism. There it was that the democratic clubs sought to federate with the view of forming a National Convention. One of their members, named Besey, now posted up the following placard. After stating that the prevailing misery is due to the present unjust and unnecessary war, the number of abuses and sinecures, and "the monopoly of farms which disgraces this country," it continues thus: "The Minister would gladly instigate you to riot and plunder that he might send against you those valiant heroes who compose his devoted Volunteer corps.... This would accelerate his darling object of governing us by a military aristocracy. The countries which supplied us with quantities of corn now groan under the iron yoke of the Tigress of the North or lie desolate from this infernal war. We send immense stores to the emigrants and the Chouans. Those rebels, not satisfied with traitorously resisting the constituted authorities of their country, have desolated the face of it. These honourable Allies must be fed, as others of the kind are paid, by us." He then urges them to form popular Societies and demand redress of grievances. He concludes thus: "You may as well look for chastity and mercy in the Empress of Russia, honour and consistency from the King of Prussia, wisdom and plain dealing from the Emperor of Germany, as a single speck of virtue from our HELL-BORN MINISTER."[421]

In view of these facts, is it surprising that Ministers decided to issue a royal proclamation against seditious assemblies and the circulation of treasonable papers? Sheriffs, magistrates, and all law-abiding men were charged to apprehend those who distributed such papers and to help in the suppression of seditious meetings (4th November). Six days later Grenville introduced the Treasonable Practices Bill, while Pitt in the Commons moved the Seditious Meetings Bill. The Prime Minister stated that, as soon as the Habeas Corpus Act came again into operation, the political clubs renewed their propaganda and brought about the present dangerous situation. In order to suppress gatherings of a definitely seditious character, he proposed that, before a meeting of more than fifty persons which was not convened by the local authorities, notice must be given by seven householders and sent to the magistrates. The Bill also required the presence of a magistrate, and invested him with power to stop any speech, disperse the meeting, and order the arrest of the speaker. But this was not all. The authorities had been alarmed by the popularity of Thelwall's racy discourses, resumed early in 1795, which represented Government as the source of all the country's ills. Whether his sprightly sallies were dangerous may be doubted; but Pitt, with characteristic lack of humour, paid Thelwall the compliment of ordaining that lecture-halls must be licensed by two magistrates; and a magistrate might enter at any time. The Bill was passed for three years.

Equally drastic was the Treasonable Practices Bill. Declaring the planning or levying war within the kingdom to be an act of substantive treason, it imposed dire penalties on those who devised evil against the King, who sought to coerce Parliament or help the invaders. Even those who spoke or wrote against the constitution came under the penalties for treason and might be transported for seven years. As Fox indignantly exclaimed, if he criticized a system which allotted two members to Old Sarum and none to Manchester, he might be sent to Botany Bay. The alarm of Pitt at the state of affairs appears in a request which he and Portland sent to the Duke of York, on 14th November, for reinforcements of cavalry. They asked him to despatch three troops of the 1st Dragoon Guards from Romford to Hackney, replacing the Pembroke Fencible Cavalry, which was utterly useless; to order up two troops of the Cornish Fencible Cavalry from Barnet to Hampstead and Highgate; to despatch the 11th Light Dragoons from Guildford to Ewell or Kingston, and the 1st Fencibles from Reading to Uxbridge. These, along with the Lancashire Militia at Lewisham and Greenwich, and the Guards in London, would suffice for the crisis.[422]

Such were the conditions under which the debates on the two Bills proceeded. They turned largely on the connection between the Islington meeting and the outrage on the King. Canning stoutly affirmed that connection, which Sheridan and Fox no less vehemently denied. Wilberforce on this occasion supported the Government. Pitt showed little zeal in defending his Bill, promising to safeguard the right of public meeting when lawfully exercised. The debate in the Lords elicited from the Bishop of Rochester the significant statement that he did not know what the great mass of the people had to do with the laws except to obey them. The Earl of Lauderdale pilloried this utterance, thereby consoling himself for being in a minority of 5. In the Commons Fox mustered 22, as against 167 for the Government (6th November-14th December 1795). Meanwhile monster meetings of protest were held on 12th November and 2nd and 7th December, the two last in Marylebone Fields, which now form the greater portion of Regent's Park. The orderliness of these vast throngs, comprising perhaps a quarter of a million of men, affords a strong argument against the two Acts. Lord Malmesbury much regretted that there was no rioting, now that all was ready for its repression. After the passing of those "barbarous bloodthirsty" measures (as Place called them) the country settled down into a sullen silence. Reformers limited their assemblies to forty-five members; but even so they did not escape the close meshes of the law. Binns and Jones, delegates of the London Corresponding Society who went to Birmingham, were arrested there; and the Society soon gave up its propaganda. All but the most resolute members fell away, and by the end of 1796 it was L185 in debt.[423]

Undoubtedly these measures mark the nadir of Pitt's political career. Nevertheless, the coincidence between the London Corresponding Society's meeting at Islington and the attempted outrage on George III was suspiciously close in point of time; and a dangerous feeling prevailed throughout the country. Pitt, as we shall see, took steps to alleviate the distress which was its chief cause; but after the insult to the King he could not but take precautionary measures against sedition. After such an incident, a Minister who did nothing at all would be held responsible if the monarch were assassinated. Some coercive measures were inevitable; and it is clear that they cowed the more restive spirits. Among other persons who wrote to Pitt on this topic, Wilson, formerly his tutor at Burton Pynsent and Cambridge, sent him a letter from Binfield, in which occur these sentences: "The Sedition Bills also have had so good an effect. Our farmers can now go to market without being exposed to the danger of having republican principles instilled into them while they are dining." Apparently, then, the loyal efforts of Berkshire magistrates extended to the interiors of inns. Whether the two Acts were not needlessly prolonged is open to grave question. Certainly, while driving the discontent underground, they increased its explosive force. General David Dundas, in his Report on National Defence of November 1796, states that at no time were there so many people disposed to help the invaders. Perhaps we may sum up by declaring the two Acts a disagreeable but necessary expedient during the time of alarm, and mischievous when it passed away.[424]

The insult to the King was but one symptom of a distemper widely prevalent. Its causes were manifold. Chief among them was a feeling of disgust at the many failures of the war. The defection of Prussia and Spain, the fruitless waste of British troops in the West Indies, the insane follies of the French emigres, the ghastly scenes at Quiberon, and the tragi-comedy of Vendemiaire in the streets of Paris, sufficed to daunt the stoutest hearts. By the middle of the month of October 1795, Pitt decided to come to terms with France, if the Directory, newly installed in power, should found a stable Government and exhibit peaceful tendencies. His position in this autumn is pathetic. Reproached by the emigres for recalling the Comte d'Artois from Yeu, taunted by Fox for not having sought peace from the Terrorists, and reviled by the populace as the cause of the dearth, he held firmly on his way, shelving the emigres, maintaining that this was the first opportunity of gaining a lasting peace, and adjuring the people to behave manfully in order the more speedily to win it.

This advice seemed but cold comfort to men and women whose hardships were severe. Political discontent was greatly increased by dear food and uncertainty of employment. The symptoms had long been threatening. At midsummer of the year 1795 the men of Birmingham assembled in hundreds opposite a mill and bakehouse on Snow Hill, crying out: "A large loaf. Are we to be starved to death?" They were dispersed by armed force, but not without bloodshed. At that time insubordination in the troops was met by summary executions or repression at Horsham, Brighton, and Dumfries. In July a drunken brawl at Charing Cross led to a riot, in the course of which the mob smashed Pitt's windows in Downing Street, and demolished a recruiting station in St. George's Fields, Lambeth. The country districts were deeply agitated by the shortage of corn resulting from the bad harvest of 1794. A report from Beaminster in Dorset stated that for six weeks before the harvest of 1795 no wheat remained; and the poor of that county would have starved, had not a sum of money been raised sufficient to buy cargoes of wheat which then reached Plymouth.

The suffering was increased by the extraordinary cold of that midsummer which destroyed hundreds of newly-shorn sheep and blighted the corn. Driving storms of rain in August laid the crops. On heavy land they were utterly spoilt, so that even by October the poor felt the pinch. From all parts there came the gloomiest reports. In Oxfordshire there was no old wheat left, and the insatiable demands from the large towns of the north sent up prices alarmingly. In November Lord Bateman wrote from Leominster that the wheat crop was but two thirds of the average, and, if Government did not import wheat directly, not through fraudulent contractors, riots must ensue. Reports from Petworth, East Grinstead, and Battle told of the havoc wrought by blight and rains. At Plymouth the price of wheat exceeded all records. Lord Salisbury reported a shortage of one third in the wheat crop of mid-Hertfordshire. Kensington sent a better estimate for its corn lands. But the magistrates of Enfield and Edmonton deemed the outlook so threatening that they urged Pitt and his colleagues (1) to encourage the free importation of wheat, (2) to facilitate the enclosure of all common fields and the conversion of common and waste lands into tillage; (3) to pass an Act legalizing relief of the poor in every parish by the weekly distribution of bread and meat at reduced prices in proportion to the size of the family and of its earnings.[425]

The protests against the Corn Laws are significant. In 1773 the bounty system of the reign of William III was revised, the average price of wheat being reckoned at forty-four shillings the quarter. If it fell below that figure, a bounty of five shillings a quarter was granted on export, so as to encourage farmers to give a wide acreage to wheat, in the assurance that in bountiful seasons they could profitably dispose of their surplus. But when the price rose to forty-four shillings exportation was forbidden, and at forty-eight shillings foreign corn was admitted on easy terms so as to safeguard the consumer; for, as Burke said: "he who separates the interest of the consumer from the interest of the grower starves the country." Unfortunately, in 1791, Government raised the price at which importation was allowed to fifty-four shillings the quarter. The upward trend of prices may have called for some change; but it was too drastic. In view of the increase of the manufacturing townships, Pitt should have favoured the import of foreign corn, though not in such a way as unduly to discourage agriculturists. England, in fact, was then reaching the stage at which she needed foreign corn when nature withheld her bounties at home, and it is well to remember that 1792 was the last year in which England exported any appreciable amount of wheat. During the Great War she became an importing country, and at no time was the crisis worse than in the winter of 1795-6. Early in the year 1796 the best wheat sold at six guineas the quarter, or four times its present price; the inferior kinds were very dear, and many poor people perished from want if not from actual starvation. So grave was the crisis as to evoke a widespread demand for Free Trade in corn. This feeling pervaded even the rural districts, a report by John Shepherd of Faversham being specially significant. In the towns there was an outcry against corn merchants, who were guilty of forestalling and regrating. Possibly but for these tricks of trade the supply of home wheat might almost have sufficed.

Pitt seems to have thought so; for he wrote to the Marquis of Stafford, stating his desire to have powers for compelling exhaustive returns of the wheat supply to be sent in. On the whole, however, he deemed such an expedient high-handed and likely to cause alarm. He therefore decided to call for a special committee to inquire into the high price of corn, and explained his reasons to the House of Commons on 3rd November 1795. He urged the need of modifying the old and nearly obsolete law relating to the assize of bread, and he suggested the advisability of mixing wheat with barley, or other corn, which, while lessening the price of bread, would not render it unpalatable. As to prohibiting the distillation of whiskey, he proposed to discontinue that device after February 1796, so that the revenue might not unduly suffer. The committee was equally cautious. In presenting its report eight days later, Ryder moved that the members should pledge themselves to lessen the consumption of wheat in their households by one third. These proposals appeared wholly inadequate to Bankes and Sheridan, who urged that all classes should be compelled to eat the same kind of bread. Francis, however, asserted that the poor in his district now refused to eat any but the best wheaten bread. There was therefore every need for a law compelling bakers to make bread only two thirds of wheat. Nevertheless, the House agreed to the proposals of the committee. Members also bound themselves to forswear pastry, and by all possible means to endeavour to lessen the consumption of fine wheaten flour. History does not record how far these resolves held good, and with what hygienic results. An external sign of the patriotic mania for economy in wheat was the disuse of hair-powder, which resulted from the tax now imposed on that article. Thus Rousseau, Pitt, and Nature are largely responsible for a change which in its turn hastened the disappearance of wigs.

Pitt and his colleagues sought to check the practice of forestalling. But, as usually happens in a struggle with human selfishness, success was doubtful. More fruitful was the expedient of attracting foreign corn by granting large bounties on imports. As if this were not enough, British warships sometimes compelled neutral corn-vessels, bound for France, to put in at our harbours and sell their cargoes at the high prices then prevailing, a high-handed practice which prepared the way for the Armed Neutrality League of 1800. These exceptional expedients seem to have been due to what Sheffield called "a sure little junto,"—Pitt, Ryder, and Jenkinson. He further accused them of taking the corn trade out of the hands of the merchants and then dropping State management prematurely. Over against this captious comment may be placed the undoubted fact that, early in the year 1796, wheat sold at six guineas the quarter, and by the month of May was down nearly to normal prices. In that month Pitt deemed the crisis past; for the King's Speech of 19th May, at the end of the last session of that Parliament, congratulated members on the success of their efforts to afford relief to the people. The harvest of 1796 was more abundant; but confidence was not restored until late in the year. As Whitbread pointed out, the increase of large farms at the expense of the little men led to the holding back of the new corn. The small farmer perforce had to sell his corn at once. The wealthy farmer could bide his time.[426]

In these years of dearth, when the troubles in Poland restricted the supply of corn from that natural granary, the importance of the United States became increasingly obvious. Pitt had consistently sought to improve the relations with our kinsmen, and in 1791 sent out the first official envoy, George Hammond. The disputes resulting from the War of Independence and those arising out of the British Maritime Code during the Great War, brought about acute friction; but the good sense of Pitt, Washington, and John Jay, his special envoy to London, led to the conclusion of an Anglo-American Treaty (7th October 1794). Though hotly opposed by the Gallophil party at Washington, it was finally ratified in September 1796, and thus postponed for sixteen years the hostilities which had at times seemed imminent. For the present the United States sent us an increased quantity of cotton wool, but mere driblets of corn except in seasons of scarcity. Lancashire benefited from the enhanced trade, while the British farmer did not yet discern the approach of times of ruinous competition.[427]

* * * * *

Agriculture had long been an occupation equally fashionable and profitable. No part of the career of George III deserves more commendation than his patronage of high farming. That he felt keen interest in the subject appears from the letters which he sent to "The Annals of Agriculture" over the signature of "Ralph Robinson," one of his shepherds at Windsor. A present of a ram from the King's fine flock of merinos was a sign of high favour. Thanks to this encouragement and the efforts of that prince of agricultural reformers, Arthur Young, the staple industry of the land was in a highly flourishing condition. The rise in the price of wheat now stimulated the demand for the enclosure of waste lands and of the open or common-fields which then adjoined the great majority of English villages. The reclamation of wastes and fens was an advantage to all but the very poor, who, as graziers, wood-cutters, or fishermen, dragged along a life of poverty but independence. Though they might suffer by the change to tillage, the parish and the nation at large reaped golden harvests.

The enclosure of common fields was a different matter. Though on them the traditional rotation of crops was stupid and the husbandry slipshod, yet the semi-communal tillage of the three open strips enabled Hodge to jog along in the easy ways dear to him. In such cases a change to more costly methods involves hardship to the poor, who cannot, or will not, adopt the requirements of a more scientific age. Recent research has also shown that villagers depended mainly on their grazing rights. Now, a small grazier does not readily become a corn-grower. Even if he can buy a plough and a team, he lacks the experience needful for success in corn-growing. Accordingly, the small yeomen could neither compete with the large farmers nor imitate their methods. While the few who succeeded became prosperous, the many sank into poverty. These results may also be ascribed to the expense and injustice too often attending the enclosures of this period. Far from striking off at one blow the fetters of the old system, as happened in France in 1789, English law required each parish to procure its own Enclosure Act. Thus, when the parishioners at the village meeting had decided to enclose the common fields and waste, there occurred a long and costly delay until the parochial charter was gained.

Then again, the difficult task of re-allotting the wastes and open fields in proportion to the rights of the lord of the manor, the tithe-owner, and the parishioners, sometimes furnished an occasion for downright robbery of the poor. That staunch champion of high-farming and enclosures, Arthur Young, names many instances of shameful extortion on the part of landlord and attorneys. Where the village carried out its enclosure fairly and cheaply, the benefits were undoubtedly great. The wastes then became good pasture or tolerable tillage; and the common fields, previously cut up into small plots, and worked on a wasteful rotation, soon testified to the magic of individual ownership. A case in point was Snettisham, near Sandringham, where, as the result of the new wealth, the population increased by one fifth, while the poor-rate diminished by one half. Young also declared that large parts of Norfolk, owing to judicious enclosures, produced glorious crops of grain and healthy flocks fed on turnips and mangolds, where formerly there had been dreary wastes, miserable stock, and underfed shepherds.

The dearth of the year 1795 brought to the front the question of a General Enclosure Act, for enabling parishes to adopt this reform without the expense of separately applying to Parliament. To devise a measure suitable to the wide diversities of tenure prevalent in English villages was a difficult task; but it had been carried out successfully in Scotland by the Act of 1695; and now, a century later, a similar boon was proposed for England by one of the most enterprising of Scotsmen. Sir John Sinclair was born in 1754 at Thurso Castle. Inheriting large estates in the county of Caithness, he determined to enter political life, and became member for Lostwithiel, in Cornwall. Differing sharply from Pitt over the Warren Hastings affair, he adopted the independent line of conduct natural to his tastes, and during the Regency dispute joined the intermediate party known as the Armed Neutrality.

Above all he devoted himself to the development of Scottish agriculture, and began in 1790 a work entitled "A Statistical Account of Scotland." He also founded a society for improving the quality of British wool, and in May 1793 he urged the Prime Minister to incorporate a Board of Agriculture. Young bet that Pitt would refuse; for, while favouring commerce and manufactures, he had hitherto done nothing for the plough. He lost his bet. Pitt gave a conditional offer of support, provided that the House of Commons approved. The proposal won general assent, despite the insinuations of Fox and Sheridan that its purpose was merely to increase the patronage at the disposal of the Cabinet. Sinclair became president, with Young as secretary.[428] The Englishman complained that Sinclair's habit of playing with large schemes wasted the scanty funds at their disposal. But the Board did good work, for instance, in setting on foot experiments as to the admixture of barley, beans, and rice in the partly wheaten bread ordained by Parliament in 1795.

With the view of framing a General Enclosure Act, Sinclair sought to extract from parochial Enclosure Acts a medicine suitable to the myriad needs and ailments of English rural life. His survey of typical enactments is of high interest. He summarizes the treatment accorded to the lord of the manor, the rector or other tithe owner, and the parishioners. Thus, in the case of three parishes near Hull, namely, Hessle, Anlaby, and Tranley, the wastes and open fields, comprising 3,640 acres, were divided by an act of the year 1792 in a way which seems to have given satisfaction. Commissioners appointed by the local authorities divided the soil among the lords of the manors, the tithe-owners, and the parishioners, the landlords retaining half of their portions in trust for the poor. Other instances, however, reveal the difficulty of the question of tithes. Young and Sinclair felt bitterly on this subject, as their recent proposal to give a detailed description of the lands of every parish in England was successfully opposed by Dr. Moore, Archbishop of Canterbury.

Pointing out the need of a General Enclosure Act, Sinclair claimed that of the 22,107,000 acres of waste in England and Wales, a large portion could be afforested, while only one million acres were quite useless—a very hopeful estimate.[429] In order to investigate this question, a Select Committee was appointed, comprising among others Lord William Russell, Ryder, Carew, Coke of Norfolk, Plumer, and Whitbread. The outcome of its research was the General Enclosure Bill introduced early in the session of 1796, which elicited the sanguine prophecy of its author quoted at the head of this chapter.

The measure aroused keen interest. On 15th March the London Court of Aldermen urged its members to assist in passing some such measure with a view to increasing the food supply, and providing work for the poor, as well as for soldiers and sailors discharged at the peace. The proposals were as follows: The present method of enclosure would be extended so as to enable the parties concerned to frame an inexpensive and friendly agreement. In case of disagreement the Bill would enable the majority of the parishioners, voting, not by head, but according to the value of their rights, to decide on the question of enclosure. But, in order to safeguard the rights of the poor, the choice of commissioners charged with the duty of re-allotting the soil would rest with the majority, reckoned both according to heads and value. The lord of the manor could not veto enclosure; but his convenience was specially to be consulted in the re-apportionment of the land. Sinclair also pointed out to Pitt that, as tithe-owners were now "much run at," their interests must be carefully guarded. As for the cottagers, they would find compensation for the lapse of their fuel rights by the acquisition of small allotments near to their cottages. The poor also would not be charged with the expenses of enclosure, and might raise money on loan to fence the plots awarded to them in lieu of their share in the waste and the open fields. To insist, said Sinclair, on four acres being annexed to every cottage was really harmful. Finally he expressed the hope that, under his plan, the legal expenses of enclosure would on an average be L5 per parish as against the present burden of L500.[430]

Pitt's treatment of the General Enclosure Bill is somewhat obscure. Again and again Sinclair urged him to greater activity. In April 1796 he begged him to consult with the judges so as to meet the objections of tithe-owners. In May he warned him of the general disappointment that must ensue if no measure of that kind passed in that session. He asked him whether the Bill, as now amended by the committee, would not answer its purpose. Pitt gave no encouraging sign. On the contrary, he gratified the country gentlemen by opposing a Bill for the Reform of the Game Laws. The proposer, Curwen, sought merely to legalize the killing of game started on ground farmed by the occupier. But the squires took alarm, asserting that every small farmer could then pursue hares and rabbits from his ground into their preserves, and that country life, on those terms, would be intolerable. Pitt took their side, averring that sport was a relaxation well suited to the higher Orders of State, but likely to entice farmers away "from more serious and useful occupations." Much may be forgiven to a Prime Minister shortly before a General Election, which, in fact, gave to Pitt a new lease of power.

To Sinclair the election brought defeat and chagrin. He travelled northward to the Orkneys to seek a seat there, and, writing from Edinburgh on 6th July, tartly informed Pitt of his rejection after a journey of nearly a thousand miles. He must (he adds) either obtain a seat elsewhere, or take no further interest in the Board of Agriculture. If Pitt approves of his labour at the Board, will he show it in some way? "If, on the other hand," he continues, "you feel the least hesitation about giving it support, your candour, I am persuaded, will induce you to inform me at once, that I may no longer be tempted to waste so much time and labour in such pursuits.... I still flatter myself, however, that you will see the object in such a light that you will give the President of the Board of Agriculture a seat either in the Upper or the Lower House, that he may be encouraged to carry on the concerns of that useful institution with redoubled energy." Pitt's comment on the back of the letter is suggestive: "That he has lost his election, but flatters himself that a seat will be given him either in the Lower or Upper House, or he must decline taking further concern in the proceedings of the Board of Agriculture." A little later Sinclair renewed his appeal for a seat either at Midhurst, or in Scotland. Failing that, he hinted that the President of the Board of Agriculture ought to be a Peer. Is it surprising that Pitt fulfilled the suggestion by giving his influence in favour of Lord Somerville, who displaced Sinclair at the Board in 1798? Loughborough it was who suggested the change;[431] but Pitt must have approved it; and thereafter the Board deteriorated.

In truth the thane of Thurso had become a bore. His letters to Pitt teem with advice on foreign politics and the distillation of whisky, on new taxes and high farming, on increasing the silver coinage and checking smuggling, on manning the navy and raising corps of Fencibles. Wisdom flashing forth in these diverse forms begets distrust. Sinclair the omniscient correspondent injured Sinclair the agrarian reformer. Young treated the Prime Minister with more tact. His letters were fewer, and his help was practical. A pleasing instance of this was his presence at Holwood in April 1798, when Pitt was draining the hillside near his house, so as to preserve it from damp and provide water for the farm and garden below. Young drew up the scheme, went down more than once to superintend the boring and trenching, and then added these words: "I beg you will permit me to give such attention merely and solely as a mark of gratitude for the goodness I have already experienced at your hands."[432]

Sinclair, now member for Petersfield, brought his General Enclosure Bill before Parliament in 1797. In order to meet the objections of tithe-owners and lawyers, he divided it into two parts, the former applying to parishes where all the persons concerned were unanimous, the latter where this was not the case. Even so the measure met with opposition from the legal profession; and on 13th May he wrote to Pitt expressing deep concern at the opposition of the Solicitor-General. In July he besought Pitt to make the Bill a Cabinet measure in order to "prevent either legal or ecclesiastical prejudices operating against it." Nevertheless Pitt remained neutral, and the Bill was lost in the Lords, mainly owing to the opposition of the Lord Chancellor.[433] In December Sinclair announced his intention of bringing in a Bill for the improvement of waste land; but, he added significantly, "I should be glad previously to know whether it is your intention to support that measure or not." Pitt gave no sign, and the proposal did not come forward.

Pitt's treatment of one of the most important questions of that time deserves censure. We may grant that the fussiness of Sinclair told against his proposals. It is also true that the drafting of a Bill applicable to every English parish was beset with difficulties, and that enclosures, while adding greatly to the food supply of the nation, had for the most part told against the independence of the poorer villagers. But this was largely due to the expense and chicanery consequent on the passing of parochial Acts of Parliament; and what objections were there to facilitating the enclosure of wastes and open fields by parishes where everyone desired it? In such a case it was the bounden duty of Parliament to end the law's delays and cheapen the procedure.

That Pitt did little or nothing to avert the hostility of bishops and lawyers in the Upper House convicts him either of apathy or of covert opposition. He is largely responsible for the continuance of the old customs, under which a parish faced the expense of procuring a separate Act of Parliament only under stress of severe dearth; and, as a rule, the crisis ended long before the cumbrous machinery of the law enabled the new lands to come under the plough. It is, however, possible that he hoped to inaugurate a system of enclosures of waste lands by a clause which appeared in his abortive proposals of the year 1797 for the relief of the poor. His Bill on that subject comprised not only very generous plans of relief, but also the grant of cows to the deserving poor, the erection of Schools of Industry in every parish or group of parishes, and facilities for reclaiming waste land. His treatment of the question of poor relief is too extensive a subject to admit of adequate description here; but I propose to return to it and to notice somewhat fully the criticisms of Bentham and others.[434] It must suffice to say that the draft of that measure bespeaks a keen interest in the welfare of the poor, and indeed errs on the side of generosity. Abbot, afterwards Lord Colchester, was asked by Pitt to help in drafting the Poor Bill; and he pronounced it "as bad in the mode as the principles were good in substance."[435]

After the withdrawal of Pitt's Poor Bill, nothing was done to facilitate enclosures until the accession of Addington to power. His General Enclosure Act of the year 1801 afforded timely relief in the matter of food-supply, a fact which shows that the difficulties in the way of such a measure were far from serious. The passing of that Bill, it is true, was helped on by the terrible dearth of that year, when the average price of wheat was close on 116 shillings the quarter. But Pitt was content to meet the almost equally acute crisis of 1795-6 by temporary shifts, one of which exasperated the neutral States of the North and prepared the way for the renewal of the hostile League of the Baltic.

FOOTNOTES:

[420] B.M. Add. MSS., 27808.

[421] "H. O.," Geo. III (Domestic), 36.

[422] "H. O.," (Departmental), Secs. of State.

[423] B.M. Add. MSS., 27808; "Hist. of the Two Acts," 330 et seq.

[424] Pitt MSS., 190; "W. O.," 113.

[425] "H. O.," Geo. III (Domestic), 36.

[426] "Parl. Hist.," xxxii, 235-42, 687-700, 1156; Tooke, "Hist. of Prices," i, 185 et seq.; Porter, "Progress of the Nation," 147, 452.

[427] "Dropmore P.," iii, 87, 243, 526-30; "Report of the American Hist. Assoc." (1903), ii, 67-9, 354, 375, 440 et seq., 552-8; E. Channing, "United States," 148-50; Cunningham, 512, 694.

[428] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," i, ch. iv; ii, ch. i.

[429] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," ii, 60-4, 104; Sinclair, "Address ... on the Cultivation of Waste Lands (1795)"; "Observations on ... a Bill for facilitating the Division of Commons." He first urged this on Pitt on 10th January 1795 (Pitt MSS., 175).

[430] Pitt MSS., 178.

[431] "Corresp. of Sir John Sinclair," i, 124.

[432] Pitt MSS., 193. Sinclair raised two corps of Fencibles. The list of his works, pamphlets, etc., fills thirty-two pages at the end of his Memoirs.

[433] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," ii, 106-9.

[434] "Pitt and Napoleon Miscellanies."

[435] "Lord Colchester's Diary," i, 82.



CHAPTER XIV

THE YEARS OF STRAIN (1796-7)

Torn as we are by faction, without an army, without money, trusting entirely to a navy whom we may not be able to pay, and on whose loyalty, even if we can, no firm reliance is to be placed, how are we to get out of this cursed war without a Revolution?—CORNWALLIS TO ROSS, 15th December 1797.

The year 1797, which opened with events portending the overthrow of Austria and the financial collapse of England, brought a passing gleam of sunshine into the gray life of Pitt. For some time he had been a frequent visitor at Eden Farm, Beckenham, the seat of Lord Auckland. It was on the way to Holwood, and the cheerful society of that large family afforded a relief from cares of state not to be found in his bachelor household. His circle of friends, never large, had somewhat diminished with the wear and tear of politics. His affection for Wilberforce, perhaps, had not quite regained its former fervour. As for the vinous society of Dundas, a valuable colleague but a far from ideal companion, Pitt must in his better moments have held it cheap. He rarely saw his mother, far away in Somerset; and probably his relations to his brother had cooled since he removed him from the Admiralty. In truth, despite his loving disposition, Pitt was a lonely man.

The voice of rumour, in his case always unfair, charged him with utter indifference to feminine charms. His niece, Lady Hester Stanhope, who later on had opportunities of observing him closely, vehemently denied the charge, declaring that he was much impressed by beauty in women, and noted the least defect, whether of feature, demeanour, or dress. She declared that, on one occasion, while commending her preparations for the ball-room, he suggested the looping up of one particular fold. At once she recognized the voice of the expert and hailed the experiment as an artistic triumph. Hester's recollections, it is true, belong to the lonely years spent in the Lebanon, when she indulged in ecstatic or spiteful outbursts; and we therefore question her statement that Pitt was once so enamoured of a certain Miss W——, who became Mrs. B——s of Devonshire, as to drink wine out of her shoe. But Hester's remarks are detailed enough to refute the reports of his unnatural insensibility, which elicited coarse jests from opponents; and we may fully trust that severe critic of all Pitt's friends, when, recalling a special visit to Beckenham Church, she pronounced the Honourable Eleanor Eden gloriously beautiful.[436]



To this bright vivacious girl of twenty years Pitt's affections went forth in the winter of 1796-7;[437] and she reciprocated them. Every one agrees that Eleanor combined beauty with good sense, sprightliness with tact. Having had varied experiences during Auckland's missions to Paris, Madrid, and The Hague, she had matured far beyond her years. In mental endowments she would have been a fit companion even to Pitt; and she possessed a rich store of the social graces in which he was somewhat deficient. In fact, here was his weak point as a political leader. He and his colleagues had no salon which could vie with those of the Whig grandees. The accession of Portland had been a social boon; but Pitt and his intimate followers exerted little influence on London Society. He and Grenville were too stiff. Neither Dundas nor Wilberforce moved in the highest circles. Portland, Spencer, and Windham held somewhat aloof, and Leeds, Sydney, and others had been alienated. Accordingly, the news that Pitt was paying marked attentions to Auckland's eldest daughter caused a flutter of excitement. Her charm and tact warranted the belief that in the near future the Prime Minister would dominate the social sphere hardly less than the political.

Among his friends who knew how warm a heart beat under that cold exterior, the news inspired the hope that here was the talisman which would reveal the hidden treasures of his nature. The stiff form would now unbend; the political leader would figure as a genial host; the martinet would become a man. Assuredly their estimate was correct. Pitt's nature needed more glow, wider sympathies, a freer expression. A happy marriage would in any case have widened his outlook and matured his character. But a union with Eleanor Eden would have supplied to him the amenities of life. We picture her exerting upon him an influence not unlike that which Wordsworth believed that his sister had exerted upon his being:

thou didst plant its crevices with flowers, Hang it with shrubs that twinkle in the breeze, And teach the little birds to build their nests And warble in its chambers.[438]

It was not to be. After toying with this day-dream, Pitt suddenly broke away to Downing Street. His letter to Auckland, written there on 20th January 1797, announced the decision of the Minister in chillingly correct terms. In pathetically halting and laboured phraseology he implied that he had throughout observed a correct aloofness. After five long sentences of apology to the father he proceeded thus:

Whoever may have the good fortune ever to be united to her is destined to more than his share of human happiness. Whether, at any rate, I could have had any ground to hope that such would have been my lot, I am in no degree entitled to guess. I have to reproach myself for ever having indulged the idea on my own part as far as I have done, without asking myself carefully and early enough what were the difficulties in the way of its being realised. I have suffered myself to overlook them too long, but having now at length reflected as fully and as calmly as I am able on every circumstance that ought to come under my consideration (at least as much for her sake as for my own) I am compelled to say that I find the obstacles to it decisive and insurmountable.[439]

Auckland had a right to feel the deepest pain at this official missive. The matter had been discussed in newspapers. Indeed, a caricaturist ventured to publish a sketch showing Pitt as Adam conducting Eve to the nuptial bower in the garden of Eden, while behind it squatted Satan as a toad, leering hatred through the features of Fox. It is to be hoped that Auckland did not know of this indelicate cartoon when he replied to Pitt. That letter has very properly been destroyed. But we have Pitt's second letter to Auckland, in which he again assures him how deeply he is affected by hearing of "the sentiments of another person, unhappily too nearly interested in the subject in question." He adds these moving words: "Believe me, I have not lightly or easily sacrificed my best hopes and earnest wishes to my conviction and judgment." Auckland's reply of 23rd January reveals the grief of his wife and daughter. For two or three days they remained in absolute solitude, and that, too, in a household remarkable for domestic affection. To Pitt also the decision was a matter of deep pain and life-long regret. Thenceforth he trod the path of duty alone. On 7th February the Archbishop of Canterbury wrote to Auckland (his brother-in-law) that Pitt lived in seclusion and seemed dreamy. At a recent Council meeting his face was swollen and unhealthy looking. Probably this was the time at which Pitt informed Addington that he must take the helm of State.[440]

We can only conjecture as to the insuperable obstacles to the union; but it seems highly probable that they were of a financial kind. In the Pitt MSS. (No. 196) there is a brief Memorandum in Pitt's writing, of the year 1797, which must refer to his yearly expenses, either at Downing Street or at Holwood. It gives the liquor account of the steward's room as "L300 and upwards," and states that the other expenses of that room might be reduced from L600 to L300, those of his own wardrobe from L600 to L400, and those of the stable from L400 to L300. These figures do not tally with those of the Downing Street or Holwood accounts for the latter half of 1797, which will be stated later; and the loose way in which Pitt estimates his expenses is highly suggestive. We now know that he was heading straight for bankruptcy throughout this period; and probably on looking into his affairs he discovered the fact. It is also certain that he lent money to his mother. She seems to have lost on farming experiments at Burton Pynsent; for she charged her sons to defray her just debts incurred in this manner, and the Bishop of Lincoln in July 1801 stated that she owed to Pitt the sum of L5,800 on which she ought to pay interest but did not. Chatham also borrowed L1,000 from Pitt in August 1791, and the fact that he paid not a penny to help to discharge the debts of his brother in the year 1801 seems to show that he himself was still in low water.[441]

Piecing together these fragments of evidence, we may infer that Pitt's near relations were a source of considerable expense, and that his own heedlessness had by this time further served to embarrass him. Therefore, his conduct towards Miss Eden, which at first sight seems heartless, was probably dictated by sheer financial need. We may also reject the spiteful statement in which Lady Hester Stanhope represented Pitt as saying: "Oh, there was her mother [Lady Auckland],—such a chatterer! and then the family intrigues! I can't keep them out of my house; and for my King's and my country's sake I must remain a single man." This is mere romancing. Pitt went to the Aucklands' house, not they to his. As for the remark about Auckland's intrigues, it clearly refers to the painful days after 1801, when Pitt broke with the household at Beckenham.

There was only one method whereby Pitt could have assured his marriage with Eleanor Eden, namely, by condescending to political jobbery. It was beyond the power of Auckland, a comparatively poor man, burdened with a large family, to grant a dowry with her unless Pitt awarded to him a lucrative post and sinecures. Of course any such step was wholly out of the question for either of them. In fact, Pitt opposed Auckland's promotion, opened up by the death of Lord Mansfield, President of the Council, though the public voice acclaimed Auckland as the successor.[442] Equally noteworthy is the fact that, early in the year 1798, Pitt appointed Auckland Postmaster-General, with an annual stipend of L2,500, but required him to give up his pension of L2,000 for diplomatic services.[443] It is pleasing to record that their friendship was not overclouded, except for a brief period.