ONE:The great question of the Prince of Wales's debts was brought on by Alderman Newnham, who had been selected by the prince's set for that purpose, to give it more an air of independence. Newnham, on the 20th of April, asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his Majesty's Ministers proposed to make any arrangement for this purpose. He praised the prince for his generous conduct in breaking up his establishment to facilitate the payment of his debts; but declared it disgraceful to the nation that he should remain in that condition. Not[338] receiving any satisfactory answer, the alderman gave notice of a motion on the subject for the 4th of May. Pitt then endeavoured to deter the alderman from bringing in the motion, by saying that it was not his duty to do so except by command of the king. Newnham, however, persisted in his motion, and in the course of the debate Mr. Rolle, the member for Devonshire, pointedly alluded to the rumours that were afloat as to the marriage of the prince with Mrs. Fitzherbert, a Roman Catholic lady. As a matter of fact, these rumours were true: the prince had been secretly united to her by a Protestant clergyman on December 21st, 1785, in the presence of several witnesses. The marriage placed the prince in this dilemma: by the Act of Settlement, marriage with a Roman Catholic invalidated all claims to the throne; but by the Royal Marriage Act, any marriage contracted without the royal consent was null. He could therefore annul the action of the first Act by pleading the second, but by so doing he would obviously take away the character of his wife. The prince saw a better way out of the difficultynamely, a denial that the marriage had taken place at all. Fox, completely duped by the mendacious assurances of his royal friend, was induced to get up and contradict the rumour, "by direct authority." The revulsion of feeling in the House was immediate. On the 23rd of May Pitt laid before the members a schedule of the prince's debts, amounting to one hundred and ninety-four thousand pounds. Of this sum a hundred and sixty-one thousand were voted, together with twenty thousand for the completion of Carlton House, and the king was induced to add ten thousand a year from the Civil List to the prince's income. He was thus placed for the time being in affluence, and only had to reckon with Mrs. Fitzherbert. This he did by disavowing Fox, whom he declared to have spoken without authority. But the lady appears to have urged some public explanation. The prince naturally avoided Fox, but sent for Grey, who, however, declined to have anything to do with the dirty business. "Then," said the prince, "Sheridan must say something." Accordingly, a few days later, Sheridan got up and paid a few vapid compliments to Mrs. Fitzherbert, which assuaged her wrath, without exposing the royal liar.
FORE:To approach Ferdinand's forces, the French were obliged to pass a narrow ground between a river and a marsh, and were so cramped that they committed the very error which cost them the battle of Blenheim. They placed the cavalry in the centre, and made wings of their infantry. The cavalry made a succession of furious charges on Ferdinand's centre, but this stood compact and immovable, till the French horse, being discouraged, the Allies charged in their turn, and the centre of the army, the cavalry, being thus driven back, the whole line gave way. At this moment Ferdinand sent orders to Lord George Sackville to charge with the cavalry, which had been kept in reserve, and thus complete the destruction of the flying French. But Lord George, who had been constantly quarrelling with Ferdinand, as well as his own second in command, the Marquis of Granby, now did not appear to comprehend a succession of orders, and sat still. But Ferdinand, having lost patience, sent word to the Marquis of Granby to advance, and he promptly obeyed, but it was now too late; the French had got half an hour's start. Thus the English cavalry was deprived of all share in the victory; but the English foot had borne the chief brunt of the attack, being in the centre. Six British regiments, in fact, for a time maintained the whole shock of the French. Sackville was tried by court martial, and dismissed from all his military appointments. The battle of Minden was fought on the 1st of August, 1759.
FORE:His first measure was to establish the Great Northern Alliance. He had obtained information of designs on the part of France and Spain to make a descent on our southern coast, and burn the dockyards of Portsmouth and Plymouth. Before quitting office, in 1761, he had planned this alliance, and he now made endeavours, but in vain, to induce Frederick of Prussia to come into such an alliance. Frederick was too sore at his treatment by the Cabinet of Lord Bute to listen to any proposals from England. Still, this would not have prevented Chatham from prosecuting the object of the alliance with Sweden, Denmark, Russia, Germany, and Holland, had he remained long enough in[191] office. His name carried the utmost weight all over the Continent. His indomitable vigour, and his victorious arms, had been witnessed with wonder. In Paris, Horace Walpole found the news of his return to office produced a panic not to be described. The very mention of his name struck a silence into the most boastful or insolent company.[See larger version]
FORE:These were his first decrees:I. The British Isles were declared in a state of blockade. II. All commerce and correspondence with Britain was forbidden. All British letters were to be seized in the post-houses. III. Every Englishman, of whatever rank or quality, found in France, or the countries allied with her, was declared a prisoner of war. IV. All merchandise or property of any kind belonging to British subjects was declared lawful prize. V. All articles of British manufacture, and articles produced in her colonies, were, in like manner, declared contraband and lawful prize. VI. Half of the produce of the above confiscations was to be employed in the relief of those merchants whose vessels had been captured by British cruisers. VII. All vessels coming from Britain or British colonies were to be refused admission into any harbour in or connected with France. These decrees were to be binding wherever French power extended, but they had no effect in checking the commerce of Britain; the distress to Continental merchants, however, and the exasperation of the people deprived of British manufactures, grew immediately acute. Bourrienne says that the fiscal tyranny thus created became intolerable. At the same time, the desire of revenue induced Buonaparte to allow his decrees to be infringed by the payment of exorbitant licences for the import of British goods. French goods, also, were lauded with incredible impudence, though they were bought only to be thrown into the sea. Hamburg, Bordeaux, Nantes, and other Continental ports solicited, by petitions and deputations, some relaxation of the system, to prevent universal ruin. They declared that general bankruptcy must ensue if it were continued. "Be it so," replied Buonaparte, arrogantly; "the more insolvency on the Continent, the more ruin in England." As they could not bend Buonaparte, merchants, douaniers, magistrates, prefects, generals, all combined in one system of fraudulent papers, bills of lading or certificates, by which British goods were admitted and circulated under other names for sufficient bribes. The only mischief which his embargo did was to the nations of the Continent, especially Holland, Belgium, Germany, and to himself; for his rigour in this respect was one of the things which drove the whole of Europe to abominate his tyranny, and rejoice in his eventual fall.
FORE:[See larger version]Prussia having been introduced into the debate, on the 1st of March it was renewed by Mr. Martin, followed by Francis, Fox, and others, who argued that the secret was thus out; we were fighting again on account of the old mischiefGerman alliances. Pitt defended the policy of Ministers. He asked whether Russia was to be permitted to drive the Turks from Europe and plant herself in Constantinople, with Greece as part of her empire? In that case, Russia would become the first maritime power in the world, for her situation in the heart of the Mediterranean, and with Greeks for her sailorsthe best sailors in that seawould give her unrivalled advantages, and make her the most destructive opponent of British interests that had ever arisen. Pitt drew a dark character of the Czarinathe Messalina of the North; reminded the House of her endeavours to strike a mortal blow at us during the American war; of her arrogance and insolence on many occasions, and said that he did not envy Fox the honour of having his bust ordered by this notorious woman from Nollekens, the sculptor. Fox well deserved this hard blow, for he had shown a strange blindness to the grasping designs of Russia, and confessed that, whilst in office, he had refused to concur in remonstrances to Russia against the seizure of the Crimea. The motion of Whitbread was rejected by a majority of two hundred and forty-four against one hundred and sixteen.
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