believe Townshend; and though he would flatter grossly, he would the next moment turn the same men into ridicule. Fox was too confident and overbearing; Burke had no address or insinuation. Men of less talents are more capable of succeeding by art, observation, and assiduity. The House dividing, Lord North was beaten by 62 to 61, a disgraceful event for a Prime Minister. Since he would oppose Fox's motion contrary to his declaration, he ought to have taken care to have his members about him; but he daily showed that he was only a subservient Minister. The Scotch cabal and the Tories could sway him as they pleased, and his negligence demonstrated that he followed their dictates, not his own objects. In fact he disliked his post, and retained it only from hopes of securing some considerable emolument for his family. He was indolent, good humoured, void of affectation of dignity, void of art, and his parts and the goodness of his character would have raised him much higher in the opinion of mankind if he had cared either for power or applause."*

At the end of 1772 a new disposition of offices was made expressly to open a place for Charles Fox, who was named one of the Commissioners of the Treasury.

But it was soon found that a subordinate situation in office was not suited to his talents, his activity, or, we must say, his daring temper. Within little more than a year of his acceptance of office, on a question of committing Woodfall the printer to the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms, Mr. Fox burst out against the Press and the City, and moved that Woodfall be committed to Newgate. Lord North promised his support, tried to retract, owned himself bound to vote with Fox if he persisted, and finally was dragged off *"Corr. of C. J. Fox," p. 83.

by his junior Lord of the Treasury in a minority of 68 to 152. The King noticed the transaction in the following

terms:

"I am greatly incensed at the presumption of Charles Fox in forcing you to vote with him last night; but approve. much of your making your friends vote in the majority. Indeed, that young man has so thoroughly cast off every principle of common honour and honesty, that he must become as contemptible as he is odious. I hope you will let him know that you are not insensible of his conduct towards you."*

On the 24th of February Charles Fox was dismissed from the Board of Treasury. It is said that on this occasion Lord North wrote him the following laconic note: "His Majesty has thought proper to order a new Commission of Treasury to be made out, in which I do not see your name. -NORTH."

Horace Walpole says, speaking of Lord North: "With his usual hurry after indolence, he turn'd out Charles Fox, as a threat to those who might incline to desert, but without effect."+

It is to be lamented that during this period of his life Mr. Fox entered deeply-almost madly-into the pursuit of gaming. Lord Egremont afterwards suspected that he was the dupe of foul play. Be that as it might, he borrowed to such an extent, that the purchase of the annuities he had granted cost his fond and indulgent father no less a sum than 140,0007.

Dr. Parr has truly said, in his somewhat pompous Latin :— "Erupisse in eo fatebor illum impetum ardoremque, qui, sive ad literas humaniores, sive ad prudentiam civilem, *"Corr." vol. i. p. 99. "Corr." vol. i. p. 101.

sive ad luxuriam amoresque inclinaret, id unum ageret, id toto pectore arriperet, id universum hauriret."*

Horace Walpole, in less stately phrase, tells us: "As the gaming and extravagance of young men of quality had arrived now at a pitch never heard of, it is worth while to give some account of it. They had a club at Almack's, in Pall Mall, where they played only for rouleaus of 50%. each, and generally there was 10,000l. in specie on the table. Lord Holland had paid above 20,000l. for his two sons. Nor were the manners of the gamesters, or even their dresses for play, undeserving notice. They began by pulling off their embroidered clothes, and put on frieze greatcoats, or turned their coats inside outwards for luck. They put on pieces of leather (such as are worn by footmen when they clean the knives) to save their laced ruffles; and to guard their eyes from the light and to prevent tumbling their hair, wore high-crowned straw hats with broad brims and adorned with flowers and ribbons; masks to conceal their emotions when they played at quinze. Each gamester had a small neat stand by him, to hold their tea, or a wooden bowl with an edge of ormolu to hold their rouleaus. They borrowed great sums of Jews at exorbitant premiums. Charles Fox called his outward room, where those Jews waited till he rose, his Jerusalem Chamber."

* Dr. Parr's Preface to "Bellendenus," &c.

CHAPTER IV.

ORIGIN OF THE AMERICAN WAR.

THE adoption of the plans of Columbus by Ferdinand and Isabella led to the acquisition of immense possessions by those Sovereigns. The valour of the Mexicans, the gentleness of the Peruvians, were unable to cope with the bold genius of Cortes, or to resist even for a time the merciless ferocity of Pizarro. From Florida to Lima a vast territory was swayed by the sceptre of Charles V., or obeyed his successors on the throne of Spain. The other powers of Europe appeared to rest satisfied with the leavings of the Spaniard. Portugal ruled over Brazil. In the middle of the seventeenth century, France possessed the mouths of the Mississippi and of the St. Lawrence, and stretching to the West from each point, embraced the valley of the Ohio, thus connecting the lakes of Canada with the great rivers which poured their waters into the Gulf of Mexico. England had sent her emigrants to Virginia in the south, to Boston and New Plymouth on the north, but between these settlements the Dutch and the Swedes held the intervening provinces. In this century the power of Great Britain in America was greatly increased by conquest and by treaty. Cromwell failing Hispaniola, conquered Jamaica; Charles II. obtained by arms and by the treaty of Breda the territory which, on being granted to his brother, was

called New York. A century afterwards, the peace of Paris secured and extended this new empire. France, by that treaty, so glorious to Great Britain, ceded Canada and a part of the shores of the Mississippi. Spain gave up Florida in return for Havannah.

Thus, instead of being hemmed in by a rival and hostile race, the Anglo-Saxon colonists found themselves in a vast country neither tempted to indolence by the abundance of gold and silver, nor enervated by the heat of a sultry and burning climate. Like the Athenians of old, their difficulties were their means.

The warriors and statesmen of France-Montcalm, Choiseul, and Vergennes-amid all their losses, derived consolation from the thought that British America, no longer fearing the neighbourhood of the French, and no longer needing the aid of the English, would aim at independence.

This calculation was so just, and the prospect so alarming to Great Britain, that it obviously behoved her rulers to endeavour by every means to confute the prophecy and avert the calamity. England and her American subjects had fought together in a glorious struggle; it would have been politic to encourage the feelings of common sympathy and national pride. The British Americans, nearly three millions in number, would naturally seek to enlarge their commerce and increase their wealth; it would have been wise to relax restriction and encourage exertion. The emigrants who had left Europe for America had been partly Puritans, of stout hearts and sturdy faith, who were resolved to break loose from the fetters of Laud; and partly English gentlemen, who preferred seeking adventures in the wilderness to a mere competency in the old country.