People's thoughts were so engaged on the Prince's affair, that the debate this year on the continuance of a standing army of near 18,000 men was not much laboured or attended to: the question came into the House of Commons but two days before that on the 100,000l.; and everybody was so warm on the one that they had no fire to spare for the other,* and in the House of Lords there was scarce one word said upon it. The riots and tumults that had happened this last year in so many parts of the kingdom, and the absolute necessity everybody allowed there had been of calling in the King's forces on these occasions, without which the laws could not have been executed or the peace of the kingdom preserved, made the Court party stand upon better ground than usual in arguing for their continuance; since they had it to say that it must certainly encourage these seditious spirits, if, before there appeared a greater disposition in them to subside than anybody could yet say there was, any reduction should be made of that force which had been the chief, if not the only, power capable of checking these licentious proceedings, and preventing the nation from falling into anarchy and confusion, and a general dissolution of all government.

Lord Hervey told Sir Robert Walpole he perceived both the King and Queen were less satisfied with his conduct in the Prince's affair, than they were apt to be with his be haviour on other points. Sir Robert said he perceived it too: but thought their suspicions of his having had any management or tenderness towards their son were most unjust and unreasonable. "For sure, my Lord," continued he (these were his words), "if ever any man in any cause fought dagger out of sheath, I did so in the House of Commons the day his Royal Highness's affair was debated there." Lord Hervey said, "the Duke of Newcastle had certainly talked in his usual palliating style, and hinted to the Queen that the best way of putting an end to this matter was to allow the Prince something more; and as his Grace is thought to speak your sentiments, Sir, I believe the Queen imagines you have set him to feel her pulse and prepare your way." Sir Robert said, "My Lord, I cannot mend the Duke of Newcastle's understanding; and if he will not believe what I have told him, that that nail will not drive, I cannot help it. * There was a very warm debate on the Army vote, and a division of 246 to 178.

But I am determined to have a full explanation with the Queen this very night on all these entangled affairs, and not to let things go on longer in this disagreeable way. And for the Duke of Newcastle, I know him as well as you do, and see very plainly his manner of working; he is linking himself with the Chancellor, and thinks to stand by that help on his own legs without me." Lord Hervey said his Grace's conduct was not hard to fathom; and that besides cultivating the Chancellor, his courting the Bishop of Salisbury in the manner he did, showed plainly he proposed to keep an interest at Court by the means of the greatest enemy Sir Robert had there; and that the remarkably good correspondence he kept up with Lord Carteret as plainly demonstrated that, as his Grace thought Lord Carteret's a better life than Sir Robert's, he determined not to be desperate with the reversionary Minister any more than with the reigning one; and that the obligations he had to the one could not prevent his turning his eyes towards the other.

Sir Robert Walpole this night told the Queen that, though she knew he was not apt to be suspicious, yet she could not imagine him so insensible as not to perceive some little relaxation in that flood of favour in which she used to receive him; "Nor could I, Madam," said he, " though I were ever so blind in this room, not to feel by what passes on the King's side of the house that my good-will towards your Majesty's service has not the same degree of good fortune it used to meet with. I know when the King speaks his own thoughts, and when he speaks yours; and have not had the honour of serving him and you so long without being able to distinguish between the warm sallies of his own temper when he contradicts me and recedes, and the cooler reasoning objections communicated to him by your Majesty: which 1 feel the force of, and know by the source from whence they arise that, though they flow with less vehemence, I shall find it much harder to turn their course." The Queen said she had certainly felt very uneasy ever since this affair of her son had been started; and owned that she thought thirty a very small majority, especially since the King had paid so dearly for it, as making the concession he did in the message he had sent the day before this affair came into the House. Sir Robert Walpole desired she would remember that all the King had paid was in words, for the Prince had the 50,000%.

a-year before,and to the voters her Majesty knew it had cost the King but 9007." And where, Madam, there can be nothing but good words and promises on the one side, and that they are so profusely lavished-whilst on the other there is nothing given by the King, who has it in his power to give things so much better than words and promises-can you wonder that many fly to your son on this occasion to see what they can get there, though it be only words and promises? Everybody comes to a court to get, and if they find there is nothing to be got in present, it is natural to look out for reversions. Whilst, therefore, the King loses his interest in people by not bestowing what it is in his power to give, your son makes interest by promising what yet is not in his power; and let him be ever so lavish and profuse in these promises, he runs no risk at present, because he can never forfeit his credit for non-performance till the day of payment is come." The Queen said nobody thought that these promises were worth much. Sir Robert replied, that was very true; but everybody who could get no ready money had rather have a bad promissory-note than nothing. "However, Madam, I own you must get the better of your son: things are come to that pass that the King must conquer him or be conquered; but consider how that is to be done. I know my Lord Carteret has offered to sell your son to you, and I know the hands through which he has tried to make the bargain with you." The Queen owned to him that Lord Carteret had endeavoured to excuse taking the Prince's part, by sending her word that he was driven to it. "He says," continued the Queen, "that he found you were too well established in my favour for him to hope to supplant you; and, upon finding he could not be first, that he had mortified his pride so far as to take the resolution of submitting to be second; but if you would not permit him even to serve under you, who in this house could blame him if he continued to fight against you?" Sir Robert said it was impossible the King's business could go on long with him and Lord Carteret both in the King's service; that he knew Lord Carteret thoroughly; and that knowing this was an impracticable scheme, and that a reconciliation of this kind would be nothing more than a short introduction to a new rupture, he must beg leave to tell her Majesty (as impertinent as it might sound), that she must take her choice between them; for that he never could serve with Lord Carteret, but

was very ready if she thought it for her interest and her service to quit. "I know, Madam," continued Sir Robert, "how indecent it is generally for a minister and servant of the Crown to talk in this style, and to say there is anybody with whom he will not serve. I therefore ask your pardon; but I thought I should be still more in the wrong if I suffered your Majesty to make any agreement with Carteret, and afterwards quitted your service on that event without having previously told you I would do so. What I have said, therefore, Madam, was in order to take the method I thought most just to your Majesty, and by which I should incur the least reproach; and I give your Majesty my word I will never speak of quitting again till I do it. I know, Madam, too," continued he, "that Bishop Sherlock and Carteret have offered your Majesty to bring in the Tories, and fight this battle for you against your son; but consider before you embark how this matter will stand. In the first place they cannot answer for the party; in the next place, if they could, in what manner is this to be done? Are you to turn out all those who voted for you when you carried it by thirty, to take in those who voted against you in order to carry it by a greater majority? How are they to save appearances in their own conduct but by advising you to give 20,000l. a-year more to your son, and will that quiet him? No; you will then have done what you have now avoided, and will have your son just as ready to fight for the rest as he is now, and more able. Besides, Madam, the very changing your measures is acknowledging a defeat; if your son forces you to do anything you would not have done without his stirring in this affair, he has conquered-I say he has conquered-for forcing you to change your administration is conquest. You know he said so himself when Mr. Hedges spoke to him on this affair, and tried to divert him from pursuing it in Parliament by telling him it was impossible he could ever get the money; your Majesty knows his answer was— -At least I shall show I can do more by opposing than the Opposition have been able to do in sixteen years without me: 1 shall turn out Walpole, and by showing I have weight enough to make my father change his administration, shall make a much better figure than I can do by keeping quiet.' Consider, too, Madam, what you would do by taking a Tory administration: you would bring people into your service who never can be in

your interest; and the Whig party, which is the natural support of your family, and in my opinion can only support it, you would unite in the interest of your son against you. What is the case of the Whig party?-not that the Tories are too strong for them, for the Whigs are divided, and yet though divided support you? Do not flatter yourself then, Madam, that a party that is strong enough in this country to support you though divided will not be strong enough to distress you if you unite them against you. I know the distrust that always attends their way of arguing who argue for themselves, but I think what I have said is so manifestly true, that it must remove that distrust with which I own it is natural your Majesty on this occasion should hear me. Weigh it, Madam, and make your own determination upon it; at the same time I promise you, let me but do as I will, and you shall conquer this son; and give me leave to say one thing more as impertinent as it is to be talking of oneself -that I think it would be a hard fate for a Minister who has served you as I have done, if not with ability at least with such success in all public affairs either foreign or domestic, to be ruined at last by a family quarrel; by your enemies, not by your friends; and by an event I foresaw, by one you know I foretold, and by one I advised you to prevent." Sir Robert Walpole, who came immediately down from the Queen to Lord Hervey's lodgings after this conversation, gave him this account of it, and told Lord Hervey at the same time that he thought what he had said had made all the impression upon her he could desire; for that the Queen had dismissed him with the strongest assurances it was possible to make, of satisfaction in his conduct, and promises to protect and support him.

CHAPTER XXXI.

WHEN the day came that had been appointed by the House of Lords to enter into the examination of the Scotch affair, Lord Carteret, before the provost and bailies of Edinburgh were called to the Bar, proposed a string of questions to the House that he said he thought it was proper these magis