through the last session. The bribery, corruption, and intimidation were of the most open and shameless kind; but the whigs, having the monied interest in their favour, carried the day. During the elections Sunderland did his best to spur on the king to a decided and determined contest against the tories. He declared that nothing was more dangerous than to let either party think the king was wavering; that it was injurious to his own peace and the prosperity of his policy to give the tories any countenance, even in his closet; that nothing ought he to convince himself of so much as that it was utterly hopeless to expect to win a tory heartily to his cause. Let him consider, he said, writing to Somers, whether he had ever succeeded in doing so in thirteen years. He reminded Somers of the course taken daring the elections in 1696; that many depended on the king, and that he ought to speak to them, and tell them how to vote, and that he would admit of no excuse. The tories, he told him, were better speakers in the house of commons than the whigs, and that, therefore, the whigs should endeavour to secure such advantages as would counterbalance that, and that the choice of the speaker was one of the most important of these measures; that he should put promising and capable men into employment, and by all means pass the act of grace; for, if he did not, the quarrels would go on as furiously as ever, and though the whigs might have a majority at starting, the tories would recover it in a fortnight; that an act of abjuration of the prince of Wales ought to be passed, and ought to proceed from the commons.
Sunderland omitted nothing which might contribute to commencing the session with effect. "As soon," he said, "as the speaker's named, endeavours should be made to thank the king for his speech; and it would be well for the king to give order to two of the cabinet to prepare the speech, as the duke of Devonshire and secretary Vernon, and bid them consult in private lord Somers, rather than bring the cabinet a speech already made." He even pointed out the proper topics of the speech, and especially dwelt on the pernicious consequences of the division between the two houses, which, added to the late period of meeting, rendered the last session of parliament almost useless for the public good; that such differences should be strongly reprobated, a good dispatch of the business recommended, not neglecting the exhortation to the payment of the debts, as tending to maintain credit, together with suitable remarks on supporting and defending the protestant religion, both at home and abroad. He next pointed out the most proper persons for the new ministry, marking them by their initials; and he recommended that none of these should be admitted to the cabinet council, except such as had a sort of prescriptive right to be there from their office, as the archbishop of Canterbury, the lord keeper, the lord president, the privy seal, the lord steward, the lord chamberlain, the first commissioner of the treasury, the two secretaries of state, and, if in England, the lord lieutenant of Ireland. If the king wished for more, they should be the first commissioner of the admiralty and the master of the ordnance; but, if the king excluded those, no other person could take it ill if he were not admitted, and the king could send and consult them when anything in their department was under consideration. Last of all, he laid particular emphasis on a particular in which William had been culpably and impolitically negligent, and to which he owed much of his unpopularity. "It would be much for the king's service if he brought his affairs to be debated at that council." William had grossly neglected this in regard to the partition treaties, and he had felt the evil effects of it. There was not a circumstance or a topic that this consummate master of state business did not touch on; and though the new ministry was not altogether such as he recommended, in all the rest, even to the drawing up of the speech, his advice seems to have been scrupulously followed as the very essence of diplomatic wisdom; and some of his recommendations, as that regarding the cabinet and the prompt address of thanks on the king's speech, and the drawing up of the speech, not by the king, but by some well-qualified members of the cabinet, became, as it were, the stereotyped practice from this time. All this correspondence, however, was carried on in profound secresy, the king being denoted frequently not by name, but by "No. 12," and Sunderland by "No. 33," Sunderland to the last resisting all importunities to take the premiership. Probably he dreaded engaging openly in the rude fight which would take place, for he was truly called "the fox" for his subtlety, and this is pretty clearly indicated by his own words:—"When 12 has put his affairs into some order, 33 may, perhaps, be of some use; and as soon as that is, he will desire to be sent for as much as he now desires to be forgot."
The new ministry was immediately put in preparation. On the 24th of December Charles Howard, the earl of Carlisle, was appointed first lord of the treasury, in place of lord Godolphin. On the 4th of January Charles Montague, earl of Manchester, who had been ambassador at Paris, was made secretary of state in place of Sir Charles Hedges; on the 18th the earl of Pembroke was transferred from the presidency of the council, and made lord high admiral; and Charles Seymour, duke of Somerset, took the presidency. Henry Boyle, afterwards earl of Carleton, was appointed chancellor of the exchequer; the privy seal having been in commission since the death of the earl of Tankerville, remained so. The cabinet thus consisted of the personal friends of the king, and the whigs had strengthened their party, having carried the elections in most of the counties and chief boroughs; yet they found themselves so far from a commanding majority that they were immediately defeated in the election of the speaker. The king was desirous of seeing Sir Thomas Littleton in the chair, but the tories managed to elect Harley; Henry St. John, afterwards lord Bolingbroke, who was sent up from Wootton Basset, seconding the motion for Harley. The speech, which was drawn up by Somers according to Sunderland's advice, was then read by William.
In this speech, which was greatly admired, the king said that he trusted that they had met together with a full sense of the common danger of Europe, and of that resentment of the conduct of the French king which had been so strongly and universally expressed in the loyal addresses of the people; that in setting up the pretended prince of Wales as king of England they had offered to him and to the nation the highest indignity, and put in jeopardy the protestant religion and the peace and security of the realm, and he was sure they
