of the unmanly envy it occasions in me; but I still flatter myself that nobody can at last more thoroughly withdraw into that narrow circle where all my happyness shall depend on myself and family. It costs at first to philosophize, but the philosophy will not be less perfect and calm and uninterrupted when it is determin'd. It is not so yet, or I should not write thus much about it.
In March Lord Holdernesse resigned the seals, and Bute accepted them. The resignations of Pitt and Temple were expected. "Mr. Fox," writes Lord Fitzmaurice to the new Secretary of State, "is not at all surprised at the change in general that is proposed, nor does he think that His Majesty's affairs will be carried on the worse for it. He does not, no more than I do, wish your Lordship joy of it, but congratulates the public very much, and wishes you all the private and particular satisfaction and success the situation can admit of, and your Lordship's wishes suggest. Since Sir Robert Walpole's time there has been no Ministry in this kingdom; and he hopes this will be the beginning of a durable and an honourable one to both King and State."[1]
While the negotiation was still in embryo, Lord Shelburne died, and Lord Fitzmaurice, who had been returned as member for the family borough of Chipping Wycombe was in consequence removed to the House of Lords without having taken his seat in the House of Commons, which had been elected in the spring of 1761.[2] A month before the death of his father, he had applied for the Comptrollership of the Household; but the King, apparently taking exception to some expressions used in his request, refused to grant it. This refusal was the
- ↑ Fitzmaurice to Bute, March 1761.
- ↑ He was first returned on June 20th, 1760, while serving abroad; and again at the general election in May 1761. His father died in May 1761. He took his scat in the House of Lords on November 3rd, 1761. His father had been created a Peer of Great Britain on the 17th May 1760, and thereupon vacated the seat of High Wycombe, for which, being an Irish peer, but not a representative peer, he had been able to sit. Lord Shelburne took his seat in the Irish House of Lords, April 25th, 1764.
