better, not well. You are the first man that ever went into the country on a cold day, because he had taken medicines."[1]
Shelburne in this speech, his second Parliamentary effort, insisted on the necessity of supporting public credit, now grievously injured; the sums which ought to have been spent in paying off debt having been consumed in military expenditure, while at the same time the fleet, on which the security of the country mainly depended, had been comparatively neglected.[2] The resolution carried to a division, as against the previous question, was negatived by 105 to 16, and eight of the minority, Shelburne amongst them, signed a protest against the decision of the House. This speech and protest threw Bute into a state of despondency and alarm. "Lord Bute," writes Fox, "says that Friday s'nnight gave delight and strength to his enemies at Court. I do not see why it should, but it is the real opinion of many very impartial people."[3] "Lord Shelburne," writes Jenkinson, striking the first note in a long history of discord, "is a mad politician."[4]
"Lord Bute," writes Shelburne in his own defence, "very unnecessarily, as well as very imprudently, was induced to defend a measure in which he was in no way concerned, and which he was well known to disapprove. He had the conscience, notwithstanding what I had declared the first day, to ask me first to vote with government, and then to stay away, and to affect being very much hurt with my conduct afterwards. The minority did not consist of more than sixteen,[5] who were all, however, distinguished the next day at Court by marks of the King's personal displeasure; a measure of a piece with all the rest, and which made the King's resentment as cheap as his favours had lately been made."[6]
- ↑ Fox to Shelburne, February 4th, 1762.
- ↑ Parliamentary History, xv. 1217.
- ↑ Fox to Shelburne, February 13th, 1761.
- ↑ Jenkinson to Bute, February 14th, 1761.
- ↑ See Parliamentary History, xv. 1218. Walpole, Memoirs, i. 136, says that the Duke of Bedford softened his motion from a proposal of recalling the troops from Germany into a resolution of the ruinous impracticability of carrying on the war. Had the Duke of Bedford done this, it would not have made his motion less but more hostile to Ministers.
- ↑ Memorandum on events of 1762.
