Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third Volume I Part 8

One way or other, this business does most certainly draw to a conclusion. I allow, by this proposal, one week more for them to take their resolution. If they delay it beyond that, it is in effect the most mortifying and the most insulting way of refusing it that they could have adopted; and as such I think you would do right to state it in your letter. But whichever way it terminates, I think we shall derive the greatest advantage from Townshend's having authorized me to promise that on the 21st something should be done in the English House of Commons, and having sat by and acquiesced in my saying that _that_ something would, I _apprehended_, be brought forward by Government. If it is not, I think I need not say what a situation they stand in; and what ours will be--how much better than if nothing had been said. On the other hand, if they do authorize me to bring forward, or bring forward themselves, on that day, a satisfactory Bill, we shall derive much more advantage to Government from having given an early notice of it, and much more personal credit from its coming through my mouth from you, than if it had been done only by the Minister, and kept back till the 21st.

I have had no communication with Lord Shelburne, nor have I either seen or heard from him since I spoke in the House of Commons. I mean, however, to-morrow to write to him on the strength of having received fresh despatches from you, and to press him in the strongest manner, that _the Bill to be_ proposed on the 21st, may be such as will satisfy your wishes by satisfying the people of Ireland. What the new reason for delay will be, G.o.d knows. In the meantime is it not inconceivable that a man will hazard so much, in every sense of the word, so much credit as a Minister, so much in point of character, and so much in point of weight and support to his administration, without its being possible for one to discover any one object under Heaven which he is to gain by the delay? Possibly such a letter as I wish from you may succeed in bringing him to his senses; if not, I am sure the sooner your hands are washed of it the better; for if the rest of your administration in Ireland is to go on in the same manner, and you are to be left for months together without knowing whether Government here will expressly support or expressly contradict you, and all this only that they may gain time, without having anything further to gain, such a situation is neither suited for such tempers as we have, nor for such characters as I hope we shall ever preserve together.

The real grievance seems to be, what did hang as a dead weight upon the last administration till it pulled it down, and what must hang as the same dead weight upon this--I mean a Cabinet of eleven. If these are disunited, there are not wanting, even among themselves, men to publish it to the world; and how is it possible that they should be otherwise, except by the means of that delightful expedient which I stated to you once before, and which was again alluded to in yesterday's conversation. I should hope, however, that the appearance of your resolution will put an end to this scene of procrastination, disgraceful to you and dangerous to the country; if it does not, I am sure the resolution itself is most absolutely necessary to vindicate us to ourselves, as well as to others, from the consequences which we both foresee.

In the meantime, my dear brother, I cannot close this letter without expressing to you the extreme pleasure and satisfaction which I feel when, after having confided so much to my discretion, you express yourself satisfied that, however unsuccessful I may have been, the failure of my endeavours to procure this long-expected answer has not been owing to any want of zeal or judgment in me, but to those to whom the consequences are really to be imputed, and who have on that account already made themselves most deeply responsible both to G.o.d and their country.

Believe me, my dear brother, Ever most sincerely and affectionately yours, W. W. G.

D'Ivernois is here, and going over almost immediately to Ireland with two other _commissaires_.

If any decision should drop from the skies before I receive your letter to Townshend, I will suppress it entirely.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO LORD TEMPLE.

Pall Mall, Dec. 25th, 1782.

My dear Brother,

All the effect which I hoped for by the official despatch has been produced by the confidential communication. Townshend has had this morning a long conversation with Lord Shelburne, the result of which is a compliance with your wishes. But this will be done by an official despatch, and not by a Cabinet minute, as they cannot venture to meet a Cabinet upon it. Still, however, I think that is sufficient for you--sufficient to authorize you in present, and to justify you in future. I write this in great haste, in order if possible to prevent the measure which I recommended in my last.

Thurlow will probably oppose it in that House. They talk of altering the bill, _but not materially_. I put the question explicitly, whether it was to contain a recognition, and was answered that it should. Townshend asked me whether you would be likely to pledge yourself that this should satisfy, as he thought that might possibly be expected. I said it could not be expected that you should _pledge_ yourself for madmen, but that you certainly _hoped_. He then said that it would take a day or two to prepare and send in circulation the despatch, and hoped this would make no material difference. I said certainly not, if I was allowed to state this conversation to you. To this he agreed. Then I mentioned the dissolution. He said that you seemed to agree that this would take effect much better with the news of a peace, and that (he might tell me confidentially) this must be decided within three days, unless something very unforeseen happens.

On this idea I wait here a few days longer, and then shall bring your despatches with me, and go back if you think it right.

I think the event shows how much more strongly your determination operated, as I said it would, than all the reasoning possible.

Believe me ever, My dear brother, Most sincerely and affectionately yours, W. W. G.

The "Order" referred to in the following letter is the Order of the Knights of St. Patrick, inst.i.tuted in Ireland, under the Viceroyalty of Lord Temple, on the 5th of February, 1783.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO LORD TEMPLE.

Pall Mall, Dec. 28th, 1782.

My dear Brother,

As, in consequence of your letter of the 25th, I mean to stay over the 21st of January, I write immediately to explain to you what I referred to in my last about the Order. It is not of any very great importance; but as I then expected to have seen you in a few days, I thought I should be able to explain it better by word of mouth.

It relates to the difficulty of reconciling the business of the Commoners who have been talked of for it, with the King's strong approbation of your only having proposed sixteen, and his very great disinclination, which Townshend has repeatedly expressed to me, to increase the number even to eighteen or twenty. I suppose you mean sixteen _exclusive_ of the Sovereign and Grand Master. I apprehend Conolly, Ponsonby, O'Neill, and Daly to have been talked of. The difficulty is greater, because I understand that the two first have more than once refused peerages. This, however, you will arrange as you think best. The King was pleased with the motto, _Quis separabit?_ To this would apply very well the Collar which Hawkins told me had been thought of, of trefoils and roses alternate. Townshend will write, or has wrote, to you for a plan, which plan is meant to include Badges, and all other playthings belonging to it. You'll break Percy's heart if you settle it all without him. Pray oblige me, as a herald, so far as to appoint a genealogist, and to make the Knights deliver in pedigrees three descents back at least: that is the number in the Garter Statutes, which I send to you. The Thistle and Bath have both genealogists--the last must be an arduous office. I do not apprehend that the names are meant to be sent as part of the plan, nor indeed can you do that yet. Do you offer one to the _Nolo Privy Councillari_, or do you draw the line of none but Privy Councillors?

I called the other day on the Archbishop of Cashel, and was told that he was gone for Ireland; but I'll know in a day or two.

Adieu.

Ever yours, W. W. G.

The King seems to expect to get two Red Ribands by it--Lord A.

and Lord B. Query the latter.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO LORD TEMPLE.

Pall Mall, Dec. 30th, 1782.

My dear Brother,

I have been with Townshend this morning, and have had a long conversation with him. He showed me his despatch to you, and that brought on the conversation, which I managed so that I might at any time have produced your last letter; but upon the whole I thought it better not shown, although the words of his despatch are certainly by no means satisfactory. He spoke very openly to me, and said that as his despatch had been written without the concurrence of Cabinet, he thought he could hazard no more. In this I could not but agree with him, especially as it gave me occasion to press upon him, for his sake as well as yours, the necessity of something being finally settled.

He then went at large into the difficulties. He was convinced, he said, that it would come in the end to your proposition. But in the meantime Thurlow was against it, and meant to oppose the Bill; and Shelburne wanted to be forced to it, and said that he was sure a stand would be to be made somewhere; and why not now?

I answered that it did not seem to me the most prudent step to choose a post where no man of any description would stand by you. We had much more conversation of the same sort. There were those, Townshend said, who had said that as the preliminaries were expected soon, it would come with better grace then. But, continued he, if we wait till then, I am afraid it may not come at all. To this I answered, that this was exactly my idea, but in the meantime, was it not fit you should know on what ground you stood? He said so; and (he went on) see where we should be in that case. The Lord-Lieutenant would not stay an hour. Here he stopped, as waiting my answer. I immediately said, most certainly not. And then the person who succeeds him will be to wait on you. You know better than I do the situation of things and men. Tell me to whom I am to apply. To the Duke of Portland's people?--to the old Court and Lord Shannon?--to Hood and his set? I went on a good deal more in the same strain, and ended with saying that he could not be astonished, or even at all surprised, that every day should increase your impatience.

This was to prepare him for your peremptory despatch, which, if my subsequent letters have not stopped, I shall now most certainly deliver. He told me that on Wednesday he should see most of his colleagues, and he should then hope to have some answer to give me.

I threw out one idea to him, which I said proceeded entirely from myself: and therefore, if he mentioned it at all, it should be as a thing to be proposed to you, and not as one coming from you. It was that, as it would probably be thought right that the matter should be discussed in a Committee of the whole House as a foundation for bringing in the Bill, such terms might be used in the resolutions of that Committee as should obviate the difficulty which was made upon the idea of the preamble's referring to past rights. I then mentioned in general words my idea for those resolutions, but did not give them to him in writing. I have since reduced them to writing, and enclose them to you for your ideas upon them. I mean to-morrow to read them to Townshend, in order to explain my idea fully, but not to leave them with him. The first resolution is copied almost verbatim from the addresses. If you turn to them, you will see what I have omitted, and that I have inserted nothing but what I thought absolutely necessary, in order not to clog the resolution, and render it thereby less perspicuous.

Pray let me have your ideas on this as soon as possible. I still think your preamble will at last be consented to: but a pressing despatch, to be used or not, as occasion requires, can do no harm.

Believe me, My dearest brother, Most affectionately and sincerely yours, W. W. G.

1783.

The Renunciation Bill--The Fall of the Shelburne Administration--The Cabinet Interregnum--The Coalition Ministry--Resignation of Lord Temple.

The impediments and delays Mr. Grenville had to encounter in his negotiations with Ministers, are sufficiently detailed in the preceding correspondence. They appear to have originated chiefly with Lord Shelburne, who, in the line of conduct he pursued on this occasion, betrayed either a singular indifference to the state of Ireland, or an inexcusable ignorance of it. For the latter, indeed, he had no reasonable excuse, since the suspense of the public mind, and the growing discontents of the people, were constantly pressed upon his attention by Lord Temple and Mr. Grenville. There certainly was no shadow of pretence for not thoroughly understanding the whole merits of the question at issue between the two kingdoms, and still less for not setting it at rest at once, as the Ministry did at last, and must have intended to do in some shape all throughout. Yet it was not until the beginning of January, 1783, after nearly six weeks of incessant representations and hara.s.sing interviews with Lord Shelburne, Pitt and Townshend, that the mission of the Irish Secretary a.s.sumed a definite shape, and that something like a distinct hope was held out of its being brought, at last, to a satisfactory conclusion.

Lord Shelburne appears to have been desirous of postponing the Irish difficulty until after he should have succeeded in securing the peace, for which he was then treating with France. He thought that a measure, however just and indispensable in itself, emanating from a strong Government, would be received as a graceful concession, while the same measure, granted by a Government which had been described early in the preceding December by Lord Mornington (afterwards Marquis of Wellesley) as subsisting solely on the divisions of its enemies, might seem to be wrung from the embarra.s.sments of the Administration. This shuffling policy, and want of magnanimity in the Minister--this coquetting with extremities, in the forlorn hope of extracting from them some advantage for a sinking Government, pervaded the councils of the Cabinet, and led finally to its downfall.

In the meanwhile, agitation was rising into open manifestations of distrust and resentment in Ireland. The Volunteers, whose nationality had been appeased by the recent Repeal of the Declaratory Law, renewed their demands for a specific measure, by which the legislative and judicial independence of the country, guaranteed by that Repeal, should be unconditionally recognized, and placed beyond doubt or cavil. Their suspicions were excited by the hesitation of the Imperial Government, and their indignation was roused by the fact that, in contravention of the settlement by Act of Parliament of the rights of Ireland, an Irish case had been heard in an English court of law, and decided by Lord Mansfield. The circ.u.mstances were irritating, and peculiarly calculated to shake the confidence of so sensitive a race in the sincerity of their rulers. Nor were there wanting persons who were ready to avail themselves, for factious purposes, of every fresh symptom of national disquietude to inflame the pa.s.sions of the people. At the head of these disturbing patriots were Lord Beauchamp and Mr. Flood; fortunately, on the other side, was Mr. Grattan, whose pure patriotism, confiding in the honour and justice of the Imperial Legislature, resisted all violent demands, until a fair opportunity had been afforded to England to vindicate the integrity of a settlement, the principle of which was clear, and admitted on all hands. His language on this point, in reply to an Address from the Volunteers, was explicit: "I know of no circ.u.mstance, except one, which has really happened to alarm you: the entertaining and deciding by the Court of King's Bench, in England, an Irish cause, is, no doubt, a very great infringement. You do not imagine that I mean to rest under it; but I shall never suppose such a measure to be the act of England, unless her Parliament shall hesitate to do it away in a manner the most clear, comprehensive and satisfactory." Mr.

Grattan's firmness stayed the impetuous course of the Volunteers; but it was at the cost of his immediate popularity, and, as it afterwards proved, at the imminent risk of his personal safety.

It was while these events were taking place in Ireland, that Lord Temple and Mr. Grenville were urging upon the Administration the imperative necessity of bringing forward a measure that should satisfy the apprehensions of the Irish people. With that view a Bill, known by the t.i.tle of the Bill of Renunciation, was prepared by Lord Temple and forwarded to Mr. Grenville. Upon the structure, and not upon the substance, of this Bill, innumerable quibbles were raised. The difficulty with Lord Shelburne was, not the renunciation itself, for that was nothing more than a confirmation of the repeal, but the technical form in which it was to be expressed. n.o.body dreamt of disturbing or evading the principle of the measure which this Bill simply declared anew and fortified by a more distinct enunciation; but Ministers could not agree upon the words--for into a discussion about words the whole negotiation finally degenerated. And thus, the fear of compromising the dignity of England by some unguarded expression, or of failing from over caution to satisfy the demands of Ireland, had the effect of protracting the pa.s.sage of a measure, upon the substantive justice and urgent necessity of which all parties were unanimous.

At length Mr. Grenville was enabled to announce to his brother that these petty discussions were brought to a satisfactory close. But the issue, as will be subsequently seen, was not quite so near as he supposed. The Administration had wasted so much time in verbal criticisms, that, although they had the merit of ultimately introducing the Bill into Parliament, they were obliged to bequeath the satisfaction of earning it to their successors.

MR. W. W. GRENVILLE TO LORD TEMPLE

Pall Mall, Jan. 2nd, 1783.

My dear Brother,

After the many changes and delays which have occurred in the course of this business, I think I may at last congratulate you, and what is infinitely more, the two kingdoms, on its being brought to such an issue as you desire.