CHAP. VI. quests made by the British arms and not yet known, should be unconditionally surrendered. Such an improvident sacrifice was strongly opposed by Grenville and Lord Egremont, and when the capture of the Havannah became known, Spain readily yielded the extensive, but barren and useless province of Florida, as an equivalent for its restitution. There being no real difficulty in the way of peace, when the party who was in a position to dictate its terms, thus refused to take any advantage, the preliminaries were signed at Fontainebleau on the 3rd of November, 1762; approved by Parliament, although opposed by Pitt; and the treaty was finally concluded at Paris on the 10th of February, 1763. I. By this treaty, both France and England abandoned their allies, neither Austria nor Prussia being mentioned. While Bute stipulated that all territories belonging to the Elector of Hanover and the Landgrave of Hesse should be restored, he displayed his enmity against the King of Prussia by making no such stipulation with regard to Cleves, Wesel, and Gelders. He simply required their evacuation by the French, who were therefore at liberty to hand them over to Austria. 2. France ceded to England, Nova Scotia, Canada, Cape Breton and the whole of her provinces in North America, retaining a share in the fisheries of Newfoundland, with the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon, but without fortifications. In the West Indies, she ceded Grenada and the Grenadines, and three of the so-called neutral islands, namely, Dominica, St. Vincent, and Tobago; the fourth St. Lucie was restored to her as well as Martinique and Guadaloupe. In Africa, she surrendered the river Senegal, but received Goree; in the East Indies she recovered all the factories and settlements that she had possessed in the beginning of 1749, including Pondicherry, but she renounced all subsequent acquisitions, and was prohibited from erecting any fortifications or maintaining any troops. She also restored to England Natal and Taban in the island of Sumatra. In Europe, besides relinquishing her conquests in Germany, she restored Minorca, but received Belle Isle, and engaged to place Dunkirk in the state required by former treaties. 3. Spain ceded to England, Florida and all districts east of the Mississippi, recovering the Havannah and all other British conquests. She also surrendered the three capital points which for a series of years had formed the grounds of her complaints against England, namely, the right of the British to cut logwood in the Bay of Honduras; her own right to fish on the banks of Newfoundland; and her claims upon English cruisers for their captures of Spanish vessels. The latter question was referred to the English Admiralty. Full restitution was to be made to Portugal which acceded to the peace. 4. By way of compensation for the loss of Florida, France, by a private agreement, made over to Spain, New Orleans, and what remained to her of Louisiana. 1763 The conclusion of this treaty left Prussia, Austria, and Saxony to continue the war alone. But these powers were already in negotiation; and on the 15th of February, Hubertsburg. 1763, they signed the Peace of Hubertsburg. The Peace of Maria Theresa renounced all pretensions she might have to any of the dominions of the King of Prussia, and especially those which had been ceded to him by the treaties of Breslau and Dresden. She agreed to restore the town and county of Glatz, and the fortresses of Wesel and Gelders, made over to her by the French. All affairs between Prussia and Saxony were placed on their ancient footing.* 8. Political Results of the Seven Years' War.-The political results of the Seven Years' War were considerable. England, instead of France, began to be regarded as the leading power in Europe, and the predominance of the Five Great States was henceforth established by the success of Prussia. The alliance between England and the latter State, combined with the remarkable genius and enterprise of Frederick the Great, was destined in our own day to bring about a new German Empire; but the dissolution of the alliance destroyed nearly all the ties by which England was connected with continental policy; she retained only her relations with Holland and Portugal; for Austria had abandoned her to gain France, and Russia was only bound to her by a commercial treaty. The political influence of England, therefore, in the European system ceased after this, until it was again restored by the wars of the French Revolution. The greatest consequences to Europe sprang out of the use which England made of her maritime superiority. Shut out from her colonies by the English cruisers, France began in 1756 to grant the right of trading thereto, to neutrals. England maintained the absolute illegality of this trade, and captured neutral ships and neutral property. The dispute expired of itself with the return of peace; but the rule of 1756 was accepted by England, as the rule for the future, and the right of neutrals to carry on the colonial trade of a belligerent power was not permitted. This led to some serious complications during the war of American Independence. 3. THE PREMIERSHIP OF LORD BUTE. 9. Circumstances which supported the Personal Rule of George the Third. The anxiety which Bute showed for peace abroad was Dyer's Modern Europe, III., 438-439; Stanhope's England, IV., 269-273. + Heeren's European States and Colonies, 248-249. CHAP. VI. the simple result of the King's desire to begin the struggle at home for the recovery of that power and influence, which since the Revolution had been appropriated by Parliament. Several circumstances, at the accession of George the Third, promised favourably for the success of this scheme. Parliamen tary corrup tion. I. The mode in which parliamentary government had developed itself was not such as to entitle it to the respect and confidence of the nation. Owing to the venal character of the House of Commons, factions and sometimes even individuals had been able to exercise supreme power. The results of this were imbecility in the national Councils, abuse of the public service throughout every department, and the complete dependence of the Crown upon the predominant party. To a people which still regarded royalty with reverence and affection, and the supremacy of prerogative as a simple and intelligible mode of government, this new form of policy was not altogether acceptable.* 2. Popular opinion in this respect was still further strengthened by the character of the House of Commons itself. At a time when it Character of had become all-powerful in the State, and when Government the House of hung simply on its will, the House had ceased to be a real Commons. representation of the people. No effort had been made since the Restoration to meet growing abuses by a redistribution of seats, on the basis of population; and great towns like Manchester and Birmingham remained unrepresented, while places like Old Sarum, which had ceased to exist as boroughs, continued to send members. Even in towns which had a claim to representation, the narrowing of municipal privileges, and the restriction of the franchise to the corporate bodies, practically deprived them of electoral rights, and placed them in the hands of the wealthy boroughmongers, who nominated the members. Some of these were "the King's boroughs;" others were "close boroughs," and others, with a show of independence, shamelessly offered themselves to the highest bidder. A body returned by such constituencies, and cut off from the influence of public opinion by the secrecy of its proceedings, was naturally ready to sell itself, in turn; and it was by the wholesale bribery of its members that the Whigs had maintained their power so long. 3. Thus George the Third had ready to his hand a most efficient instrument for raising the authority of the Crown out of its helpless and dependent condition. The royal revenue was employed to buy seats and to buy votes; corruption and bribery were extended beyond all precedent, and the old Duke of Newcastle beheld with dismay and astonishment, his long cherished Government boroughs turned into agents for his own overthrow. The Whig families thus paid the penalty of having converted the natural organ of popular feeling into a mere department of ministerial patronage.† Bribery and borough mongering. the Tories. 4. The new monarch was next assisted in his assertions of regal authority by the support which he received from the Tories. The accesRevival of sion of a Sovereign born and bred in England, and wholly untainted by Hanoverian impartialities, gave this party a favourable opportunity to renounce, even in outward form, their obsolete political faith. They had withdrawn altogether from correspondence *Massey's George the Third, I., 51-52. 1 Sandford's Estimates of English Kings. George the Third, p. 503 1762 with the exiled princes many years before, and they now came flocking in to the royal levees, and found a gracious reception.* These new accessions to the Court for the most part took shelter under the wing of Bute. From this time, therefore, the Tories of modern politics date their origin. They transferred the loyalty which had aforetime been fixed on a foreign Pretender, to the reigning sovereign; and their aim was not to subvert but to secure the settled order of things. On the other hand, the Whigs no longer represented their prototypes of the reigns of William and Anne, but began now, like their rivals, to develope themselves into a party which bears their name at the present day.† 5. But the most remarkable means which George adopted for the security of his personal authority was that known by the name of "The King's Friends," a set of men who employed the King's name "The King's and the influence of his personal sentiments, in organising an Friends." opposition to those Ministers who were not chosen by himself, but were brought into office by the force of party connection. It must not be supposed, however, that these men formed a regularly constituted Cabal or Secret Cabinet, as was suggested by Burke ; but that there were nearly always, throughout the reign, two or three men, of no great ability; busy, gossiping intriguers, who were employed as irresponsible agents in making known what were the King's real wishes. George's fixed and avowed purpose from the commencement of his reign, was, to break up party connection, and emancipate his Government from the domination of great lords. He therefore resorted to this secret influence for the purpose of recovering the power which, he thought, fairly belonged to the King,-the right to choose his own Ministers, and be their master.§ The success which he achieved in these plans of personal Government was due to these "friends," and to his own careful observation of the various changes in public opinion. In the course of his struggle he met with many mortifications and not a few seemingly fatal checks; but he always bent to the storm in time, and generally knew when and how long to maintain an inflexible purpose.]] Tories into 10. Composition and Character of Bute's Ministry. The resignation of the Duke of Newcastle in June, 1762, was followed by the appointment of Bute as First Lord of the Treasury, and the gradual introduction of Tories into all departments of the Government. The Prime Minister himself, and Lord Egremont, Admission of who had succeeded Pitt, were both Tories; Sir Francis the Cabinet. Dashwood, a man of slender parts and small experience, and of notoriously immoral character, was made Chancellor of the Exchequer for no other reason than that he was a Tory and had been a Jacobite; while the royal household was filled with men, whose favourite toast, a few years before, had been "the King over the water." Many Whigs, however, still remained in office; the Duke of Bedford, who had negotiated the treaty with France; the Duke of * Stanhope's England, IV., 214. See his Thoughts on the Present V., 117-119. § Massey's George the Third, I., 53-54. + Stanhope's England. V., 113. Discontents." Also Stanhope's England, Sandford's Estimates, p. 506. hatred CHAP. VI. Devonshire, who continued to be Lord Chamberlain; Grenville, who was now promoted to the Secretaryship vacated by Bute; and Fox, who enjoyed in silence the immense gains of the Pay Office. But the evident intention of the Court to exclude all Whigs from employment, roused after a long sleep the mutual animosities of the two political parties, to which was presently added the spirit of national animosity. The two sections of the great British people General were not yet indissolubly blended together, and the way against Bute. in which Bute filled the public offices, the army and the navy with Scotchmen, excited a storm of indignation throughout England. It was at this time that John Wilkes first emerged into evil fame by the periodical papers which he directed against the Premier, under the title of the North Briton; a host of other libels came forth, and the First Lord of the Treasury found himself detested on all sides-by many as a Tory, by many as a favourite of the Princess Mother, and by many as a Scot. The hatred which flowed from these various sources soon mingled in one torrent of obloquy against the treaty of peace. The Duke of Bedford who had signed the treaty was hooted through the streets; Bute was attacked in his chair, and was with difficulty rescued by a troop of the guards. So much discontent had not been known for many years past. Bute therefore began to think how he should meet all this opposition when the Parliament met, and the peace would be submitted for its approval. 11. How the Treaty of Peace was carried through Parliament. -Hitherto Bute had boasted that the King's Government was carried on without bribery and corruption; but in the face of approaching danger he now thought that it was possible to be over scrupulous, and that a majority must be secured, no matter by what means. Fox being then applied to, undertook to bring the Government safely through, on condition that a peerage, which he had long coveted, should be his reward. The pay office was accordingly converted into a mart for votes; and it is said that £25,000 were thus paid away in a single morning, the lowest bribe given for an individual vote being £200. Those whom money could not reach were intimidated. The Lords Lieutenant of several counties were dismissed, and the Duke of Devonshire, the head of the great house of Cavendish, was treated by the King with gross personal indignity and compelled to resign his office. A political persecution then set in, which was wholly unprecedented, and has not been equalled since. Every placeman who owed his post. to the patronage of an opponent of the peace, was removed; indivi Enormous sums spent in bribery. |