СНАР.

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"net Council will remain just as it was, with the " addition of the Duke of Kingston, as Privy Seal. "Mr. Methuen and I shall continue Secretaries. "But if my Lord Townshend shall decline Ireland, "and if which by some has been suggested, but "which I cannot think possible-he should prevail upon you to offer to quit your employments, the

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King, in this case, hath engaged my Lord Sun"derland and myself to promise that his Lordship "will be Secretary, and that I, unable and un

equal as I am every way, should be Chancellor "of the Exchequer for this session; the King "declaring, that as long as he can find Whigs "that will serve him he will be served by them, "which good disposition his Majesty shall not have "reason to alter by any backwardness in me to "expose myself to any trouble or hazard. You "know as much of our plan now as I do, and are, I "dare say, fully satisfied that I think it highly con"cerns me that you should stay where you are. "I am very sorry that my Lord Townshend's tem

per hath made it impracticable for him to con"tinue Secretary. The King will not bear him in "that office, be the consequence what it will. "This being the case, I hope and desire that you "will endeavour to reconcile him to Ireland, which "I once thought he did not dislike, and which, I "think, he cannot now refuse, without declaring "to the world that he will serve upon no other "terms than being Viceroy over father, son, and "these three kingdoms. Is the Whig interest

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"to be staked in defence of such a pretension? or CHAP. "is the difference to the Whig party, whether "Lord Townshend be Secretary or Lord-Lieu"tenant of Ireland, TANTI ?"

It is on this transaction that a charge of base dissimulation and treachery has been brought against Secretary Stanhope by Archdeacon Coxe. "As Brereton," he says, "who conveyed these despatches without being apprised of their contents, "could not have quitted Gohre more than three days subsequent to the departure of Horace Wal

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pole, it was obvious that he (Horace Walpole) had "been duped and deceived, that the plan for the re"moval of Sunderland had been then settled, and "that the solemn promises made by Stanhope were "never intended to be fulfilled."* But it will be found from the authentic letters which Coxe himself has published that his heavy accusation rests upon a gross error he has made as to the dates. It does him no great honour as an historian that we should thus be able to disprove the statements in his first volume by the documents in his second. The letters from Stanhope, announcing the removal of Townshend, are dated on the 15th of December. On the 8th Horace Walpole had already reached the Hague on his way home from Hanover, and wrote to Stanhope an account of his progress. It

It is to

See this letter in Coxe's Walpole, vol. ii. p. 137. be remembered that all the letters of Horace Walpole from the Continent are, like Stanhope's, dated N. S.

This is beyond

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CHAP. is evident, therefore, that he must have quitted VII. Hanover towards the beginning of that month. But further still, a passage in a subsequent letter from Robert Walpole to Stanhope indicates the 2d of December as the precise day when Horace began his journey homewards. Alluding to the friendly expressions of Stanhope to Horace, and to the subsequent dismissal of Townshend, Robert Walpole observes, "What could possibly create so

great an alteration among you in the space of "twelve days is in vain to guess."* Thus then it appears that the real interval was no less than four times greater than that assigned by Archdeacon Coxe, and that therefore his charge of treachery deduced from the shortness of time completely falls to the ground.

Are there, however, any other grounds for accusing Stanhope of treachery in this transaction? I think none. How could he possibly have acted more kindly for his friend, or more patriotically for his country? When he found the King determined to dismiss his Prime Minister, and absolutely fixed in that determination, he could surely do no better for Lord Townshend than endeavour, as it were, to break the force of his inevitable fall, and

question, he having left London express with Lord Townshend's despatch of Nov. 2. O.S., that is, Nov. 13. N.S., and his letters from the Hague and Hanover on his first arrival being dated Nov. 17. and 23.; and this is so stated by Coxe himself, vol. i. p. 99.

* Coxe's Walpole, vol. ii. p. 145.

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obtain for him an appointment of still higher profit, CHAP. and scarcely inferior power. It may be said, however, that he ought rather to have resigned his own office than acquiesced in the loss of Lord Townshend's. But what would have been the consequence? Not, I am convinced, any change in the King's inflexible temper, but the dissolution of the whole Whig administration; thus either throwing the Government into the hands of a factious opposition, or leaving the country, at a most stormy crisis, without any efficient hands at the helm. Can this really be thought the duty of an honest public servant? Let me borrow Stanhope's own words in writing to Methuen: "The King thinks fit to re"move one servant from a worse to a better post. "Is this a reason for others to abandon him? I "am sure that if it had happened to yourself to be "turned out, and without any colour of reason,

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you would not in your own case let your resent"ment carry you to any indecent behaviour, much "less would you spirit up mankind to such divi"sions as must end in the destruction of your country if not prevented. Do some people expect by their behaviour to force the King to "make my Lord Townshend Secretary again? If

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they do, they don't know him. If they do not, "what do they propose? ..... Whoever wishes "well to his King, to his country, and to my Lord

Townshend, ought to persuade him to accept of "Ireland. I hope Walpole, upon cooler thoughts, "will use his endeavours to this end. If you have

CHAP.

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any interest or credit with them, for God's sake "make use of it upon this occasion. They may possibly unking their master, or (which I do be"fore God think very possible) make him abdi"cate England, but they will certainly not force "him to make my Lord Townshend Secretary. "I will not enter into the reasons which have engaged the King to take this measure, but it is “taken; and I will ask any Whig whether the dif"ference to the public between one man's being "Secretary or Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland is of "such consequence that we ought to hazard every thing for the resentment of one man?"*

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The vindication of Stanhope appears to me complete; and with respect to Sunderland also, I see no foundation for any charge of treachery. I admit that, unlike Stanhope, he, far from striving to avert, probably promoted and co-operated in the fall of Townshend. But then his political position was very different from Stanhope's. He was not bound to Townshend by any ties of confidence and friendship. He had some grounds to complain of Townshend's jealousy, and of his own exclusion from power. He was considered by Townshend not as an ally, but as a rival; and his enmity was all along expected and foreseen. Now it surely must be owned that previous confidence is implied in a charge of treachery; and that where there was

* Stanhope to Methuen, January 13. 1717. Coxe's Walpole.