Note 354 — Chapter XX

Walpole is mistaken in this supposition; for the King himself proposed Lord Temple for the Treasury. (Lord Hardwicke’s letter to the Duke of Newcastle.) An impartial narrative of this transaction is given by Mr. Adolphus (vol. i. p. 127), with a reference to the contemporary authorities, of which the most important are Lord Hardwicke’s letter, and the letters in the Chatham Correspondence (vol. ii. p. 242). The “dexterity” and finesse ascribed in the text to Mr. Pitt hardly belong to his character, and certainly were not exhibited on this occasion. His private correspondence proves, as he told the King, that he felt throughout the impossibility of his making a ministry, unless it rested “on the great families who had supported the Revolution Government, and other great persons, of whose ability and integrity the country had had experience, and who had weight and credit in the nation.” This would necessarily have involved greater changes than the King then contemplated, though not greater than his Majesty subsequently found inevitable.—E.