528 1761 THE KING'S VIGILANCE. Ch. 13. which, however jealous of each other, were always united on the one point of resisting his attempt to govern independently of their dictation and control. He found the aid which he required in the class of adventurers who had lately obtained a footing in the House of Commons. These men, untrammelled by engagements, and indifferent to creeds, were generally ready to vote as the private agents of the court directed. This system, of course, required time to bring to maturity. It was first brought into operation against the Rockingham ministry; and became fully efficient when the King found in Lord North a minister both able and willing to serve his purpose. Jealousy of the country party. The country gentlemen and the old historical parties regarded these upstarts with extreme jealousy and disgust. The possibility of expelling the intruders seems at one time to have been in contemplation. After the general election of 1768 a great number of petitions complaining of undue elections on the ground of bribery were presented; and several strong opinions were expressed against the propriety of admitting adventurers who went about canvassing from borough to borough with no other recommendation than pockets full of money. But though it was agreed that there might be good reason for opposing the admission of such persons, yet if bribery could not be proved against them, it would be difficult to question their right to be the sitting members.d d Cavendish Debates. POWER OF THE LANDED INTEREST. The King himself was active and vigilant as a party leader; surpassing even the Duke of Newcastle in attention to the minute details of party management. He daily scrutinised the votes of the House of Commons, rewarding and punishing the members according to their deserts. The patronage of the government was dispensed under his immediate direction; and he frequently interfered in the disposal of the inferior offices. The pension list became a potent engine of corruption; and by an ingenious evasion of the law which disqualifies pensioners from sitting in the House of Commons, members were bribed by offices tenable with their seats, but having a salary or gratuity annexed to them, revocable at pleasure. In this manner every member of Parliament who wanted a place or a pension was taught to understand that his success depended not so much on the favour of the minister as on that of the King. 529 Ch. 13. 1760-70 aristocracy. Such, then, was the condition of Parliament and Power of the of parties when George the Third began his reign and at the close of its first decennial period. The territorial aristocracy possessed almost the whole of the county representation as they always had done, and as they do at the present day. They had also a considerable number of boroughs in which the form of an election alone remained. Some of these belonged to the King; and some to This was so stated by Mr. Cornwall, without contradiction, in the Debate on Mr. Dowdeswell's Bill for disfranchising revenue officers.-Cavendish Debates. 530 Ch. 13. 1760-70 l'arty policy. PARLIAMENTARY INTRIGUES. the government. A few of them had been secured by the new party of political adventurers, though these latter sprung mostly from the corruption of the open constituencies. Thus,' said the son of Chatham a few years later, 'this House is not the representative of the people of Great Britain. It is the representative of nominal boroughs; of ruined and exterminated towns; of noble families; of wealthy individuals, of foreign potentates.' e Each petty chief of party had his staff of spies, agents and go-betweens. The business of the court was principally managed by Jenkinson and Dyson. The former had been employed by Lord Bute at the commencement of the reign; the latter was a political adventurer of the lowest grade.f Whately and Lloyd, the one Secretary to the Treasury, and the other a clerk in that department, when Grenville was at its head, were ever afterwards his faithful adherents. Lloyd, under Grenville's direction, drew up a pamphlet on the state of the nation, intended to justify his administration, and which drew forth Burke's more celebrated reply. Whately was indefatigable in collecting political intelligence for his patron, and his letters to Grenville throw great light on the movements and intrigues of parties. The Duke of Bedford's d Bubb Dodington's Diary, Feb. 2, 1761. e In allusion to the Indian princes, the Rajah of Tanjore and the Nabob of Arcot. The latter potentate had at one time eight nominees in the House of Commons.-Speech on Reform of Parliament, 1783. f See an account of him in Lord Albemarle's Memoirs of Rockingham. DEBASEMENT OF POLITICAL LITERATURE. man was the notorious Rigby, a model of the hardened partisan and Parliamentary bully of that generation. The Marquis of Rockingham had a more distinguished, but not less devoted follower in Edmund Burke. Lord Chatham, in his earlier days, despised and neglected the arts of political management and intrigue; but he always made use of the services of Beckford to keep up his interest in the city; and latterly, Calcraft, a rich contractor and borough proprietor, acted as his political agent. These men, by their flattery and tale-bearing, contributed much to maintain the jealousies and divisions between their respective patrons and parties which ultimately secured the triumphs of the court. The Bedford party, indeed, was broken up some time before the death of their chief. The Duke, though he renounced office for himself, insisted on being amply represented in any administration to which he gave his support; and though he desired to withdraw his nominees when the Duke of Grafton resigned, the Gowers, the Weymouths, the Sandwiches, and the Rigbys preferred their places to the obligations of party allegiance. 531 Ch. 13. 1760-70 of political Besides the more important manifestoes occa- Employment sionally put forth under the immediate directions partisans. of the leaders of parties, a regular staff of hackney writers was kept in pay both by the Court and the Opposition. At the commencement of the century, the political press was illustrated by writers who will ever be the purest models of the English language. But after Swift, Addison, and Bolingbroke, party literature degenerated, all at once, from the 532 Ch. 13. 1760-70 Hired writers. MERCENARY WRITERS. classic standard, and fell into the vilest hands. Walpole, himself no scholar, and almost devoid of elegance and taste, cared little about the quality of the pamphlets and essays which were written in support of the Protestant succession; trusting more perhaps to those grosser means from which he was accustomed to see an immediate and practical result. From that time to a period far within living memory, party writing had been the meanest walk of letters; and its adepts had ranked, for the most part, among the most degraded of mankind. It is only within later years that political literature has been restored to eminence by a periodical press, the creation of public patronage, and the faithful exponent of public opinion. The hired political writings of these times were much on a level with similar performances both before and since. What they wanted in argument and wit, they made up in scurrility. Dull abuse of the Opposition was encountered by dull abuse of the Court. Bute was designated as Sejanus; and a dreary parallel was drawn out between persons and circumstances so unlike, as the Cæsar, accomplished in policy as well as in vice, and a parasite of congenial qualities, with a respectable English king and his shallow Scotch governor. On the other side, the servility of Pitt in fomenting German wars, merely to gratify the prejudices and predilections of a weak Sovereign, and the waste of British blood and treasure on such unworthy objects, were held up to public execration and contempt. Such was the burden respectively of |