this realm; but though he rather chooses to merit the highest titles than to wear them, we have however thought fit, in order to ennoble his family, to confer on the son the honour due to the father, &c." * On the 27th May the king closed the session; and on the 3d of June, he set out for Hanover, accompanied by Townshend and Cartaret. As usual, some promotions were conferred before his majesty's departure; and the duke of Norfolk, and the lords Orrery, North, and Grey, and others who had been imprisoned on account of the late plot, were admitted to bail. The struggle for ascendancy between the secretaries was carried on with unabated hostility during their stay at Herenhausen; but with Robert Walpole at home, Horace Walpole in Paris, and the duchess of Kendal on his side, whom he had recently gained over, Townshend rapidly out-stripped his rival in court influence. The affairs of Hanover formed the grand point of their diplomacy, although interests of a more important class ostensibly occupied their attention. The tedious congress of Cambray had terminated in general disappointment; and all the powers who were parties to it, now resolved to enter into separate negotiations for the attainment of their own objects. Sweden and Russia were about to conclude a treaty favourable to the duke of Holstein's pretensions to Sleswic, which his Britannic majesty had guaranteed to Denmark; and this arrangement obviously threatened the security of Bremen and Verdun. On the other hand France had been reconciled to Spain, and the Regent (who had just married his two daughters to the prince of Asturias, and the eldest son of Philip II., by his second wife), was projecting a marriage between the king of France and the infanta of Spain, then three years old. The danger of this alliance was, that it would strengthen Spain in her demands for the restitution of Gibraltar and Port Mahon, and render the friendship of Great Britain unimportant to France. These difficulties were considerably in * Tindal. 1724. OPENING OF THE SESSION. 125 creased by the establishment of an imperial East India Company at Ostend, which was regarded with commercial jealousy both by England and Holland.* The position in which the emperor was placed by these conflicting circumstances, was hardly less embarrassing than that of Great Britain. He might coalesce with Sweden and Russia, to the complete severance of the new Hanoverian provinces, which he still refused to invest without the payment of an enormous sum, said to be one million sterling; and he did not affect to conceal his indignation towards the king of England, by whom he considered himself abandoned. In this crisis what part was king George to act? If he declared against the emperor, he perilled the safety of his German dominions — if he joined him he gave a tacit support to the Ostend company, and incurred the hostility of France and Spain. As the dilemma thickened upon him, the regent of France died, and was succeeded by the duke of Bourbon, who, through the able negotiations of Horace Walpole, became the firm ally of England. Luck was still at the side of the English monarch, and, although he failed in propitiating the emperor on behalf of Hanover, his journey was not altogether useless. He formed a union with Prussia for the protection of the Protestants, and bound Denmark by a stricter alliance, thus escaping from a general war by a fortuitous combination of favourable accidents. But he still held his cherished acquisitions by a frail tenure; and he returned to England in December, after an absence of seven months, trembling with apprehensions for his beloved principality. The session of parliament opened on the 9th January, 1724. The flourishing state of trade, regenerated by the activity of Walpole, furnished a fair topic of congratu * A vote against this company passed the English parliament, and subsequently an act declaring it a high crime and misdemeanour in any British subject to countenance the undertaking. King George endeavoured in vain to dissuade the court of Vienna from the project. He could procure nothing more than vague promises that no treaties should be violated; a marked reproof against his own want of faith. lation. Resolutions were adopted for the reduction of the national debt, and useful reforms were introduced into the manner of collecting the revenue. The additional vote of 4000 men, adopted in the previous year on account of the conspiracy, was continued, but not without a violent opposition in the house of peers on the part of the lords Orrery, North, and Grey, who had been recently set at liberty by the government, and whose conduct on this occasion was justly characterised as being alike insidious and ungrateful. After a short session parliament was prorogued in April. The intrigues of Cartaret against Walpole and Townshend were now brought gradually, and not without considerable difficulty to a final close, in his signal discomfiture, and the complete triumph of his rivals. One of his closest friends in the cabinet was the earl of Cadogan, who was supported by the remnant of Marlborough's party, and who held the important posts of commander-in-chief and master of the ordnance. Cadogan, who was a noted swordsman and linguist, had become a marked favourite with the king on account of the frankness of his manners, and his familiarity with the languages of the continent. Walpole, to whom he had rendered himself obnoxious, desired to remove him ; but the king gave a decided negative to the proposal. This repulse was hailed by Cartaret and Cadogan as a certain omen of Walpole's approaching downfal.* But they miscalculated the energy and influence of the minister. Serious discontents had recently arisen in Ireland from the introduction of a new copper coinage, under a patent granted by the king to one William Wood, an extensive proprietor of iron and copper works in England, to furnish that country with halfpence and farthings to the amount of 100,0001. This patent had been issued in consequence of representations made to his majesty of the deficiency of small money for commercial purposes in Ireland. Sunderland, through whom 1724. WOOD'S HALFPENCE. 127 it was procured, gave the disposal of it to the duchess of Kendal, who sold it to Wood. When this money came to be circulated, an extraordinary clamour was raised against it; Swift inflamed the country with tracts and letters affirming the coin to be of a base and inferior quality; and Cartaret, by imputing the disturbances to the misconduct of Walpole and his friend the duke of Grafton, then lord-lieutenant of Ireland, endeavoured to subvert the rival ministers in the favour of the king. In the midst of the excitement the Irish parliament passed resolutions to the effect that false representations had been made to the king in order to obtain the patent; that the money wanted weight; that the importing and uttering the coin was injurious to trade, and destructive of the rights of the subject; and that it was prejudicial to the kingdom to grant the right of coinage to private persons. Addresses founded on these resolutions were transmitted to the king, who immediately ordered an assay of the coin to be made, by the result of which it appeared that the terms of the patent had been strictly fulfilled, that the money was equal to that used in the English circulation, and superior to that which had been coined for Ireland in former reigns. The popular rage, however, continued ; and as Cartaret had taken so active a part in impugning the administration of Grafton, Walpole adroitly seized the opportunity to recal that nobleman, and appoint Cartaret in his place. This was a final blow to his power. He felt that his influence with the king would be destroyed in his absence, and he delayed his departure to the last moment, still hoping for some new turn of events. But he was disappointed. He went to Ireland, attempted to force Wood's halfpence on the country, and failed. In the following year the obnoxious coinage was graciously abandoned in a speech from the throne *; Walpole firmly declaring that he * Wood received a compensation in pensions of 30007. per annum for eight years. would not urge any measure, however laudable, contrary to the general sense of the people.* The duke of Grafton was made lord chamberlain ; many of Walpole's friends were placed in minor appointments, and the duke of Newcastle, a nobleman whose capacity fitted him for subserviency, was nominated to the vacancy occasioned by Cartaret's removal. Walpole and Townshend were now safe, and commanded the whole machinery of government. The former was soon after created a knight of the order of the bath, and subsequently installed knight of the garter-the only commoner who had ever received that distinction†; and the latter was honoured with the garter, in a special manner, by the hands of the king. So complete was their ascendancy over his majesty, that they prevailed upon him to defer another journey to Hanover, which he had previously fixed upon for the recess. Parliament met again on the 12th November; but this session was as brief and as barren of incidents as the last. The 4000 additional troops were again proposed, vehemently resisted, and voted. A new opponent to the administration appeared in the person of the celebrated Pulteney, who commenced his opposition in the 1725. present session. The occasion which led to his hostility * Walpole acted strictly on this principle, in reference to his great measure of Excise, which is ridiculed with stupid virulence by Dr. Johnson, in the definition he gives of the word in his dictionary, and which was ob jectionable only because it was in advance of his age. He carried it by majorities always decreasing, and finding at last, that his majority was under twenty, and that the people were so much against it, that it could not be maintained except by the aid of troops, he gave it up. "No revenue," he exclaimed," ought to be levied in this free country that it requires the sabre and the bayonet to collect." f Young, the most servile of all poets, congratulated Walpole on this circumstance, in a piece called the "Instalment." Although it is not easy to predicate the uses to which poetry could turn such a subject, the panegyrist found something to say about the gloriousness of the new knight, to whose installation he summoned the shades of the departed brotherhood. "Ye mighty dead, ye gartered sons of praise! The minister, however, despised such contemptible offerings, and the |