On the 27th of November the Parliament reassembled.Only forty-eight hours before had arrived tidings of the surrender of Cornwallis and his army; and it had consequently been necessary to rewrite the royal speech.Every man in the kingdom, except the King, was now convinced that it was mere madness to think of conquering the United States.In the debate on the report of the address, Pitt spoke with even more energy and brilliancy than on any former occasion.He was warmly applauded by his allies; but it was remarked that no person on his own side of the house was so loud in eulogy as Henry Dundas, the Lord Advocate of Scotland, who spoke from the ministerial ranks.That able and versatile politician distinctly foresaw the approaching downfall of the government with which he was connected, and was preparing to make his own escape from the ruin.From that night dates his connection with Pitt, a connection which soon became a close intimacy, and which lasted till it was dissolved by death.
About a fortnight later, Pitt spoke in the committee of supply on the army estimates.Symptoms of dissension had begun to appear on the Treasury bench.Lord George Germaine, the Secretary of State, who was especially charged with the direction of the war in America, had held language not easily to be reconciled with declarations made by the First Lord of the Treasury.Pitt noticed the discrepancy with much force and keenness.Lord George and Lord North began to whisper together; and Welbore Ellis, an ancient placeman who had been drawing salary almost every quarter since the days of Henry Pelham, bent down between them to put in a word.Such interruptions sometimes discompose veteran speakers.Pitt stopped, and, looking at the group, said, with admirable readiness, "I shall wait till Nestor has composed the dispute between Agamemnon and Achilles."After several defeats, or victories hardly to be distinguished from defeats, the ministry resigned.The King, reluctantly and ungraciously, consented to accept Rockingham as first minister.
Fox and Shelburne became Secretaries of State.Lord John Cavendish, one of the most upright and honourable of men, was made Chancellor of the Exchequer.Thurlow, whose abilities and force of character had made him the dictator of the House of Lords, continued to hold the great seal.
To Pitt was offered, through Shelburne, the Vice-Treasurership of Ireland, one of the easiest and most highly paid places in the gift of the crown; but the offer was, without hesitation, declined.The young statesman had resolved to accept no post which did not entitle him to a seat in the cabinet: and, in a few days later, he announced that resolution in the House of Commons.It must be remembered that the cabinet was then a much smaller and more select body than at present.We have seen cabinets of sixteen.In the time of our grandfathers a cabinet of ten or eleven was thought inconveniently large.Seven was an usual number.Even Burke, who had taken the lucrative office of paymaster, was not in the cabinet.Many therefore thought Pitt's declaration indecent.He himself was sorry that he had made it.
The words, he said in private, had escaped him in the heat of speaking; and he had no sooner uttered them than he would have given the world to recall them.They, however, did him no harm with the public.The second William Pitt, it was said, had shown that he had inherited the spirit, as well as the genius, of the first.In the son, as in the father, there might perhaps be too much pride; but there was nothing low or sordid.It might be called arrogance in a young barrister, living in chambers on three hundred a year, to refuse a salary of five thousand a year, merely because he did not choose to bind himself to speak or vote for plans which he had no share in framing; but surely such arrogance was not very far removed from virtue.
Pitt gave a general support to the administration of Rockingham, but omitted, in the meantime, no opportunity of courting that Ultra-Whig party which the persecution of Wilkes and the Middlesex election had called into existence, and which the disastrous events of the war, and the triumph of republican principles in America, had made formidable both in numbers and in temper.He supported a motion for shortening the duration of Parliaments.He made a motion for a committee to examine into the state of the representation, and, in the speech, by which that motion was introduced, avowed himself the enemy of the close boroughs, the strongholds of that corruption to which he attributed all the calamities of the nation, and which, as he phrased it in one of those exact and sonorous sentences of which he had a boundless command, had grown with the growth of England and strengthened with her strength, but had not diminished with her diminution or decayed with her decay.On this occasion he was supported by Fox.The motion was lost by only twenty votes in a house of more than three hundred members.The reformers never again had so good a division till the year 1831.
The new administration was strong in abilities, and was more popular than any administration which had held office since the first year of George the Third, but was hated by the King, hesitatingly supported by the Parliament, and torn by internal dissensions.The Chancellor was disliked and distrusted by almost all his colleagues.The two Secretaries of State regarded each other with no friendly feeling.The line between their departments had not been traced with precision; and there were consequently jealousies, encroachments, and complaints.It was all that Rockingham could do to keep the peace in his cabinet;and, before the cabinet had existed three months, Rockingham died.