But even Ireland was by no means the last of Lord North's troubles. The feeling against government by influence had been steadily on the increase. With characteristic selfishness, the mass of the people had sympathized with the war, which seemed to some rebellion against the natural supremacy of Englishmen, and which others saw clearly was a revolt against that commercial system which they regarded as the chief safeguard of their own interests. But want of success, increased taxation, and a diminution of trade, began to change the current of opinion, and men observed with jealousy the impossibility of carrying any measure against the influence of the Court. The King had completely triumphed, and by means of his friends, his pensioners, contractors, and sinecurists, could at all times command a large majority in Parliament. The Whigs, finding that influence which they had so long wielded thus transferred to other hands, began to see the enormity of such a system, and the great leaders of the party, whose territorial power was very great, put themselves at the head of a reform movement which soon became important. In the autumn of 1779 motions for economical reform were brought into the House of Lords. They were rejected; but in December the general feeling, and the determination of the Whigs to create an organization outside the House, were shown by a great meeting in York, attended by a large majority of the freeholders of the county. This influential meeting was followed by others of the same sort in many counties, and the organizers of the party went so far as to establish committees of correspondence on the model of the committees in America. Twenty-three counties and many large towns, in spite of the constant opposition of the Government, sent up petitions like the one agreed to in Yorkshire, demanding a reduction in exorbitant emoluments and the abolition of sinecures. Sir George Savile presented the Yorkshire petition on the 8th of February, and three days afterwards Burke introduced a great measure for economical reform of which he had already given notice. Lord North found it so impossible to oppose him, that the Bill passed almost unanimously into Committee. It there, however, encountered a most vigorous resistance, and was finally destroyed piecemeal. But the movement, once started, continued its course. Mr. Crewe introduced a Bill to deprive revenue officers of their votes, and Sir Philip Clerke another for the exclusion of contractors from the House. Outside the House the pressure became heavier and heavier, till at length, on the 6th of April, after a great meeting of the people of Westminster, where Fox had harangued, and which was thought sufficiently dangerous to demand the presence of troops, Dunning rose in the House, and after blaming the ministry for their underhand obstruction to Burke's Bill, produced the startling resolution, that "it is the opinion of this Committee that the influence of the Crown has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished." This resolution, with a very slight alteration, he was enabled to carry against Government by a majority of eighteen. It was followed by two other resolutions in the same direction, one declaring the right of the House to reform the Civil List, the other that the abuses complained of should be immediately redressed. Both were carried. But when the House again met, and he proceeded to more detailed motions, Dunning found that the corrupt body he addressed, though willing enough to affirm abstract resolutions, had no real liking for reform. His majorities rapidly diminished, and finally no action was taken upon the resolutions which he had carried.

Scarcely had the ministry managed to escape from Dunning's resolutions when a new danger came upon them. This time they did not stand alone. All parties in the House had to join to repel a common enemy. It has been mentioned that a measure of Sir George Savile's for the alleviation of the penal laws against Roman Catholics had been carried, and that the motion of introducing a similar measure for Scotland had caused much displeasure in that country. The feeling spread, and Protestant associations formed themselves throughout England, and fixed upon the crackbrained Lord George Gordon for their chief and representative. The agitation had been kept up during the last year, and now Lord George wanted a great demonstration and petition to be got up. He declined to present the petition unless accompanied by 20,000 followers, who were to meet in St. George's Fields, adorned with blue cockades. Instead of 20,000, some 60,000 men were present, and proceeded to march across London Bridge to the Parliament House. There, in Palace Yard, they held their position unmolested, while they attacked and ill used any obnoxious Peers, or broke into the lobby of the Lower House, and, with their excitement kept alive by addresses which Lord George delivered from the staircase above, demanded that their petition should be at once attended to. Lord George was brought to some reason by a threat of personal violence if he continued his foolish behaviour, and the military at length arriving, the immediate precincts of the Parliament House were cleared. But though foiled in their wish to intimidate the House, the mob were by no means satisfied, and the unaccountable and timorous delay on the part of the executive, whether ministry or magistrates, allowed the riot to reach such a height that it could be with difficulty controlled. That night the chapels of the Sardinian and Bavarian embassies were burnt, and after a day of comparative quiet, the mob, finding itself unopposed, proceeded to renewed acts of violence. For four days London was in its hands. The prisons were broken open, Catholic chapels burnt and sacked, the shops of Catholic tradesmen pillaged, and the houses of those who were known to be favourable to the Catholic claims either destroyed, as those of Lord Mansfield and Sir George Savile, or kept in a state of siege. Johnson tells us how he saw the mob, quietly and undisturbed, destroying the sessions house in the Old Bailey. Horace Walpole found Lord Hertford's house barricaded and the lord himself and his sons loading their muskets in expectation of an assault. On the 7th the tumult rose to its height. This was the fifth day of the riots. The town was so intimidated that blue flags and strips of blue were shown on most houses, and few came out without the blue cockade. The rioters had long since passed from under the control of their religious leaders, and were guided by leaders of their own. On this day more than one attack was made on the Bank, headed by a fellow mounted on a brewer's horse, with a harness of the chains of Newgate jingling about him. More chapels were sacked, more prisons opened. No less than thirty-six fires were blazing at once. The most fearful scene was in Holborn, where Mr. Langdale's distillery was broken open and set on fire. There, amid the flames fed by constant supplies of spirit, the wretched rioters flew upon the liquor, drinking the gin from pails, or lying grovelling and lapping it from the kennel; many died of actual drunkenness, many more perished helplessly in the flames. It was time that something should be done, yet the ministry and magistrates alike shrank from doing anything. There was a notion abroad that the military might not act till an hour after the Riot Act had been read by a magistrate, and courageous magistrates could not be found; nor was it forgotten that on previous occasions soldiers had been harshly treated by juries for over zeal. The emergency was one which well suited the dogged and courageous character of the King. On the 7th he summoned a Privy Council, and put to it the question whether the soldiers might be employed without the machinery of the Riot Act. None of the members of the Council would take the responsibility of recommending such a course, and the Council had almost separated without doing anything, when George called upon Wedderburn, who was present as legal assessor, to state the view of the common law. He unhesitatingly said that a soldier did not cease to be a citizen, and might, and should, interfere to prevent acts of felony. This was all the King required. There were 10,000 troops in London, and he now felt he might act energetically. Orders were sent to Lord Amherst, the commander-in-chief, to that effect, and that evening and during the night such vigorous measures were taken that the mob was at once crushed and the crisis over. The numbers killed and wounded by the military were not less than 500, and probably very many more, as many were carried off privately. Undoubtedly the King's decision on this occasion saved London. Of the prisoners some twenty-nine were executed. The Lord Mayor was tried and Trial of Lord George Gordon. convicted of criminal negligence. Lord George Gordon was arrested and foolishly tried for high treason. Wedderburn had meanwhile become Lord Chief Justice, and before him he was tried. The Judge's address was more like the pleading of an advocate than the charge of a judge, and people felt it so; the turn of feeling also had a little changed, and Lord George was acquitted. He died, a Jew, in 1793 of gaol distemper caught in Newgate, where he had been confined for libelling the Queen of France. When the House of Commons again assembled the gigantic Protestant petition was considered. It was met by five resolutions, the joint work of the political enemies Burke and North, which declared the continual approval of the Commons of the late Act of Toleration.

In the midst of these difficulties at home there had been some rays of comfort from the success of both fleet and army abroad. Early in the year Rodney had been placed in command of a fleet which was to act in the West Indies. On his way out he had Rodney's victory. instructions to relieve Gibraltar, which had been closely invested since the beginning of the war with Spain. While carrying out these orders he met the Spanish fleet off Cape St. Vincent and gained over it a complete victory. Four line of battle-ships were taken, four destroyed, only four made their escape. Gibraltar was then relieved, and Minorca also, so that Rodney could write home that the English were masters of the Mediterranean. He thence proceeded on his way to the West Indies, where De Guichen, with the French and Spanish fleets, could not be brought to an engagement, and where for the time nothing was done. Though Rodney's successes and those of Admiral Digby in the Bay of Biscay were somewhat neutralized by the entire destruction of our West and East India fleets, ably planned and carried out by the Spaniards off the Azores, they raised the spirits of the Government, coupled as they were with cheering news from the army. Just as the Gordon riots were suppressed, information arrived that Charleston, the capital of South Carolina, had Capture of Charleston. fallen into our hands. On several occasions during the war the eyes of the commanders had been turned southward. The feeling of loyalty was less shaken there than in the more northern provinces, and it seemed desirable that the efforts of England should not be confined to one little spot along the whole of the enormous seaboard of America. Savannah in Georgia had already been taken, and in pursuance of a general plan for acting on a more extended basis, Clinton moved with the bulk of his army from New York and besieged Charleston. The siege was carried on with vigour and skill, and General Lincoln found himself obliged to surrender. Clinton set actively to work to reduce the Carolinas. Virginia, one of the centres of disaffection, would thus be between two fires, and something more tangible might be effected than had yet been The interest of the war passes to the South. done by the army at New York. In fact, the interest of the war was now transferred to the South, for though Washington and the main American army still lay about New York, its effect there was only to neutralize the English army opposed to it, while the active operations which led to the end of the war were carried on at Carolina and Virginia.

Before describing the final struggle, it will be well to see the difficulties under which the English laboured. The war had become a world-wide one. Not only had the two maritime powers France and Spain engaged in it, but it was plain that our old rivals the England alone against all Europe. Dutch were soon going to do so also. Before the end of the year an unusually strong instance of our determination to insist on the right of searching neutral ships, when a convoy was searched and captured under the guns of the convoying War with the Dutch. ships of war, had raised the anger of the Dutch to a high pitch. The capture of a vessel containing Mr. Laurens, late President of the American Congress, and proofs that he was engaged in making an alliance with the States of Holland, rendered it impossible to avoid a declaration of war, and Holland was added to our armed opponents. Nor was this all. The same odious rigour of search nearly brought all the nations of the North upon us. The Empress of Russia had suffered from it at the hands of the Spaniards. She therefore, acting probably at the instigation of the King of Prussia, Armed neutrality of the North. constituted herself the champion of neutral rights, and succeeded in uniting the nations of the North in an armed neutrality in support of the doctrine that neutral ships made neutral cargoes, and that nothing was contraband of war except what had been definitely made so by treaty. In other words, she claimed for neutrals the right of carrying the property of belligerents unmolested, a right which virtually told against the English only, whose main hope lay in keeping dominion of the sea and stopping the trade and supplies of its enemies. The Armed Neutrality also upheld the now generally received principle that a blockade to be respected must be efficient, that is, that there must be sufficient force before a blockaded port to prevent the entrance of trading vessels. The whole maritime power of Europe was thus arrayed against England, and yet it was only by keeping the upper hand at sea that she could hope to carry out successfully her attempts on land. It was impossible to pour large armies into America and to subdue a continent without some easily accessible base of operations. This base the sea afforded. It will be seen in the sequel that the loss of naval supremacy was the immediate cause of the disaster of Yorktown.

But as yet the arms of England continued to be successful. Clinton, leaving Cornwallis to command in the South, had hastened back from Carolina to New York, that he might be ready to oppose the French fleet, whose arrival had been threatened. In June the expected armament arrived, consisting of seven line of battle-ships and 6000 men under the Count de Rochambeau. The rapidity with which Rhode Island was at once occupied and placed in a state of defence thwarted the efforts of the English to regain it, but the British fleet was so much stronger than that of the enemy that a blockade was maintained around the seaboard of the province, which paralyzed all action on the part of the French for the rest of the year. This forced inactivity of Rochambeau gave rise to one of the best known episodes of the war. Washington left his headquarters to Arnold's treachery. meet the French general and concert measures for action if possible. His absence was used for the purpose of carrying out a piece of treachery which had long been hatching. General Arnold was in command at West Point on the Hudson, a position of great importance, as it prevented the occupation of the valley which affords direct communication between New York and Canada. Married to a royalist wife, with a feeling that his undoubted genius was not sufficiently valued, and smarting under a public reprimand for some dishonest practices into which he had been led by his poverty and love of ostentation, Arnold had for some time been in secret correspondence with Clinton, making arrangements for changing sides, and handing over to the English the important post of which he had charge. The correspondence had been carried on through Major André, a young and very promising officer, now Adjutant-General of Clinton's army. Washington's departure seemed to offer an opportunity for carrying out the plan. To complete the negotiation a personal interview was required, and Major André, with instructions from Clinton not to enter the lines of the enemy and to wear uniform, repaired to the neighbourhood of West Point. When day dawned the interview was not over, and André was induced to continue it in a house within the American lines. On leaving he was also imprudent enough to dress as a civilian. He had already passed the lines on his homeward journey, when he was accidentally met and stopped by some militiamen; he avowed himself an English officer, but presented a pass from Arnold; the pass was disregarded, he was searched, and papers found in his boot. Under these circumstances there were about him all the outward marks of a spy, and as such he was Trial and death of Major André. treated. Much to the anger of the English, Washington, refusing to hear any representations in his favour, brought him to trial before a court of American officers, by whom he was condemned. He even rejected the last prayer of the enthusiastic soldier, that he might be saved from a felon's death, and had him hanged, with all the usual attendant circumstances of disgrace—a piece of stern but perhaps necessary justice, and, in spite of the outcry raised at the time, apparently in strict accordance with the laws of war. Timely information of André's capture enabled Arnold to escape from his house, where Washington was momentarily expected, and to obtain shelter on board the English man-of-war which had conveyed André to the ill-fated meeting. Washington was surprised on reaching Arnold's house to find no host, but it was not till he had paid a visit to West Point, and found the commander absent there also, that he discovered the real state of the case.

While things were thus at a standstill round New York, the war had been actively prosecuted in Carolina. Alarmed by the fall of Charleston, the Americans had sent General Gates to take the command there; they regarded him as their ablest general, and he figured in some degree as a rival to Washington. He found the English in possession of a line of country extending from Pedee river to Fort 96. The main body of the English, under the command of Lord Rawdon, lay in the neighbourhood of Camden, towards the centre of this line. Against this position Gates advanced; his march was a very difficult one; he had to make his way through a rough uncultivated country, where provisions were not to be obtained; for several days his troops had to subsist on the peaches which are there almost indigenous. He was able, in spite of these difficulties, to bring into the field a force numerically double that of the English, who were no more than 2000 strong. His troops, however, were unable to withstand the attack of a well-disciplined force. On the left and centre they at once threw down their arms and took to flight. The troops from Maryland and Delaware upon the right showed, it is true, more firmness, but the victory of the English was complete, and Lord Cornwallis, who had hurried up to assume the command, improved it to the utmost. Colonel Tarleton, an officer of indefatigable energy, pushed rapidly forward, and succeeded in surprising Colonel Sumter, a partisan officer, on the Catawba, and the whole army moved steadily forward to Charlotte, with the intention of invading North Carolina. A slight check sustained by a body of loyal militia, however, alarmed Cornwallis, and, together with the smallness of the number of troops at his command, induced him to postpone his forward movement till the following year. In the interval he and Lord Rawdon, his second in command, were guilty of acts of most impolitic severity. Such prisoners as could be proved to be deserters from the royal army, or to have once accepted the royal Government and to have subsequently joined Gates, were hanged. Some of the disaffected residents of Charleston were deported to Saint Augustin, while the property of others was sequestrated. Rawdon in fact went even further, and ventured to set a price on the head of every rebel. Such acts went far to alienate the people, and by weakening the security of the communications increased the difficulties of the following year, and tended to neutralize the effects of a very promising campaign.

The same success which had attended the English arms in Carolina followed the efforts of the fleet in the early part of the next year; Rodney captured from the Dutch, who had joined the coalition St. Eustatia captured. 1781. against England, the enormously wealthy island of St. Eustatia. Much of the property collected there belonged however to English owners, and a vast clamour arose when the admiral declared it all prize of war. He asserted, and it subsequently became plain, that the island was used as an entrepôt for the collection of goods which were afterwards to be supplied to the enemy. Other charges brought against him, accusing him of hasty and over rigorous action, afterwards proved to be equally ill founded, for fortunately both military and naval commanders were members of Parliament, and had full opportunity of vindicating themselves before the House, and of stripping the charges against them of the exaggerations which surrounded them. Thus General Vaughan was charged with forcible removal of all Jews from the island, but was able to produce a written document from the Jews themselves thanking him for his considerate treatment of them.

These successes soon proved to be delusive. The coalition against England was becoming too powerful to be withstood. Already a great drawn battle with the Dutch had been fought off the Doggerbank, and Sir Hyde Parker had been compelled to withdraw his shattered fleet into English quarters; and it soon became evident that we had for the present lost our supremacy of the sea, or at least were unable to keep a commanding superiority in all parts of the world at once, for to such dimensions had the war grown. Thus the French made an attack upon Jersey, which was only saved, when it had already fallen into their hands, by the intrepidity of Major Pierson, a young soldier of twenty-five, who himself lost his life by almost the last shot fired; another and more successful expedition under the Duke of Crillon assaulted Minorca; while a great armament setting out from France parted midway across the Atlantic, thus becoming two fleets, one of which, under Bailli de Suffren, was able to give us full employment in the Indian waters, while the other, under De Grasse, raised the naval power in the West Indies above our own. Rodney found himself unable to save the Island of Tobago, and, broken by the climate, was compelled to return to England. Nor was his successor Sir Samuel Hood more fortunate; a detached squadron was found sufficient to counterbalance the English fleet in the West Indies, while De Grasse sailed with the bulk of his fleet to the American coast, where his arrival at once turned the balance against us, and deprived us of that command of the sea which was absolutely necessary for our success. The fatal effects of this loss were soon to be apparent.

The first warlike event of the year was an expedition under General Arnold (who had obtained a command from his new masters) directed against Virginia, in the hope that such a diversion might assist Cornwallis in what was intended to be the main effort of the year. It produced however no great effects beyond the destruction of a considerable amount of property, and when Cornwallis set himself in motion, he found himself faced by a more formidable opponent than General Gates. At the instigation of Washington, Nathaniel Greene, a self-made general, who had risen from a blacksmith's forge, had been given command in the South. He proved himself a man of great vigour and tenacity, and though invariably beaten when opposed to any large body of English troops, he contrived to recover so quickly, that the barren name of victory was usually all that was left to the English. The campaign opened by the defeat of Colonel Tarleton, who had rashly attacked the Americans under Morgan at Cow-pens; nor could Cornwallis succeed in getting between the victorious general and Greene's army; their united forces were compelled however to fall back before Cornwallis' advance till they had evacuated the whole of North Carolina. Political necessities checked the English advance, and Cornwallis attempted, without much success, to consolidate the royal influence in Battle of Guildford Courthouse. March 15. the province; but, by the middle of March, Greene found himself again in a position to re-enter Carolina and to give battle to Cornwallis in the neighbourhood of Guildford. He occupied a position at Guildford Courthouse; as usual the English were victorious, as usual they reaped nothing from their victory, for Cornwallis, finding his troops much diminished in numbers and not meeting with the assistance he expected from the inhabitants, was compelled to fall back upon Wilmington. Greene did not long pursue him, for by thus withdrawing to the coast he had laid open the road into South Carolina, where Rawdon had been left with a small detachment. Greene saw his opportunity, and pushing boldly southward, again approached the English post at Camden. Afraid to attack Rawdon without reinforcements, he occupied a strong position upon Hobkirk's Hill, about two miles from Camden. There Rawdon thought it prudent to attack him, and he was driven from his position. The ludicrous insufficiency of the Hobkirk's Hill. April 25, 1781. English troops (there were but 900 engaged in the battle) again prevented them from using their victory, and Greene was enabled, without risking another engagement, to compel Rawdon to withdraw his troops to the immediate defence of Charleston.

Meanwhile two courses had been open to Cornwallis at Wilmington; he might either hurry in pursuit of Greene and assist the hard pressed army of Rawdon, or push northward and effect a junction with the Virginian expedition, which has already been mentioned, under Arnold and Phillips. To pursue the first course was to give up all his previous successes, to relinquish all hope of striking a decisive blow; for independent action his own army, numbering only 1500, was too small: he decided therefore to march northward, and in May formed a junction with the expedition, by which the number of his troops was raised to 7000. He left Wilmington on the day on which the battle of Hobkirk's Hill was fought. Till the heat of summer compelled a cessation of active fighting, Cornwallis was always superior to his enemy; but as the autumn advanced, the Americans, who had been constantly reinforced, were again a match Position of the English armies. for him. The three English armies were then acting—the main body, 10,000 strong, under Clinton at New York—Cornwallis' army, about 7000 strong, on the coast of Virginia—Rawdon's handful of men, now under the command of Colonel Stewart, a little in advance of Charleston. Before the close of the year the whole of South Carolina and Georgia were lost, with the exception of Charleston and Savannah; for Greene, coming down from his summer position on Battle of Eutaw. Sept. 8. the Santee Hills, had succeeded, after a very severe struggle at the Eutaw Springs, in obliging Colonel Stewart to retire to Charleston Neck, leaving the whole open country to be overrun by the Americans.

The position of Cornwallis was also becoming critical. Cut off from support on the south, his only hope was to fight his way northwards to join Clinton, or to receive large reinforcements from this general by sea; but it was not likely that Washington would allow his army to be neutralized by the English troops in New York. It was almost certain that he would turn his attention southward, join General Cornwallis in Virginia. Wayne in Virginia, and render a northward movement of the English impossible. The only real hope was from the sea, but the sea was no longer a secure basis of operations. The English fleet, now under the command of Admiral Graves, who had succeeded Arbuthnot, tried its strength against De Grasse in September. The action was indecisive, but it became evident that, when all the fleets were joined, the French could muster thirty-six sail of the line in the Bay of Chesapeake, while the English force was no more than twenty-five. But as yet the English did not acknowledge the naval superiority of their enemies, and Cornwallis, acting as he believed, though apparently erroneously, on instructions from Clinton, took possession of Yorktown, a village on the high southern bank of York river, and there awaited assistance. The defensive position thus taken up by the English army and the want of energy shown is explained by the news which had reached Clinton, that the French were thinking of withdrawing if the war should last beyond the current year. He believed that, could he contrive to weather the difficulties which surrounded him, the opposition of the Americans, unable to stand alone, would on the loss of their allies disappear without further effort on his part. His hope was not unfounded; it was in truth a critical moment for the Americans. At a meeting between the American generals and De Grasse, the Admiral had declared that he had orders not to remain longer than November; the nation was on the verge of bankruptcy; the New England States, with the selfishness which had marked them throughout, were ready American armies close round Yorktown. to give in. It was thus absolutely necessary for Washington to act quickly and to win some striking success. What Clinton therefore ought to have foreseen happened; Washington turned his attention towards Virginia, and undeterred by an assault on the New England States which Clinton attempted as a diversion, the mass of the American army began steadily to gather round Cornwallis. The position which he occupied was not a happy one, it was in fact untenable without command of the sea, which, as has been mentioned, had already been lost. He occupied the southern bank of the York river, there about a mile wide, and on the northern side the little village of Gloucester. The fortifications were of no great value, and the advanced posts were at once withdrawn upon the receipt of a despatch from Clinton, stating that there was every hope that the fleet, with 5000 men, would attempt to relieve the army, and would leave New York for that purpose in about ten days' time. This was a fatal error, as it gave the enemy positions commanding the works. The besiegers numbered 18,000, their large and powerful artillery being in part supplied by the French ships. The first parallel was completed on the 9th of October; the fire from it was overwhelming: on the 11th the second parallel was opened, nor could the bravery of the besieged prevent the capture of two advanced redoubts on the 14th, which were at once included in it. It now became evident to the besieged that the expected reinforcements had failed them, and after a brilliant sally, during which many of the enemy's guns were spiked, Cornwallis, finding all his guns silenced and his ammunition drawing to a close, felt that he had to choose between surrender and an effort to withdraw his troops from their untenable position. He determined to attempt the latter plan; his scheme was a desperate one; his troops were to be transported in open boats to Gloucester, they were there to break through the enemy's lines, which were not strong in that direction, to seize the horses of the besiegers and of the neighbouring country people, and make their way to New York. The boats with their loads had already crossed once when a storm arose which rendered the further prosecution of the plan impossible, and when morning dawned Cornwallis had no alternative but to make terms. He agreed to surrender all his troops as prisoners of war, and on the 19th of October, 4000 British soldiers who remained fit for work marched out with the honours of war between the long lines of the French and American army and laid down their arms. It is worth mentioning, as a strange little piece of professional arrogance, Cornwallis compelled to surrender. Oct. 18, 1781. that when marching between the lines of French on the one side and Americans on the other, the English officers saluted punctiliously all the French officers as belonging to a regular army, but refused any acknowledgment to the Americans. This was virtually the close of the war. The infant Hercules had strangled its second serpent, as was afterwards portrayed on Franklin's medal.

The close of the war under such circumstances of failure could not but bring with it the fall of the ministry. The news arrived at a striking time, but two days before the opening of the session. With such a weapon in their hand, and with the stored-up rancour of ten years of opposition, the leaders of the Whigs pressed motion after motion against the Government. Tottering condition of the Government. Fox and Burke vied with each other in their bitter assaults, and the young Pitt, who had come into Parliament as member for Appleby, on the nomination of Sir James Lowther, rapidly assumed a high position on the same side. The Budget was in itself a proof that Lord North was yielding; the estimates were so small, that he had to explain that he intended to give up all notion of a war on a "continental plan by sending armies to march through the provinces from South to North;" he would henceforth content himself with holding some important harbours on the American coast. Outside Parliament, in the metropolitan counties, vigorous opposition meetings were held, and the public anger was raised to its climax by a succession of misfortunes which befell our arms. Admiral Kempenfeldt found himself completely outnumbered in the West Indies, and the whole of the Leeward Islands, except Barbadoes and Antigua, were lost. Minorca, which was regarded as of even more importance than Gibraltar, and the key to the Mediterranean, surrendered after a gallant defence. The Bailli de Suffren thwarted an expedition against the Cape of Good Hope, at the same time at home the Irish difficulties, which will be treated of more at length afterwards, were becoming most threatening. Under these circumstances, a motion by General Conway, that Defeat of the ministry on Conway's motion. the war on the continent of America should be discontinued was lost by one vote only, and a repetition of the same motion a week later was carried by a majority of 234 against 215. Lord George Germaine, who was pledged to the continuance of the war, withdrew from the Government, and finally a direct vote of no confidence on the 15th of March was only lost by a scanty majority of nine. North saw that further struggle was hopeless, and on the 20th compelled the King to allow him to declare the administration at an end. He went out of office with his usual tact and good humour. A great attack had been arranged for that evening, which was to be led by Lord Surrey; he and North rose at the same moment, and the cries from the rival parties could not be quelled till Fox rose and proposed a formal motion that Lord Lord North's resignation. Surrey be first heard. With admirable presence of mind, North rose and said that he would speak to that motion, and prove its inutility by declaring his government at an end. There is a well-known anecdote of his persistent good humour; expecting a long debate, the Opposition members had sent away their carriages, and as they stood awaiting them shivering in the drizzling rain, Lord North passed through them to get into his. "Gentlemen," he said, "you see the advantage of being in the secret," and drove off.

North's resignation was the complete defeat for the time of the King's plans; but George III. was a man of the most obstinate and determined character, and he by no means intended as yet to give up the fight. The Opposition which had formed the alliance to drive North from office consisted of two sections. First, the old or Revolution Whigs, as they liked to call themselves, who, true to their aristocratic principle, had chosen for their leader the wealthiest but by no means the ablest man among them, Lord Rockingham, an agriculturist, a sporting man, of respectable talents and much honesty, though without any of the gifts of oratory which are necessary for the management of a public body; and secondly, those Whigs who had owned the leadership of Chatham, and who now followed the Earl of Shelburne; a party less tied by aristocratic connections, and representing, as far as could then be represented, the real liberal interests of the country. To avoid the necessity of putting himself into the hands of his particular enemies, the Whig families, it was to this section that the King at once applied. But, as Chatham had always found, it was of itself far too weak a party in Parliament to form a satisfactory ministry. Moreover, the eagerness with which Burke and Dunning had of late years demanded financial reform, and the share they had taken in driving North from office, made it impossible for their claims to be ignored. Shelburne therefore refused the King's request. The King's discomfiture seemed quite complete when Rockingham New Whig Government. accepted office. The ministry consisted of equal numbers of the two sections of the Liberals. Rockingham, Keppel, Lord John Cavendish, the Duke of Richmond, and Mr. Fox, of the one party; Lord Shelburne, Camden, General Conway, Lord Ashburton (Dunning), and the Duke of Grafton of the other. Strangely enough, the balance between them was held by the Tory Lord Thurlow, the King's personal friend, who remained in the position of Lord Chancellor. Pitt haughtily refused to accept any subordinate office.

Three great questions at once presented themselves to the new administration,—to pacify the clamours of Ireland, to complete the economical reforms to which they were pledged, and by means of which they hoped to regain some of the power of which the successful policy of the King had robbed them, and to bring to conclusion as honourably as possible the American War.

In Ireland the agitation had been constantly on the increase since the conciliatory measures of Lord North in 1780. Free trade had been granted, but this step towards independence had opened the way to still further demands; if they had followed the Americans thus far, why not follow them a step further and demand legislative independence also? The legislative superiority of England rested mainly upon two Statutes, Poynings' Law, or the Statute of Drogheda of the reign of Henry VII., by which all Bills brought forward in the Irish Parliament, except such as regarded money, were subject to revision or suppression by the English Privy Council, and the Statute 6 George I., which asserted the right of the English Parliament to legislate for Ireland. No sooner had Grattan succeeded in his first agitation, than he proceeded, in spite even of the wishes of his friends Lord Charlemont and Burke, to set to work the same machinery for the purpose of obtaining the reversal of these statutes. As early as April 1780 he had produced, though unsuccessfully, a motion in the Irish Parliament declaratory of Irish independence. Since that time his position had become stronger, disputes in Parliament had excited the national feeling, the volunteers had completed their organization, and appointed Lord Charlemont their commander-in-chief. A great meeting of deputies from the volunteers had been held at Dungannon, which had accepted to the full Grattan's propositions. With this great armed power behind him, and reinforced by the influence of the Roman Catholics, whose interests he had lately espoused, Grattan was enabled on the 16th of April to bring forward a final and successful address declaring the perfect legislative independence of Ireland. It was carried unanimously through both Houses. In face of this pressure, though not blind to the almost inevitable evils of a dual Government, Fox and Shelburne yielded the point, and the Statute of George I. was repealed in express terms.

The ministry had entered upon office supported by a vast agitation throughout the country, by county meetings, societies and corresponding associations, and these allies outside the walls of Parliament were eager for very sweeping measures of reform in all directions, especially financial reform, limitation of the influence of the Crown, the purity of the House, and reform of the representation. All these measures had a political as well as an economical side. They all formed portions of the avowed politics of the Whigs for breaking the power of the Crown. Both revenue officers and contractors assisted to uphold Government influence; the votes of the revenue officers were said to command no less than seventy boroughs, and contracts, given not because advantageous to the public, but for political purposes, were but so many indirect bribes. But the voice of the statesman is apt to be singularly tempered by his accession to office, and the Government Bills which Burke introduced in June proved but a weak reflection of his former measure. Certain obvious abuses were removed, secret service money was diminished, and a smaller share of it allowed to the Treasury; the Pension List was cut down, and £300 fixed as the outside limit for a single pension; the whole Board of Trade, which had proved useless, was swept away; but the expenses of the Principality of Wales and the Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, together with many useless offices of the Household, and public offices, were untouched, and the whole saving effected was only about £72,000 a year. Burke in thus limiting his propositions was doubtless acting under pressure from his colleagues. His own sincerity was proved by the limitation which he set to the inordinate emolument which as Paymaster he derived from his own office. But the honesty of the ministry as a whole was somewhat compromised when they forestalled the action of their own Bill, and hurriedly granted large pensions, varying from £2600 to £3200, to Lord Grantham, to the Chancellor, and to Colonel Barré. Still further proof that a limitation of the royal power and not real reform was the object in view, was given by the reception accorded to a measure for parliamentary reform introduced by William Pitt. Chatham had always seen and asserted that some measure of parliamentary reform was necessary if influence was to give way to any true national representation. But though constantly inveighing against Government influence when in the hands of their opponents, the Whig oligarchs, to whom parliamentary influence was as necessary as it was to the King himself, had no idea of lessening their own power, and Pitt's measure for transferring it to the counties, at that time the chief homes of independence, though ably supported, was defeated by a majority of twenty, swelled by the open opposition of some of the ministry and the lukewarmness of others. Fox and the Duke of Richmond however supported him. Divisions in the Cabinet upon so important a question, scandals such as the Barré pension and the unsatisfactory carrying out of promises of economical reform, tended to lessen the popularity of the ministry. But it was the management of the great question of all, the completion, namely, of an honourable peace, which displayed chiefly the weakness of the administration.

As far as America itself was concerned the fall of Yorktown had virtually put an end to hostilities, and the declared policy of England Conclusion of the American War. reached no further than the retention of certain posts and harbours. It may be a question whether this was wise, for it is certain that the condition of the Americans was very deplorable. Bankrupt and impoverished, the Congress was in no condition to support the army in a state of efficiency, and from its factions and intrigues had so lost public confidence, that Washington was earnestly intreated to make himself dictator, and take the management of the country into his own hands. But it was impossible for the Whigs, after the language they had used in Parliament, where they had not scrupled to rejoice at American successes, and to speak of the American armies as our armies, to think of anything but peace at once and on any terms. But though the war with America thus died out, that with the allied powers of Europe was by no means ended. Spain and France had joined the Americans with the cry of independence, absurd enough from such monarchies, but with the real object of destroying the power of England, and reversing the humiliating terms forced upon them by the Treaty of 1763. The Dutch had joined the coalition for commercial objects of its own; they were desirous of destroying the English Navigation Act and of restoring the freedom of the sea. The moment seemed to have arrived when all these wishes could be gratified, and negotiations for a general peace were therefore of a twofold character and by no means easy to complete, as America was pledged not to conclude a treaty without her allies. A further complication arose from the peculiar arrangements of the English ministry, by which American affairs fell to the lot of Shelburne as Home Secretary, while Fox, his rival in the ministry, in his capacity of Foreign Minister had the duty of negotiating with the European powers. As Dr. Franklin, the most important American diplomatist, was at this time in Paris, that city became the centre of negotiations, and thither both ministers sent agents. Mr. Oswald, on the part of Lord Shelburne, began to open the business with Franklin, while Mr. Thomas Granville was accredited as plenipotentiary from Fox to arrange matters with M. Vergennes, the French minister. With singular ingratitude, the Americans, though bound not to conclude a treaty without their allies, thought it right to complete all the arrangements except the actual conclusion secretly and separately with the English, although they had not thought it beneath them to let their allies undertake all the more arduous parts of the war. Although there was some difference of opinion as to the exact manner of granting the independence of America, all parties in England were agreed that it should be granted, and as this was the sole point at issue between the countries, there was little to be done but the arrangement of boundaries and some minor details.