1804.] PITT PRESSES FOR AN ADMINISTRATION ON A BROAD BASIS. 431 consistent with a sense of duty, forbear any longer a direct opposition to the measures of administration. "From the 22nd of April to May the 2nd, there were frequent communications verbally between the king and Mr. Pitt through the Chancellor, which led to Mr. Pitt writing a letter to his lordship to be communicated to his majesty; having, during that intercourse, been encouraged to submit his thoughts to the king respecting a new administration, at the head of which he should be." This is Mr. Rose's account. * Lord Eldon is accused by the biographer of Mr. Addington of having betrayed his political chief; and lord Campbell thinks the charge is completely established. We leave the consideration of this question of personal character to the minute historians. It is sufficient for us to select the more important circumstances of this negotiation. The letter from Mr. Pitt to the Chancellor, which was submitted to the king on the 2nd of May, stated "how desirable it would be, in the present circumstances of this country and of Europe, that an administration should be formed on a broad basis, combining the best talents and the great weight of property of the country; and with that view earnestly recommended including lord Grenville and his friends, and Mr. Fox and his friends." Mr. Rose, who was in the confidence of Mr. Pitt, wrote to the Chancellor on the 4th, urging the same course. Lord Eldon immediately answered, "that he thought the advice to form an administration on the basis alluded to would be the very worst that could be given; adding terms of the highest reprobation, and in a style of acrimony." § On the 6th, the king wrote to Mr. Pitt. His majesty required of him, before he would consent that he should form an administration, that he would never agitate or support Catholic Emancipation or the Repeal of the Test Act; his majesty disapproved of the conduct of lord Grenville and Mr. Dundas when they went out of office; he hoped in a new administration Mr. Pitt would include as many of his majesty's present servants as possible; to the admission of Mr. Fox in the administration the king expressed an absolute negative. In the autumn of that year the king told Mr. Rose, "that he had taken a positive determination not to admit Mr. Fox into his counsels, even at the hazard of a civil war." ¶ Bonaparte was at the gates; and the king would risk something far higher than his Crown,-the lives of his people, the independence of his country, for a miserable personal pique, which he was compelled to lay aside two years afterwards. In an evil hour Pitt complied with the will of his obstinate sovereign. The Grenvilles refused to take office without Fox. Pitt had stated in his letter of the 2nd of May that he would not agitate for Catholic Emancipation during the king's lifetime; but he contrived to evade giving the monstrous pledge required by the king, that he would never support the claims of the Catholics or the Repeal of the Test Act. In an evil hour Pitt accepted the post of prime minister, under the limitations prescribed by the king. On the 10th of May, Addington resigned.** Grenville, on the 8th, had written to Pitt, on the part of himself and the other members of the Opposition, declining his offers: "We rest our determination solely on our strong sense of the impropriety of our

* "Diary," vol. ii. p. 113.

+ "Lives of the Chancellors," chap. excviii.
Rose, vol. ii. p. 114. § Ibid., p. 116.
Ibid., p. 117.

66

Ibid., p. 156. ** See Diary of Lord Colchester," vol. i. p. 508. "He told us he had resigned, and should pack up his awls." The transcriber, or the printer, of this Diary, must imagine that Addington,

432

HIS FAILURE-HIS RETURN TO POWER.

[1804.

becoming parties to a system of government, which is to be formed, at such a moment as the present, on a principle of exclusion."* On the 18th of May, William Pitt, First Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer, took the oaths and his seat in the House of Commons, upon his re-election for the University of Cambridge. On the 18th of May, the Senate of France, by their decree, declared Napoleon Bonaparte Emperor of the French.

The indiscretion, to use no harsher term, of the Addington Ministry had contributed towards placing Bonaparte on the throne. Lord Malmesbury thus writes in his Diary:-"In the beginning of February, the measures concerted by Pichegru, Moreau, &c., were confided to me. They were represented as immanquable. The idea was the restoration of the monarchy under at Bourbon prince. Their plans were extensive, and, as they thought, well and secretly arranged." It is not likely that what lord Malmesbury knew was concealed from the leading members of the Administration. He adds, that "whenever the event became certain, and the moment arrived that a more conspicuous character was necessary, lord Hertford was to appear in the double character of making peace and restoring the old dynasty." Lord Hertford the second marquis-was not a very "conspicuous character" in 1804, although he figured in the court scandals of 1814. Nevertheless the lord of Ragley might have been considered by the French emigrants as the noblest representative of the British aristocracy; and the French Bonapartists might have regarded him as impersonating the British monarchy. Pichegru went to Paris in January, where Georges Cadoudal, one of the insurgents in Brittany, had also arrived. On the 17th of February, the Minister of Justice made a Report to the First Consul, of the discovery of a conspiracy. It begins thus:-" New plots have been hatched by England." It concludes by saying, "England had no hopes of accomplishing her design but by the assassination of the First Consul." The Report implicates Pichegru, Georges, and Moreau-with others designated as brigands. Georges and Pichegru, after some time had elapsed, were apprehended. Georges was executed; Pichegru was found strangled in prison; and Moreau was exiled. The conspirators denied that the assassination of Bonaparte was any part of their plot. Although it is perfectly clear that no idea of assassination could ever have been contemplated by the most violent of English statesmen, the complicity of the Ministry with the scheme of overturning the consular government, and restoring the monarchy, was reasonably inferred by the discovery of a clandestine correspondence between Mr. Drake, our Minister at Bavaria, and some disaffected persons in France, which correspondence was carried on by a spy, who betrayed Drake to the French government. Mr. Spencer Smith, our envoy at Wurtemburg, was also involved in these intrigues. Official notes passed between Talleyrand and lord Hawkesbury upon the conduct of these envoys; and in answer to the remonstrances of the French government, our Secretary for Foreign Affairs maintained, that "a

in the humility of the moment, thought with the citizen in Julius Cæsar-"Truly, sir, in respect of a fine workman, I am but, as you would say, a cobbler-all that I live by is with the awl." *Court and Cabinets of George III." vol. iii. p. 352.

1804.] CONSPIRACY AGAINST THE FIRST CONSUL-THE DUC D'ENGHIEN.

433

minister in a foreign country is obliged, by the nature of his office, and the duties of his situation, to abstain from all communication with the disaffected of the country where he is accredited, as well as from every act injurious to the interests of that country; but he is not subject to the same restraints with respect to countries with which his sovereign is at war."* This is very doubtful morality. When lord Hawkesbury said that "belligerent powers have an acknowledged right to avail themselves of all discontents that may exist in countries with which they may be at war," he did not very logically close his argument by reproaching the French for their encouragement of Irish rebels. The murder of the duc d'Enghien, the only son of the duc de Bourbon, and grandson of the prince de Condé, quickly followed the discovery of what French writers call the Anglo-Bourbon conspiracy. He was residing in the State of Baden; was carried off to France by a troop of horse which had crossed the Rhine in the night; was conducted to Paris on the 20th of March, heavily fettered; was hurried to the Castle of Vincennes, and was subjected the same night to an examination by a military commission, who sentenced him to death. He was shot before dawn, in the ditch of the castle, by the light of torches. His murder produced a profound sensation throughout all civilized countries. Thiers has a few epigrammatic sentences on the conduct of Bonaparte in this hateful transaction. "The sage Consul had suddenly become a madman. He was the injured man who breathes only vengeance; he was the victorious man voluntarily braving the enemies that he is sure to conquer. The better to defy his adversaries, and to satisfy his ambition at the same time as his anger, he put the imperial crown upon his head."+

Parties opposed to Mr. Pitt's government-Indications of a new Grand Alliance-Napoleon and the army at Boulogne-Coronation of Napoleon-His letter to the king-Addington joins the ministry-War with Spain-Charges against Lord Melville-His impeachmentTreaty with Russia-Annexation of Genoa-Nelson's chase after the French and Spanish fleets-Sir Robert Calder's naval action-Napoleon's anxiety at Boulogne-He breaks up the camp-March into Germany-Surrender of the Austrian army at Ulm-Nelson takes the command of the fleet off Cadiz-Victory of Trafalgar-Death of Nelson-His Funeral -French enter Vienna-Austerlitz-Peace of Presburg-Pitt's failing health-Death of Pitt.

WHEN Mr. Pitt returned to power in May, 1804, he did not enter the House of Commons with his old confidence in an overwhelming majority. There were three parties who were either wholly or partially opposed to the government. The Addington party was sore and was capricious. The Grenville party was disgusted at the acceptance of office by Pitt, without having stoutly resisted the king's system of exclusion. The Fox party was systematically opposed to the war-policy which had been pursued since 1793. The ministry could only absolutely command about 230 votes; and it would be beaten whenever the three neutral or opposition parties coalesced.* There was a great trial of strength on the 18th of June, in the largest House since