Of the Liverpool cabinet there remained only lord Harrowby, and Messrs. Huskisson, Robinson, and Wynn. Lord Melville resigned in the course of the evening, avowing, with singular candour, the instinct upon which he acted; -he doubted the stability of the new arrangements. Four members of the household, and nine no-popery subalterns, with the same instinct as lord Melville, or the fear of dismissal, also resigned.

The last vacancy made, and the first supplied, was in the office of lord Melville. Mr. Canning, next morning, effected the appointment of the duke of Clarence as lord high admiral of England. This nomination of the heir presumptive struck the recusants with dismay. The coolness between Mr. Canning and sir John Copley appears to have endured only twenty-four hours*: the master of the rolls was appointed chancellor, with a peerage, by the title of baron Lyndhurst. Lord Anglesey was appointed master-general of the ordnance, with a seat in the cabinet, as successor to the duke of Wellington. Lord Bexley, upon reflection, withdrew his resignation. Mr. Sturges Bourne was appointed to the home department. To supply the remaining places, Mr. Canning opened a negotiation with lord Lansdowne: no official arrangements resulted; but lord Lansdowne, and the main body of the whigs, with sir Francis Burdett, volunteered

* Mr. Canning, soon after, concluded a letter to him with "Phillpotto non obstante, sincerely yours;" to which sir J. Copley replied, "Now as always-minus twenty-four hoursyours sincerely.” — Stapleton, supp. vol.

their unofficial support of Mr. Canning's government. Upon Mr. Canning's appointment to the chancellorship of the exchequer, Mr. Robinson was called to the house of peers as lord Goderich, and lord Dudley succeeded Mr. Canning as foreign secretary.

The house of commons re-assembled on the 1st of May. The mutual exchanges of place by the. two great parties had a whimsical effect: the late opposition seemed to think there was something laughable in the change; but this perception of the ridiculous was not shared on the other side. There was a numerous attendance both of members and strangers, in the vague anticipation of something interesting. Mr. Peel took advantage of a motion for a new writ to state the motives of his resignation he relied chiefly on the altered circumstances in favour of the catholics. His explanation was received with applause. His brother-in-law, Mr. Dawson, was less fortunate: he attacked the new ministry, and its coalition with the whigs, in a tone and temper contrasting strangely with the liberal feelings of which he has the reputation in every relation of life without the precincts of the house of commons. Mr. Canning detailed the circumstances which preceded his appointment. "If,” said he, “I had submitted in my person to the principle of exclusion as a friend to the catholic claims, I should have dishonoured myself; - such a submission would have been a badge of helotism, and the indelible disgrace of my political life." A tone of mutual and marked kindness was observable between him and Mr. Peel. Sir Francis Burdett and

Mr. Brougham vindicated their disinterested support of Mr. Canning's administration, as likely to promote enlightened principles of government both at home and abroad, and especially the cause of religious liberty.

The house of lords met on the following day. Lord Ellenborough called upon the ex-ministers to explain their conduct. An outpouring of explanations followed. The duke of Wellington began: he spoke at great length, and read part of a correspondence between himself and Mr. Canning. The main points of his explanation were the cold and formal tone of Mr. Canning's proposal; the slight offered to him by Mr. Canning, who withheld from him explanations which he gave lord Westmoreland! and "his (the duke's) conviction that the principle of lord Liverpool's government would be abandoned eventually."—" As to the motives imputed to him of having resigned because he was not himself appointed prime minister," he made his memorable declaration, that it was "a station with respect to which he was wholly out of the question; - to which he was unaccustomed; - in which he was not wished; for which he was unqualified. My lords," said he, "I should have been mad, or worse than mad, if I had thought of such a thing.”*

Lord Bexley said he was apprehensive of not having the same freedom of opinion in opposing the

* This is the version in what appeared to be an authorised report of his speech. In some of the reports given by the newspapers, he is made to call it “ an insane project, which certain individuals, for their own base purposes, had imputed to him."

catholic claims; but that, discovering his error, he retracted his resignation. Lord Bathurst pleaded the resignations of his colleagues, and his objection to a pro-catholic premier. Lord Westmoreland alleged his opposition to the catholics. Lord Melville asked whether he ought to have joined an administration of which he doubted the stability. All concurred in denying, with a coarse violence of language which they called indignation, the common rumour, that they resigned by concert. Lords Goderich, Lansdowne, and Anglesey, vindicated the new administration and their own conduct. Lords Londonderry and Winchelsea, and the duke of Newcastle, attacked Mr. Canning in a style of intemperate folly and clownish personality, which might excite surprise if there existed any natural connection between sense, breeding, and a peerage.

These explanations were severely canvassed by the public. The duke of Wellington asserted ignorance of the intended head of the new government, at a moment when any other man living, in his situation, — having had several conferences with Mr. Canning on the subject, — must have well known who would be that head. He alleged as a matter of surprise and offence to him the formal tone of Mr. Canning's proposal, at a moment when, as he well knew (but the public did not know), the hostility of his adherents, and his own participation in their intrigues, had provoked the resentment of Mr. Canning, The duke of Wellington's anticipations of the abandonment of the Liverpool policy towards the catholics were realised,—but by himself. It was strange that he should never have thought of

being prime minister, and been wholly ignorant of the movements of his friends to procure his appointment, at a moment when he was named expressly, and more than once, to Mr. Canning by his confidential friend Mr. Peel, as the person whose appointment "would solve all difficulties." Among these singularities in the explanation and conduct of the duke of Wellington, it is not the least curious that, after pronouncing himself disqualified in 1827, he should have thought himself qualified in 1828, in spite of the dilemma to which he had reduced himself, of disqualification on the one side, and madness or something worse on the other.

The only particular which demands reference in the other explanations is the denial of concert or confederacy by all those who resigned. The coincidence was suspicious, and they admitted that it was singular. What constitutes confederacy, may present itself as a nice and doubtful question to a mind exercised in equity, like that of lord Eldon ; but to common apprehensions there appeared in the disclaimer that obliquity which logicians call proving too much, and which is equally fatal to reasoning and to testimony.

The seceders from Mr. Canning greatly overrated their weight with the public. The appointment of the duke of Wellington to high civil office was, to adopt his own expression, "not wished." The administrative capacity of Mr. Peel, and his peculiar usefulness in the career of law reform which he had begun, made his resignation a subject of regret; but, for the other seceders, they were regarded by the intelligent and reflecting among the