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Commons, in Common Council assembled, his most respectful and grateful acknowledgments for the signal honour they have been pleased to confer on the mere discharge of his duty, in a moment of impending calamity.

"Under deep impressions of former marks of favourable construction of his conduct, during the evil hour of a dangerous foreign war, he now deems himself too fortunate to find his efforts for preventing the ruin and horrors of a civil war approved, honoured, and strengthened by the first Corporate body in the kingdom."

During the remainder of the session, which ended on the 26th of May, 1775, Lord Chatham did not attend; nor during the succeeding session, which began on the 26th of October 1775, and ended on the 23d of May 1776. His health declined so fast, he was not able.

CHAPTER XLIII.

Duke of Grafton resigns-Lord Chatham's motion to discontinue the American War; and Speeches on the same.

Ar the meeting of Parliament towards the end of October, 1775, the Duke of Grafton being con

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vinced of the hostile measures of the Cabinet against America, declared that his conscience forbade him supporting those measures in Parliament, and, therefore, he resigned the Privy Seal; which was thereupon given to Lord Dartmouth, and Lord George Germaine succeeded his Lordship as Secretary of State for America.

On the thirteenth day of May, 1777, Lord Chatham attended the House of Lords, again, to make another motion, deprecating hostilities with America. He began―

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My Lords, this is a flying moment; perhaps but six weeks left to arrest the dangers that surround us. The gathering storm may break; it has already opened, and in part burst. It is difficult for Government, after all that has passed, to shake hands with defiers of the King, defiers of the Parliament, defiers of the people. I am a defier of nobody; but if an end is not put to this war, there is an end to this country. I do not trust my judgment in my present state of health; this is the judgment of my better days; the result of forty years attention to America. They are rebels: but what are they rebels for? Surely not for defending their unquestionable rights! What have these rebels done heretofore? I remember

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when they raised four regiments on their own bottom, and took Louisbourg from the veteran troops of France. But their excesses have been great. I do not mean to be their panegyrist; but must observe in extenuation, the erroneous and infatuated counsels, which have prevailed-the door to mercy and justice has been shut against them. But they may still be taken up upon the grounds of their former submission. [Referring to their petition.] I state to you the importance of America; it is a double-market; the market of consumption, and the market of supply. This double-market for millions, with naval stores, you are giving to your hereditary rival. America has carried you through former wars, and will now carry you to your death, if you don't take things in time. In the sportsman's phrase, when you have found yourselves at fault, you must try back. You have ransacked every corner of Lower Saxony; but 40,000 German boors. never can conquer ten times the number of British freemen: they may ravage; they cannot conquer. But you would conquer, you say! Why, what would you conquer-the map of America? I am ready to meet any General Officer on the subject. [Looking at Lord Amherst] What will you do out of the protection of your fleet? In the winter, if together, they are starved; and if dispersed they are taken off in detail. I am experienced in spring. hopes and vernal promises; I know what Ministers

throw out; but at last will come your equinoctial disappointment. You have got nothing in America but stations. You have been three years teaching them the art of war. They are apt scho-* lars, and I will venture to tell your Lordships, that the American gentry will make officers enough fit to command the troops of all the European powers. What you have sent there are too many to make peace, too few to make war. If you conquer them, what then? You cannot make them respect you; you cannot make them wear your cloth. You will plant an invincible hatred in their breasts against you. Coming from the stock they do, they can never respect you. If Ministers are founded in saying there is no sort of treaty with France, there is still a moment left; the point of honour is still safe. France must be as self-destroying as England, to make a treaty while you are giving her America at the expence of twelve millions a-year. The intercourse has produced every thing to France; and England, old England, must pay for all. I have at different times made different propositions, adapted to the circumstances in which they were offered. The plan contained in the former bill, is now impracticable; the present motion will tell you where you are, and what you have now to depend upon. It may produce a respectable division in America, and unanimity at

home. It will give America an option; she has yet made no option. You have said, lay down your arms, and she has given you the Spartan answer, "come take." [Here he read his motion.]

"That an humble address be presented to his Majesty, most dutifully representing to his royal wisdom, that this House is deeply penetrated with the view of impending ruin to the kingdom, from the continuation of an unnatural war against the British Colonies in America; and most humbly to advise his Majesty to take the most speedy and effectual measures for putting a stop to such fatal hostilities, upon the only just and solid foundation, namely the removal of accumulated grievances; and to assure his Majesty, that this House will enter upon this great and necessary work with cheerfulness and dispatch, in order to open to his Majesty the only means of regaining the affections of the British Colonies, and of securing to Great Britain the commercial advantages of these valuable possessions; fully persuaded, that to heal and to redress, will be more congenial to the goodness and magnanimity of his Majesty, and more prevalent over the hearts of generous and free-born subjects, than the rigours of chastisement, and the horrors of a civil war, which hitherto have served only to sharpen resentments, and consolidate

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