insignificant minority of the people of Ireland, and how the right of legislating for Ireland had been completely secured for the English Parliament by the Act of 1719. The Protestants also complained that, while the native Irish manufacture of frieze was unmolested, the attempt to introduce the English woollen trade had been repressed since 1699, while the Ulster linen industry had not been encouraged. This state of things caused great discontent, as was shown by the agitation against Wood's halfpence; but, on the whole, Ireland had been quiet until the outbreak of the American war, and even till the colonists were joined by European states. To withstand this formidable coalition the English were obliged to withdraw many of their troops from Ireland, and in 1779 their place was taken by Protestant volunteers, who were allowed to enrol themselves, and to whom the government furnished arms.

The volunteers.

Encouraged by the example of America, the volunteers soon formed the notion of using their arms as the Americans had done, to secure concessions for their country, and so formidable was their attitude that in 1780 the English Parliament, which had already made some slight concessions, annulled a great many of the restrictions on Irish trade. Encouraged by this success, the volunteers supported Grattan, a member of the Irish Parliament, in drawing up a Declaration of Right, demanding legislative independence for Ireland. This was accepted by the Irish Parliament in April, 1782, and the English Parliament passed measures by which the Act of 1719 was repealed, and Poynings' Act was so far modified that the Irish Parliament became independent.

Grattan's Declaration of Right.

Lord Shelburne becomes Prime Minister.

In July, 1782, the Marquess of Rockingham died. From the outset, the division in the ministry between Rockingham, Fox and Burke, who had the confidence of Parliament, and Shelburne, who was the favourite of the king, had been very marked. Fox and Burke would have had the Duke of Portland for Premier, and when George appointed Shelburne, Fox resigned and Burke followed him. Shelburne formed an administration from Chatham's followers, and those of the Rockingham Whigs who had not followed Fox and Burke, and

he boldly gave the post of Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons to young William Pitt.

Treaty of

The negotiations for peace having been successful, England acknowledged the independence of the United States, and in 1783 a formal peace was concluded at Versailles between Versailles. England, France, Spain, and Holland. By this treaty England gave up Minorca to the Spaniards and Tobago to the French, but for the most part the foreign possessions remained as before. Nothing, however, could make up to England for the loss of her American colonies, and as these have increased and multiplied mainly through emigration from England herself, the importance of their separation from England has become more and more clear. In the matter of trade we have never done so much with them as we used to do when they were under our flag. When the United States were our colonies, they consumed per man more than £1 worth a year of English goods. They have never done so much since, and now consume per head about 10s. worth.

Shelburne forced to resign.

Even before the preliminaries of peace had been settled, Shelburne found himself exposed to the attack both of his old opponents and of his recent colleagues. No one had been more unsparing in his denunciation of Lord North than Fox, and yet Fox and Burke united with Lord North in order to turn out Shelburne. Nothing equal to this The coalition coalition for inconsistency had ever been seen in the ministry. English Parliament, and both king and nation were wroth at the unnatural alliance. But in the House of Commons Fox and North had a large majority, who carried amendments in the address to the crown proposed by the government in 1783; and on February 24 Shelburne resigned. To no one in the kingdom was the coalition more distasteful than to George himself. He looked on North as a deserter, and on Fox as a personal enemy, whom he had himself driven from office in 1774. However, after vainly attempting various unsuccessful combinations, the king was forced to give way, and after thirty-seven days' interval the coalition ministry came into power, with the Duke of Portland as nominal Prime Minister, Fox and North being the Secretaries of State.

The king, however, had no intention of allowing this arrangement to be permanent, and he found an opportunity of striking at the

India under

the East Indian Company.

coalition when they brought in their East India. Bill. We saw that the victories of Plassey and Wandewash had shown the superiority of the English and their Sepoys over the native soldiers and the French troops respectively. In 1760 Clive came home, but in his absence Major Munro, in 1764, defeated the Nabob of Oude at Buxar and entered Allahabad. In 1765 Clive returned to India, and he made the East India Company rulers of an extensive territory by taking over, by a deed granted by the Great Mogul, the districts of Bengal, Orissa, and Behar, which had been governed by the Nabob of Bengal. The Nabob was not deposed, he was only pensioned, and the government was still conducted in his name, but the English company were the real rulers.

Miserable

the natives.

Though they had thus, accidentally as it were, become rulers, the object of the East India Company was still to make money. With such an object as the end of government, it is no wonder that corruption and oppression everywhere condition of prevailed; and the new rule became a curse to the natives. Famine followed famine, and the Ganges was sometimes choked with corpses. At last stories of these deeds reached England, and the natives found a strong advocate in Edmund Burke, who, whether the victims were colonists, Irish, or Hindoos, was always on the side of the oppressed. Clive, undoubtedly, did what he could to put down corruption; but the forces against him were too strong, and Parliament, urged by Burke, determined to take the matter in hand.

Lord North's
Regulating

A commission inquired into the case, and in 1773 Lord North passed his Regulating Act, by which the three presidencies of Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay were united under the governor-general of Bengal; and Warren Hastings, who was then president of the Bengal council, was made the first governor-general. The governor was to be assisted by a council, and a high court of justice to administer English law was also created.

Act.

The new governor-general was a man of very great ability, thoroughly versed in all the Indian arts of intrigue, and on the whole he administered the affairs of

Warren

Hastings.

the company with great success. The greatest danger to the

company's power arose from the ambition of Hyder Ali of Mysore, a robber chief, who had raised himself to independence, and threatened to overwhelm Madras. Hastings was driven to the last extremity to defend it, but in 1781 Hyder Ali was defeated by Sir Eyre Coote at Porto Novo-a name which recalls the old Portuguese settlements. To supply money for the struggle, and also to pay the company's dividend, Hastings had been forced to most unprincipled acts: he had lent English troops for hire to the Nabob of Oude, and he had by force and cajolery obtained large sums from the Rajah of Benares, and also from the Begums or Princesses of Oude.

Bill for dealing

with the

affairs of the East India Company.

When the news of Hastings' high-handed proceedings became known, Parliament was again called on to interfere, and had a good excuse for doing so, for in spite of all Hastings' efforts the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. Accordingly, the coalition ministry drew up a bill by which the management of the commercial affairs of the company was to be left to the directors; but political affairs were to be put under a board of seven persons nominated by Parliament for four years, and afterwards by the crown. So far as the bill affected the natives, it was good, for it had been drawn up by Burke; but the bill was not judged on its merits. The opposition saw that its effect would be to give the present majority in Parliament the whole control of East Indian patronage, and, in fact, would provide them with a gigantic engine of patronage with which to secure their ill-gotten power. Under these circumstances the bill was so distasteful to the king, to the opposition, and to the East India Company itself, that George ventured on a course which in itself was highly unconstitutional; for when the bill came on for second reading in the Lords, he authorized Pitt's cousin, Lord Rejection of Temple, son of George Grenville, to say that "whothe India Bill. ever voted for the India Bill was not only not his friend, but would be considered by him as an enemy." This influence secured the rejection of the bill, and the king, overjoyed by his success, demanded the seals from the coalition officers that very night.

The coalition ministry was dismissed on December 18, and on December 23 it was announced that William Pitt had formed

Struggle to

place Pitt

in office.

a government from the king's friends, and from the old followers of Lord Chatham. Then a great struggle ensued. George had made up his mind to dissolve Parliament, but he did not wish to dissolve until the conduct of the coalition had been thoroughly understood by the country. On the other hand, Fox and North wished to drive Pitt from office as soon as possible. But against all their eloquence Pitt stood firm. It was in vain that the old ministers joked Pitt on his age, and laughed at "a kingdom trusted to a schoolboy's care." In vain they petitioned the king to form a strong government, and threatened not to vote the supplies or to pass the Mutiny Act. It was soon seen that Pitt's was the winning side. The lords supported him, the merchants of the city of London, who had been the staunch friends of his father, sent him an address. His friends in the House steadily increased, and at last, on March 8, a motion of Fox against the ministers was carried by one vote only. Two days afterwards the Mutiny Bill was passed, and on the 25th Parliament was dissolved. The election which followed was a signal triumph for Pitt and the king. No less than one hundred and sixty of the friends of the coalition lost their seats, and the wits of the day called them "Fox's Martyrs "

From his boy

Pitt and

the king.

The new Prime Minister was a wonderful man. hood he had been trained to be a statesman, and circumstances had given him the opportunity while he was still young enough to make use of it. Moreover, Pitt was the first premier since the beginning of the reign who had possessed the confidence of both the king and the nation, and consequently business was done with an ease and celerity which for a long time had been unknown. To his delight George found that his young minister in the main agreed with his own views, and had so much administrative talent that he could safely be entrusted to carry them out by himself. Consequently the popularity of George steadily increased. For the first twenty-three years of his reign he was undoubtedly very unpopular, for he was regarded as the author of the unpopular acts of the government; but he now began to get credit for Pitt's success, and the feeling of the nation underwent a complete change.

One of Pitt's first acts was to pass an India Act. By it he