HISTORY OF GREAT BRITAIN DURING THE REIGN OF QUEEN ANNE. CHAPTER I. MEANWHILE the business of the Lower House had proceeded with a tranquillity in striking contrast to the vimlant dianlan THE author regrets that through inadvertency it was omitted to place the date of the year at the top of each page. These dates should be as follows: HISTORY OF GREAT BRITAIN DURING THE REIGN OF QUEEN ANNE. CHAPTER I. MEANWHILE the business of the Lower House had proceeded with a tranquillity in striking contrast to the virulent displays of party feeling which had been exhibited by the Lords. The jealous spirit which prompted Somers and Wharton to attack their best friends, the Ministers, was but little shared by their followers in the Commons. Before the end of the year all the more important resolutions about supplies had been passed; and Godolphin and Marlborough had every reason satisfied with the liberality of the House. The sums granted for carrying on the war amounted to nearly six millions sterling. That the Tories, as a body, disapproved of the enormous expenditure upon land forces, there seems good grounds for believing, and in the present House they were at least as numerous as the Whigs; but they were content to keep their objections to themselves, and voted the public money as cheerfully as their rivals. The explanation of this supineness may be that the Tories of lower rank were men of less independent ideas than the chiefs of the party. Rochester, Nottingham, Haversham, were free and outspoken in their opposition, without a care as to what were the personal feelings. or opinions of the sovereign. Their followers seem to have |