In the year 1785, owing to a severe family affliction*, I had some intention of retiring from public life, and offered to resign my seat for Lestwithiel, in Cornwall, which I had procured through the medium of the Minister. The friendly feeling he expressed, in the following letter he sent me on that occasion, does him much credit.

Letter from Mr Pitt to John Sinclair, Esq.

MY DEAR SIR,

Downing Street, May 17. 1785.

I feel very sensibly the kind proof of your zeal and friendship at such a moment, and truly lament the unfortunate cause which deprives us at present of your assistance. As far as numbers are in question, a single vote, though always of some consequence, is, I trust, not now so material as once seemed possible. I am not, however, the less thankful to you for the accommodation you propose, though very glad to think it unnecessary. Believe me, my Dear Sir, yours very sincerely, W. PITT.

I

In 1786, I resolved to make an extensive tour through the northern countries of Europe, which, in a political point of view, were at that time probably the most interesting. found, wherever I went, the strongest wish to obtain some accurate account of the splendid character and brilliant talents of that great statesman, who had recently appeared on the stage of British politics. I was in consequence induced to draw up in French, the following brief sketch of the endowments of the British Minister. The celebrated Mirabeau,

The loss of my first wife, Sarah, daughter of Alexander Maitland, Esq. of Stoke Newington, to whom I was much attached. It was to relieve the grief I felt on that melancholy event, that I took a long journey through all the northern countries of Europe, which shall afterwards be frequently alluded to. She left only two daughters, Sarah, who wrote the celebrated letter, "On the Principles of the Christian Faith," which has gone through sixteen editions, and Janet, married to Sir James Colquhoun of Luss, Baronet.

whom I met at Berlin, and with whom I had much friendly intercourse, expressed himself highly gratified with this sketch, and undertook to improve the style, as I was not thoroughly master of the niceties of the French language. He returned it with a note, of which the following is a copy:

"Je vous renvoie votre portrait de Pitt, avec quelques corrections de style, et j'y joins les trois lettres que vous avez desirées pour Paris. Faites m'écrire, je vous prie, jusqu'à quelle heure precise de demain matin, ou de ce soir, je puis garder les feuilles que vous m'avez confiées. J'espere avoir l'honneur de vous voir encore, avant votre depart

19. Novembre 1786."

Character of the Right Honourable William Pitt.

Drawn up by Sir John Sinclair, at Petersburgh, in August 1786, and the language afterwards corrected by Mirabeau at Berlin.

Guillaume Pitt, premier Ministre d'Angleterre, peut avoir, à present, environs vingt-sept à vingt-huit ans. Tout jeune qu'il est, il n'y a personne dans le royaume, qui puisse lui contester l'emploie qu'il occupe. Charles Fox, son rival dans la chambre basse, a, sans doute, la tête bien organisée pour les affaires publiques; mais il est dissipé, occupé par les jeux les plus hazardeux, et d'un caractere si facile, qu'il est toujours plus prêt a suivre les mauvaises idées de ceux qui l'énvironnent, que les siennes, qui sont communément, par ellesmêmes, assez saines. Il a aussi eu l'absurdité de se rendre ennemi personel du Roi, par des expressions, et des discours, impolis et meprisans; et quoiqu'un Roi d'Angleterre soit quelquefois obligé de donner l'administration des affaires, et le gouvernement du royaume, à des personnes qu'il n'aime pas, il peut cependant rendre la situation d'un tel ministre

• The note was accompanied by letters of introduction to three of his friends, who, he said, were the three most interesting characters in Paris. These were, 1. Talleyrand, then the Abbé Perigord; 2. The Marquis de la Fayette; and, 3. Panchaud the celebrated Banker. The first unfortunately was not in Paris. The two latter gave me the most cordial reception, as a friend of Mirabeau.

tres desagréable, et il se sert, avec raison, de la premiere occasion favorable, pour chasser un officier, qui oublie les devoirs et le respect dus à son souverain, quand ce changement n'est pas contraire au bonheur publique.

Le caractere de Monsieur Pitt est tout-à-fait different. Dans sa vie domestique il est si temperé, que ses ennemis même, lui reprochent sa continence comme un crime; et l'Angleterre est à present si degenerée, qu'il y a des personnes qui soutiennent, sans rougir, qu'un ministre d'état est incapable de remplir les fonctions de son emploi, sans s'abandonner quelquefois aux excès. Il aime le travail, et il s'occupe sans cesse des affaires qui en dependent. Il reçoit avec plaisir des informations de quelque personne que ce soit, mais il poursuit toujours ses propres sentimens, sans se rendre aux sentimens des autres, soit par lassitude, au par foiblesse. Personne ne comprend un sujet plus promptement que lui. Il lui arrive quelquefois, comme à d'autres personnes habiles et penetrantes, de decider trop vite; mais il ne craint pas de changer son opinion, quand il est convaincu par la raison.

Son eloquence ressemble à celle de Ciceron. Elle est pleine, et non concise. Il ne manque jamais un mot, même quand il parle sans s'y être preparé: et ses periodes sont si elegantes, et si bien arrangées, qu'il est impossible d'en rayer, ou d'en alterer un mot. Toute cette elegance est aussi accompagnée de force, de feu, et d'esprit; et il est justement distingué par cette rare félicité, que quand il se leve au sublime le plus grand, il ne descend jamais à la hauteur, d'où il prend son essor.

Il surmonte les difficultés de son état avec beaucoup de succes. Il est ferme, mais respectueux, à l'égard de son souverain. Il est attentif et sociable avec ses amis, et ceux qui le supportent dans les deux chambres de Parlement; et il fait tout son possible pour se rendre populaire, par une attention continuelle aux veritables interêts de sa patrie, et non par une complaisance aveugle aux prejugés du peuple. Quand il est

une fois decidé, il ne craint rien; et ses amis esperent, en con sequence, avec beaucoup de raison, qu'il fera un ministre de la guerre, aussi heureux, et aussi formidable, que l'a été son pere, le fameux Chatham, et qu'il l'imitera, avec un attention invariable, aux merites de ceux en qui il mettra sa confiance, aussi bien qu'en la force et en la grandeur de son esprit.

Il s'est aussi occupé jusqu'à present de l'administration interne, qui étoit dans un tres grand desordre. Il a arrangé les finances d'Angleterre d'un façon que peu des personnes pensoit possible. Il a non seulement trouvé des ressources pour toutes les debtes publiques, accumulées par l'extravagance des ministres pendant la guerre Americaine, mais il a aussi mit en sureté un surplus d'un million de livres sterling, pour affranchir la nation des charges dont elle est accablée. On dit, qu'il se propose de s'appliquer aussi à l'avenir aux politiques étrangeres, pour placer l'Angleterre, dans cette situation respectable, à laquelle elle a droit, chez les souverains du monde, et de faire tous les traités necessaires, pour augmenter le commerce de sa patrie, et pour conserver la balance de l'Europe.

Enfin, pour repeter les complimens, qu'on lui a fait dans le Parlement, même par mi Lord North, un de ces rivaux et predecesseurs, "Il est né ministre, et il ressemble à un diamant sans tache."

Such was the opinion which I then entertained of this celebrated Minister; and for some time I had no reason to express myself otherwise. At first, indeed, he gave me the entrè to his house in Downing Street, and the porter had instructions to admit me whenever I called, as if I had been a member of the Cabinet. Gradually we became more estranged, and ultimately our intercourse was chiefly carried on through the medium of Mr Secretary Dundas, by whose friendly and patriotic assistance, I obtained the support of the Minister to some measures of great national importance.

The first of these was the issue of Exchequer bills in 1792, for the relief of the commercial and manufacturing interests.

I had proposed to move the appointment of a select committee, for the consideration of this subject; but was informed by Mr Dundas, to whom I had communicated my intention, "That unless something definite was previously arranged, the appointment of any committee to take up the subject loosely, might produce mischief, with very little prospect of good; but that if I had any specific ideas to state, Government would be glad to receive them." In consequence of this hint, I transmitted to Mr Pitt, on the 16th of April 1793, my plan for restoring the commercial credit of the country; and, on the 24th of April following, that minister informed me that the plan had been approved of by his Majesty's Government, and that he wished to see me next morning, to fix on the members who should compose the committee.

success.

There never was a measure attended with more complete On the particulars it is unnecessary here to enter. But unfortunately I could not prevail upon the Minister to concur in another part of my proposed system, by which those commercial distresses, which have since so frequently occurred, would, in a great degree, have been prevented. My suggestion was, to check the unlimited power of issuing notes payable to the bearer on demand, by compelling bankers to find security for such issues. When I pressed Mr Pitt to adopt that part of the system, which seemed to me indispensably necessary, he replied, "That he could not at the moment. give it all the consideration it required; and as the rest of the measure had succeeded so well, there was no urgent necessity for bringing the remainder of the plan forward at present.” The want of such security, however, was the chief circumstance which brought on the crisis of 1797, and rendered the restriction on cash-payments at the Bank unavoidable. At that period I made another attempt to establish the system of licensing country bankers, but was equally unsuccessful *. The second public measure to which I procured Mr Pitt's

All these particulars are fully detailed in the History of the Revenue, third edition, vol. ii. p. 287 and 330.