An address to the king in the same spirit was passed, and similar motions and addresses were repeated until parliament was prorogued with a discontented speech from the throne, and it was dissolved on the day following, March 25, 1874; thus ending for the time this threatening contest between the Crown and the most important part of the legislature, and transferring the arena of conflict to the hustings. By the royal will, Pitt, though only in his twenty-fifth year, was established as Prime Minister of England, uniting in himself the offices of first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer; his colleagues being those already known as “the king’s friends,” or youthful aspirants to power willing to tread in their steps. At the elections, the opposition laboured under the disadvantage of leaving the patronage of administration in the hands of their antagonists, and though the contests were obstinate, the Court influence and the king’s name, which was used openly in defiance of the privileges of parliament, secured a majority of seats at once, confirming the apprehensions of the Whig party, and fixing Pitt in security at the pinnacle of power. Horace Walpole has pictured the feelings of the day:-- “The Court struck a blow at the Ministers, but it was the gold of the East India Company, that nest of monsters (which Fox’s Bill was to demolish), that really conjured up the storm, and has diffused it all over England. On the other hand Mr. Pitt has braved the majority of the House of Commons, has dissolved the existent one, and, I doubt, given a wound to that branch of the legislature, which, if the tide does not turn, may be very fatal to the constitution. The nation is intoxicated, and has poured in addresses of thanks to the Crown for exerting the prerogative _against_ the palladium of the people. The first consequence will probably be, that the Court will have a considerable majority upon the new Elections.” The aversion to the late Coalition Ministry was turned to account by the Court; the elections showed the opposition, so strong before the dissolution, in a woeful minority; the great Whig families, Horace Walpole wrote-- “have lost all credit in their own counties; nay, have been tricked out of seats where the whole property was their own; and, in some of those cases, a _Royal_ finger has too evidently tampered, as well as singularly and revengefully towards Lord North and Lord Hertford.... Such a proscription, however, must have sown so deep resentment as it was not wise to provoke, considering that permanent fortune is a jewel that in no Crown is the most to be depended upon.”