“At no period during our long friendship have I been more unhappy than at present. The day on which I was obliged to set out from London I had no time allowed me after a most shocking conversation with Lord Lonsdale, and I hastened home in hopes of finding you, but you were gone out. It was to inform you that upon his seeing me by no means in good humour, he challenged it roughly, and said, ‘I suppose you thought I was to bring you into Parliament. I never had any such intention.’ In short, he expressed himself in the most degrading manner, in presence of a low man from Carlisle, and one of his menial servants. The miserable state of low spirits I had, as you too well know, laboured under for some time before made me almost sink under such unexpected insulting behaviour. He insisted rigorously on my having solicited the office of Recorder of Carlisle; and that I could not, without using him ill resign it until the duties which were now required of it were fulfilled, and without a sufficient time being given for the election of a successor. Thus was I dragged away as wretched as a convict; and in my fretfulness I used such expressions as excited him almost to fury, so that he used such expressions towards me that I should have, according to the irrational laws of honour sanctioned by the world, been under the necessity of risking my life, had not an explanation taken place.... I am down at an inn, in wretched spirits, and ashamed and sunk on account of the disappointment of hopes which led me to endure such grievances. I deserve all that I suffer. I may be kept hanging on for weeks, till the election and Midsummer Sessions are over; and I am at the same time distracted what to do in my own county, as to the state of which I expect letters every day. I am quite in a fever. O my old and most intimate friend, what a shocking state am I now reduced to! I entreat of you, if you possibly can, to afford me some consolation, directed to me here, and pray do not divulge my mortification. I will endeavour to appear indifferent; and as I now resign my Recordership, I shall gradually get rid of all communication with this brutal fellow.” In Boswell’s correspondence Lord Lonsdale’s name only reappears once. Writing to Mr. Temple on the 21st July, he remarks, “I parted from the northern tyrant in a strange equivocal state, for he was half irritated, half reconciled; but I promise you I shall keep myself quite independent of him.” Parliament was dissolved in July, and Boswell proposed once more to offer his services to the Ayrshire constituency. He ultimately determined more wisely, remarking to Mr. Temple that “he did not go to Ayrshire, finding that he could only show how small a party he had.”