"Edmund Burke, too, was in a mighty great rage, And declared Lord North the disgrace of his age; His plans and his conduct he treated with scorn, And thought it a curse that he'd ever been born. Derry down, down, down, derry down. "So hated was he, Fox and Burke they both swore, They infamous were if they enter'd his door; But, prithee, good neighbour, now think on the end, Both Burke and Fox call him their very good friend! Derry down, down, down, derry down. "Now Fox, North, and Burke, each is a brother, So honest, they swear, there is not such another; No longer they tell us we're going to ruin, The people they _serve_ in whatever they're doing. Derry down, down, down, derry down. * * * * * "But Chatham, thank heaven! has left us a son; When _he_ takes the helm, we are sure not undone; The glory his father revived of the land, And Britannia has taken Pitt by the hand. Derry down, down, down, derry down!" The King, as a matter of course, thwarted the new ministers from the outset, and made no secret that he wished that Lord North, whom now he hated as much as Fox, was "eighty or ninety or dead." He quarrelled with the Administration over the amount of an allowance to the Prince of Wales, and saw an opportunity to dismiss it on the question of Fox's India Bill, by which measure powers were sought to transfer the control of the great dominion that Warren Hastings had built up from the East India Company to a Board of seven commissioners, who should hold office for five years and be removable only on an Address to the Crown from either House of Parliament. This was bitterly opposed by the merchant class, who saw in it a precedent for the revocation of other charters; but the clause that aroused the greatest bitterness was that in which it was laid down that the appointment of the seven commissioners should be vested in Parliament, and afterwards in the Crown. This was, of course, equivalent to vesting the appointments and the enormous patronage attaching thereto in the Ministry, and "it was an attempt," said Lord Thurlow, "to take the diadem from the King's head and put it on that of Mr. Fox." The Bill was fought with every weapon, but it passed the Commons by 208 to 102, and in the Lords there was no division on the first reading. The King, however, was determined the measure should make no further progress, and he gave Lord Temple a paper written in his own royal hand: "That he should deem those who should vote for it not only not his friends, but his enemies; and that if he (Earl Temple) could put this in stronger words, he had full authority to do so."[224] The result of this was that ministers found themselves in a minority of twelve on a question of adjournment, and the Bill itself was thrown out on December 17, by 95 to 76.