You will laugh at my mentioning that, because you will not conceive that I understand it; perhaps I do not, but I perfectly remember how (I) have heard and read it described to be, and it is as different from what our present Patriots or Whigs represent it, as the Government of the Grand Senior (Signer). Poor Fitz(willia)m, whom I really love on many accounts, held me in conversation last night, his brother only being present. I do not know if he was in earnest, but I suppose that he was. He had worked himself up to commiserate the state of this country, nay, that of the King himself, [so] that I expected every instant that his heart would have burst; but to speak more to my passions, he lamented, in the terms the most attendrissants, your situation, and how much your pride, and feelings of every kind, must be hurt, and that for no estate upon earth he would be in your perilous state. I begged for a little light, and to know if there was a possibility of salvation in any position in which our affairs could be placed. He asked me then with the utmost impetuosity, what objection I had to Lord Rockfingham(210) being sent for. You may be pretty sure that if I had any, I should not have made it. I contented myself with asking how he intended to begin his operations, to which I was answered in two Latin words, de nova. If that should be, and the in nova fert animus should take place, we must as individuals be meta[mor]phosed indeed, and what will become of the public neither he, Burke, Charles, or any one of the Cavendishes I suppose knows or cares. But I think that Lord N(orth's) peremptory assurance of yesterday, together with the King's strong expressions of resentment for the manner in which he has been treated, may suspend all this nonsense for the present, and leave us at leisure to regret something of more essential consequence to the public than whether Charles and Hare live in St. James's Street, or at the Treasury. To-day we have the Taxes, which are heavy enough of themselves without all the speeches made to oppose them; to-morrow I know nothing of; and on Friday we shall have another trial of skill between the Privileges of the Crown and the Prerogative of the People. In the meantime there is in the larder the loss of Minorca and of St. Kit's,(211) with good hopes of further surrenders, to feed our political discontent, and private satisfaction. I have a new relation, as you know, that is the most zealous Constitutionist, according to his own notions, that ever was, and he has honoured me lately with very long conferences; ma porte ne lui est jamais refusee, cela s'entend. But I can only ask questions for information, and even my doubts or ignorance are not acceptable, but we part always upon very good terms, because I always appear attentive, and so he presumes that of course I must be more instructed than when he came to me.