Lord Wellesley had made no secret of Mr. Perceval’s mismanagement of the war, and the public mind being unsettled, the Whigs were invited by the Prince Regent, his year of restrictions having now expired, to join a new administration. But the heads of that faction would not share with Mr. Perceval, and he, master of the secrets relating to the detestable persecution of the Princess of Wales, was too powerful to be removed. However, on the 11th of May, Perceval was killed in the house of Commons, and this act, which was a horrible crime, but politically no misfortune either to England or the Peninsula, produced other negociations, upon a more enlarged scheme with regard both to parties and to the system of government. Personal feelings again prevailed. Lord Liverpool would not unite with lord Wellesley, the Grey and Grenville faction would not serve their country without having the disposal of all the household offices, and lord Moira, judging a discourtesy to the Prince Regent too high a price to pay for their adhesion, refused that condition. The materials of a new cabinet were therefore drawn from the dregs of the Tory faction, and lord Liverpool became prime minister. It was unfortunate that a man of lord Wellesley’s vigorous talent should have been rejected for lord Liverpool, but this remnant of a party being too weak to domineer, proved less mischievous with respect to the Peninsula than any of the preceding governments. There was no direct personal interest opposed to lord Wellington’s wishes, and the military policy of the cabinet yielding by degrees to the attraction of his ascending genius, was finally absorbed in its meridian splendour. Many practical improvements had also been growing up in the official departments, especially in that of war and colonies, where colonel Bunbury, the under-secretary, a man experienced in the wants of an army on service, had reformed the incredible disorders which pervaded that department during the first years of the contest. The result of the political crisis was therefore comparatively favourable to the war in the Peninsula, the story of which shall now be resumed.