No inconsiderable amount of harm, however, was inflicted on many of the prelates, including Hare himself. Walpole was disposed to translate him when an advantageous opportunity offered; but Hervey showed him good reason for preferring pliant Potter, then of Oxford. Gibson, the Bishop of London, had been looking to be removed to Canterbury whenever Dr. Wake’s death there should cause a vacancy. He expected, however, that, in accordance with his wish, Sherlock would succeed him in London. The Queen was disposed to sanction the arrangement; but she was frightened out of it by Walpole and Hervey. She accordingly advised Sherlock ‘to go down to his diocese and live quietly; to let the spirit he had raised so foolishly against him here subside; and to reproach himself only if he had failed, or should fail, of what he wished should be done and she had wished to do for him.’ During the absence of the King, in 1736, in Hanover, the Queen Regent had but an uneasy time of it at home. First, there were corn riots in the west, which were caused by the attempts of the people to prevent the exportation of corn, and which could only be suppressed by aid of the military. Next, there were labour riots in the metropolis in consequence of the market being overstocked by Irish labourers, who offered to work at lower rates than the English; and which also the bayonet alone was able to suppress. Thirdly, the coasts were infested by smugglers, whom the prospect of the hangman could not deter from their exciting vocation, and who not only killed revenue officers in very pretty battles, but were heartily assisted by the country people, who looked upon the contrabandists as most gallant and useful gentlemen. Much sedition was mixed up with the confusion which arose from these tumultuary proceedings: for wherever the people were opposed in their inclinations, they immediately took to cursing the Queen especially; not, however, sparing the King, nor forgetting, in their street ovations, to invoke blessings upon James III. It was, indeed, the fashion for every aggrieved person to speak of George II., in his character of Elector of Hanover, as ‘a foreign prince.’ When this was done by a nonjuring clergyman named Dixon, who exploded an innocent infernal machine in Westminster Hall (to the great terror of judges and lawyers), which scattered papers over the hall denouncing various acts of parliament--first that against the sale of gin in unlicensed places, then the act for building Westminster Bridge, the one to suppress smuggling, and that which enabled ‘a foreign prince’ to borrow 600,000_l._ of money sacredly appropriated to the payment of our debts --the Lord Chancellor and the Chief Justice were so affrighted that they called the escapade ‘a treason.’ Caroline summoned a council thereon, and, having at last secured the half-mad and destitute offender, they consigned him to rot in a gaol; although, as Lord Hervey