It is indeed difficult to understand how so fierce and restless a spirit could have endured the passive existence to which he had restrained himself by the acceptance of office. We seem to hear a growl but a few months after he had become Paymaster. 'In the gloomy scene which, I fear, is opening in public affairs for this disgraced country,' he writes to George Grenville in October 1746; not a cheerful tone for a young minister, but one not unfamiliar among those in subordinate positions. Still he could afford to wait. He probably contented himself with the reflection that King George could not last for ever, and flattered himself with an easy entrance to the councils of King Frederick. He could watch, too, with silent scorn, the miscarriages of his official superiors, confident that high office must come to him, as it were, of its own accord. Still, he had to wait long, and the death of Frederick as well as the longevity of the monarch were little less than disastrous to his calculations. It would have been better, of course, for his historical position had he refrained from taking a subordinate office, which restrained his independence, and deprived him of the peculiar lustre of his lonely power. In these days we ask ourselves what temptation could induce him to accept a post which seemed to offer nothing but salary in exchange for the exceptional splendour of his independent position? How was it worth his while to become Vice-Treasurer of Ireland? It cannot have been for money. He was notoriously indifferent to money (though his nephew casts doubts even on this), and he was better off as to money than he had ever been before, owing to the Marlborough legacy. It may have been that as his political associates had all joined the administration, he thought that his loneliness impaired his power, and he must certainly have felt that it was impossible for him to continue in active and effective opposition to a Government which included his closest friends. That would seem to be the chief and conspicuous reason. But there was another, as one may well suppose, which was not less potent. Office is the natural, legitimate and honourable object of all politicians who feel capable of doing good work as ministers, and even of some who do not. The instances to the contrary are so few as to prove the rule. Wilberforce and Burdett, Ashley (for Ashley, though not literally outside the category of officials, cannot be considered as one), and Cobden are the names that obviously present themselves. But Ashley and Wilberforce had consecrated themselves to a high career of philanthropy which was incompatible with the bond of ministry. Burdett, long a popular idol and an orator of great power, a country gentleman of the best type, and personally agreeable even to those who differed from him, was probably held to be too advanced a demagogue to be even considered for an appointment. Cobden refused office at least twice; yet had he lived he