A deputation, of which Wilberforce was the head, proceeded from the House of Commons to the Queen, dressed in full Court costume; but her Majesty's turbulent admirers did not appreciate their good intentions, and they were roughly greeted by the mob. The reception they met with from the Queen was not much more courteous. Her answer was a refusal. "Her manner was extremely dignified," observes the principal negotiator, "but very stern and haughty." In a letter which he wrote at the time, he gives all the details of the question,[26] from which it is clear that the members of Government had agreed to resign their offices if the restoration of the Queen's name to the Liturgy was carried against them in the House of Commons; and that, seeing the improbability of obtaining this demand, the Queen would have accepted an equivalent proposed by the Government, had not some sinister influence been exercised which brought about her refusal. Mr. Wilberforce shared the general fate of peace-makers in getting terribly abused; but he evidently had the authority of the Queen's most able counsellor for the steps he took. "She will accede to your address," he wrote on the 22nd of June, "I pledge myself."[27] [26] Letter to Samuel Roberts, Esq., "Life," vol. v. p. 62. [27] Letter to Samuel Roberts, Esq., "Life," vol. v. p. 65. Cobbett published a letter addressed to Mr. Wilberforce, made up of declamation and invective, in the style that then took the public taste. This composition is described as "very clever, but very mischievous, and full of falsehoods." He was attacked so frequently, and with such violence, by the Queen's partisans, that it forced him to exclaim, "What a lesson it is to a man not to set his heart on low popularity, when, after forty years' disinterested public service, I am believed to be a perfect rascal!"[28] [28] "Wilberforce's Life," vol. v. p. 68. He complained bitterly of the conduct of the leaders of Opposition. Their language to the Queen, especially that of Lord Grey, Mr. Tierney, and Sir Francis Burdett, was, "Oh! you may be sure you never can be prosecuted,"--thereby, as he acknowledges, "taking away what must doubtless have most powerfully enforced her consent. Then no sooner had she refused, and the prosecution goes forward, than they say, Government never should have admitted a compromise at all, but have prosecuted without hesitation."[29] [29] Ibid. p. 69. "She seems," writes Lord Dudley, "to have been advised by persons that are resolved to play the deepest possible game, and care little to what risk they expose her, provided they have a chance of turning out the Government, or perhaps of over-throwing the monarchy. I do not think that it is Brougham's doing."[30] "The people," confesses Cobbett, "as far as related to the question of guilt or innocence, did not care a straw."[31] Their leaders cared still less: