In France, the prosecution of the war was by no means an unanimous measure. D’Argenson, the promoter of it, was on ill terms with Madame Pompadour, whose interest was to lull the King and nation in pleasures and inactivity, not to foment events that might shake her power. It received a blow from another quarter. The Cardinal de la Rochfoucault, and Sassy, the King’s confessor, played off the earthquake on his superstition. He promised to receive the sacrament at Easter, and relinquish his mistress. She, who held more by habit than passion, saw no reason why a woman might not work the machine of religion as well as a priest, and instantly gave into all his Majesty’s scruples; offered up her _rouge_ to the demon of earthquakes, and to sanctify her conversion and reconcile it to a Court-life, procured herself to be declared _Dame du palais_ to the Queen. February 25th.--Sir George Lyttelton, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, opened the plan of supplies and taxes for the current year. The first, a duty on wrought plate, was calculated to bring in 30,000_l._ a year. Another, on bricks and tiles, and a double duty on cards and dice; the actual duty produced 10,000_l._ a year; but as doubling the tax would not double the produce, the addition was estimated at only 7000_l._ a year. This, said Sir George, some will think a tax on _necessaries_. The Legislature calls gaming a vice; but the legislators, who can best expound their own laws, seem, by their practice, to think otherwise. Legge objected to either tax on plate or bricks; and showed with singular art how much greater a master he was of the nature of the revenue and commerce than his successor. Sir George seemed to repeat an oration on trade that he had learned by rote; Legge talked on it like a merchant. He urged that plate was not a prejudicial commodity, but a dead treasure, to be resorted to on an emergency: if sold, it would go abroad; if coined here, did not increase the national stock. He showed that bricks would be a partial tax, as many parts of the kingdom employ only stone. But within the volume of our duties there was actually a fund of taxes that might be drawn out without any new impositions, the old were so fraudulently levied, or so injudiciously distributed. He instanced in the duty on tea, which being regulated by Sir John Barnard, produced near double, and demolished smuggling. By reduction of the duty on raw silk, it rose from 800_l._ per annum to 15,000_l._ That on hemp, if reduced, would produce much more. George Townshend proposed taxes on the number of servants, and on exportation of horses, because no French officer had fewer than two English horses. Murray asked if many of our taxes were not partial--on cyder, on malt, on coals? Lord Strange objected strongly to the brick-tax, because the houses that ought to pay most, those of the rich, are built of stone. Vyner observed, that a tax on plate was teaching servants to turn informers. The plate-tax passed.