and the Scotch; and as a mark of disobedience, went to a hunting party at the Duke of Richmond’s, to which he had been invited with the Prince of Mecklenburg; but the latter was not suffered to go to a disaffected house in disaffected company. But while inactivity reigned in the Parliament of England, that of Ireland was not idle. Lord Halifax,[178] their new Lord-Lieutenant, was, like most of his predecessors very popular at first. They voted him an additional salary of four thousand pounds a year. He had the decency, though very necessitous, not to accept it for himself, but desired it might be settled on his successors. The House of Commons, however, would not wait till it should take place, to pay themselves, but passed a vote to make their Parliaments, which existed during the life of each King, septennial. The party attached to the Castle[179] voted for it, concluding it would be thrown out by the Lords. The Lords, as provident for their popularity, thinking it would be rejected in England, passed it likewise. It was rejected here, but not without much disposition in some of the Council to have it granted. Lord Hilsborough,[180] who had great weight with Lord Halifax, stayed with him in Dublin, and openly made war on the Primate;[181] while William Gerard Hamilton,[182] the Secretary, gained such applause in that Parliament, that a motion for augmenting the troops was carried by the sole power of his eloquence. March 19th, the bill for continuing the militia for seven years was passed by the House of Commons in England; and the counties, that had not raised theirs, were ordered to pay five pounds a man. This was settled by a compromise, lest a longer term should be insisted on. Its own friends were sick of it, and had clogged it with many clauses, in hopes it would be rejected by their opponents. But the Ministers would not risk the unpopularity of a negative, and were even afraid to part with so large a body of men. CHAPTER X. Conquest of Martinico.--War in Portugal.--Lord Tyrawley.-- Count la Lippe.--The Cock-Lane Ghost.--Pacific disposition of the new Czar.--His Popular Measures.--Count Schouvalow.-- Meditated War with Denmark by the Czar and the King of Prussia.-- Insurrections in Ireland, quelled by the Earl of Hertford.--Lord Bute’s Ambition.--The Duke of Newcastle.--His friends.--The Portuguese War, and the War in Germany.--The Duke of Bedford.-- Fox’s Observation to Walpole.--Lords Mansfield, Hardwicke, and Lincoln.--Newcastle’s tenacity of Power.--Creation of seven new Peers.--Private negotiation with the Court of Vienna.--The new Peers.--Buckingham House purchased by the Queen.--Seclusion of the King and Queen.--the King’s younger Brothers.