appointed the hearing three days before the approaching new election for Middlesex.[149] Conway said it were better to let his petition lie on the table without notice. Sir Joseph Mawbey, then mentioning Lord Barrington’s letter of thanks to the 3rd Regiment of Guards, for the execution in St. George’s Fields, as if they had conquered a foreign enemy, his lordship, with that steady confidence with which he always defended any particular servility in his conduct, said, he had not regarded what had been said against him without doors, but now would satisfy the House on what he had done. This vindication consisted in avowing that _he_ had advised the King to thank the soldiers; _he_ had added the postscript of his own accord; _he_ had promised the accused soldier support; _he_ had supplied him with public money; _he_ had protected and maintained him since--and, if any man would move for his letter, _he_ would second it. Sir William Meredith did move for his letter, and Lord Barrington seconded; but the Ministers’ tender of _such conscious and modest innocence_, interposed; and though they commended his alacrity in justifying himself, they declared, they could not in prudence let the measures of Government be called thus intemperately in question; and the Opposition, finding it vain to contest, gave it up without a division.[150] An Opposition so distracted and disunited, called for recruits--at least, for something that might sound creditable in the ears of the public, and keep up a spirit. Calcraft, who had the best head for intrigue in the whole party, contrived a reconciliation between Lord Temple and Lord Chatham, as a prelude to the re-appearance of the latter; and Lady Chatham was made to say, that her lord had got an efficacious fit of the gout, which was to imply that his head was quite clear. Still this coalition in that family had no other effect than to alarm the Bedfords, who, concluding, according to a prevailing notion at that time, that nothing could withstand the union of the three brothers, and forgetting how lately they had deserted Grenville, or rather, remembering it with fear, thought the best method of securing themselves was to add another treachery, and betray the Duke of Grafton. On this they determined in a meeting at Rigby’s, and sent to offer themselves to Grenville--and were, as they deserved, rejected.