"I have, since I received it, taken two journies into Devonshire, upon Maynooth business, and have not had, when in town, a spare moment from Indian and domestic torments. The history of the latter could not be put upon paper, and if it could, would be as voluminous as an Indian despatch. You know enough of the parties not to suspend your opinion till you know as much as is necessary to form it. The Duke of Portland's resignation has only accelerated the crisis, and you know enough of Perceval to be sure that we are not broken up, because _he_ insists upon having the whole power in his own hands, and will not serve under any third person. Under these circumstances, and a thousand others, there seemed no resource left, but to attempt an overture to Lord Grey and Grenville jointly, which is made with the King's consent and authority. If it is met in the spirit in which it is made, I trust it will be successful. Whatever we may be _driven_ to do, if they shut their ears to the proposal of an extended and combined administration, we shall not, in my opinion, have been justified in our own eyes or in those of the country, if any party feelings prevented us from _endeavouring bonâ fide_ to form such a Government as may both protect the King, and be fit for these times. They are, I believe, as little able to form a separate Government as ourselves, unless they mean to re-unite themselves with those at whose proceedings they were so evidently alarmed last year. If they come in alone by force, they will have the Catholic question as a millstone round their necks. The very fact of an union with us who are known to entertain a decidedly opposite opinion upon that question (some of us for ever, and all during the King's life) would enable them to get rid of it for the present, as, without any pledge, which, after all that has passed, could neither be asked nor given, that question could never be made a Government question without the immediate dissolution of the administration. "You express a very flattering satisfaction at my return to public life. It will probably be a very short excursion, and certainly a most painful one. I look for no comfort but in planting turnips in my Sabine farm. "Yours ever most sincerely, "HARROWBY." Lord Erskine writes in 1813, to Wilberforce:-- "I cannot sufficiently discharge a duty I owe to the public without telling you what I think of the speech you sent me on the Christian question in India. The subject, though great and important, was local and temporary; but the manner in which you treated it made your speech of the greatest value in the shield of Christianity that eloquence and faith could possibly have manufactured.