The anger caused by the issue of the struggle with the Middlesex electors found voice in petitions to the throne. Middlesex sent up a manifesto, which was virtually adopted by London, accusing the ministers of treason; Westminster prayed for a dissolution of parliament, and some counties and boroughs followed its example, arguing that the presence of Luttrell, who had not been duly elected, invalidated every act of the existing parliament. London further declared itself against the court party by electing Beckford, a prime mover in promoting the Surrey petition, as lord mayor. The country, however, was not all on the same side; the petitions were not, as a rule, signed by many of the larger freeholders, and by the end of the year the movement seemed at a stand.[81] In July Chatham appeared at court restored to health. The king received him kindly, but must have been vexed to hear that he disapproved of the policy of the ministers, specially with regard to the Middlesex election. He treated Grafton with extreme coldness, and Camden, who had sneered at him in his absence, at once followed his lead. He allied himself with the opposition, with Temple, Grenville, and their following, and with the Rockingham party, so far as measures were concerned. With the Rockinghams, however, he was never wholly at one; his violence, and habit of looking beyond parliament to the people itself, and of seeking political strength in popular good-will, separated him from them in feeling and methods of action. Yet his alliance with them was never formally broken. He entered into it because, he said, former differences should be forgotten when the struggle was _pro aris et focis_. He was eager for the fray. Parliament, said he, "must, it shall, be dissolved". With him as leader and with a united opposition, backed by a large part of the nation, victory seemed almost certain. He reckoned without the king. An ostensible minister might be forced to resign; but the king was a permanent official, and George was hard to beat. [Sidenote: _CHATHAM IN OPPOSITION._]