concede to the Irish a small share of their undoubted rights, the King dismissed him from office, and the King's friends, as they were called, expressed their indignation at the presumption of a minister who could oppose the wishes of so benign and gracious a master. And when, unhappily for his own fame, this great man determined to return to power, he could only recover office by conceding that very point for which he had relinquished it; thus setting the mischievous example of the minister of a free country sacrificing his own judgment to the personal prejudices of the reigning sovereign. As it was hardly possible to find other ministers who to equal abilities would add equal subservience, it is not surprising that the highest offices were constantly filled with men of notorious incapacity. Indeed, the King seemed to have an instinctive antipathy to everything great and noble. During the reign of George II. the elder Pitt had won for himself a reputation which covered the world, and had carried to an unprecedented height the glories of the English name. He, however, as the avowed friend of popular rights, strenuously opposed the despotic principles of the Court; and for this reason he was hated by George III. with a hatred that seemed barely compatible with a sane mind. Fox was one of the greatest statesmen of the 18th century, and was better acquainted than any-other with the character and resources of those foreign nations with which our interests were intimately connected. To this rare and important knowledge he added a sweetness and amenity of temper which extorted the praises even of his political opponents. But he, too, was the steady supporter of civil and religious liberty; and he, too, was so detested by George III., that the King, with his own hand, struck his name out of the list of Privy Councillors, and declared that he would rather abdicate the throne than admit him to a share in the government. "While this unfavorable change was taking place in the sovereign and ministers of the country, a change equally unfavorable was being effected in the second branch of the imperial legislature. Until the reign of George III. the House of Lords was decidedly superior to the House of Commons in the liberality and general accomplishments of its members. It is true that in both Houses there prevailed a spirit which must be called narrow and superstitious if tried by the larger standard of the present age.