HISTORY OF EUROPE. 
cess of its measures did not corres- 
pond with the over sanguine expec. 
tations of the public, the people 
were __ industriously reminded, 
‘thatthe king, in trusting the go- 
vernment of the country to the 
hands where it was now lodged, 
had consulted less his own opinions 
and inclinations, than what he un- 
derstood to be the wishes and ex- 
pectations of his people. The new 
opposition professed those princi- 
ples and followed that line of con- 
duct, which they understood to be 
the mostacceptable at court. They 
disclaimed with horror the intention 
of a systematic opposition to his 
majesty’s government, and showed 
indeed by their conduct that nothing 
could possibly unite them in any 
system, except the being together ‘in 
office ; and yet in the midst of these 
professions, they contrived to ha. 
rass the ministers as effectually as the 
* most factious opposition could have 
done. It is immaterial, whether 
these symptoms of how the court 
stood affected towards the adminis- 
tration were rightly interpreted or 
not. ‘The belief that ministers were 
unacceptable in that quarter was 
equally prejudical to their interest 
in the country, as if the fact had 
been so; and the effect of it, on 
the whole, was to weaken the pub- 
lic confidence in the stability of their 
administration, which every one 
concluded, whether rightly or not 
is out of the question, would last no 
longer than the necessity-that had 
imposed it. 
in addition to all these circnm-. 
_ Stances, the component parts of the 
new administration had been too 
recently brought together, when 
they first came into office, to be 
thoroughly united. Lord Sidmouth 
had been unconnected with the 
35 
other leaders of the party at so late 
a period as the death of Mr. Pitt. 
Had an amendment to the address 
been moved on the first day of the 
sessions, it was understood that 
lord Sidmouth and his friends 
would have supported the original 
address. The two other branches 
of the government, which had bcen 
known by the names of the new 
and old opposition, had begun to 
cooperate in parliament, and to con- 
cert together their proceedings in 
that assembly, in the spring of 1804, 
but without making any formal 
compact or agreement for a union of 
parties. In so much, that when Mr. 
Addington resigned in the beginning 
of the summer of that year, there 
existed no positive or formal en- 
gagements between Mr. Fox and 
lord Grenville, of a nature to have 
prevented the latter from accepting 
the offers of Mr. Pitt, and going in- 
to office without the other. The 
refusal of the noble lord to act in 
that manner arose from the opera- 
tion of public principle alone, un- 
fettered by any private compact or 
engagement. Since that period the 
greatest union and confidence had 
subsisted between the leaders of the 
two parties ; but the same good un- 
derstanding was not yet thoroughly 
established between their respective 
adherents: Many of the old oppo. 
sition trembled, lest the popular 
principles of their party should be 
diluted or neutralized by the in-. 
finence of their new connections. 
The friends of Lord Grenville had 
not yet quite banished from their 
minds their former alarms of what 
they apprehended to be the revolu.~ 
tionary principles of some of their 
new associates; and from  pri- 
vate intimacy and long habits of 
acting with the ex-ministers, they 
D2 could 
