344 MISSION TO PORTUGAL. [1806. 



When I in one of our conversations referred to his 

 great and prompt decision, and to the breaking up 

 of the Addington ministry in 1804, immediately after 

 the joint attack upon his naval administration, ex- 

 pressing my wonder that he had not taken the king's 

 offer to stand by them and dissolve, if necessary, 

 his answer was, that he certainly should have insisted 

 upon this course being taken, but he knew that there 

 were friends of the besieged in the garrison ready to 

 open the gates to them. He particularly named Per- 

 ceval and Eld on, whom he believed to be in league 

 with Pitt. On my saying he had the professional 

 dislike to lawyers, he added that Hawkesbury also 

 inclined to Pitt, and perhaps Castlereagh, but of 

 Eldon he was sure. But he denied having the least 

 prejudice against our profession, and, on the contrary, 

 said he had some most excellent friends who were at 

 the head of it, particularly Erskine, for whom he had 

 the greatest regard, and had sometimes taken him on 

 a cruise. Indeed I always found he had a kind of 

 professional pride in Erskine, from his having been, 

 as he said, " bred to the sea." In mentioning Ad- 

 dington, he said he had been much underrated, and 

 in some respects was a considerable man, especially 

 for his political courage, which, he said, would have 

 borne him out in resisting the coalition had it not 

 been for the enemy within his garrison. 



I found him to be less adverse to the Catholic 

 question than was supposed ; but he greatly disap- 

 proved of Pitt's manner of conducting it, with the 



