JET. 35.] THE OPPOSITION. 71 



the pleasantest part of it. The want of specie in Spain 

 is said to be dreadful, and I cannot help thinking, upon 

 the whole, that Lord Wellesley must soon pay a visit 

 to Portugal again. When the ministers dissolved to 

 injure Canning and Wellesley, they reckoned without 

 their host, for it has greatly increased their numbers. 

 They say they have twenty-two in the House of Com- 

 mons. Canning told me that four seats had been 

 given to them, of which they had not the slightest ex- 

 pectation. He said, ' To me that is, to Wellesley and 

 me, 9 and talked as if their union was quite complete. 

 He as well as Charles Ellis and Lord Granville Leveson 

 seemed to prize their late accession in Ward very 

 highly, and I could not help giving them warning that 

 they might not have a long lease with him. 



" Sir William Manners will, if I mistake not, get 

 himself into a scrape. He goes about openly talking 

 of having sold three seats for 18,000, so that nothing 

 is easier than to bring an action against him. This I 

 knew before, but Lord Lonsdale having spoken of it 

 very significantly yesterday, shows me that people 

 have their eyes on it. I think, after all, that it is a 

 bad kind of business, now the law is made. It is quite 

 as bad as usury, which people are apt to think dis- 

 creditable, though there is but one opinion as to the 

 usury laws. 



" I am much obliged to you for the solicitude you 

 express as to my alarm. The alarming symptoms 

 arose from heat, nor am I quite sure that it was 

 groundless, but having a constitution of extreme 

 strength, I threw it off, and though left somewhat ex- 

 hausted, am in perfect health, and ready in a few days 

 to go through twice as much as I did last winter ; but 



