SIE WILLIAM WYNDHAM, THIRTY-FOURTH BIASTER. 235 



Oxford, Lord High Treasurer, and St. John, Lord Bolingbroke, 

 in July 1714, Sir William adhered to the latter. Upon the 

 death of Queen Anne, on August 1, 1714, he signed with others 

 the Proclamation of George I. ; nevertheless his Jacobian sym- 

 pathies were viewed with distrust by the Hanoverian party, 

 and in October following he was removed from his post of 

 Chancellor of the Exchequer. In the next Parliament, which 

 met on March 17, 1715, he appeared very vigorous in oppo- 

 sition to the measures of the Administration, and was, in 

 consequence, reprimanded by the Speaker. On the outbreak 

 of the rebellion in Scotland under the Earl of Mar, in August 

 1715, Sir William fell under suspicion, was impeached for 

 alleged complicity in that rising, and, upon an alleged charge 

 of escaping from custody, he was proclaimed a traitor, and 

 1,000/. offered for his arrest. Having soon after surrendered, 

 he was examined by the Privy Council, and committed to the 

 Tower, but was never brought to trial. In this respect he 

 seems to have passed through much the same ordeal as Colonel 

 Graham, the whilom eleventh Master of the Household branch 

 of the Royal Buckhounds. After he had regained his liberty 

 he continued his opposition to the several administrations 

 under which he lived, though he is believed to have altered 

 his opinion with regard to the Government itself, from the 

 Jacobite notions which he might formerly have espoused, to 

 a more large and popular system ; and that upon this ground 

 he afterwards formed his whole political conduct. It was 

 universally allowed that he possessed all the qualifications 

 requisite to form an able senator, — sagacity, to discern the 

 strength or weakness of every question, and eloquence, to 

 enforce the one and expose the other; skill and address, to 

 seize every advantage in the course of a debate, without 

 affording any; and a proper degree of warmth and vivacity 

 in speaking, necessary to secure the attention of an audience, 

 without such an excess as might embarrass himself and expose 

 him to the cooler observation of his antagonists. Apart from 

 his political career, this famous statesman was socially the 

 best of company, equally distinguished by an unaffected 



