THE DUKES OF GKAFTON. 25 



distinguished in many ways, but who is perhaps best known to modern 

 readers as the Prime Minister, whose ill fortune it was to be denounced 

 in terms of unsparing abuse by "Junius," in those memorable letters 

 which created an unparalleled sensation at the time, and have ever 

 since exercised the ingenuity of experts to discover their origin. 

 Before coming to the racing career of the duke it will be not unin- 

 teresting to summarise briefly the principal points in his eventful 

 history. Augustus Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Grafton, was born in 

 1736, and was a great-grandson of Charles II. by the Duchess of 

 Cleveland. He was educated at that unrivalled nursery of learning, 

 Westminster School, and at St. John's College, Cambridge. At the 

 latter place his classical attainments acquired him some distinction, 

 and his profligate conduct a disgraceful notoriety. In November, 



1756, he was appointed a Lord of the Bedchamber to George III., 

 then Prince of Wales ; towards the end of the same year he took his 

 seat in Parliament as member for Bury St. Edmunds, and in May, 



1757, having succeeded to his grandfather's honours, he was called 

 up to the House of Lords. In the Ministry of the Marquis of Kock- 

 ingham, in 1765, he became a Secretary of State, attacked the Cabinet 

 of which he was a member, and his resignation caused its collapse. 

 A new ministry was formed under his presidency, nominally, but in 

 reality under the guidance of Pitt, aftei-wards Earl of Chatham. 

 "Junius," in a letter addressed to the duke, thus narrates and severely 

 animadverts upon the circumstances of his grace's appointment to 

 the Premiership: — "The spirit of the favourite (Lord Bute) had 

 some apparent influence upon every administration, and every set 

 of ministers preserved an appearance of duration as long as they 

 submitted to that influence ; but there were certain services to be 

 performed for the favourite's security or to gratify his resentments, 

 which your predecessors in office had the wisdom or the virtue not 

 to undertake. A submissive administration was at last gradually 

 collected from the deserters of all parties, interests, and connections, 

 and nothing remained but to find a leader for these gallant, well- 

 disciplined troops. Stand forth, my lord, for thou art the man I 

 liord Bute founcl no resources of dependence or security in the proud, 

 imposing superiority of Lord Chatham's abilities, the shrewd in- 

 flexible judgment of Mr. Grenville, nor in the mild but determined 

 integrity of Lord Rockingham. His views and situation required a 

 creature void of all these properties, and he was forced to go through 

 e\'ery division, resolution, composition and refinement of political 

 chemistry, before he happily arrived at the caput morhium of vitriol 

 in your grace. Flat and insipid in your retired state, but, brought 

 into action, you became vitriol again. Such are the extremes of 

 alternate indolence or fury which have governed your whole admin- 

 istration." But unquestionably one of the most brilliant and bitter 

 pieces of invective which " Junius " ever penned, was the following 

 allusion to the duke's descent from Charles II. : — " The character of 

 the reputed ancestors of some men has made it impossible for their 



