in which he indeed gained his election, but at the sacrifice of his whole fortune. In 1771 he was appointed rear-admiral of Great Britain, and took the chief command on the Jamaica station. At the expiration of the term allotted for the continuance of that service, he retired to France, with the view of recovering from his pecuniary embarrassments. It is said that while residing abroad he had several splendid offers made him to engage in the French service; but the stories connected with this portion of his life are not sufficiently authenticated. At the conclusion of the year 1779, he was appointed commander-in-chief on the Leeward island station. On his way thither he fell in with sixteen sail of Spanish merchantmen, bound to Cadiz, under convoy of a line of battle ship and six frigates, the whole of which surrendered to him without resistance. Passing on towards Gibraltar, he met with a Spanish fleet of eleven ships of the line and two frigates, off Cape St Vincent, which he instantly engaged; and, in an action of ten hours' continuance, he succeeded in destroying or capturing seven of the larger vessels. Off St Lucia, he fell in with the French fleet, and brought it to action, but it succeeded in bearing off. These successes, however, obtained for him the thanks of both houses of parliament, and the city of Westminster elected him one of its representatives.

Rodney now sailed towards St Eustatia, where the Dutch had established a huge magazine of naval and military stores, notoriously for the supply of our combined enemies. It surrendered without resistance, and property nearly to the amount of £3,000,000, with 150 merchantships, and some vessels of war, fell into the hands of the captors. The king and the ministry approved of the admiral's conduct; but a fierce attack was made upon him in the house of commons, by a party who represented him as sacrificing public interests to private advantages, and succeeded for a while in rendering him extremely unpopular throughout the kingdom. He returned to England in bad health, but met and confuted the successive charges brought against him, in a manner which amply satisfied all his friends.

On the death of Lord Hawke, Rodney was appointed vice-admiral of Britain, and repaired immediately to the West India command. Here he was joined by Sir Samuel Hood, and found himself at the head of thirty-six ships of the line. With this fleet he overtook the French fleet, commanded by the Count de Grasse, near the island of Dominica, and having gained the weather-gage, forced the count into action. The contest lasted the whole of the 12th of April, 1782, and is said to have been in a great measure decided by the manoeuvre-then nearly new in naval tactics-of breaking through the enemy's line. It has been alleged that Rodney, previously to his sailing on this expedition, had received some hints, as to the new system of manoeuvring, from Clerk, but this has never been satisfactorily proved, and there is some evidence to show that the breaking of the enemy's line in this action, was purely incidental and the thought of the moment. Our ships were closely engaged under the lee of the French line, theirs were dropping down upon us, and, an opening presenting itself, Rodney, in the Formidable, with his seconds, the Namur and Duke, and immediately supported by the Canada, dashed through, and broke the enemy's line about three ships short of the centre, where de Grasse commanded in the Ville de Paris. The victory was complete and decisive; the Ville de Paris with

four other ships of the line fell into the hands of the conquerors, and another was sunk in the action.

For this service Rodney was advanced to the peerage, on the 19th June, 1782, by the title of Baron Rodney of Rodney-Stoke, in the county of Somerset; and a pension was voted to him of £2000. He died on the 24th of May, 1792.

Sir George Pocock.

BORN A. D. 1706.-DIED A. D. 1792.

THIS excellent naval officer was a son of the Rev. Thomas Pocock, chaplain of Greenwich hospital. He entered the naval service in 1718, under Sir George Byng, whom he accompanied to the Mediterranean. In 1732 he became first lieutenant of the Namur. On the 31st of August, 1738, he was promoted to the rank of post-captain, and commanded, successively, the Woolwich and the Sutherland. In 1748, being then chief officer on the Leeward islands station, he blockaded Martinico, and captured nearly forty vessels belonging to a Frer.ch convoy from Europe.

In 1754, he proceeded to the East Indies, as captain of the Cumberland, and second in command to Rear-admiral Watson. On the 4th of February, 1755, he was made rear-admiral of the blue; and rear of the red on the 4th of June, 1756. In the month of March, 1757, he led the attack, in the Tiger, upon Chandernagore, and, though he received seven wounds, did not quit the deck till the end of the action. On the 16th of August following, he succeeded to the chief naval command in the East Indies. He was made vice-admiral of the red on the 31st of January, 1758. Being reinforced by Commodore Stevens, he hoisted his flag in the Yarmouth, and put to sea with a squadron which gave chase to seven French ships, on the 29th of April, off the coast near Negapatam. An action ensued, in which the Yarmouth was attacked, and, at one time, nearly captured by the enemy. Soon after the engagement, he caused a court-martial to be held at Madras, on the captains of the Cumberland, Newcastle, and Weymouth, for misconduct in not answering his signals in this engagement; one of them was sentenced to be dismissed from his ship, another to be cashiered, and the third to lose a year's rank. Admiral Pocock sailed a second time the same year, in pursuit of the French, whom he succeeded in bringing to action, on the 3d of August; but, after a running fight of an hour, the enemy's fleet escaped into the road of Pondicherry, with a loss of 550 men, killed and wounded, while that of the English was comparatively insignificant. Pocock now proceeded to Bombay, for the purpose of refitting; and, on the 17th of April, 1759, he sailed again in search of the French fleet, with which he came in sight on the 2d of September. He immediately commenced a chase, but was baffled by the going down of the wind. Correctly supposing that the enemy would make for Pondicherry, he proceeded thither, and came to action on the 10th. The French commander, however, after a loss of 1500 men, again sheered off.

In 1760 Pocock returned to England; in 1761 he was created a

knight of the Bath. In this latter year he distinguished himself by the taking of the Havannah. On the appointment of Sir Charles Saunders, his junior, to the office of first lord of the admiralty, in 1765, he retired in disgust from the service. He died on the 3d of April, 1792.

Sir George was an able and successful officer, esteemed by his country, beloved by his officers and men, and respected by his enemies abroad. When General Lally was brought prisoner to England, after the reduction of Pondicherry, he begged to be introduced to Admiral Sir George Pocock, whom he thus addressed :-" Dear Sir George, as the first man in your profession, I cannot but respect and esteem you, though you have been the greatest enemy I ever had. But for you, I should have triumphed in India, instead of being made a captive. When we first sailed out to give you battle, I had provided a number of musicians on board the Zodiaque, intending to give the ladies a ball upon our victory; but you left me only three fiddlers alive, and treated us all so roughly, that you quite spoiled us for dancing."

North, Earl of Guildford.

BORN A. D. 1729.-DIED A. D. 1792.

FREDERICK NORTH, eldest son of Francis, Earl of Guildford, was born in 1729. He was educated at Eton and Oxford.

He entered parliament as member for Banbury. In 1759 he was appointed a commissioner of the treasury, and remained in office until 1765. In the following year he was made joint-receiver and paymaster of the forces, and obtained a seat in the privy council. In 1767, on the death of Charles Townshend, he became chancellor of the exchequer ; and in 1770, first lord of the treasury.

A contemporary, writing in 1776, thus sketches the political career of his lordship up to that period. "The first time our professed plan will permit us to take notice of his lordship was on the day that the once justly revered Pitt was created Earl of Chatham, and lord-privyseal, the 2d of August, 1766. On the same day, according to the language of the red book of the exchequer, Lord North was put to-bed to the old woman' at the pay-office, without any previous courtship, or indeed knowledge of that venerable old lady. His lordship having sat several years at the treasury-board-where he was known to be industrious, laborious, and plodding, and where he studied Cocker and Wingate's valuable treatises on arithmetic, and the surprising combinations between pounds, shillings, and pence, under that occult and profound financier, the late Mr George Grenville-the shining, flourishing, political Proteus, whose commission bore equal date, and who was appointed chancellor of the exchequer, gave sterility to barrenness, by calling our hero to his confidence, and putting himself under his lord

3

The well-known Mr Cooke, member for Middlesex, with whom he was appointed joint-paymaster-general.

Burke says, in his celebrated speech, that his lordship had never seen his bedfellow's face until the bridal night.

The late Charles Townshend.

A house of commons bull, fathered on the last-mentioned honourable gentleman.

ship's pupilage. Fame saith that here our hero rendered the junto most essential service, and paved the way to that elevated situation he now stands in. Versatile Charles had talents for flourishing away a speech, and for flattering and misleading the house of commons. He could write a pamphlet, or betray a connection, and laugh at it. He could even mitigate the resentments of those he had the most highly offended; and, by a certain mixture of animal vivacity, highly seasoned with wit and good humour, he possessed the knack of disarming the very persons he had thus grossly betrayed. But in every other particular his talents were limited. He hated application, and despised the means of attaining useful knowledge. With such complexional abilities, accompanied with a variety of other circumstances, it is not at all to be wondered that he leaned on Lord North for assistance. He could entertain no jealousy of such a man, because fire and water were not, he knew, more contradictory in their nature. He looked upon

his lordship as a useful drudge, fit to be employed to some purposes; and this intercourse being known at Carleton-house, Charles's vanity was flattered; he liked to take the lead; he was detached from the ostensible minister, and from his first commissioner of the treasury," with whom he was by his post more nearly connected. He differed from them in cabinet; and the house of commons, by proper management, being predisposed, Charles, in the committee of supply, proposed that certain duties should be laid on tea, paper, painters' colours, and glass, imported into America. When his colleagues remonstrated against the measure, he held out the house of commons in terrorem against them; all resistance he declared was vain; for the house, he assured his principal, were united as one man; and were determined to compel America to contribute towards the support of their military establishment, as well as towards relieving the people of this country from part of the heavy burdens incurred in the protection and assistance of its colonies during the late war.

"Whether Lord North acted as a confidential adviser in this business, or whether he was the confidential medium through which the junto and Charles communicated with each other in the beginning, there is little reason to doubt that his lordship was oftener at the treasury than the pay-office; and infinitely more intimate with Charles Townshend than with his old spouse at the Horse-guards. Charles lived out his year; pity it is that he had not died a year earlier, or had not been still living, to answer for the event of his wild and improvident schemes! What he had often in a ludicrous manner foretold, came, however, to be exactly fulfilled; for before he was quite cold Lord

Lord Chatham.

Duke of Grafton.

8

1 Cooke.

• "See," said Charles, "that great, heavy, booby-looking, bursten-bellied, seeming changeling. You may believe me, when I assure you it is a fact, that if any thing should happen to me, he will succeed to my place, and very shortly after come to be first commissioner of the treasury." It would appear that George Grenville, also, foresaw the rise of the booby.' Shortly after North's first appearance in public life, he was met, one morning, by George Grenville, and another gentleman, walking in the park, and as it appeared, rehearsing an oration. "Here comes blubbering North," said the latter to Grenville; "I wonder what he is getting by heart, for I am sure it can be nothing of his own!" "You are mistaken," replied Grenville; "North is a young man of great promise, and high qualifications; and if he does not relax in his political pursuits, he is very likely to be prime minister."

North was appointed to succeed him in the chancellorship of the exchequer.

"His lordship, in the early persecution of Mr Wilkes, having exerted himself so strenuously as to lay, in a great measure, the foundation of his future fortunes, it was expected, of course, that as minister of the house of commons he would confirm the happy presages formed of his talents and disposition in this line, by those who were the means of pushing him into so respectable a situation. His lordship did not disappoint them; he surpassed even their highest and most sanguine expectations; the cabinet was his own, in spite of his principal; and Wilkes was not only expelled, but incapacitated.

"The time now approached when an opportunity was given to his lordship to smooth the way to the post of first minister. Charles Townshend's port-duties were not so favourably received in America as either their framer or those who employed him expected. If his lordship had any part, at first or second hand, in urging or pressing Charles to that dangerous, and, we fear, ruinous measure, he acted under cover; but now, as minister of the house of commons, he could no longer dissemble or conceal his sentiments. The non-importation agreement entered into by the several colonies, and a dispute with the province of Massachusetts Bay relative to the quartering of the army, having greatly embarrassed administration, two letters were written, which have been already sufficiently commented on. One of them was the circular letter promising that no more duties should be imposed on America, and that those laid on already should be repealed on commercial principles. This letter was certainly written with his lordship's approbation and consent, he being then of the cabinet, and minister of the house of comHow then has he performed his promise, or fulfilled the engagement contained in that letter? By refusing to take off the duty on tea, when he moved for the repeal of the duties on paper, painters' colours, and glass; and giving the most full and confidential assurances to the country-gentlemen in the beginning of the three last sessions, in the committee of ways and means, that taxes were expected from America; that they were the leading object of the present hostile measures; that we were not seeking a pepper-corn, but were contending for a substantial support from America, towards lightening the intolerable burdens we now groan under, from the heavy debt incurred in defending, protecting, and securing that country.

mons.

"The last part of Lord Chatham's political farce was now to be played. The cabinet on his lordship's closet arrangement consisted of himself, the duke of Grafton, the lords Shelburne, Camden, and Charles Townshend, Sir Charles Saunders, and General Conway. Now let us see how the mock-cabinet stood when the repeal of all the American duties was moved there in 1769. Duke of Grafton, and lords Camden, North, Weymouth, Rochford, Hillsborough, and Bristol. Here we may well repeat the words of a certain noble lord," that scarce a second plank of the vessel originally launched was remaining when the noble duke was outvoted in cabinet, on a proposal of a total repeal of the

'The ostensible cabinet was then composed of Lords Camaen, Hillsborough, Gower, Weymouth, Clare, Rochford, North, and the duke of Grafton-a majority of five to "Lord Chatham.

two.

10 Duke of Grafton.