WIIXIAJI AND MABY.
75
successful. The truth seems to be that the difficulties of thesituation were great', and that he, with all his ingenuity andeloquence, was ill qualified to cope with those difficulties. Thewhole machinery of government was out of joint; and he wasnot the man to set it right. What was wanted was not what hehad in large measure, wit, taste, amplitude of comprehension,subtlety in drawing distinctions; but what he had not, promptdecision, indefatigable energy, and stubborn resolution. Hismind was at best of too soft a temper for such work as he hadnow to do, and had been recently made softer by severe afflic-tion. He had lost two sons in less than twelve months. A letteris still extant, in which he at this time complained to hishonoured friend Lady Russell of the desolation of his hearthand of the cruel ingratitude of the Whigs. We possess, also,the answer, in which she gently exhorted him to seek for con-solation where she had found it under trials not less severethan his*
The first attack on him was made in the Upper House. SomeWhig Lords, among whom the wayward and petulant FirstLord of the Treasury was conspicuous, proposed that the Kingshould be requested to appoint a new Speaker. The friends ofHalifax moved and carried the previous question.** About threeweeks later his persecutors moved, in a Committee of the wholeHouse of Commons, a resolution which imputed to him no par-ticular crime either of omission or of commission, but simplydeclared it to be advisable that he should be dismissed from theservice of the Crown. The debate was warm. Moderate poli-
* Tho letter of Halifax to Lady Bussell is dated on the 23<1 of July 16S9,about a fortnight after the attack on him in the Lords, and about a weekbefore tho attack on him in the Commons.
** Sec the Lords’ Journals of July 10. 1G89, and a letter from Londondated July and transmitted by Croissy to Avaux. Don Pedro do Ron-quillo mentions this attack of the Whig Lords on Halifax in a despatch ofwhich I cannot make out the date.
CHAP.
XIV.
J68i),