Lord N(orth), when he went to the King, was told abruptly of these intentions; and then He (sic) sent for the principal persons in Administration, and those who had assisted him, and having thanked them, went down to the House to declare this in his place in the manner in which you will, I suppose, see it described in the papers.(222)

The old Ministry is at an end, and of what materials the new one will be composed, the Lord knows.  The insolence, the hard heartiness (sic), brutality, and stuff, which these people talk, altogether give me the worst apprehensions of what they will do, and I have only to hope that from this, which seems so irreconcilable to reason, decency, or the usual practice of Government, some system will be formed that I shall like better.

As to Lord N(orth), what happens disagreeable to him he merits in greatest degree, and if the King chooses to acquiesce in all this ill treatment of him, I see no reason why I should be offended, or feel more for a man’s disgrace than he feels himself.  He might have prevented it; he seemed to wish that he could; he now seems not affected by it; but je courerois risque d’extravaguan(ce) si je continuois sur le chapitre.

I stayed at Brooks’s this morning till between 2 and 3, and then Charles was giving audiences in every corner of the room, and that idiot Lord D.(223) telling aloud whom’he should turn out, how civil he intended to be (to) the P(rince), and how rude to the K(ing).

Thursday night, 9 o’clock.—­George is going on as before, no fever, but a cough.  Sir N. T[homas] has forbid his going out as yet.  I took him out airing yesterday in the middle of the day for an hour, but to-day he has had some physic.

Lord Gower and I were a long while together at Whitehall; we both agreed that, re bus sic stantibus, it seems impossible that you should stay in Ireland.  Hare informs me that they do not mean to remove you.  I should wonder if they did, for such an account as I have of the state of Ireland is terrible, and I am sure one cannot wish to send a friend to weather such a storm.  The best thing for you would be their sending another in your room, but, if they do not do that, the next is to desire to be recalled, when you know who these Ministers are.  You must expect a pause for some time in your political carriere, and you must in that interval practise a great economy, which will do you infinite credit, and then, upon a new turn of affairs you will be called with more lustre into a better situation.  This was Lord Gower’s opinion, and is mine.

Charles assured me, not half an hour ago, that the King had sent for nobody, that all was as much at a stand as before the Creation.  Nobody knows what to make of it.  But a Ministry must be formed by Monday.  It is thought that my nephew will be Chancellor of the Exchequer and C(harles) Fox the Secretary of State, and of the rest I know nothing, of that nothing like intelligence (sic).  It is imagined that Lord Rock(ingham) and Lord Shelbourn cannot agree.