Intimidation was joined with corruption.  All ranks, from the highest to the lowest, were to be taught that the King would be obeyed.  The Lords Lieutenants of several counties were dismissed.  The Duke of Devonshire was especially singled out as the victim by whose fate the magnates of England were to take warning.  His wealth, rank, and influence, his stainless private character, and the constant attachment of his family to the House of Hanover, did not secure him from gross personal indignity.  It was known that he disapproved of the course which the Government had taken; and it was accordingly determined to humble the Prince of the Whigs, as he had been nicknamed by the Princess Mother.  He went to the palace to pay his duty.  “Tell him,” said the King to a page, “I that I will not see him.”  The page hesitated.  “Go to him,” said the King, “and tell him those very words.”  The message was delivered.  The Duke tore off his gold key, and went away boiling with anger.  His relations who were in office instantly resigned.  A few days later, the King called for the list of Privy Councillors, and with his own hand struck out the Duke’s name.

In this step there was at least courage, though little wisdom or good nature.  But, as nothing was too high for the revenge of the Court, so also was nothing too low.  A persecution, such as had never been known before, and has never been known since, raged in every public department.  Great numbers of humble and laborious clerks were deprived of their bread, not because they had neglected their duties, not because they had taken an active part against the ministry, but merely because they had owed their situations to the recommendation of some nobleman or gentleman who was against the peace.  The proscription extended to tidewaiters, to gaugers, to doorkeepers.  One poor man to whom a pension had been given for his gallantry in a fight with smugglers, was deprived of it because he had been befriended by the Duke of Grafton.  An aged widow, who, on account of her husband’s services in the navy, had, many years before, been made housekeeper to a public office, was dismissed from her situation, because it was imagined that she was distantly connected by marriage with the Cavendish family.  The public clamour, as may well be supposed, grew daily louder and louder.  But the louder it grew, the more resolutely did Fox go on with the work which he had begun.  His old friends could not conceive what had possessed him.  “I could forgive,” said the Duke of Cumberland, “Fox’s political vagaries; but I am quite confounded by his inhumanity.  Surely he used to be the best-natured of men.”

At last Fox went so far to take a legal opinion on the question, whether the patents granted by George the Second were binding on George the Third.  It is said, that, if his colleagues had not flinched, he would at once have turned out the Tellers of the Exchequer and Justices in Eyre.