While things were in this state, Chatham at length returned to London.  He might as well have remained at Marlborough.  He would see nobody.  He would give no opinion on any public matter.  The Duke of Grafton begged piteously for an interview, for an hour, for half an hour, for five minutes.  The answer was, that it was impossible.  The King himself repeatedly condescended to expostulate and implore.  “Your duty,” he wrote, “your own honour, require you to make an effort.”  The answers to these appeals were commonly written in Lady Chatham’s hand, from her lord’s dictation; for he had not energy even to use a pen.  He flings himself at the King’s feet.  He is penetrated by the royal goodness so signally shown to the most unhappy of men.  He implores a little more indulgence.  He cannot as yet transact business.  He cannot see his colleagues.  Least of all can he bear the excitement of an interview with majesty.

Some were half inclined to suspect that he was, to use a military phrase, malingering.  He had made, they said, a great blunder, and had found it out.  His immense popularity, his high reputation for statesmanship, were gone for ever.  Intoxicated by pride, he had undertaken a task beyond his abilities.  He now saw nothing before him but distresses and humiliations; and he had therefore simulated illness, in order to escape from vexations which he had not fortitude to meet.  This suspicion, though it derived some colour from that weakness which was the most striking blemish of his character, was certainly unfounded.  His mind, before he became first minister, had been, as we have said, in an unsound state; and physical and moral causes now concurred to make the derangement of his faculties complete.  The gout, which had been the torment of his whole life, had been suppressed by strong remedies.  For the first time since he was a boy at Oxford, he had passed several months without a twinge.  But his hand and foot had been relieved at the expense of his nerves.  He became melancholy, fanciful, irritable.  The embarrassing state of public affairs, the grave responsibility which lay on him, the consciousness of his errors, the disputes of his colleagues, the savage clamours raised by his detractors, bewildered his enfeebled mind.  One thing alone, he said, could save him.  He must repurchase Hayes.  The unwilling consent of the new occupant was extorted by Lady Chatham’s entreaties and tears; and her lord was somewhat easier.  But if business were mentioned to him, he, once the proudest and boldest of mankind, behaved like a hysterical girl, trembled from head to foot, and burst into a flood of tears.

His colleagues for a time continued to entertain the expectation that his health would soon be restored, and that he would emerge from his retirement.  But month followed month, and still he remained hidden in mysterious seclusion, and sunk, as far as they could learn, in the deepest dejection of spirits.  They at length ceased to hope or to fear anything from him; and though he was still nominally Prime Minister, took without scruple steps which they knew to be diametrically opposed to all his opinions and feelings, allied themselves with those whom he had proscribed, disgraced those whom he most esteemed, and laid taxes on the colonies, in the face of the strong declarations which he had recently made.