(396) This transaction was an endeavour on the part of Mr. Grenville to obtain from General Conway a declaration that “his disposition was not averse from a general support of the persons and measures of those now employed,” and permission " to say so much when he might have occasion to speak to him.”  This declaration General Conway declined to give, although Mr. Grenville seemed to ask it only to enable him to save Conway from dismissal on account of his late vote.  There is reason to believe that at this conference (at which the Duke of Richmond was present, as Conway’s friend) some overtures of a more intimate connexion with the administration were made; but Conway declared his determination to adhere to the politics of his friends, the Dukes of Devonshire and Grafton.  “At least,” he said, “if he should hereafter happen to differ from them, he should so steer his conduct as not to be, in any way of office or emolument, the better for it."-C.

(397) Isaac Barr`e was a native of Ireland, and born in 1726:  he entered the army early in life, and rose, gradually to the rank of colonel.  He was in 1763 made adjutant-general and the governor of Stirling Castle, but was turned out on this occasion, and even resigned his half-pay.  He continued to make a considerable figure in the House of Commons:  in 1782 he became a privy-councillor and treasurer of the navy, which latter office he soon exchanged for paymaster of the forces; but on the change of government he retired on a pension of 3200 pounds, which his political friends had previously secured for him.  From this time his sight failed him, and he was quite blind for many years previous to his death, which took place in 1802.-C.

(398) Captain James, afterwards Sir James Campbell, of Ardkinglass:  a captain in the army, and member for the county of Stirling.-E.

(399) Major-General Edward Harvey, lieutenant-general in 1772.-E.

(400) Colonel Barr`e, previous to his dismissal, had distinguished himself by an attack on Mr. Pitt, which is not reported in the Parliamentary Debates.-C. [In the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 171, will be found the following passage, in a letter from Mr. Symmers to Sir Andrew Mitchell, dated January 29, 1762:—­“Would you know a little of the humour of Parliament, and particularly with regard to Mr. Pitt?’ I must tell you that Colonel Barr`e, a soldier of fortune, a young man born in Dublin, of a mean condition, his father and mother from France, and established in a little grocer’s shop by the patronage of the Bishop of Clogher; a child of whom the mother nursed; this young man (a man of address and parts), found out, pushed, and brought into Parliament by Lord Shelburne, had not sat two days in the House of Commons before he attacked Mr. Pitt.  I shall give you a specimen of his philippics.  Talking in the manner of Mr. Pitt’s speaking, he said, ’There he would stand, turning up his eyes to heaven, that witnessed his perjuries, and laying his hand in a solemn manner upon the table, that sacrilegious hand, that hand that had been employed in tearing out the bowels of his mother country!’ Would you think that Mr. Pitt would bear this and be silent; or would you think that the House would suffer a respectable member to be so treated?  Yet so it Was.”]