Adieu my dear lord; you shall hear as often as I can find a conveyance but these are not topics for the post!  Poor Mrs. Fitzroy has lost her eldest girl.  I forgot to tell you that the young Duke of Devonshire goes to court to-morrow.  Yours ever.

Wednesday evening.

I am forced to send you journals rather than letters.  Mr. Craufurd, who was to carry this, has put off his journey till Saturday, and I choose rather to defer my despatch than trust it to Guerchy’s courier, though he offered me that conveyance yesterday, but it is too serious to venture to their inspection.

Such precautions have been taken, and so many troops brought into town, that there has been no rising, though the sheriffs of London acquainted the Lords on Monday that a very formidable one was preparing for five o’clock the next morning.  There was another tumult, indeed, at three o’clock yesterday, at Bedford-house, but it was dispersed by reading the Riot-act.  In the mean time, the revolution has turned round again.  The ministers desired the King to commission Lord Granby, the Duke of Richmond, and Lord Waldegrave, to suppress the riots, which, in truth, was little short of asking for the power of the sword against himself.  On this, his Majesty determined to name the Duke of Cumberland captain-general but the tranquillity of the rioters happily gave H. R. H. occasion to persuade the King to suspend that resolution.  Thank God!  From eleven o’clock yesterday, when I heard it, till nine at night, when I learned that the resolution had dropped, I think I never passed such anxious hours! nay, I heard it was done, and looked upon the civil war as commenced.  During these events, the Duke was endeavouring to form a ministry, but, luckily, nobody would undertake it when Mr. Pitt had refused so the King is reduced to the mortification, and it is extreme, of taking his old ministers again.  They are insolent enough, you may believe.  Grenville has treated his master in the most impertinent manner, and they are now actually digesting the terms that they mean to impose on their captive, and Lord Bute is the chief object of their rage; though I think Lord Holland will not escape, nor Lord Northumberland, whom they treat as an encourager of the rioters.  Both he and my lady went on Monday night to Bedford-house, and were received with every mark of insult.(831) The Duke turned his back on the Earl, without speaking to him, and he was kept standing an hour exposed to all their railery.  Still I have a more extraordinary event to tell you than all I have related.  Lord Temple and George Grenville were reconciled yesterday morning, by the intervention of Augustus Hervey; and, perhaps, the next thing you wilt hear, may be that Lord Temple is sent by this ministry to Ireland, though Lord Weymouth is again much talked of for it.

The report of Norwich and Manchester weavers on the road is now doubted.  If Lord Bute is banished, I suppose the Duke of Bedford will become the hero of this very mob, and every act of power which they (the ministers] have executed, let who will have been the adviser, will be forgotten.  It will be entertaining to see Lord Temple supporting Lord Halifax on general warrants!