pheld that side of the sphere. Undoubtedly, great temper and judgment
was requisite in the management of the colony politics; but the official
detail was a trifle. Since the new appointment, a train of unfortunate
accidents has brought before us almost the whole correspondence of this
favorite secretary's office since the first day of its establishment. I
will say nothing of its auspicious foundation, of the quality of its
correspondence, or of the effects that have ensued from it. I speak
merely of its _quantity_, which we know would have been little or no
addition to the trouble of whatever office had its hands the fullest.
But what has been the real condition of the old office of Secretary of
State? Have their velvet bags and their red boxes been so full that
nothing more could possibly be crammed into them?

A correspondence of a curious nature has been lately published.[43] In
that correspondence, Sir, we find the opinion of a noble person who is
thought to be the grand manufacturer of administrations, and therefore
the best judge of the quality of his work. He was of opinion that there
was but one man of diligence and industry in the whole administration:
it was the late Earl of Suffolk. The noble lord lamented very justly,
that this statesman, of so much mental vigor, was almost wholly disabled
from the exertion of it by his bodily infirmities. Lord Suffolk, dead to
the state long before he was dead to Nature, at last paid his tribute to
the common treasury to which we must all be taxed. But so little want
was found even of his intentional industry, that the office, vacant in
reality to its duties long before, continued vacant even in nomination
and appointment for a year after his death. The whole of the laborious
and arduous correspondence of this empire rested solely upon the
activity and energy of Lord Weymouth.

It is therefore demonstrable, since one diligent man was fully equal to
the duties of the two offices, that two diligent men will be equal to
the duty of three. The business of the new office, which I shall propose
to you to suppress, is by no means too much to be returned to either of
the secretaries which remain. If this dust in the balance should be
thought too heavy, it may be divided between them both,--North America
(whether free or reduced) to the Northern Secretary, the West Indies to
the Southern. It is not necessary that I should say more upon the
inutility of this office. It is burning day