rth's government lasted for twelve
years, and its career is for ever associated with one of the most
momentous chapters in the history of the English nation and of free
institutions.

Through this long and eventful period, Burke's was as the voice of
one crying in the wilderness. He had become important enough for the
ministry to think it worth while to take pains to discredit him. They
busily encouraged the report that he was Junius, or a close ally of
Junius. This was one of the minor vexations of Burke's middle life.
Even his friends continued to torment him for incessant disclaimers.
Burke's lofty pride made him slow to deal positively with what he
scorned as a malicious and unworthy imputation. To such a friend as
Johnson he did not, as we have seen, disdain to volunteer a denial,
but Charles Townshend was forced to write more than one importunate
letter before he could extract from Burke the definite sentence
(November 24, 1771):--"I now give you my word and honour that I am not
the author of Junius, and that I know not the author of that paper,
and I do authorise you to say so." Nor was this the only kind of
annoyance to which he was subjected. His rising fame kindled the
candour of the friends of his youth. With proverbial good-nature, they
admonished him that he did not bear instruction; that he showed such
arrogance as in a man of his condition was intolerable; that he
snapped furiously at his parliamentary foes, like a wolf who had
broken into the fold; that his speeches were useless declamations; and
that he disgraced the House by the scurrilities of the bear-garden.
These sharp chastenings of friendship Burke endured with the perfect
self-command, not of the cold and indifferent egotist, but of one who
had trained himself not to expect too much from men. He possessed the
true solace for all private chagrins in the activity and the fervour
of his public interests.

In 1772 the affairs of the East India Company and its relations with
the Government had fallen into disorder. The Opposition, though
powerless in the Houses of Parliament, were often able to thwart the
views of the ministry in the imperial board-room in Leadenhall Street.
The Duke of Richmond was as zealous and as active in his opposition
to Lord North in the business of the East Indies, as he was in the
business of the country at Westminster. A proposal was made to Burke
to go out to India at the head of a commission of three supervisors,
with