n this matter as a personal affront to
himself, was determined that all who held either military or civil
appointments should clearly understand that they could not continue to
serve him if they opposed his policy in parliament. With Bedford's
approval, Conway, Barre, and with them General A'Court, who had also
voted in the minority, were deprived of their commands, and Shelburne,
Barre's patron, was dismissed from his office as aide-de-camp to the
king. Barre followed Shelburne's example in attaching himself to Pitt.

[Sidenote: _GRENVILLE'S ECONOMY._]

These dismissals violated the most valuable of the privileges of
parliament, freedom of speech and immunity from royal coercion. It was a
well-established constitutional rule that the king should not take
notice of anything which passed in parliament and that no member should
suffer for his speeches or votes. This rule had been broken in the last
reign when, in 1733, two officers lost their commands and, in 1735, Pitt
his cornetcy for acting with the opposition. On the present occasion the
responsibility for its violation rests on Grenville at least as much as
on the king himself. Parliament took little notice of this infringement
upon its privileges, though on the first day of the session, 1765,
Granby pleased the army by some sharp remarks on the dismission of
officers on account of their votes in parliament.[67] Encouraged by
their success against Wilkes, the ministers waged war on political
libels. A large number of _ex officio_ informations, or accusations
presented by the attorney-general on which the person accused was
brought to trial without the previous finding of a grand jury, were laid
against printers and others during the course of the year. As this
looked like persecution, it excited popular anger. One bookseller who
was sentenced to stand in the pillory in New-palace-yard, Westminster,
drove thither in a hackney coach numbered 45, and was cheered by a crowd
estimated at 10,000 persons. Two hundred guineas was collected for him,
and the mob hung a jack-boot and a "Scotch bonnet" on a gibbet and then
burnt them.

Grenville insisted on economy in the national expenditure; it was
needful, for during the late war the public debt had risen from
L72,500,000 to L132,700,000, and the country was heavily taxed. His
budget stood in honourable contrast to the finance of the late
administration; it did not propose lotteries or a private loan, and it
included an ad