breasts
of the English people; and, as naturally, the feelings of contempt for
his cold, calculating, official colleagues.

THE AFFAIRS OF WILKES.

By this time Sergeant Glynn had been elected for the county of
Middlesex. Glynn was the friend and companion of Wilkes, and it happened
that some of the chairmen of his opponent killed a man of the name
of Clarke in an affray. At this period, such events were by no means
uncommon, but as Sir William Beauchamp was a ministerial candidate, the
populace spread surmises abroad, and circulated accusations detrimental
to his character. He was charged with being an employer of assassins,
and two of his chairmen were tried at the Old Bailey for murder. They
were acquitted, but this only tended to increase the popular excitement
against the ministers. Wilkes still more inflamed it by his intemperate
conduct. Lord Weymouth sent a letter to the bench of magistrates for the
county of Surrey, expressing the warmest approbation of their conduct,
and recommending them to quell all tumults on their first rising by
the aid of the civil and military power. This letter, or a copy of it,
having fallen into the hands of Wilkes, it was published by him, with
an inflammatory preface, in which he called the affair in St. George's
Fields "a horrid massacre, and the consequence of a hellish project
deliberately planned." Irritated by his imprisonment, Wilkes, indeed,
seems now to have set his fortune on the cast of a die, and the only way
of playing the game successfully, seems to have been, considered by him,
that of inflaming the passions of the people, already enraged beyond
endurance, to the utmost. But the ministers resolved that he should
not act with impunity, and this last act determined them upon taking
effectual measures to overthrow his cause, finally and for ever. But the
determination taken by them only aided the "patriot" in his ambitious
projects, and tended to increase their own unpopularity.

{GEORGE III. 1765-1769}

MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.

Parliament, with the Duke of Grafton at its head, assembled on the 8th
of November. In his speech his majesty alluded to the signs of commotion
among the continental powers which now existed; to the state of our
American colonies, especially to the proceedings at Boston, which he
denounced in strong terms; and to the late abundant harvest, which he
viewed with satisfaction, as having come opportunely to the relief of
his poorer