rely
rely. Having {251} thus secured a full power to act, Walpole was not
long in bringing the disturbances to an end. He displayed both
discretion and resolve. He was able to satisfy the most reasonable
among the brewers and maltsters that their interests would not really
suffer by the proposed resolutions. The natural result was that the
combination of brewers began to melt away. The brewers held a meeting,
and it was soon found that it would not be possible to secure a general
resolution to meet the legislation of the Government by passive
resistance and by ceasing to brew. As all would not stand together,
every man was left to take his own course, and the result was that what
we should now call a strike came quietly to an end.

[Sidenote: 1725--Intrigue and counter-intrigue]

A modern reader is naturally shocked and surprised at the manner in
which members of the same Government in Walpole's day intrigued against
one another, and strove to thwart each other's policy. No actual
defence is to be made for such a practice; but it is only fair to
observe that up to Walpole's own entrance into office, and after it,
the habit of English sovereigns had been to make up an administration
by taking members of different and even of opposing parties and
bringing them together, in the hope of securing thereby the
co-operation of all parties. Under these circumstances it was natural,
it was only to be expected, that the minister who was pledged to one
policy would endeavor by all means in his power to counteract the
designs of the minister whom he knew to be pledged to a very different
kind of policy. Nor, indeed, is the practice of intrigue and
counter-intrigue among members of the same cabinet actually unknown in
our own days, when there is not the same excuse to be pleaded for it
that might have been urged in the time of Walpole. In the case of the
Duke of Roxburgh, however, the attempt to counteract the policy of
Walpole was made in somewhat bolder and less subtle fashion than was
common even in those days, and Walpole was well justified in the course
he took. For once his high-handed way of dealing with men was
vindicated {252} by its principle and by the unqualified advantage it
brought to the interests of the State and to those of the minister as
well.

[Sidenote: 1725--Dictatorship overdone]

The student of history derives one satisfaction from the frequent
visits of King George to Hanover. The corresponde