is barely civil to Lady C.; he knows that Mount Charles is
independent of him, and that the King likes him and admits him
continually and familiarly to his presence, and of this it seems
that he is jealous. I was more struck with one word which dropped
from him than with all he told me of Sir W. Knighton. While the
Tyrolese were dancing and singing, and there was a sort of gay
uproar going on, with which the King was greatly delighted, he
said, 'I would give ten guineas to see Knighton walk into the
room now,' as if it were some master who was absent, and who
should suddenly return and find his family and servants
merrymaking in his absence; it indicates a strange sort of power
possessed by him.

[Page Head: HOSTILITY OF LORD GREY.]

The King was very civil to the Duke of Dorset, and repeatedly
told him that what had passed would make no difference in their
private friendship. In the meantime the Corn Bill has been thrown
out, and I think political animosities are full as strong as
ever, though they have taken rather a sulky than a violent tone.
I had a long conversation with Duncannon yesterday, who is fully
possessed of the sentiments of all the Whigs, and by what he says
it is clear that they are extremely dissatisfied; they want
Canning to display his power by some signal act of authority, and
to show that he is really supported cordially by the King. The
opposite party are persuaded that the King is secretly inclined
to them and averse to his present Government, and this opinion
obtains more or less with the public in consequence of the
impunity with which Canning has been braved by the Chancellor in
Ireland. The appointment of Doherty as Solicitor-General has
never yet passed the Great Seal, and Lord Manners refuses to
sanction it; he has likewise refused to put Sir Patrick Bellew (a
Catholic) in the Commission of the Peace, though he is a
respectable man and he has been strongly pressed to do it even by
Protestants. This refusal so disgusted Duncannon that he was very
near withdrawing his name from the Commission, and if he had his
example would have been followed by many others, but Lord Spencer
dissuaded him from doing so. Lord Grey is in such a state of
irritation that he will hardly speak to any of his old friends,
and he declares that he will never set his foot in Brooks's
again. All this is the more extraordinary, and the vivacity of
his temper the more unaccountable, because he has constantly
declined