with the majority in the hope that he would overcome their
opposition, discredit his enemies, and win the confidence of the country
before he appealed to it. Fox should have urged an immediate
dissolution. If Pitt had tried to avoid it, he would have incurred the
odium of hesitating to accept the will of the nation. Fox, however, used
every effort to prevent a dissolution. The will of the commons had been
thwarted by the king's unconstitutional interference, and he was
determined to vindicate the authority of the house. Besides, he had a
substantial majority, and though it might have been maintained by a
general election, he knew that his coalition with North was unpopular,
and that his India bill had aroused the hostility of some powerful
corporations which felt that their privileges were endangered by his
attack upon the company's charter. The affairs of India were at once
made a pretext for an address to the crown deprecating a dissolution;
the house was engaged upon them, and a dissolution would frustrate its
endeavours. The king replied that he would not interfere with its work
either by dissolution or prorogation.

[Sidenote: _PITT'S VICTORIOUS CONTEST._]

The house reassembled after the Christmas recess on January 12. Fox
relying on the authority of Lord Somers, one of the leading statesmen of
the revolution, questioned the right of the crown to dissolve parliament
during the business of a session; James II., he said, had done so and
put an end to his reign. His contention was unsound; the will of a house
of commons is not conclusive: the crown has a right to dissolve in order
to ascertain the will of the nation. Pitt replied that he "would not
compromise the royal prerogative or bargain it away in the house of
commons". He was in a minority of 193 to 232. On the 14th, he brought in
his India bill, which proposed to place the political concerns of the
company under a board of control in England to be appointed by the
crown, and to leave to the company its commerce and patronage. Fox
attacked it as incomplete, and it was negatived though only by eight
votes. A fierce struggle followed, a struggle, Dr. Johnson called it,
"between George the Third's sceptre and Mr. Fox's tongue". Fox tried
every means to force the ministers to resign; he put forth all his
wonderful powers of debate and attacked Pitt with great bitterness;
addresses to the crown and resolutions hostile to the ministers were
adopted, and the supplie