, and practical sagacity.

Several eminent Whigs were in constant communication with Dykvelt: but
the heads of the great houses of Cavendish and Russell could not take
quite so active and prominent a part as might have been expected from
their station and their opinions, The fame and fortunes of Devonshire
were at that moment under a cloud. He had an unfortunate quarrel with
the court, arising, not from a public and honourable cause, but from a
private brawl in which even his warmest friends could not pronounce him
altogether blameless. He had gone to Whitehall to pay his duty, and had
there been insulted by a man named Colepepper, one of a set of bravoes
who invested the perlieus of the court, and who attempted to curry
favour with the government by affronting members of the opposition. The
King himself expressed great indignation at the manner in which one of
his most distinguished peers had been treated under the royal roof; and
Devonshire was pacified by an intimation that the offender should never
again be admitted into the palace. The interdict, however, was soon
taken off. The Earl's resentment revived. His servants took up his
cause. Hostilities such as seemed to belong to a ruder age disturbed the
streets of Westminster. The time of the Privy Council was occupied by
the criminations and recriminations of the adverse parties. Colepepper's
wife declared that she and her husband went in danger of their lives,
and that their house had been assaulted by ruffians in the Cavendish
livery. Devonshire replied that he had been fired at from Colepepper's
windows. This was vehemently denied. A pistol, it was owned, loaded with
gunpowder, had been discharged. But this had been done in a moment of
terror merely for the purpose of alarming the Guards. While this
feud was at the height the Earl met Colepepper in the drawingroom at
Whitehall, and fancied that he saw triumph and defiance in the bully's
countenance. Nothing unseemly passed in the royal sight; but, as soon as
the enemies had left the presence chamber, Devonshire proposed that they
should instantly decide their dispute with their swords. The challenge
was refused. Then the high spirited peer forgot the respect which he
owed to the place where he stood and to his own character, and struck
Colepepper in the face with a cane. All classes agreed in condemning
this act as most indiscreet and indecent; nor could Devonshire himself,
when he had cooled, think of it without