, but all the details of the arrangement
now in question, and of the preparations for the active scene of
next year, is wholly out of the question? It seems very clear that
no arrangement will happen before that time which can change the
Irish Government, and in the meanwhile you would be honourably and
_most usefully_ employed. I have, however, not hinted this idea to
any individual, nor will I. If all this is wholly out of the
question, I conclude that my reply to your answer to these
despatches, will bring to Lord Spencer and you the King's
permission to return to England.

It would be very satisfactory to you to see how well things are
going on here, and how completely our hopes have been realized on
the subject which employed so much of our time and thoughts this
summer.

God bless you, my dearest brother.

At this time, the new changes in the Administration, already alluded to,
were under discussion in the Cabinet; and, amongst the rest, it was
proposed that the government of Ireland should be offered to Lord
Fitzwilliam. As soon as this appointment was suggested, his Lordship
wrote to Mr. Thomas Grenville to offer him the office of Secretary.

MR. THOMAS GRENVILLE TO EARL FITZWILLIAM.

(Private.) Vienna, Aug. 30th, 1794,
DEAR LORD FITZWILLIAM,

You will already have heard enough of our proceedings here to give
you no considerable expectations of any great good to be done here;
and if you happen to have been in London, and to have read a very
tedious and long letter which I wrote on the 24th to the Duke of
Portland, you will have seen there, more at large than it is
necessary to repeat, the general view and impression of our minds
as to the business with which we are charged; and the little ground
which there appears to us for hoping that even by satisfying their
pecuniary demands, we could depend upon such exertions being made
in consequence, as the country would expect in return for expense
of so great and heavy a scale. It is very true, to be sure, that in
this as well as in many other cases, the difficulties present
themselves something more readily than the remedies to them, yet
upon the question of the subsidy, if we are right in our
conception that it would not probably produce, either in degree or
in shape, that energy and cordial co-o