n he was obliged to make war upon
them, he was so tender of their interest, that the British admiral was
sent out with orders rather to destroy his own fleet than the galleons,
which, in appearance, he was sent to take, and to perish by the
inclemency of the climate, rather than enter the Spanish ports, terrify
their colonies, or plunder their towns.

But to little purpose, sir, did our minister implore the compassion of
the Spaniards, and represent the benefits by which we might claim it;
for his compliance was by the subtle Spaniards attributed, not to
kindness, but to fear; and it was therefore determined to reduce him to
absolute slavery, by the same practices which had already sunk him to so
abject a state.

They therefore treated our remonstrances with contempt, continued their
insolence and their oppressions, and while our agent was cringing at
their court with fresh instructions in his hand, while he was hurrying
with busy looks from one grandee to another, and, perhaps, dismissed
without an audience one day, and sent back in the midst of his harangue
on another, the guardships of the Spaniards continued their havock, our
merchants were ruined, and our sailors tortured.

At length, sir, the nation was too much inflamed to be any longer amused
with idle negotiations, or trifling expedients; the streets echoed with
the clamours of the populace, and this house was crowded with petitions
from the merchants. The honourable person, with all his art, found
himself unable any longer to elude a determination of this affair. Those
whom he had hitherto persuaded that he had failed merely for want of
abilities, began now to suspect that he had no desire of better success;
and those who had hitherto cheerfully merited their pensions by an
unshaken adherence to all his measures, who had extolled his wisdom and
his integrity with all the confidence of security, began now to be
shaken by the universality of the censures which the open support of
perfidy brought upon them. They were afraid any longer to assert what
they neither believed themselves, nor could persuade others to admit.
The most indolent were alarmed, the most obstinate convinced, and the
most profligate ashamed.

What could now be done, sir, to gain a few months, to secure a short
interval of quiet, in which his agents might be employed to disseminate
some new falsehood, bribe to his party some new vindicators, or lull the
people with the opiate of another exp