tion a challenge was
certain to come; and in this, as in many other respects, the conduct of
Pitt was such as to strengthen our institutions. By adding to the House
of Lords a considerable number of commoners he enabled it to withstand
the storms of the Revolutionary age and the inevitable conflicts of the
future.

* * * * *

To revert to the year 1801, there occurred early in the autumn an event
of high import. The struggle of eight years between Great Britain and
France ended in stalemate. The collapse of the Armed Neutrality League
together with the capture of Malta and the surrender of the French
garrisons in Egypt left the Union Jack triumphant at sea and the
tricolour on the Continent. Each State had need of rest to restore its
finances and consolidate its conquests. Therefore, though Bonaparte had
at the end of March 1801 sharply repelled the pacific overtures of the
Addington Cabinet, yet negotiations were resumed at the close of summer,
a fact which proves that the First Consul was influenced, not by spite
to Pitt and goodwill to his successor, but by the constricting grip of
the Sea Power. Hawkesbury, Grenville's successor at the Foreign Office,
asserted that shortly before the end of the negotiation Pitt sat up with
him through part of a night discussing finance, and finally advising the
cessation of hostilities.

Not that Pitt directed the negotiations; for both Addington and
Hawkesbury were proud and sensitive men, and Pitt at some points
criticized the conditions of the Preliminaries of London (1st October
1801). They were as follows: Great Britain agreed to restore to France,
Spain, and the Batavian, or Dutch, Republic all their possessions
recently conquered by her, with the exception of Trinidad and Ceylon,
ceded to her by Spain and the Dutch respectively. She also retired from
Elba and restored Malta to the Knights of St. John, under conditions to
be further specified. The French restored Egypt to the Sultan, and
evacuated Naples and the Papal States. Portugal was also saved from
danger of partition. Nothing was said respecting the resumption of
trade between England and France; and no assurance was forthcoming as to
the independence of the Republics bordering on France. By his recent
compact with Austria the First Consul agreed to respect their
independence; but England had no definite ground for complaint if it
were violated.

While the London rabble sho