imiting the time during which the regent should be
restrained from creating peers, and another moved by Viscount Stormont,
on the restriction placed upon the regent in regard to the granting of
places, were negatived, and then all opposition ceased. A protest was
signed by fifty-seven peers, among whom the Dukes of York and Cumberland
were again numbered. But the storm was not yet over. Both the prince
and his friends were irritated in the highest degree by the restrictions
which Pitt imposed upon the regency; and though the former had privately
expressed his acceptation of, or submission to the limitations, yet the
latter were still resolutely bent upon opposing the premier. On the 27th
of January, after recapitulating all the steps which had been taken,
Pitt suggested that it would be respectful to the Prince of Wales, and
expedient in the order of their proceedings, to know parliamentarily,
whether he was willing to accept the regency upon the terms imposed by
that house. Pitt moved that a committee should be appointed to wait upon
his royal highness for that purpose, with the resolutions to which both
lords and commons had agreed. On this occasion, the minister was accused
by Mr. Gray and Burke, with treating the prince with marked disrespect;
and the latter likewise taxed him with the design of converting the
monarchy into a republic, with a regent, annually elected, nominally at
its head. Against the regency bill he burst into a paroxysm of rage.
He exclaimed, "It is a mere mummery, a piece of masquerade buffoonery,
formed to burlesque every species of government. A hideous spectre, to
which, with Macbeth, we may exclaim,--

'Avaunt and quit my sight!
Let the earth hide thee.
Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold:
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
That thou dost glare withal.'

"So it is with this ministerial, political spectre. 'Its bones are
marrowless, its blood is cold, and it has no speculation in its eyes.'
I reprobate it as a chimera, a monster summoned up from the depth
of hell!" But all the arguments, and accusations, and rage of the
opposition proved fruitless: Pitt's motion was carried without a
division, and ordered to be sent up to the lords for their concurrence.
Pitt also moved for a similar committee to wait upon the queen, in
order to ascertain whether her majesty would undertake the care of his
majesty's person, and the management and control of the household