land. The closest, the most natural, the nearest, and at the same
time, from many internal as well as external circumstances, the weakest
of our allies, Holland, would have been given up, bound hand and foot,
to France, just on the point of invading that republic. A general
consternation would have seized upon all Europe; and all alliance with
every other power, except France, would have been forever rendered
impracticable to us. I think it impossible for any man, who regards the
dignity and safety of his country, or indeed the common safety of
mankind, ever to forget Mr. Fox's proceedings in that tremendous crisis
of all human affairs.

9. Mr. Fox very soon had reason to be apprised of the general dislike of
the Duke of Portland's friends to this conduct. Some of those who had
even voted with him, the day after their vote, expressed their
abhorrence of his amendment, their sense of its inevitable tendency, and
their total alienation from the principles and maxims upon which it was
made; yet the very next day, that is, on Friday, the 14th of December,
he brought on what in effect was the very same business, and on the same
principles, a _second_ time.

10. Although the House does not usually sit on Saturday, he a _third_
time brought on another proposition in the same spirit, and pursued it
with so much heat and perseverance as to sit into Sunday: a thing not
known in Parliament for many years.

11. In all these motions and debates he wholly departed from all the
political principles relative to France (considered merely as a state,
and independent of its Jacobin form of government) which had hitherto
been held fundamental in this country, and which he had himself held
more strongly than any man in Parliament. He at that time studiously
separated himself from those to whose sentiments he used to profess no
small regard, although those sentiments were publicly declared. I had
then no concern in the party, having been, for some time, with all
outrage, excluded from it; but, on general principles, I must say that a
person who assumes to be leader of a party composed of freemen and of
gentlemen ought to pay some degree of deference to their feelings, and
even to their prejudices. He ought to have some degree of management for
their credit and influence in their country. He showed so very little of
this delicacy, that he compared the alarm raised in the minds of the
Duke of Portland's party, (which was his own,) an alarm i