Page:Defence of Shelburne.djvu/94

 Do you think it was criminal to make his son deputy paymaster, at a salary of 1000 pounds a year, which place is said to have produced 12000 pounds annually to his predecessor Mr. Caswell? Or are you displeased, that, instead of making fifty thousand pounds a year, like his predecessor, Mr. Burke should reduce his own profits to four thousand pounds a year? Do I overstate the produce of Mr. Rigby? Has your Lordship read the reports of the commissioners of accounts? Seriously then, my Lord, do you think any man will value your heart the more for the contents of page 34? I believe it cannot injure the reputation of your head.

Let us oppose your theory to Mr. Burke's practice. You had the full scope of imagination; yet all the retrenchment you could recommend was to deprive the commanders of regiments of the profits of cloathing, page 25. The next moment you say, this is no object for retrenchment, for it does not pay the expence of attending the regiments, and then again conclude with remarking, that it is the most striking object of reformation, and from which only an increase of revenue could be expected.

Military ideas were natural to an Earl of Stair, but I think the Colonels will not much Rh