Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 08.djvu/425

 Inn, though his residence chambers were at 2 Paper Buildings, in the Inner Temple.

His uncle, the banker, was a staunch whig, and his house was a favourite resort of the whig leaders. Here the young Oxonian made the acquaintance of Fox and Sheridan, who introduced him to Devonshire House at a grand supper party given by the duchess to all the wit, rank, and beauty of the whig party. There can be no doubt that at this time Canning called himself a whig, and his intimate friend, George Ellis, his colleague in the ‘Anti-Jacobin,’ and one of the founders of the ‘Quarterly Review,’ was even now writing in the ‘Rolliad.’ But the French revolution exercised the same influence on Canning as it did on many older men, hitherto the most distinguished ornaments of the whig party—Burke, Windham, Spencer, Lord Fitzwilliam—and brought them over in a body to the tory camp. Sir Walter Scott says that Canning's conversion was due to a visit from Godwin, who came to him in Paper Buildings, and told him that the English Jacobins, in the event of a revolution, had determined on making him their leader. Canning, according to this account, took time to consider the proposal, and, coming to the conclusion that he had better at once make his plunge in the opposite direction, instantly hurried off to Pitt. Scott seems to have heard this story at Murray's, but he does not say from whom, though he adds that Sir W. Knighton was the person to whom Canning told it. Godwin's visit, however, was only one out of many causes all converging to the same result. Moore declares that the treatment of Burke and Sheridan by the whigs had some effect in leading Canning to unite himself with the tories. A long letter of 13 Dec. 1792, written to his friend, Lord Boringdon, at Vienna, gives Canning's own explanation of his views and inclinations at the period, and shows that he already regarded Mr. Pitt as the man of the age. Whether, however, Canning went to Pitt, or Pitt sent for Canning, the result was the same. In 1793 he finally enrolled himself under that statesman's banner, and took his seat in the House of Commons as member for Newtown in January 1794. His maiden speech was delivered on the 31st of that month, the subject being the proposed grant of a subsidy to the king of Sardinia. Canning himself wrote an account of it to Lord Boringdon, in which he describes his own sensations at the moment of rising, and his annoyance towards the middle of his speech by seeing some members on the front opposition bench laughing, as he thought, at himself. The cheers of his friends, however, soon restored him, and he got through his task triumphantly.

In 1796, when he exchanged Newtown for Wendover, Canning was made under-secretary of state for foreign affairs, a position which he held till 1799, when he was made commissioner of the board of control. From 1800–1 he was paymaster-general. He was M.P. for Tralee 1802–6, Newtown again 1806–7, and Hastings 1807–12. From September 1797 to July 1798 he contributed to the ‘Anti-Jacobin or Weekly Examiner,’ with Ellis, Frere, the Smiths, Lord Wellesley, Lord Carlisle, and even Pitt. Canning himself, it is said, never directly acknowledged the authorship of any of the pieces attributed to him. But we may safely assert that the ‘Needy Knife-grinder,’ the lines on Mrs. Brownrigg, the ‘New Morality,’ the song on Captain Jean Bon André, the lament of Rogero, and Erskine's speech to the Whig Club, were almost exclusively his. The paper was perhaps the most brilliant success of its kind on record. The intention of it was to make the revolutionary party ridiculous. Previously it had been the upholders of law and order, the ‘Dons,’ the ‘Bigwigs,’ who had been favourite objects of popular satire. Now, perhaps for the first time, it was their assailants who were covered with contempt; and such was the success of the experiment, that we can only wonder that it was discontinued so soon. It came out in September 1797, and was stopped in the following July.

On 8 July 1800 Canning married Joan, daughter of Major-general John Scott, a young lady with 100,000l. and sister to the Duke of Portland. This made him independent, and when Pitt resigned on the Roman catholic question, Canning could follow him without any pecuniary misgivings.

During the administration of Addington, who succeeded Pitt at the treasury, Canning seems to have represented that kind of irregular opposition which, coming from below the gangway on the ministerial side of the house, is more familiar to us than to our grandfathers. He was in favour of the Roman catholic claims and for a vigorous prosecution of the war, and Addington was inclined to neither. Pitt, however, held him in check for the first two or three years, though he could not prevent him from indulging in those flights of humour at the expense of the Addingtonian party, which greatly irritated the minister's own friends, and laid the foundation of that bitter and widespread animosity which pursued him to his grave. In May 1804, however, Pitt returned to power, and Canning with him as treasurer of the navy, an office which he held till Pitt's