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Rh being made a duke. Such a condition of affairs was naturally tempting to those who sat in the cold shade of Opposition.

In the latter part of the month of December mutual overtures had been made by the friends of North and Fox, to bring these two leaders together, for the purpose of overthrowing the Government and dividing the spoils of office. The intermediaries of the negotiation were Eden and George North for Lord North, and Colonel Richard Fitzpatrick, Lady Shelburne's brother, for Charles Fox. "I own," says George Selwyn, "that to see Charles closeted every instant at Brooks by one or the other, so that he can neither punt nor deal for a quarter of an hour, but is obliged to give an audience while Hare is whispering and standing beside him, like Jack Robinson, with a pencil and paper for mems., is to me a scene 'la plus parfaitement comique que l'on puisse imaginer,' and to nobody it seems [more] risible than to Charles himself."

Considering the extraordinary violence of the language habitually indulged in by Fox during the past seven years against North, it might have been thought that any endeavours to form a coalition between them would have been but labour lost. But Fox approached the high game of politics in the same spirit in which he approached the faro table at Brooks. Not a year was gone by since he had apostrophized the Administration of his rival in the following terms: "From the moment," he said, "when I shall make any terms with one of them, I will rest satisfied to be called the most infamous of mankind. I would not for an instant think of a coalition with men who in every public and private transaction as ministers,