assiduity and devotion with which he practised the arts of corruption.  Henry Fox, grasping, unscrupulous, with powerful talents, a warm friend after his fashion, and a most indulgent father; Carteret, with his strong, versatile intellect and jovial intrepidity; the two Townshends, Mansfield, Halifax, and Chesterfield,—­were conspicuous figures in the politics of the time.  One man towered above them all.  Pitt had many enemies and many critics.  They called him ambitious, audacious, arrogant, theatrical, pompous, domineering; but what he has left for posterity is a loftiness of soul, undaunted courage, fiery and passionate eloquence, proud incorruptibility, domestic virtues rare in his day, unbounded faith in the cause for which he stood, and abilities which without wealth or strong connections were destined to place him on the height of power.  The middle class, as yet almost voiceless, looked to him as its champion; but he was not the champion of a class.  His patriotism was as comprehensive as it was haughty and unbending.  He lived for England, loved her with intense devotion, knew her, believed in her, and made her greatness his own; or rather, he was himself England incarnate.

The nation was not then in fighting equipment.  After the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, the army within the three kingdoms had been reduced to about eighteen thousand men.  Added to these were the garrisons of Minorca and Gibraltar, and six or seven independent companies in the American colonies.  Of sailors, less than seventeen thousand were left in the Royal Navy.  Such was the condition of England on the eve of one of the most formidable wars in which she was ever engaged.

Her rival across the Channel was drifting slowly and unconsciously towards the cataclysm of the Revolution; yet the old monarchy, full of the germs of decay, was still imposing and formidable.  The House of Bourbon held the three thrones of France, Spain, and Naples; and their threatened union in a family compact was the terror of European diplomacy.  At home France was the foremost of the Continental nations; and she boasted herself second only to Spain as a colonial power.  She disputed with England the mastery of India, owned the islands of Bourbon and Mauritius, held important possessions in the West Indies, and claimed all North America except Mexico and a strip of sea-coast.  Her navy was powerful, her army numerous, and well appointed; but she lacked the great commanders of the last reign.  Soubise, Maillebois, Contades, Broglie, and Clermont were but weak successors of Conde, Turenne, Vendome, and Villars.  Marshal Richelieu was supreme in the arts of gallantry, and more famous for conquests of love than of war.  The best generals of Louis XV. were foreigners.  Lowendal sprang from the royal house of Denmark; and Saxe, the best of all, was one of the three hundred and fifty-four bastards of Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland.  He was now, 1750, dying at Chambord, his iron constitution ruined by debaucheries.