Regency first met and agreed to meet again on the Tuesday, and that there should be a Privy Council every fortnight.

9th. The Duke of Athol was with my secretary, to desire the names of several persons might be put in Justices of the Peace for Perthshire; but on talking with Sir R. Walpole, he advised me not to take them from him, because he knew by letters intercepted that the Duke of Athol was in measures with his elder brother, who is attainted.

12th.-Went to Ockham, and returned Monday morning.

14th.-Returned from Ockham, and sat in the Court of Chancery. 15th.-A Regency, where, amongst other things, was read a Petition of George Lord Murray, setting forth that he was but eighteen years old when he went into the rebellion: that he stands indicted, but was never convicted nor attainted, praying the King's mercy : which being referred by the King to the Regency for their opinions, we were all of opinion that there was nothing in law to stand in the way of the King's pardon, and that if he pleased he might do it. But it was desired that there might be a more explicit opinion, and what we should advise the King to do. I said I wished him pardoned, but I was unacquainted with the facts, and therefore could only say that, if the King thought fit to pardon him, there was nothing in law to obstruct it, but to advise either one way or other I could not, because I was not sufficiently master of the facts. The Archbishop would not advise anything in the case of blood. The Duke of Argyle strongly against it, because this man's treason was attended with perfidy, in deserting the King's troops and running away to the rebels; and if this man were pardoned, others would immediately make the same application. Roxburgh, Walpole, a majority were for it; so a letter ordered to advise the King to pardon him.

At my desire the Regency now ordered that Mr Paxton, who had been employed by the Council in the affair of the Masters, might lay before the Regency an account of the deficiency of the Masters, showing to this time what the particular effects were that were paid into the Bank; and the Attorney and Solicitor-General were ordered to take care that the suitors might receive satisfaction for their several demands. This I did that care might be taken of the suitors in Chancery, and because it was not proper that I should be both judge and party; that the Attorney and Solicitor-General might bring all things necessary before the court, and might be the prosecutors in this matter.

The Duke of Argyle and Mr Walpole spoke to me to expedite the Commissions of the Peace for the several shires of Scotland, which commissions, as they said, had been settled by Lord Townshend before he went away, and sent to the late Commissioners of

the Seal. I told them I knew nothing of it-nothing had been said to me about it.

16th.-Mr Scroop came to me from Mr Walpole, to let me know that the lists of the Justices of the Peace for Scotland, sent to the Commissioners, were by them sent to the Crown-office; and Mr Pynsent, Deputy Clerk of the Crown, now brought the several lists for all the counties in Scotland, and the old lists, and said that he had never received any orders from the late Commissioners of the Seal to make out any commissions upon them. Whilst we were talking, the Master of the Rolls came in, and he said that all he knew of it was, that Mr Bulkley brought these new lists to him from Lord Townshend, without any letter or order, and that being but two or three days before he closed up the seals, he did nothing upon it, but sent them to the Crown-office. I told Mr Scroop that this was not the usual way of putting in Justices of the Peace, that I would look over the lists, but if any were to be left out I should first know the reason, and whosoever were to be put in I would have a recommendation in writing from the Lord-Lieutenants, desiring they might be put in, and attesting their fitness, or from some other person of quality and known integrity. He said Mr Stewart of the House of Commons should wait on me and give me more particular account of these matters, that he himself was unacquainted with them, but there was a necessity for the new commissions, because of levying the malt tax.

17th.—Mr Stewart, a Scotch member of the House of Commons, was with me, and acquainted me that all the lists of the Justices of the Peace for the several counties of Scotland had been settled by the direction of Lord Townshend, by Lord Islay, with the Members of the House of Commons, and that the settling these lists had taken up three months' time. I spoke this morning with the Marquis of Tweedale, and showed him the lists for Edinburgh, Haddington, Berwick, and Roxburgh; he said that no objection could be made to the men put therein, only in Haddington he thought some more new names might be added, but he would not add any because he had not been consulted in it, notwithstanding which he sent me three names, which put into the commission for Haddington.

30th. An express came from General Wade, of a tumult that had been at Glasgow on the 24th, the day the malt tax took place, and that among other outrages they had pulled down Daniel Campbell's house and gutted it. The Duke of Newcastle came to the seal where I was then sitting, in the Inner Temple hall, and acquainted me of it; whereupon I told him my opinion, and desired him to get together that evening as many of the Regency as he could, and to have a general meeting the next morning, and to send out notices accordingly.

July 1st.-There was a meeting of the Regency: present, Archbishop of Canterbury, myself, Duke of Devonshire, Duke of Kingston, Duke of Dorset, Earl of Berkley, Earl Godolphin, Duke of Newcastle. At the meeting, a letter, amongst others, from General Wade was read, in which there was a passage, that if the commissions for the justices of peace had been sent down, it might have been of use to them on this occasion: on which I told the Regents, that when I had the seals I found thirty-one commissions of the peace for thirty-one of the shires of Scotland, or rather lists of names for those commissions, lying in the Crown-office, and I had been informed that there had been lists likewise for the two other shires now missing, viz. Peebles and Perth. On which Mr Pynsent, the Deputy clerk of the Crown, was called in, and said that the Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal had sent these lists for the several counties of Scotland, but had not given any particular directions what to do with them. The Duke of Newcastle informed the Regents, that the Earl of Islay had had orders for a considerable time before the King went away to settle proper and fit lists for the justices of peace in Scotland, it being now proper, both for levying the malt tax and disarming the Highlanders, and that such lists had been made and delivered to Lord Townshend, who had desired him to see those lists expedited, and that it was only the hurry of business, just as he went away, that was the occasion it had not been done. The Earl of Islay, who attended at my desire, was called in, and he gave an account that several months ago he received orders from the King, by Lord Townshend, to go through the lists of all the commissions of the peace in Scotland, and settle proper lists; that to this end he had consulted with the parliamentmen of the several counties: that those who were dead, or had never acted, or had no estates in the county, they had left out; that this was the common method of such proceedings, and had added men of estates and character in the respective counties; that the list took up three months' time in preparing, and was done with great exactness and regard to gentlemen. On this, I told the Regency, that though in England the Great Seal would be a little more consulted in matters of this nature, yet, considering the urgency of affairs, if their Excellencies would order me to pass those commissions of the peace, as now settled, I would do it. Whereupon they ordered me forthwith to pass these thirty-one commissions, and also the two others, if the originals could be recovered again, and, in default thereof, such as the Earl of Islay should, from his papers, or memory, or any other way, recollect. Whereupon, I sent by the express that now went to Scotland commissions of the peace for Edinburgh, Haddington, Lanark, and Berwick, and the others I ordered to be expedited as fast as possible.

24th.-Sir Robert Walpole went with me to my house at Ockham,

and lodged there the night. He entered into a free discourse with me about foreign affairs. That whilst we had plenipotentiaries at Cambray, the King of Spain, being provoked by the French Court sending back his daughter, had entered into a private treaty with the Emperor; that the Queen of Spain, who governs all there, was unmeasurably angry with France, and that she was allured by the Emperor, by a proposal that the Emperor's daughter should be married to her son Don Carlos; that in this point she trusted the Emperor, and, believing that it would be so, inclined Spain to come into the treaty, whereby the hereditary dominions of Austria are preserved in the Emperor's daughters. That the Emperor had invited us to accede to this treaty, and so to guarantee the succession for his daughters; that to encourage us, he had proposed his mediation with Spain to settle all differences between us, and particularly that of Gibraltar and Port Mahon; we declining to enter into that guarantee, Spain had now intimated to the King her hopes that the King would restore those two places.

He likewise informed me of the state of the North: that the Czarina had pressed the King of Sweden to let her send her fleet to Norkoping, to be ready for her design upon Denmark and Sleswick, and that he had been likely to have granted it, had not we warned him that if this were suffered, the Czarina would by this means turn him out of his kingdom, and put it under the dominion of the Duke of Holstein; and that to encourage him we were forced to give him £10,000 as part of some subsidies that by treaty we are to give him in case of a war; that now all things were like to be quiet on that side.

He told me also another secret: that pending the design in France of sending back the young Queen to Spain, there had been a negotiation between the Princess and Count Broglio, the French Ambassador, by the intervention of the late Lady Darlington, for Princess Ann to be given in Marriage to the French King, and that the French Court expected it as a thing sure; and for that reason, at the same time that the Ambassador notified the resolution of sending the young Queen back, he desired of the King his granddaughter for his master, but that the King absolutely refused it.

Another negotiation had lately been on foot in relation to the two young Princes, Frederick and William.† The Princet and his wife were for excluding Prince Frederick from the throne of

Afterwards Frederick Prince of Wales.

† Afterwards Duke of Cumberland. This is a very curious proof of the early hatred of George the Second and Queen Caroline to Frederick Prince of Wales. It would have been fortunate if the separation of Hanover from England had taken place then or at any time, by fair means, or by any means. The then Prince of Wales, afterwards George the Second. The Princess of Wales, afterwards Queen Caroline.

England; but that, after the King and Prince, he should be Elector of Hanover, and Prince William King of Great Britain: but that the King said it was unjust to do it without Prince Frederick's consent, who was now of age to judge for himself; and so this matter now stood. But that Sir Robert Walpole had told the King, that if he did not in his life-time bring over Prince Frederick, he would never set his foot on English ground; so that he did not know whether the King, when he returned from Hanover, would not bring that Prince with hiin.

26th.-Received by Lord Townshend from the King a warrant to pass a commission under the Great Seal to Lord Townshend to treat and contract with such princes and states as the King should direct, which I accordingly passed under the Great Seal.

29th.-The Duke of Newcastle was with me to explain the meaning of the commission to Lord Townshend, which was, that the Emperor and King of Spain being now in strict amity, there was a necessity to enter into a league with other powers to preserve the peace of Europe; that France and the King of Sardinia were ready, and it was hoped that the Protestant Princes of the Empire and Holland would likewise come into it.

Aug. 11th. At Sir Robert Walpole's; dined there with Lord Harcourt and Lord Trevor. The end of our dining there was to consider what was fit to be done with Lord Macclesfield's £30,000. We all agreed that, till the deficiency was known, there could not be any distribution; and therefore the safest way would be to lend this £30,000 upon the land-tax, and so it would carry interest, and that interest might go to the credit of the suitors, in aid of the deficiency.

12th. At a Regency, some of the Regents being then gone, Mr Stroop bringing a warrant from the Lords Justices to sign for striking £30,000 land-tax tallies to Holford and Lovibond, two of the masters, for the use of the suitors, to be disposed of as the Court of Chancery should direct, myself, Lord Dorset, Lord Harcourt, and Sir R. Walpole signed the said warrant to the Treasury for that purpose. But at the Regency the week after, this was altered, because it was said that the first intimation must come from the Court of Chancery; and thereon, on the motion of the AttorneyGeneral, an order of Court was made that the Treasury should be desired to issue the £30,000 fine, paid in by the Earl of Macclesfield, to Holford and Thruston, the senior and junior Masters, to be by them lent on the land tax, &c., for the benefit of the suitors. In the month of August, I drew up an order for obliging the Masters in the Court of Chancery to pay their money into the Bank according to the order of the 26th May, 1725, reciting or confirming the said order, with additions and explanations; the Master of the Rolls intimating by the Attorney-General that he was willing to