the subject of the revolution must before long formally break their alliance. The growing alienation of Burke from Fox and the party for which he had so lorig worked caused him pain and anxiety (Elliot, i. 364-70), and it was at this time probably that he said to Addington, ‘I am not well, Speaker; I eat too much, I drink too much, and I sleep too little ’ (Pellew, Life of Sidmouth, i. 85). Early in 1791 Burke published his ‘Letter to a Member of the National Assembly’ (Works, iv. 359). In a debate in April, Fox, provoked by this renewed attack, uttered a warm panegyric on the new French constitution. Burke rose to reply in visible emotion, but was forced to give way to the division (Parl. Hist. xxix. 249). Every effort was used to persuade Burke to let the matter pass, but ‘knowing the authority of his friend's name; he believed it necessary to bring his panegyric to trial (Ann. Reg. 1791, 115). The Quebec Bill would, he knew, give him an opportunity, und he acquainted some members of the administration with his intention. On 21 April Fox visited him and begged him to defer the final rupture, but it was too late. They walked down to the house together. In the course of a speech on the postponement of the bill, Fox, ‘meeting what he could not avoid’ to some extent, challenged Burke to express his decision, and Burke declared that ‘dear as was his friend the love of his country was dearer still’ (Parl. Hist. xxix. 362). On 6 May the house reassembled after the holidays, and, the Quebec Bill being again brought forward, Burke spoke at length on the revolution. He was called to order by various members and jeered at by Fox. Baited by one and another ignoble foe, he exclaimed:
The little dogs and all—
Tray, Blanch, and sweetheart—see, they bark at me.
(Pellew, i. 85). Fox spoke plainly of the difference of opinion between them. Burke in his reply referred to the desertion of friends. ‘There is no loss of friends; Fox whispered. Yes, he answered, there was a loss of friends—he knew the price of his conduct—he had done his duty at the price of his friend—their friendship was at an end. When Fox rose, some minutes passed before he could speak for tears (Parl. Hist. xxix. 361-88). Burke’s separation from his party brought on him a storm of calumny. It was asserted that he led Fox on to speak of the revolution that he might prejudice the king against him. Burke complained of the report in a debate on ll May, and as he and Fox defended each his own conduct, the breach between them was widened (ib. 416~26). Burke stood alone, for he had cut himself ofi, for a while at least, from the part of which he had so long been the life and the instructor. He now undauntedly set himself to enlighten his friends and lead them back to the true principles of 1688. At the end of the session he went down to Margate with his wife and his niece, Miss French, who was now living with him, and finished his ‘Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs’ (Works, iv. 392). In December he brought out his ‘Thoughts on French Affairs ’ (tb, 551), a pamphlet exhibiting the revolution as no mere political change, but as concerned, like the Reformation, with doctrines and o inious which would certainly spread unless checked by a coalition of powers. While at Margate he received a visit from Calonne, who came from the refugees at Coblentz to seek his advice. He sent his son Richard to represent him at Coblentz, a step which was allowed though not authorised by the government, while the Chevalier de la Bintinnaye was sent to represent the princes at Beaconsfield (ib. i. 633). No advice, however, could help men so impracticable as the Coblentz refugees. Richard returned home and was at once engaged by the Irish catholics, who hoped through him to gain his father’s guidance. This mission called forth the letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, written in January 1792, in which the whole question of religious toleration in Ireland is discussed. In February Burke attended the funeral of his old friend Sir Joshua Reynolds, who leit him his executor with a legacy of 2,000l., and appointed him guardian of his niece, Miss Palmer, shortly afterwards married to Lord Inchiquin. Burke immediately sent 100l. by his son to two poor women by the Blackwater, one of them by birth a Nagle and probably one of his mother's family, adding ‘God knows how little we can spare it’ (ib. ii. 91). He took little part in the debates of this session. He opposed Grey’s notice of motion on parliamentary reform. Anger at the sympathy the unitarians expressed with the revolution and fear of disturbing the established order again led him, in May 1792, to forget his tolleant principles and oppose Fox’s motion for the repeal of certain penal statutes respecting religious opinions (Parl. Hist. xxix. 1381).
Burke now held a unique position. ‘He is,’ writes Elliot, ‘a sort of power in Europe, though totally without any of those means, or the smallest share in them, which give or maintain power in other men.’ He was in correspondence with Monsieur (Louis XVIII) the Count of Artois, and the French royalists. All hope of help from England was founded
