under the elder Pitt when party was forgotten, and the Council, in the words of the aged Carteret, Lord Granville, was a happy conciliabulum. Or, again, we might show why precisely it came that Frederick II of Prussia[1] conceived his deep distrust of the English constitution for its influence on the conduct of foreign affairs, and 'abused Parliaments'—sentiments which were entertained also, in different degrees of bitterness and contempt, by Catherine II, by Kaunitz, and others.[2] The composition and the cohesion of parties in Britain, the cohesion and security of ministries, seemed to depend upon temporary and changing circumstances of a domestic character. Could anything be taken for certain in dealings with a State whose politics were thus founded, and thus displayed to foreign observers? Such assertions and charges, even when they were not justified, or were but little sustainable, from facts, had a diplomatic use: they could be made to serve a diplomatic end, immediate or ulterior.
While foreign princes and foreign ministers, as well as some ministers and critics at home, were thus passing adverse judgement on the British constitution for its imperfections and excesses caused by the parliamentary system, leaders of the Opposition were demanding the production of dispatches, papers, and reports which the Government was withholding on the plea of State necessity. Of many complaints the two following are typical. They are taken from the Lords' Protests: they are drawn from the armoury of the Opposition to Sir Robert Walpole. In the first[3] it was contended, with reference to the trading interests of the British colonies and
