Page:Life of William Shelburne (vol 2).djvu/276

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240
WILLIAM, EARL OF SHELBURNE
CH. VII

not the enormous sum of 25 millions unfunded? Our Navy bills bearing an enormous discount; our public credit beginning to totter; our commerce day by day becoming worse; our army reduced, and in want of 30,000 men to make up its establishments; our navy, which has been made so much the boast of some men, in such a condition, that the noble Viscount, now at the head of the profession, in giving a description of it, strove to conceal its weakness by speaking low, as if he wished to keep it from going abroad into the world. But in such a day as this it must be told; your Lordships must be told what were the difficulties which the King's Ministers had to encounter in the course of the last campaign. Your Lordships must be told how many sleepless nights I have spent; how many weary hours of watching and distress. What have been my anxieties for New York? What have I suffered from the apprehension of an attack on that garrison, which, if attacked, must have fallen! What have I suffered from the apprehension of an attack on Nova Scotia or Newfoundland! The folly, or the want of enterprise of our enemies, alone protected those places; for had they gone there instead of to Hudson's Bay, they must have fallen. What have I suffered for the West Indies, where, with all our superiority of navy, we were not able to take one active or offensive measure for want of troops; and where, if an attack had been made where it was meditated, we were liable to lose our most valuable possessions! How many sleepless nights have I not suffered for our possessions in the East Indies, where our distresses were indescribable! How many sleepless nights did I not suffer on account of our campaign in Europe, where, with all our boasted navy, we had only one fleet with which to accomplish various objects! That navy the noble Viscount was fair to own, was well conducted. Its detachment to the North Seas, to intimidate the Dutch, was a happy and a seasonable stroke; but the salvation of the Baltic fleet was not at all to be ascribed to ability; accident contributed to that event; accident contributed to more than one article of our naval triumphs. How many of our ships were