it would have been paid then, had not the Board with such an infraction of justice refused him
preservation of the revenue. His Grace was treated with accordingly; and by a liberal agreement received £70.000; which was at the extraordinary rate of 140 years purchase: to which was added a pension of £2000 (on the Irish estabIishment) for the lives of himself and the Duchess which was enjoyed forty years.—In 1804, the revenue of the Island having much improved in the interval, the Inheritor of this peerage complained of the serious loss and injury to the family, by the transfer above forty years before!—On the part of Government it was alleged that this improvement was owing to the greater vigilance they were enabled to exert by their cruizers, &c., and therefore was not to have been expected, had the management continued in private hands—an explanation which seems satisfactory enough. But, though it would be difficult to say that any contractor for naval or military stores might not on such a precedent claim compensation for a calculated loss twenty or thirty years after signing the articles,[subnote 1] his Grace, who must have reckoned accurately on his resources, goes down to Parliament, and by that influence which in all countries, whatever may be their form of Government attends on high rank and great possessions procured to the Dukedom of Athol a grant of £3.500 per annum, in perpetuity to replace the pension extinct. The old observation, that it is much easier for a rich man to obtain an addition to his wealth, than for a poor one to procure what is necessary to his existence, comes home with
- ↑ At this time, the Author was not aware that in the debate on the grant, one of the speakers (Sir John Miller) indignantly opposed it on the same ground; for he "wished the house joy of what they were going to do. Henceforth they would have business enough upon their hands in remunerating every contractor who had made a bad bargain."—Weed's History of the Isle of Man, page 313.
