A Bill for a Militia in Scotland was less successful; nor could the disaffected there obtain this mode of having their arms restored. Pitt had acquiesced; but the Duke of Newcastle, the Solicitor-General Yorke, Nugent, Lord Barrington, and the young Whigs, attacked it with all their force. Even the Scotch Lord Advocate spoke with spirit against it. Elliot defended it masterly; and Sir Henry Erskine went so far as to say that all Scotland would come and demand it at the bar of the House. Unluckily for that menace, the man who had most weight in that country, the Duke of Argyll, was not cordial to the Bill, and it was rejected by _one hundred and ninety-four_ to _eighty-four_.
A proposed extension of the Militia met with the same fate. It had been granted for five years. The counties which had adopted it grew tired of the expense. The Tory gentlemen were fond of this more decent mode of accepting emoluments. To humour them and George Townshend, Pitt had consented that a Bill should be brought in to make the expense common to the whole kingdom, by enabling the counties where Militia was raised to draw on the Exchequer. The Speaker advertised the House that this would not only be a Money Bill, but must have the consent of, nay, must be recommended by, the Crown. That the King absolutely refused to give. Notice being taken of the Bill’s non-appearance, Lord Strange, in his frank manner, said, “Why did not gentlemen speak out? was it not that his Majesty would not consent to the Bill?” Pitt, to draw all possible honour from what he could not bestow, replied, it was now too late in the session; but if any man would renew the Motion the second day of next session, even to make the Militia perpetual, he would not only second, but try to get the Bill passed before the supplies; yet what were those supplies to feed but his own war, which he _boasted_ had doubled the expense of any year of Queen Anne? This very year above sixteen millions were voted.
[84] William Pulteney, the celebrated Earl of Bath.
[85] Dr. Douglas, canon of Windsor, known for his detection of Lauder, and controversy with Archibald Bower, author of the Lives of the Popes.--A.
He became Bishop of Carlisle in 1788; Bishop of Salisbury in 1791, and died in 1807.--E.