to raise fufpicion in the minds of the people. But I hope that my countrymen will be no longer impofed upon by artful and defigning men, or by wretches, who, bankrupts in bufinefs, in fame, and in fortune, mean nothing more than to involve this country in the fame common ruin with themfelves. Hence it is, that they are conftantly aiming their dark and too often fatal weapons against those who ftand forth as the bulwark of our national fafety. Lord Granby was too confpicuous a mark not to be their object. He is next attacked for being unfaithful to his promises and engagements: Where are Junius's proofs? Although I could give fome inftances, where a breach of promife would be a virtue, especially in the cafe of thofe who would pervert the open, unfufpecting moments of convivial mirth, into fly, infidious applications for preferment, or party fystems, and would endeavour to furprise a good man, who cannot bear to fee any one leave him diffatisfied, into unguarded promises. Lord Granby's attention to his own family and relations is called felfifh. Had he not attended to them, when fair and juft opportunities prefented themselves, I fhould have thought him unfeeling, and void of reflection indeed. How are any man's friends or relations to be provided for, but from the influence and protection of the patron? It is

unfair

unfair to fuppofe that Lord Granby's friends have not as much merit as the friends of

any other

great

man: If he is generous at the public expence, as Junius invidiously calls it, the public is at no more expence for his lordip's friends, than it would be if any other fet of men poffeffed thofe offices. The charge is ridiculous!

The laft charge against Lord Granby is of a most ferious and alarming nature indeed. Junius afferts, that the army is mouldering away for want of the direction of a man of common abilities and fpirit. The prefent condition of the army gives the directeft lie to his affertions. It was never upon a more refpectable footing with regard to difcipline, and all the effentials that can form good foldiers. Lord Ligonier delivered a firm and noble palladium of our fafties into Lord Granby's hands, who has kept it in the fame good order in which he received it. The strictest care has been taken to fill up the vacant commiffions with fuch gentlemen as have the glory of their ancestors to fupport, as well as their own, and are doubly bound to the cause of their king and country, from motives of private property, as well as public fpirit. The adjutant general who has the immediate care of the troops, after Lord Granby, is an officer who would dɔ great honour to any service in Europe, for his correct arrangements, good fenfe and difcernment upon all occafions,

C 2

occafions, and for a punctuality and precision which give the most entire fatisfaction to all who are obliged to confult him. The reviewing generals, who inspect the army twice a year, have been felected with the greatest care, and have answered the important trust repofed in them in the most laudable manner. Their reports of the condition of the army are much more to be credited than those of Junius, whom I do advife, to atone for his shameful afperfions, by afking pardon of Lord Granby and the whole kingdom, whom he has offended by his abominable scandals. In fhort, to turn Junius's own battery against him, I must affert, in his own words, "that he has given strong affertions without proof, declamation without argument, and violent cenfures without dignity or moderation." Clifton Jan. 26, 1769.

WILLIAM DRAPER.

LETTER III.

To Sir WILLIAM DRAPER,
KNIGHT of the BATH.

SIR,

JR

Feb. 7, 1769.

YOUR defence of Lord Granby hoes honour to

the goodness of your heart. You feel, as you ought to do, for the reputation of your friend, and

you

you express yourself in the warmeft language of the paffions. In any other caufe, I doubt not, you would have cautiously weighed the confequences of committing your name to the licentious difcourfes and malignant opinions of the world. But here, I prefume, you thought it would be a breach of friendship to lose one moment in confulting your understanding; as if an appeal to the public were no more than a military coup de main, where a brave man has no rules to follow, but the dictates of his courage. Touched with your generosity, I freely forgive the exceffes into which it has led you; and, far from refenting those terms of reproach, which, confidering that you are an advocate for decorum, you have heaped upon me rather too liberally, I place them to the account of an honest unreflecting indignation, in which your cooler judgment and natural politenefs had no concern, I approve of the spirit, with which you have given your name to the public; and, if it were a proof of any thing but fpirit, I fhould have thought myself bound to follow your example. I fhould have hoped that even my name might carry fome authority with it, if I had not feen how very little weight or confideration a printed paper receives even from the refpectable fignature of Sir William Draper.

You begin with a general affertion, that writers, fuch as I am, are the real caufe of all the public e

vils we complain of. And do you really think, SirWilliam, that the licentious pen of a political writer is able to produce fuch important effects? A little calm reflection might have fhewn you, that national calamities do not arife from the defcription, but from the real character and conduct of minifters. To have fupported your affertion, you fhould have proved that the prefent miniftry are unquestionably the best and rightest characters of the kingdom; and that, if the affections of the colonies have been alienated, if Corfica has been fhamefully abandoned, if commerce languishes, if public credit is threatened with a new debt, and your own Manilla ransom moft difhonourably given up, it has all been owing to the malice of political writers, who - will not fuffer the best and brightest of characters (meaning ftill the prefent miniftry) to take a fingle right ftep for the honour or intereft of the nation. But it feems you were a little tender of coming to particulars. Your confcience infinuated to you, that it would be prudent to leave the characters of Grafton, North, Hillsborough, Weymouth, and Mansfield, to fhift for themfelves; and truly, Sir William, the part you have undertaken is at least as much as you are equal to.

Without difputing Lord Granby's courage, we are yet to learn in what articles of military know. ledge nature has been fo very liberal to his mind.

If