so much kindness to me, and for remembering the little commission I took the liberty to give you abont the pills, which I have not yet received, but thank you as much as if I had. Since you have
President of the Council; and it is said he was designed for the office of Lord High Treasurer, when death removed him, in 1712. His character has been thus drawn by Sir James Mackintosh. "Lawrence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, was Lord Sunderland's most formidable competitor for the chief direction of public affairs. He owed this importance rather to his position and connexions than to his abilities, which however were by no means contemptible; he was the undisputed leader of the Tory party, to whose highest principles in Church and State he shewed a constant and probably conscientious attachment. He had adhered to James in every variety of fortune, and was the uncle of the Princesses Mary and Anne, who seemed likely in succession to inherit the crown; he was a fluent speaker, and appears to have possessed some part of his father's talents as a writer; he was deemed sincere and upright, and his life was not stained by any vice, except violent paroxysms of anger and an excessive indulgence in wine, then scarcely deemed a fault. His infirmities, says one of the most zealous adherents of his party, were passion, in which he would swear like a cutter, and the indulging himself in wine; but his party was that of the Church of England, of whom he had the honour for many years of being accounted the head. The impetuosity of his temper concurred with his opinions on government in prompting him to vigorous measures; he disdained the forms and details of business, and it was his maxim to prefer only Tories without regard to their qualifications for office. "Do you not think," said he to Lord Keeper Guildford, "that I cannot understand, any business in England in a month?" "Yes, my Lord," answered the Keeper, "but I be-
