ever may occur to you upon it; but it was impossible to write without mentioning the greatest point a nation ever had depending; and that is all I mean."[1]
Chatham replied:
"My letter by the post will have apprised your Lordship of my thoughts concerning the present period of the East India inquiry. I remain fully persuaded that Mr. Townshend's declaration in the House, with regard to an expected proposal, must necessarily suspend all operations for a competent time till the proposal shall be produced or be formally disavowed. In the meantime it is not to be permitted to suppose such levity and indiscretion in man as to doubt of the grounds of such a declaration. A proposal therefore I take for granted will come; and when it shall be before the House, the ways to ulterior and final proceedings upon this transcendant object will open themselves naturally and obviously enough, and acquire double force and propriety."[2]
On the 6th of February the proposals of the Company were imparted to the Administration. They bore the stamp of the ideas put forward by the Chairman in his recent conversation with Shelburne. Chatham at once declared them "inconclusive and inadmissible," at the same time that he suggested the following scheme of Parliamentary action:[3]
1. "The whole proposal to be moved for by some member and laid before Parliament.
2. "The papers which are already before the House to be moved for, to be printed.
3. "Not to proceed to the decision of the question of right on Friday.[4]
4. "The Committee to adjourn for a week or to some proper day.
5. "When they do proceed, to begin by stating facts exactly resulting from premises, viz.:
- ↑ Shelburne to Chatham, February 1st, 1767.
- ↑ Chatham to Shelburne, February 3rd, 1767. This letter it printed in the Chatham Correspondence, iii. 181-182.
- ↑ Memorandum sent by Chatham to Shelburne on the receipt of the proposals of the Company. The latter are given in the Chatham Correspondence, iii. 196.
- ↑ February 20th.
