consequence, in her majesty's service. The lord chancellor[1], lord Bolingbroke, and lady Masham, openly declared against him; to whom were joined the bishop of Rochester[2] and some others. Dartmouth, then privy-seal, and Poulett, lord steward, stood neuters. The duke of Shrewsbury hated the treasurer; but sacrificed all resentments to ease, profit, and power; and was then in Ireland, acting a part directly opposite to the court, which he had sagacity enough to foresee might quickly turn to account; so that the earl of Oxford stood almost single, and every day found a visible declension of the queen's favour toward him; which he took but little care to redress, desiring nothing so much as leave to deliver up his staff: which, however, as conjunctures then stood, he was not able to obtain; his adversaries not having determined where to place it: neither was it, upon several accounts, a work so proper to be done while the parliament sat, where the ministry had already lost too much reputation, and especially in the house of lords. By what I could gather from several discourses with the treasurer, it was not very difficult to find out how he reasoned with himself. The church party continued violently bent to have some necessary removals made in the guards, as well as a farther change in the civil employments through the kingdom. All the great officers about the court, or in her majesty's service, except the duke of Shrewsbury, and one or two more, were in the same opinion. The queen herself, since her last illness at Windsor, had the like dispositions; and I think it
may
