Commons that both his parts and his illnature were most signally
displayed. Before he had been a member three weeks, his
volubility, his asperity, and his pertinacity had made him
conspicuous. Quickness, energy, and audacity, united, soon raised
him to the rank of a privileged man. His enemies, and he had many
enemies, said that he consulted his personal safety even in his
most petulant moods, and that he treated soldiers with a civility
which he never showed to ladies or to Bishops. But no man had in
larger measure that evil courage which braves and even courts
disgust and hatred. No decencies restrained him: his spite was
implacable: his skill in finding out the vulnerable parts of
strong minds was consummate. All his great contemporaries felt
his sting in their turns. Once it inflicted a wound which
deranged even the stern composure of William, and constrained him
to utter a wish that he were a private gentleman, and could
invite Mr. Howe to a short interview behind Montague House. As
yet, however, Howe was reckoned among the most strenuous
supporters of the new government, and directed all his sarcasms
and invectives against the malcontents.30

The subordinate places in every public office were divided
between the two parties: but the Whigs had the larger share. Some
persons, indeed, who did little honour to the Whig name, were
largely recompensed for services which no good man would have
performed. Wildman was made Postmaster General. A lucrative
sinecure in the Excise was bestowed on Ferguson. The duties of
the Solicitor of the Treasury were both very important and very
invidious. It was the business of that officer to conduct
political prosecutions, to collect the evidence, to instruct the
counsel for the Crown, to see that the prisoners were not