"Mr. Pitt will not make peace because he cannot make that which he has given the nation reason to hope for," an acute observer of the court, Bubb Doddington, had already said. On succeeding to power, Lord Bute and the tories found themselves still driven by public opinion to measures more violent than their tastes or their intentions. France had made a supreme effort to reorganize its army. In the month of January, 1762, the English government declared war on Spain, striking from the first the most disastrous blows at our faithful ally. The year had not gone by before Cuba was already in the hands of the English, the Philippine Islands ravaged, and galleons laden with Spanish gold captured by British vessels. The campaign undertaken against Portugal, always friendly to England, was productive of no result. Martinique had followed the lot of Guadaloupe, which had already been conquered by the English after an heroic resistance. The war dragged on slowly in Germany. The death of the Czarina Elizabeth and the brief occupation of the throne by the young Czar Peter III., a passionate admirer of Frederick the Great, had freed the King of Prussia from a dangerous enemy, and promised him an ally faithful as well as powerful. The hope that the Family Compact had for a time given to France was deceived. The negotiations began again. On the 3d of November, 1762, the preliminaries of peace were signed at Fontainebleau. France abandoned all her possessions in America. Louisiana, which had taken no part in the war, was ceded to Spain in exchange for Florida, which was given over to the English. { 260} Only the small islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon were reserved for the French fisheries. A special stipulation guaranteed to the Canadians freedom in Catholic worship. In exchange for engaging not to introduce troops into Bengal, France recovered Chaudernagore and the ruins of Pondicherry. Guadaloupe and Martinique became again French. The English kept Tobago, Dominique, St. Vincent, and Grenada. In Germany the places and country occupied by France were to be evacuated. Like his illustrious rival. Lord Bute insisted upon the demolition of Dunkerque.
England's success had been great, and France's humiliation profound, and yet it was not enough for the persistent hatred of Pitt, now freed from the shackles of power, and at liberty to allow full reign to his rancor against Lord Bute as well as to his animosity toward our nation. He was disabled by gout, the persistent scourge of his life; he had himself carried, wrapped in flannel, to the House of Commons. Two of his friends led him to his seat, and supported him during the first part of his speech. Exhausted, he ended by sitting down, contrary to all parliamentary usage. "I have come here at the risk of my life," he exclaimed, "to raise my voice, my hand, my arm against the preliminary articles of a peace which tarnishes the glory of the war, which betrays the dearest interests of the nation, and which sacrifices public faith while deserting our allies. France is chiefly, if not entirely, formidable to us as a maritime and commercial power. What we gain in this respect is doubly precious from the loss which results to her. America, gentlemen, has been conquered in Germany; to-day you leave to France the possibility of re-establishing her navy."