ENGLAND:  1795-1798
 

^TAT. 24 TO 27

During his residence in England, which lasted till the
autumn of 1798, Mr. Paget was by no means idle. In
the first place he became M.P. for Anglesey, a seat in the
gift of his father. Lord Uxbridge, and the correspondence
shews that he was a faithful supporter of Mr. Pitt. He
remained in Parliament during the time of his subse¬
quent employment abroad, and curiously enough only
relinquished his seat in favour of his brother Berkeley
on his retirement from the Diplomatic Service in 1807,
after his Embassy to the Dardanelles.

It w^ould appear that during Mr. Paget's employment
in Berlin Lord Uxbridge had consulted Lord Grenville as
to the advisability of his son entering Parliament, and
adopting political life at home, but certainly nothing
could well be less encouraging of such a project than the
answer returned by Lord Grenville (after conferring on
the subject with Mr. Pitt) in the copy of the letter
which I have found amongst the Papers and which,
although without date, was evidently written while Mr.
Paget was acting as Charge d'Affaires in the Prussian
capital.

This notwithstanding, he certainly did go into Parlia¬
ment at some time during his stay in England (from
1795 to 1798) though i have nothing to show the pi*ecise
date of his doing so, and, as already stated, he remained
in the House of Commons until 1807. I have thought it
better to insert Lord Grenville's letter in the corre¬
spondence of this period, rather than in that of 1794
when it was written, because it refers to Mr. Paget's
home and not to his diplomatic career.

It would appear also that during his residence in
England he exchanged his diplomatic for military duties