Copy of a letter : "Ealing" [London], to [George] Canning, 1809 Oct. 30.

Replying to his letter of October 28th concerning intelligence received by Lord Wellesley with regard to an appointment as First Lord of the Treasury; saying "I am wholly unable to help you in discovering the source or foundation of this intelligence. I can assure you I never made any such representation either to Lord Wellesley or any one else; nor any statement which could have authorised or justified such a representation. I certainly have made no secret of that to which you allude in the other part of your letter, I mean the earnest application which I made to you to consider whether some third person might not be found who succeeding to the situation of the Duke of Portland, might keep us in the situations which we held before, and prevent the separations which have unhappily taken place. In expressing my readiness to consent, as far as I was concerned, to any fit person who could be found, and who might be acceptable to you in that situation, I have mentioned that Lord Harrowby, Lord Bathurst, Lord Liverpool and Lord Wellesley had occurred as Persons with whom I had stated to you that I could have been contented to continue Chancellor of the Exchequer, if the appointment of either of them could have reconciled you to the new arrangement of an administration. But I have never represented this as a proposal which I was in any degree authorised by His Majesty or any Colleagues to make, nor did I ever represent you as objecting to either of them, but that your objection appeared to me to be not to the Persons but to the arrangement itself. Whether Lord Wellesley's intelligence may have been derived from any misconception or misrepresentation of such a statement as the above I am as unable to determine as you can be; but I am glad to find from your Letter that this statement appears to accord with your recollection of what passed between us."