The other statesmen was Lord North, of whose personality — his equability of temper, which allowed him to meet political reverses with the most smiling good humour, and his equability of mind, which enabled him to indulge in sleep at the most critical moments — the Diaries and Memoirs of the time contain so many amusing reminiscences.
He was Prime Minister from 1770 to 1782, during that eventful time when we lost America, and few ministers have had to undergo so large a share of unpopularity as fell to his lot. But if mistaken and bigoted, he was an able man - a characteristic that was not to be gathered from his appearance. Horace Walpole left this little vignette of his outward man:
"Nothing could be more coarse or clumsy or ungracious than his outside. Two large prominent eyes that rolled about to no purpose (for he was utterly short-sighted), a wide mouth, thick lips, and inflated visage, gave him the air of a blind trumpeter.... yet within that rude casket were enclosed many useful talents."
Not a pleasing portrait; but Butler in his Reminiscences adds that "the word 'gentleman' was never applied to any person in a higher degree, or more generally, than it was to Lord North," and Wraxall notes "the sallies of genuine humour with which he always illuminated and often enlightened subjects of parliamentary discussion."
He died in his house in Grosvenor Square, where Wraxall, having often seen him, noted him with Gibbon, a frequent guest, disclosing "the stores of a classic mind, wit, and variety of interesting information," on 5th August 1792.