"[A]n excise was laid upon cyder... This scheme was imputed wholly to him, and filled the measure of his unpopularity. He was burnt in effigy in all the cyder counties; hissed and insulted in the streets of London. It is natural to suppose, and it is undoubtedly true, that the Opposition, which consisted in general of persons of the greatest rank, property, and experience in business, enjoyed, encouraged, and increased this unpopularity to the utmost of their power; and accordingly it was carried to an alarming height. Lord Bute, who had hitherto appeared a presumptuous, now appeared to be a very timorous Minister, characters by no means inconsistent; for he went about the streets timidly and disgracefully, attended at a small distance by a gang of bruisers, who are the scoundrels and ruffians that attend the Bear Gardens, and who would have been but a poor security to him against the dangers he apprehended from the whole town of London."
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Lord Chesterfield, 'Lord Bute' (1764), quoted in The Letters of Philip Dormer Stanhope, Earl of Chesterfield; Including Numerous Letters Now First Published from the Original Manuscripts, Vol. II, ed. Lord Mahon (1847), p. 477
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Stuart%2C_3rd_Earl_of_Bute
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John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute
John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute KG PC FSA Scot (25 May 1713 – 10 March 1792), styled Lord Mount Stuart between 1713 and 1723, was a British nobleman who served as the Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1762 to 1763 under George III. He was arguably the last important royal favourite in British politics. He was the first prime minister from Scotland following the Acts of Union in 1707. He was also elected as the first president of the [[w:Society of Antiquaries of Scot
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