CHAPTER XVII.

{GEORGE III. 1789–1791}

The Election of Speaker..... The Question of the Regency

resumed..... Recovery of his Majesty..... Adoption of a

Plan for fortifying the West India Islands..... Bill for the

Commemoration of the People’s Rights, etc...... Shop Tax

repealed, etc...... Motion respecting the Corporation and

Test Acts, etc..... Slave-trade Question..... Election of

Speaker..... Pitt’s financial Measures..... Impeachment of

Warren Hastings..... Parliament prorogued..... Continental

Affairs..... State of Parties in England..... Meeting

of Parliament..... Debates on the Test and Corporation

Acts..... Mr. Flood’s Motion for Reform in Parliament.....

East India Affairs..... Pitt’s financial Statement,

etc...... The Slave-Trade Question..... Disputes with

Spain..... Impeachment of Warren Hastings..... Parliament

prorogued and dissolved..... Settlement of Disputes with

Spain..... Continental Affairs..... Progress of

revolutionary Principles in England..... War in India.....

Meeting of Parliament.

{A.D. 1789}

ELECTION OF SPEAKER.

Mr. Cornwall, the speaker of the house, having expired on the 2nd of

January, business received a temporary interruption. On the 5th of that

month William Wyndham Grenville was proposed as his successor by the

friends of administration, and Sir Gilbert Elliot, by the Whigs. The

former was chosen by a majority of two hundred and fifteen against one

hundred and forty-four.

THE QUESTION OF THE REGENCY RESUMED.

On the day that the election of speaker took place, Pitt gave notice

that he should, on the morrow, lay before the house the restrictions

which he considered necessary to be annexed to the regency. Hitherto Fox

had complained of Pitt’s tardiness in proposing a regency, but he now

seemed resolved to impede the progress of the minister. He was well

aware that Pitt was averse to bring the royal physicians to the bar of

the house to give evidence, yet notwithstanding he resolved that

they should be again there examined. On the very day that Pitt was to

introduce the subject of the restrictions, therefore, urged by Fox,

the member for Abingdon, Mr. Loveden, made a motion to that effect. In

support of his motion, Mr. Loveden said, that before the house proceeded

any further, they ought to know how the case now stood; what was the

present state of his majesty’s health, what the degrees of alteration it

had undergone since the physicians were last examined, and whether the

probability of recovery was increasing or diminishing. This was the more

necessary he said, because contradictory reports were in circulation,

which were said to be supported by the different royal physicians. The

reports unfavourable to the king’s recovery had been put forth by, or

at least was imputed to Dr. Warren, whom Pitt, in reply, treated as a

violent Whig and party man, whose wishes suggested his predictions. Pitt

also plainly intimated that he conceived gentlemen on the opposite side,

who were to form the new administration under the regency, wished

the doctor’s opinion to be true. This insinuation was repelled by the

opposition as unjust and illiberal, but in the same breath they acted as

unjustly and illiberally, by falling upon Willis, the Tory doctor, and

accusing him with uttering false oracles and predictions of amendment,

which were merely meant to serve the purposes of Pitt and his party. But

though Pitt at first opposed this measure, he ultimately acquiesced in

its course, and a new committee of the house was appointed to re-examine

all the physicians. This examination, which ought to have been brief,

was prolonged by the frivolous questions of opposition members, and by

frequent altercations, so that the report was not brought up before the

13th of January. As the committee had not examined into the grounds

of the different opinions held by the physicians, Burke moved that

the report should be recommitted; but this was negatived without a

division, and it was ordered that it should be printed, and be taken

into consideration, in a committee of the whole house, on the 16th of

the month. On that day Pitt introduced his plan of a restricted regency.

On the 30th of December Pitt had, in a letter, submitted to the Prince

of Wales the heads of a plan arranged by the cabinet, and though the

prince, acting under the influence of his advisers, had expressed

his entire disapprobation of the plan, he nevertheless consented

to undertake the regency with the proposed restrictions. What these

restrictions were, Pitt now explained to the house. After expressing

his great satisfaction at having consented to the re-examination of the

physicians, the event of which had justified his sanguine expectations

of the king’s recovery, he observed, that under these circumstances,

what parliament had to provide for was, a deficiency in the executive

government for an interval which he trusted would be brief, and against

any embarrassment in the resumption of the royal authority, when his

majesty should be able to resume that authority. This was all that was

required, he said, for the present; but if contrary to expectations his

majesty’s illness should be protracted, then a more permanent plan of

government might be arranged. He moved, therefore, that the Prince of

Wales should be invested with the whole regal authority, subject

to certain necessary limitations. These limitations were, that his

authority should not extend to the creation of new peers; that he should

not grant any pension or place for life, other than such place as, from

its nature, must by law be held for life, or during good behaviour: that

he should not have any power over the personal property of the king;

and that he should have nothing to do with his majesty’s person or

household, which were to be left entirely to the guardianship of the

queen. Pitt proposed that the queen should be assisted in the discharge

of her duties by a council, which council were to have no power of

control, but only that of giving advice, and satisfying themselves daily

of the state of the king’s health. Pitt also proposed that they, the

said council, or some others, should be appointed to manage the real

and personal estate of the king, being bound at the same time not

to alienate or dispose or any part of it, except by lease. These

propositions were warmly advocated by Pitt and others on the same side

of the house, and as warmly opposed by members on the opposite benches.

Mr. Powys, after condemning the whole of Pitt’s plan, as tending to

mutilate the constitutional authority, and after asserting that the

heir-apparent ought to be invested with the full powers and prerogatives

of the crown, moved an amendment to the first resolution, by which his

royal highness would be appointed regent, “subject to such limitations

and exceptions as might be provided.” This motion was seconded by Lord

North, who endeavoured to show that the bestowing of the whole power and

patronage of the household upon the queen, would be setting up a party

at court in opposition to the administration of the regent. Sheridan

followed on the same side, and was both witty and severe upon the

abstraction of the household patronage from the regency, and endeavoured

to show that Pitt wanted it for himself, when he could no longer hold

his present high office! Colonel Fullarton also argued against the

mutilation of the executive government, and not only attacked Pitt, but

the queen herself. Pitt’s resolutions, however, were ably defended by

the new speaker, Grenville, and on a division the amendment moved by

Powys was lost by a majority of two hundred and twenty-seven against one

hundred and fifty-four. All the resolutions were now carried except

the last, and this, which referred to the care of the king’s person

and household, was debated on the 19th of January, with, if possible,

increased animosity. Two amendments were moved—one by Lord North and

the other by Mr. Bouverie—but both were negatived by considerable

majorities, and on the 22nd the resolutions were taken into

consideration by the lords. The contest in the lords was even more

obstinate than it had been in the commons, but an amendment, moved by

Lord Sandwich, for limiting the time during which the regent should be

restrained from creating peers, and another moved by Viscount Stormont,

on the restriction placed upon the regent in regard to the granting of

places, were negatived, and then all opposition ceased. A protest was

signed by fifty-seven peers, among whom the Dukes of York and Cumberland

were again numbered. But the storm was not yet over. Both the prince

and his friends were irritated in the highest degree by the restrictions

which Pitt imposed upon the regency; and though the former had privately

expressed his acceptation of, or submission to the limitations, yet the

latter were still resolutely bent upon opposing the premier. On the 27th

of January, after recapitulating all the steps which had been taken,

Pitt suggested that it would be respectful to the Prince of Wales, and

expedient in the order of their proceedings, to know parliamentarily,

whether he was willing to accept the regency upon the terms imposed by

that house. Pitt moved that a committee should be appointed to wait upon

his royal highness for that purpose, with the resolutions to which both

lords and commons had agreed. On this occasion, the minister was accused

by Mr. Gray and Burke, with treating the prince with marked disrespect;

and the latter likewise taxed him with the design of converting the

monarchy into a republic, with a regent, annually elected, nominally at

its head. Against the regency bill he burst into a paroxysm of rage.

He exclaimed, “It is a mere mummery, a piece of masquerade buffoonery,

formed to burlesque every species of government. A hideous spectre, to

which, with Macbeth, we may exclaim,—

‘Avaunt and quit my sight!

Let the earth hide thee.

Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold:

Thou hast no speculation in those eyes

That thou dost glare withal.’

“So it is with this ministerial, political spectre. ‘Its bones are

marrowless, its blood is cold, and it has no speculation in its eyes.’

I reprobate it as a chimera, a monster summoned up from the depth

of hell!” But all the arguments, and accusations, and rage of the

opposition proved fruitless: Pitt’s motion was carried without a

division, and ordered to be sent up to the lords for their concurrence.

Pitt also moved for a similar committee to wait upon the queen, in

order to ascertain whether her majesty would undertake the care of his

majesty’s person, and the management and control of the household; and

this likewise was carried _nem. con._, and ordered to be carried to

the lords. The motion for the concurrence of their lordships to these

resolutions was made by Lord Camden; and this being voted, committees

were forthwith appointed for the purposes therein specified. One of the

joint committees of lords and commons waited upon the Prince of Wales,

at Carlton-house, on the 30th of January, the anniversary of the

execution of Charles I., a day on which parliament never met for the

despatch of business, but which was not considered too sacred for the

execution of such an important commission. The reply of the prince was

brief, and to the point. He thanked the lords and gentlemen for the

communication of the resolutions agreed upon, and requested them to

assure their respective houses, that his duty to the king, his father,

and his concern for the safety and interests of the people, together

with his respect for the united desires of the two houses, outweighed in

his mind every other consideration, and determined him upon undertaking

the weighty and important trust proposed to him. At the same time, while

he accepted this trust, his royal highness took care to record what his

opinions were respecting the restrictions imposed upon his regency.

He remarked:—“I am sensible of the difficulties that must attend the

execution of this trust, in the peculiar circumstances in which it is

committed to my charge, of which, as I am acquainted with no former

example, my hopes of a successful administration cannot be founded on

any past experience. But confiding that the limitations on the exercise

of the royal authority, deemed necessary for the present, have been

approved by the two houses only as a temporary measure, founded on the

loyal hope, in which I ardently anticipate, that his majesty’s disorder

may not be of long duration; and trusting, in the meanwhile, that I

shall receive a zealous and united support in the two houses and in the

nation, proportioned to the difficulty attending the discharge of my

trust; in the interval, I will entertain the pleasing hope that my

faithful endeavours to preserve the interests of the king, his crown,

and people, may be successful.” On the same day, a joint committee of

lords and commons waited upon the queen at Kew Palace, and were assured

by her majesty, that out of her duty and gratitude to the king, and from

a sense of the great obligations she owed to this country, she would

accept of the trust proposed to her by parliament, together with

the council to aid her in the discharge of an office with which was

connected, not only her own happiness, but also the happiness of a

great, loyal, and affectionate people. The answers received from the

Prince of Wales and the queen were read in the house of lords on the

31st; and after they were ordered to be printed, Lord Camden moved, in

a committee of the house on the state of the nation, that letters patent

should be issued, under the great seal, empowering certain commissioners

to open and hold the king’s parliament at Westminister. Among the

commissioners proposed by ministers were the names of the Prince of

Wales, his brother, the Duke of York, and his uncles, the Dukes of

Cumberland and Gloucester. The duke of York, however, whose views

entirely coincided with those of opposition, rose and said, that from

want of knowledge, he had been unable to take any steps to prevent his

nomination; and that, as he could not sanction such unconstitutional and

illegal proceedings with his name, he desired that it might be omitted:

he added, “and I am requested to make the same request on the part of my

brother, the Prince of Wales.” The Duke of Cumberland, also, on the same

grounds, desired that his own name, and the name of his brother, the

Duke of Gloucester, should be struck out of the commission. A debate

took place on the proper mode of withdrawing the names of these four

personages, so as to convey no disrespect either to the house or to

their royal highnesses; but it was finally settled that the names should

still stand on the transcript, and that when the resolution was reported

to the house, an amendment should be moved, to make it appear on the

journals, that it was at the express desire of the several princes

that their names were omitted. Camden’s motion was now passed without

a division; and the resolution being communicated to the commons, at

a conference on the 2nd of February, Pitt moved the concurrence of the

house therein. Another stormy debate took place, in which Lord North

and Burke strongly insisted on the right of the Prince of Wales to

the regency, and in which Pitt as strongly denied that right; but no

division took place, and the resolution of the lords was therefore

carried. The session was now opened on the 3rd of February, and the bill

founded on the propositions already agreed upon was brought in, and by

the 13th of February passed the house. Every article of it was warmly

contested on the same grounds as when the resolutions were discussed,

and some amendments and variations were introduced; the peerage clause,

in particular, being limited to three years. Thus altered, the bill was

sent up to the lords; and on the 17th, their lordships, in committee,

made two important additions to it: one placing all the palaces, parks,

houses, gardens, &c., under the control and management of the queen; and

the other committing to her the care of all the royal offspring under

the age of twenty-one.

RECOVERY OF HIS MAJESTY.

The hopes of power and place which opposition had formed, and for the

realization of which they had so stoutly contended, were suddenly dashed

to the ground. While thus contending, it had been rumoured abroad that

his majesty was fast recovering. This was essentially true; and Pitt

had for some days been halting between two opinions, namely: whether

he should proceed with, the regency-bill, or whether he should stop the

proceedings. His opponents also had been perplexed as to the proper mode

of procedure; whether to let the bill pass at once without opposition,

and accept office, or to wait a little longer, and see whether there was

any chance of retaining it. At length, however, all the perplexities by

which both parties were surrounded were clean swept away. On the

very day that the lords committed the bill, as sent up to them by the

commons, it was publicly declared that the king was convalescent. This,

no doubt, was a grievous disappointment to the Whig leaders, for it

brought all their hopes and designs to a sudden termination. They had,

however, only themselves to blame for this disappointment, inasmuch as

they might, but for their opposition, have taken the reins of government

into their hands two months ago. But hope now fled, and desire failed.

On the 19th of February, Lord Chancellor Thurlow announced from the

woolsack, in his peculiar sonorous tone of voice, that from the reports

of the physicians, his majesty had been for some time in a state of

convalescence; that the accounts just received conveyed the happy news

that the improvement in his health was still progressive; and that,

therefore, it would be indecorous to proceed in the present measures,

he had no doubt, he said, that the house, participating in the general

happiness of every man in the kingdom, would consider it necessary to

wait a few days before they went further with the bill; and he therefore

moved that their lordships should immediately adjourn to Tuesday next.

In reply to Thurlow, the Duke of York remarked,—“I trust your lordships

will do me the justice to believe that no person in the house could feel

equal pleasure with myself from the favourable account which the noble

lord on the woolsack has given, and the motion he has made to the house,

in which I heartily concur. I should have had great satisfaction in

making the same communication to the house, if I had been able to do

it from certain information. I thought it my duty yesterday, upon the

favourable reports given to the public, to request to be admitted to his

majesty’s presence. From reasons very justifiable, no doubt, it was not

thought proper that I should have that satisfaction. From the knowledge

I have of my brother’s sentiments, though I have had no immediate

communication with him upon the subject of this motion, I am convinced

he will feel equal, if not greater, pleasure than myself at the hopes of

his majesty’s recovery, as it must relieve him from the embarrassment

of the situation in which this bill would have placed him, which nothing

but a strong sense of his duty to the public would have induced him

to undertake.” Thurlow’s proposed adjournment was agreed to, and the

regency bill there stopped.

The conduct of the Irish parliament in this matter formed a striking

contrast to that of the English. On receiving the intelligence of his

majesty’s illness, a motion was made in the commons for presenting to

the Prince of Wales an address, requesting him to assume the government

of Ireland during the king’s incapacity, with the full powers of the

executive branch. This motion, which was moved by Mr. Conolly and

supported by Grattan, passed without a division, and was confirmed by

the lords. The lord-lieutenant, the Marquess of Buckingham, late Earl

Temple, refused to transmit this address to England; and commissioners

were therefore appointed by both houses to present it in person to

the Prince of Wales. These delegates arrived in England on the 25th of

February, and on the following day they presented their address to the

prince at Carlton-house. The recovery of his majesty, however, rendered

the object of their commission nugatory: the prince returned his warmest

thanks to the delegates, but acquainted them with the change which had

taken place in the king’s health, and which, he said, he hoped, within

a few days, would enable his majesty to resume the government. All that

the commissioners, therefore, obtained for their pains and their loyalty

were thanks and a splendid entertainment, at which the leaders of

the prince’s party were present. Entertainments had, indeed, from the

commencement of his majesty’s illness, been the order of the day at

Carlton-house; the Saturday and Sunday of every week being set aside for

that purpose; a mode of proceeding which brought great scandal on the

prince and his party. The Whigs, by their recent conduct, in fact,

rendered themselves unpopular in the eyes of the soberer part of the

nation; and it may be questioned whether, if they had gained office

under the regency-bill, they could have retained it for any lengthened

period, even if his majesty had still been confined to Kew Palace as

a maniac. The very city of London, which had once been the centre of

opposition, was now on the side of Pitt and the king, and the feeling

was universal throughout all England.

As the regency-bill had not passed, it was not deemed necessary to

adhere to the method prescribed by it for announcing the king’s recovery

and restoration to his royal capacity; the declaration in parliament,

the bulletins of the physicians, and the suspension of those bulletins

by royal order, were considered sufficient ground to enable his majesty

to resume the functions of his office. Several adjournments of both

houses took place subsequent to Lord Chancellor Thurlow’s announcement

of his majesty’s recovery; but at length, on the 10th of March, a

commission, under the great seal, was read to lords and commons,

authorising the commissioners, previously appointed by letters patent

for opening the parliament, to declare certain additional causes

for holding the same. After the commission had been read, the lord

chancellor observed, that his majesty being, by the blessing of

Providence, recovered from his malady, had commanded the commissioners

to convey to them his warmest acknowledgments for the proofs they had

given of affection to his person, of zeal for the honour of his crown,

and concern for the security and good government of his dominions. The

commissioners were also ordered, he said, to acquaint the two houses

that, since the close of the last session, his majesty had concluded a

treaty of defensive alliance with the King of Prussia, and that he

had endeavoured, during the last summer, to prevent the extension of

hostilities in Europe. The house of commons was further informed, that

the estimates of the current year would be forthwith laid before them.

Addresses of congratulation were then passed both to the king and queen

without a dissentient voice. On that night all London seemed one blaze

of light; an illumination took place, such as that great capital had

never witnessed before. This scene was renewed on the 23rd of April,

which was appointed to be held as a day of public thanksgiving

throughout the kingdom; and when his majesty went in grand procession

to St. Paul’s Church, to return thanks to almighty God for his recovery.

His majesty was attended on this occasion by the queen and royal family,

the two houses of parliament, and all the great officers of state,

judges, and foreign ambassadors. The procession entered the cathedral

amidst the peal of organs and the voices of five thousand children of

the city charity schools, who were placed between the pillars on both

sides, and singing that old melody, the hundredth psalm. The king was

much affected; and turning to the dean, near whom he was walking, he

said with great emotion, “I now feel that I have been ill.” His emotion

almost overpowered him; but recovering himself be proceeded to the

chair, where the humility with which he at first knelt down, and the

fervour with which he appeared to pour forth the feelings of a grateful

heart, made a deep impression on all within the cathedral. By this

affliction the personal popularity of the king greatly increased. It

became the fashion to call him “the good old king,” and men loved to

dwell upon his morals and his virtues. It would be difficult, indeed, to

point out any period in the annals of English history when any monarch

was so universally revered by his subjects. Nor did the steady,

consistent, and constitutional conduct of the prime-minister remain

unacknowledged. While his opponents, by the sentiments which they

had uttered in the heat of debate on the regency-bill, had given

great offence to the people at large, Pitt had risen greatly in their

estimation. He had, also, the warmest approbation of his majesty for

the part he had taken; for on more than one occasion he expressed

the highest satisfaction of his conduct, and that of the majority

in parliament, in regard to the regency question. His majesty also

remarked, that his illness had eventually become a source of happiness

to him, inasmuch as it proved how nobly the people would support him

when he was in trouble.

ADOPTION OF A PLAN OF FORTIFYING THE WEST INDIAN ISLANDS.

The first subject that engaged the attention of parliament after his

majesty’s recovery, was a plan, formed by the master-general of the

ordnance, for the fortification of the West Indian Islands. This scheme

was condemned by General Burgoyne, Sheridan, and other members of

opposition; but on the 18th of March £218,000 was granted for that

purpose.

BILL FOR THE COMMEMORATION OF THE PEOPLE’S RIGHTS, ETC.

On the 24th of March Mr. Beaufoy moved for leave to bring in a bill

“to establish a perpetual anniversary thanksgiving to Almighty God, for

having, by the glorious revolution, delivered this nation from arbitrary

power, and to commemorate annually the confirmation of the people’s

rights.” It was argued in opposition to this bill, that the event was

sufficiently commemorated in the form of prayer appointed for the 5th of

November; but the house seemed to think otherwise, for the bill was not

only brought in, but carried through all its stages, and sent up to the

lords. In the lords, however, it met with a more successful opposition;

for, on the motion of Bishop Bangor, who pointed out the several

parts of the service of the 5th of November, which had been added and

altered, for the purpose of commemorating the revolution, the bill was

thrown out without being once read; a ceremony to which a bill proposed

by a peer is considered as a matter of right, and which is usually

accorded to any measure sent up to the lords by the commons, as a matter

of courtesy.

SHOP-TAX REPEALED, ETC.

On the 3rd of April Fox renewed the attempts he had made, in several

successive years, for the repeal of the shop-tax; and as Pitt did not

now oppose him he was this time successful. Mr. Dempster also proposed

and carried the abolition of the additional tax and restrictions which

had been laid upon the hawkers and pedlars.

{GEORGE III. 1789–1791}

MOTION RESPECTING THE CORPORATION AND TEST ACTS, ETC.

On the 8th of May Mr. Beaufoy again moved the repeal of the corporation

and test acts; being prompted thereto, he said, by the confidence which

the dissenters reposed in the disposition of the house to do justice

to the injured, and to afford relief to the oppressed. This motion was

warmly supported by Fox, who laid it down as an axiom of policy, that

no human government had any jurisdiction over opinions as such, and more

especially over religious opinions. Fox supported this view by weighty

arguments; but the motion was opposed by Pitt on the same ground as

before; and on a division it was lost by one hundred and twenty-two

against one hundred and two. On a subsequent clay, Lord Stanhope

introduced a bill into the house of peers for relieving all

nonconformists from the operation of the penal laws, and allowing them

free exercise of their faith in preaching and writing; papists only

being excepted on account of their persecuting spirit. Lord Stanhope

denounced these penal laws as a disgrace to our statute-books; but the

motion was opposed by Dr. Moore, Archbishop of Canterbury, and the

whole bench of bishops, as tending to unloose the bonds of society,

by substituting fanaticism for religious order and subordination, by

opening a door to licentiousness and contempt of Christianity, under

pretence of religious liberty; and as destructive to the Church of

England and the constitution, of which that church was a firm support.

The bill was rejected on the second reading; and another, which was

shortly after brought in by the same noble lord, to prevent suits in the

ecclesiastical courts for the recovery of tithes, shared the same fate.

SLAVE-TRADE QUESTION.

Since the last session the privy-council had been employed in

investigating facts concerning the slave-trade; and on the 12th of May

an elaborate report was laid upon the table of the house of commons,

together with petitions for and against that traffic. Mr. Wilberforce

had recovered from his illness; and on his motion it was voted that

the report, with the petitions, should immediately be taken into

consideration by a committee of the whole house. In committee,

Wilberforce moved twelve resolutions, condemnatory of the traffic and

the barbarous treatment of the African slaves, which he enforced by a

long and excellent speech; in which he considered the subject, first, on

the question of humanity, and next, on that of policy. From the evidence

before the council, it appeared that the number of slaves carried away

annually from Africa, on an average of four years, amounted 38,000.

These were chiefly brought from the interior of the country; and they

consisted of four classes: prisoners taken in war; persons seized for

debt or imputed crimes; domestic slaves, sold for the emolument of their

masters; and persons seized by violence or fraud. Mr. Wilberforce showed

that the trade thus carried on had a natural tendency to cause frequent

and cruel wars; to produce unjust convictions and aggravated punishments

for pretended crimes; to encourage fraud and oppression; and to obstruct

the natural course of civilization and improvement. He also showed that

an extensive commerce in articles peculiar to Africa and important

to our manufactures, might be substituted for this inhuman traffic; a

commerce which would at once equal the profits of the slave-trade, and

would probably increase with the civilization that would follow its

abolition. The orator dwelt very forcibly on the grievous sufferings

which the slaves endured on the passage from Africa to the West Indies,

and the horrid treatment they received on their arrival. He also dwelt

emphatically on the dissoluteness and other causes which prevailed among

them in the West Indies, and which prevented the natural increase of

population among them; arguing, that if the causes which had hitherto

obstructed the natural increase of negroes in our plantations, and if

good regulations were established among them, there would be no need

of an annual importation from Africa. At all events, he said, a trade

founded in iniquity, and carried on with so many circumstances

of horror, must be abolished, let its policy be what it will. The

wickedness of the trade was so enormous, so dreadful, and irremediable;

that he could stop at no alternative short of its abolition. His mind had

been harassed with the objections of the West India planters, who had

asserted that the ruin of their property would be involved in such a

step; but he could not help distrusting their arguments; he could not

believe that the Almighty, who forbade the practice of rapine and blood,

had made rapine and blood necessary to any part of his creation. He felt

a confidence in that persuasion; he took the resolution to act on it,

and light soon broke in upon his mind; his suspicion was daily confirmed

by increasing information; and the evidence he had now to offer on

this point was decisive and complete. He was prepared to prove that

the number of negroes in our colonies might be kept up without the

introduction of slaves from Africa. He added, in a fine spirit of

Christian philanthropy:—“Let us then make such amends as we can for

the mischief we have clone to that unhappy continent; let us put an end

at once to this inhuman traffic, and stop this effusion of human blood.

The true way to virtue is to avoid temptation; let us, therefore,

withdraw from these wretched Africans those temptations to fraud,

violence, cruelty, and injustice which the slave-trade furnishes.

Wherever the sun shines let us go round the world with him, diffusing

our beneficence; but let us not traffic only that we may set kings

against their subjects, and subjects against their kings, sowing discord

in every village, fear and terror in every family, urging millions of

our fellow-creatures to hunt each other for slaves, creating fairs and

markets for human flesh through one whole continent of the world,

and, under the name of policy, concealing from ourselves all the base

iniquity of such a traffic.” Mr. Pitt expressed his warm approbation of

the manner in which the subject had been brought before the house, and

confessed that the slave-trade must be abolished: and he consented that

the resolutions should be entered on the journals; conceiving that such

a step might produce the effect of causing foreign nations to concur

with England in the proposed abolition. Fox and Burke also applauded the

orator; the latter declaring that not only England, but all Europe was

indebted to him for exposing the iniquity of a trade “which began with

savage war, was prosecuted with unheard-of cruelty, continued, during

the middle passage, with the most loathsome imprisonment, and ended in

perpetual exile and unremitting slavery.” The feeling of the house and

the nation at large was so manifestly, at this period, in favour of the

abolition of the slave-trade, that Lord Penryn, one of its advocates,

asserted that, to his knowledge, the planters were now willing to assent

to any regulation of the trade short of its abolition; to which remark

Fox replied, with much animation, that he knew nothing of such a thing

as a regulation of robbery and restriction of murder; there was no

medium; the legislature must either abolish the trade, or plead guilty

to all the iniquity with which it was attended. Finally, Pitt conceded,

with the consent of Mr. Wilberforce, to the examination of witnesses on

the part of the slave-merchants and planters, trusting that unnecessary

delays would not be introduced, as he could not submit to the ultimate

procrastination of so important a measure. Evidence was heard at the bar

for several successive weeks; and the session being far advanced, the

friends of abolition consented, on the 23rd of June, to an adjournment

of the question to the succeeding session of parliament. Before this

session was closed, however, the temporary regulation act of Sir William

Dolben was renewed till August, 1790.

ELECTION OF SPEAKER.

Early in June Lord Sidney resigned the office of secretary of state

for the home department; and Mr. Grenville, who had so recently been

nominated speaker of the house of commons, obtained the appointment. Sir

Gilbert Elliot again became a candidate for the vacant chair; but the

ministerial nominee, Mr. Henry Addington, was elected by a majority of

two hundred and fifteen against one hundred and forty-two.

PITTS FINANCIAL MEASURES.

On the 10th of June, Pitt opened his financial scheme for the year. In

doing so, he congratulated the house and the country on the fact,

that his hopes of the efficacy of the sinking-fund, etc. had been well

founded. The permanent income declared necessary by the committee of

1786 to defray the annual demands, was £15,500,000; and for the last two

years it had exceeded that sum by £78,000. As, however, there had been

several extraordinary expenses, such as paying the debts of the Prince

of Wales, fitting out the armament of the summer of 1787, &c., he stated

that it was necessary to raise one million by loan, and to increase some

taxes or duties to pay the interest of this loan. The new duties which

he proposed were laid upon newspapers, advertisements, cards, dice,

probates of wills, and horses and carriages, none of which, he

conceived, would press at all on the poor, or heavily upon the rich. To

increase the revenue by further prevention of fraud, Pitt introduced and

carried a bill for transferring the duties on tobacco from the customs

to the excise; it having appeared, on inquiry, that one half of this

article, which would have produced a revenue of nearly £300,000, was

obtained by smuggling. Sheridan again controverted the statements of

Pitt; and on the 10th of July he moved, “that a committee be appointed

to inquire into the state of the public income and expenditure; into the

progress actually made in the reduction of the national debt since the

year 1786; and into the grounds on which a reduction of the same may

be expected in future, and to report the same, with their observations

thereon, to the house.” Sheridan pledged himself to prove that the

report of the committee of 1786 was not founded in fact; and that for

the last three years the expenditure had increased to the amount of

£200,000. A long debate took place on this motion; but it was negatived

without a division, as was also a motion to the same effect, moved in

the upper house by Lord Rawdon.

IMPEACHMENT OF WARREN HASTINGS.

The trial of Warren Hastings was revived early in this session; but from

the occupation produced by the regency-bill and by the recovery of the

king, it proceeded but slowly. It was, in fact, the 20th of April before

their lordships resumed their sitting in the hall; and from the nature

of the business which subsequently occupied their attention, they could

then only sit seventeen days. The third article was opened on the 21st

by Burke, which article related to the corrupt receipt of money. In his

speech Burke alluded to Nuncomar, and indiscreetly said, that Hastings

had murdered him by the hands of Sir Elijah Impey. As Impey had been

acquitted by the house of commons, and as the transaction respecting

Nuncomar made no part of the charges contained in the articles, Hastings

thought proper to present a petition to the commons, in which he

entreated them either to cause this, and similar allegations made by

his accuser, to be prosecuted in distinct articles, or to afford him

such redress as they should think proper. This petition was strongly

supported by Major Scott, who presented it, and who accused Burke

of being guilty of cool, deliberate, systematic, and intentional

misrepresentation, and of imputing to Hastings crimes of which he knew

him to be innocent. In reply, Burke called Major Scott the systematic

libeller of the house of commons; and he, with his friends, endeavoured

to prevent the petition from being received; contending that it was

irregular and unprecedented, and that if every expression, not agreeable

to the feelings of the party accused, were not fit to be used in a

criminal prosecution, there must be an end to such prosecution. Pitt,

on the other hand, gave his cordial support to the petition, as far as

regarded the business of Nuncomar; and after a long debate, the house

resolved “that no authority had been given by the house for the purpose

of making any criminal charge respecting Nuncomar; and that the words

complained of ought not to have been spoken.” Subsequently, a resolution

of censure on the conduct of Burke was moved by the Marquess Of Graham;

and, though strenuously opposed by Fox and the other managers, it was

carried by a majority of one hundred and thirty-live against sixty-six.

In the meantime the trial went on languidly. Legal doubts and

difficulties were constantly suggested by the counsel for the prisoner,

and time was frittered away in their consideration by the peers; and

before this single charge could be settled, their lordships decided

to postpone the trial to the first Tuesday in the next session of

parliament. These delays caused great vexation both to the accused and

the accusers. Hastings, indeed, declared that if he had foreseen such

an interminable process, he would rather have pleaded guilty at the

commencement of the process; and that, if he had done so, he should have

been a gainer as regards money. Early in the session, in fact, Hastings

had presented a petition to the lords, complaining of the great hardship

to which the duration of the trial subjected him; mentioning the death

of several of his judges, the long detention of witnesses necessary for

his defence, the probability of his being deprived of many of them by

various accidents; and reminding their lordships of the shattered state

of his own health, and that his cost had been so great, that, even

if his life should be spared to the end of the trial, he might become

destitute of the means of defence, and thereby run the fearful chance of

having his character blasted by unrefuted criminations; there being no

hope of defending himself effectually without money. On the other hand,

Burke and the managers complained of the delays as tending to favour the

accused. On one occasion, when their lordships, after long consideration

in their own chamber—whither they almost invariably retired to solve

all doubt and difficulties—decided that certain evidence taken out

of the minutes at Calcutta should not be admitted, he exclaimed, with

impassioned vehemence:—“Plunder on; the laws intended to restrain you

are mere scarecrows. Accumulate wealth by any means, however illegal,

profligate, infamous. You are sure of impunity; for the natives of India

are, by their religion, debarred from appearing against you out of their

own country; and circumstantial evidence will not be received.” But

neither the complaints of the accused nor the accusers quickened the

proceedings of the peers. They still walked leisurely from the hall

to their chamber, and from their chamber to the hall, whence it was

jocosely said by Lord Stanhope, that “the judges walked, but the trial

stood still.”

PARLIAMENT PROROGUED.

Parliament was prorogued by commission—the king-having gone to Weymouth

for his health—on the 11th of August. The speech was delivered by the

lord chancellor, in his majesty’s name; and in it his lordship observed,

that, although the good offices of the king and his allies had not been

effectual for the restoration of general tranquillity, yet the situation

of affairs abroad continued to promise to this country the uninterrupted

enjoyment of the blessing of peace. But this view of the state of

Europe was superficial: in reality it promised nothing but strife and

bloodshed. This will be manifested in the next section.

CONTINENTAL AFFAIRS.

At this period war and anarchy were disturbing a large portion of the

continent. In the preceding year, Gustavus, King of Sweden, offended at

the intrigues of Russian emissaries; jealous of the extended power of

the Czarina Catherine; and anxious to recover the territories which had

been wrested from his predecessors, had commenced a war with Russia.

Gustavus was aided by a subsidy from the Turkish Sultan, who was at war

with Russia, and he entertained hopes of assistance from Great Britain

and Prussia. The Danes were engaged by treaty to assist the Russians,

and fearing the result of this alliance, the courts of Great Britain and

Prussia, without engaging directly in the contest, encouraged diversions

both in Poland and Sweden. But Gustavus had enemies in his own

dominions. His nobles had never forgiven him for overthrowing their

unbounded power, in 1772, and the war against Russia, which he began

without the assent of the states, was the signal for revolt. Many

of these nobles were superior officers in the Swedish army, and they

conspired against the king; and, declaring that the war undertaken was

contrary to the constitution, they sent deputies to St. Petersburgh, in

order to negociate an armistice, which was effected. At the same time

a Danish army invaded Sweden and menaced Gothenburg. The situation of

Gustavus was a critical one, but he was delivered from all danger by his

high courage, and the good offices of the courts of England and Prussia.

These courts, having in vain offered their mediation between those

of Petersburg and Stockholm, so effectually intimidated the Prince

of Denmark, who governed the state for his incapable father, that he

promised to abstain from all hostilities. Gustavus now convoked a diet

at Stockholm, in which an act of union and security was proposed and

adopted by the three lower orders of the assembly; which act gave him

unlimited power, and invested him with the right of waging war without

the consent of the states; made all classes of society equal in rights

of property and security, and all places and offices accessible to the

citizens; and established colleges of government, responsible to the

king, instead of the senate of the kingdom, whose authority had been

independent. The aristocratic senate of Stockholm, which had been

abridged of its powers in the revolution of 1772, was now entirely

suppressed, and while many of the members were arrested and thrown

into prison, others fled to St. Petersburgh, where they lived under the

protection of the czarina. Gustavus now hastened back to his banners

on the Russian boundary, and in the course of this year, 1789,

several severe and bloody actions took place, in most of which he was

victorious. Towards the close of the campaign, however, while in Russian

Finland, his galley-fleet, which moved along shore and co-operated with

his army, was defeated by a more numerous galley-fleet belonging to the

czarina, and having lost many of his best troops, he was compelled to

evacuate the Russian territories and retreat across his own frontier.

After this both armies went into winter-quarters.

In the meantime, notwithstanding the exertions made both by England and

Prussia to restore peace, war continued between the imperial courts

of Austria, Russia, and the Porte. Early in this year’s campaign, the

Austrians overran the greater part of Wallachia, and Moldavia, and

the Prince of Saxe Cobourg, who commanded them, being joined by the

Russians under Suvaroff, gained a great victory over the grand army

of the Turks at Martinitzi. Subsequently, Belgrade was captured by the

Austrians, and on the northern frontier the Russian General Potemkin

defeated another Turkish army, at a place called Tabac, not far from the

town of Bender. Flushed with victory Potemkin sat down before Bender,

but though the garrison was a small one, and the fortifications

contemptible, it was not captured till its walls were utterly demolished.

Before winter set in the Russians captured several places on the shores

of the Black Sea, and others on the Dniester and the Danube. They had,

indeed, reduced almost every important place between the Danube and

the Bog and Dnieper. On the other hand, the Turkish fleet defeated the

czarina’s flotilla or flotillas, on the Black Sea, and successfully

checked the Austrians, who after the reduction of Belgrade, undertook

the siege of Orsova.

Commotions every where prevailed. While the Austrian emperor was

prosecuting victories and conquests from which he could not hope to

derive any permanent advantages, he contrived to alienate from himself

the affections of the people of the Netherlands. This people consisted

of independent states, resembling each other in manner, character, and

constitution of government; their polity being composed of three orders,

clergy, nobles, and people, under the limited principality of one

personage, denominated Count. The Netherlander had shown an heroic

devotion to his mother, Maria Theresa, and were warmly attached to his

own person. Animated, however, by a restless spirit of innovation,

he dared to interfere with their ancient privileges and religion—two

objects of which they were particularly tenacious—and thus created a

spirit of disaffection throughout all the Low Countries. Under the plea

of reform he made innovations in their ecclesiastical establishments;

suppressed the most venerated judicial institutions; appointed new and

despotic tribunals; subverted the legislature, by abrogating the power

of the assembly of states, and instituted a general government, with a

court minister at its head; and finally attacked the clerical order,

by overthrowing those institutions which were the very nursery of its

priesthood. These sacrilegious acts roused the choler of the people;

open rebellion was the natural result; and the people were victorious.

The imperial troops committed many excesses throughout the Low

Countries, and dyed their swords in blood; but the Netherlander, strong

in the justice of their cause, finally triumphed. By the close of this

year the Flemings, the States of Brabant, and all the other provinces,

with the exception of Luxembourg, completely established their

independence.

It seems clear that the revolt of the Netherlander did not arise from

that democratic spirit which everywhere prevailed at this period,

but from the rapacity and usurpations of the Austrian emperor. It is

dangerous to touch ancient constitutions, and still more dangerous to

lay violent hands upon venerated religious establishments. But while the

Netherlander may be acquitted of being inflamed with the fierce passions

of democracy in their struggle with the Emperor of Austria, as much

cannot be said of other people and nations. At this time, indeed, a

party existed in most countries, whose aim was to overturn the existing

order of things, of which the efforts at revolution in several small

states, such as Aix-la-Chapelle and Geneva may be cited as examples.

These were so many instances of the democratic spirit which now

prevailed; but they sink into insignificance when compared with the

commotion which had commenced in France.

Incidental mention has been made of the financial embarrassments of the

court of France; embarrassments which were in a great measure induced by

the impolitic interference of that court in the dispute between England

and her American colonies. Such was the deplorable condition of the

French treasury in 1780, that a national bankruptcy was only avoided

by the issue of paper money, which by a royal edict was enforced on the

people, who were enjoined to receive it as gold or silver. Added to

this a scarcity was threatened, and many of the people were actually

perishing for want of bread. The prime minister, Necker, who was at the

head of the French government during the American war, had incurred the

hatred of the court party, and had been compelled, in 1781, to leave the

kingdom. His successors were first Calonne, and then Brienne, both

of whom failed to deliver the nation from its distresses. In 1788,

therefore, Necker was recalled, and placed anew at the head of the

finances, and also admitted to the council of state. Necker was at this

time the hope of the nation, but there was no man in existence who could

effect its salvation. Urged by the people, one of the first measures

of Necker was to procure an order of council for the assembling of the

States-general, which it was thought, could alone rescue the nation from

impending ruin. The meeting of the States-general would probably have

been attended with no ill effects, had it been constituted as in ancient

times. Instead, however, of there being an equal number of nobles,

clergy, and commons convoked, Necker unfortunately prevailed upon the

king to summon six hundred of the commons, making that body numerically

equal to the other two estates, and therefore capable of successfully

opposing their measures. This was fatal to the peace of the nation,

for the mass of the people of France, from among whom the commons

were convoked, were rampant for a change in the existing order of

things—were revolutionists at heart. The factious spirit which

prevailed among them was discovered at the very opening of the

States-general, which took place on the 5th of May, 1789, at Versailles.

After the king had delivered a speech, in which he expressed a hope

that it would communicate new vigour to the nation, re-establish public

credit, and open additional sources of happiness, a question arose,

“Should votes be taken by order, as heretofore, or by head?” This

provoked the parties to combat, and the commons prevailed: the votes

were to be taken by head. This clearly gave the preponderance to the

commons, or third estate, since their number was equal to that of the

nobles and clergy and they might expect some adherents from both those

parties. Within six weeks, indeed, the third estate being strengthened

by a part of the lower clergy, upon the motion of the Abbé Sieyes,

declared themselves the national assembly. This was a great step, and

the first imposing phenomenon of the new order of things. It caused

great joy among the people, great movements among the nobility and the

clergy, and great consternation at court.

To stem the onward tide of revolution which threatened to overwhelm the

nation, the king, by a herald at arms, declared that the debates of the

assembly were suspended, and that it was his majesty’s intention to

hold a royal session. The hall of the states was now closed, but the

deputies, under their first president, Bailly, assembled at one time in

the Tennis Court, and at another in the Church of St. Louis, and took

an oath to remain united until the regeneration of the state was

accomplished. The royal session took place on the 23rd of June, and the

king having pronounced the previous resolutions of the assembly to be

illegal, ordered the estates to leave the hall, and withdraw each to

their chamber, to deliberate there upon certain subjects which he laid

before them. He would consider himself, and himself alone, he said, as

the representative of the nation, and threatened to take all necessary

measures into his own hands, if the national assembly acted contrary to

his wishes. But the words of the monarch fell upon the ears of men who

hated royalty, and who were resolved upon stripping the diadem from his

brow. Being by this time joined by the greater part of the clergy, who

seem to have considered that their interests were blended with those of

the people, the commons resolved not to stir from the hall. The command

of the king was repeated by a royal messenger, and then was seen the

determined hostility which prevailed in the assembly towards the courts.

“Only the force of bayonets,” said Mirabeau, “can drive the deputies of

the people from their seats.” The assembly, therefore, still remained,

and on the following day was reinforced by some members of the nobility,

with the Duke of Orleans at their head. The king was perplexed; but

hoping still to counteract their measures, he ordered the majority

of the nobles, and the minority of the clergy to unite with the third

estate, whereby the national assembly was finally completed. But there

was still no reconciliation. Thirty thousand armed men, foreigners, were

assembled in the vicinity of the capital, under the command of Marshal

de Broglio, and these hostile preparations excited the people to revolt,

engaged the representatives of the nation in a struggle between opposite

duties, and alarmed the friends of liberty. All Paris—all France,

became agitated and excited to action. Patriotic societies were formed

as guides of the wild-fermenting masses of the people, and means of

resistance were debated upon and adopted. In the midst of the commotion,

a report was spread that Necker and Montmarin, the two popular

ministers, had been dismissed and banished the kingdom, and that they

and their colleagues were succeeded in office by men who were decided

advocates of the ancient _régime_. Now commenced insurrection. On the

14th of July the people rose _en masse_, and being joined by the

French guards, they stormed and captured the Bastille. Alarmed at these

proceedings the king discharged his new ministers; recalled Necker; sent

away the foreign troops, and threw himself into the arms of the nation.

Joy and acclamation succeeded, and a festival of reconciliation was

celebrated at Paris, between king and people, which seemed to presage

the return of harmony. But there were two parties in the state who were

far from being satisfied with the reconciliation thus brought about—the

aristocrats and the democrats. The former saw their downfall therein,

and rather than submit to such a state of things, great numbers went

into voluntary exile. By their departure, the king was left without

defence and counsel in the midst of the roaring storm—was left to the

mercy of men who were in heart his most deadly enemies. He assumed the

tri-coloured cockade, and sanctioned the decrees of the assembly,

which aimed at the overthrow of the old, and the establishment of a new

government; but still, though he complied with their every wish, it was

evident, to all men of discernment, that he had not the affections of

his subjects, and that his life was not safe in their hands. After

his apparent reconciliation with the Parisians, Louis hastened to

Versailles, where he hoped to remain in peace. But it was scarcely to be

expected that a people, and especially the people of a corrupt capital,

after they had broken the bonds of obedience, would immediately return

to social order. Despite the exertions of Bailly, the recently elected

mayor of Paris, and of Lafayette, the head of the newly created citizen

militia, tumults were the order of the day. Famine raged in the city,

and urged by it, as well as by a desire of revenge, many fell victims

to the fury of the multitude. Thus Foulon, counsellor of state, and

thus Berthier, his son-in-law, hitherto intendant of Paris, perished.

Accumulated murders were committed in the capital, and similar scenes

occurred in the provinces. Several cities followed the example of Paris,

and in the country the peasants armed themselves against the nobles: the

times of King John seemed to return. These crimes are in a great measure

to be imputed to some members of the national assembly; but in the

month of August the better part got a resolution passed, whereby the

disturbers of the tranquillity were reminded of their duty, and the

national guards, which were promptly raised in the whole kingdom,

charged with the maintenance of order and security. But resolutions and

decrees, and even the sword, were still impotent to allay the rash fury

of the populace. It was suspected by them that the higher orders were

not sincere in the sacrifices to which they had assented, and a rumour

was industriously spread abroad that preparations were making for the

retreat of the king to Metz, in Lorraine, where the royal standard was

to be raised in opposition to the national assembly. Nor does it appear

that the king was sincere in the concessions which had been wrung from

him, or that he intended their perpetuation. At all events, if the king

himself was sincere, it is certain that the queen and her counsellors

turned their thoughts towards the restoration of the monarchy. Full

of warlike sentiments, the court brought the regiment of Flanders to

Versailles, and surrounded itself with soldiers, whence not only the

populace suspected its movements, but the municipality of Paris became

alarmed, and Lafayette himself spoke openly of a plot against liberty.

A fresh insurrection now took place. Urged in part by famine, in part by

wild cannibal passions, and in part by objects of treason and ambition,

on the 5th of October, several thousand furious women, intermixed with a

number of men of the most abandoned characters, assembled together, and

after having committed some outrages, set up a long and hideous cry “To

Versailles!” And the cry was not long confined to them. It resounded

also among the citizen-militia, and among the great mass of the

population of Paris, and Lafayette placed himself at the head of

the insurrection. On the night of the 6th of October the palace of

Versailles was attacked; many of its defenders were slain; and the king

and the royal family, being rescued from the hands of the infuriated mob

by Lafayette at the head of the national guard, were carried in triumph

to Paris. The heads of the unfortunate defenders of the monarch, fixed

on pikes, adorned the procession as it passed through the streets of the

city. This new triumph of the populace occasioned another change in

the constitution by the national assembly: the king being compelled to

accede to every thing which they chose to establish. But France was not

yet tranquil. The king and the people—except the factionists—became

again, in appearance, if not in reality, reconciled; but there was still

an under-current of mischief at work, which finally involved the monarch

in ruin, Paris in bloodshed, and all Europe in war!

{GEORGE III. 1789–1791}

STATE OF PARTIES IN ENGLAND.

The events which had taken place in France during this year, naturally

attracted the anxious notice of other European states. In England many

persons read of them with pleasure, others with suspicion and jealousy,

and others with anxiety and alarm. The general opinion was favourable

to the revolution, arising from the natural abhorrence with which

Englishmen look upon despotism under every possible form and shape. Even

Fox and Pitt at first united in a tribute of admiration of the great

movement; they, with others, overlooking its most criminal excesses,

on the presumption that it would tend to establish the liberty and

the happiness of the French people. All parties, indeed, agreed in

believing, or at least hoping, that the states being properly modelled

would by degrees effect the most important reforms, and produce the

most valuable results, not only to the French themselves, but to all the

world. Poets sang the destruction of the Bastille; orators applauded

the asserters of liberty; statesmen contemplated the revolution with

pleasure; and even divines from their pulpits did not blush to extol the

character of the French regenerators. Among the most ardent admirers of

the French revolution was an assemblage of persons, with Lord Stanhope

at their head, who had associated for many years for the purpose of

commemorating the British revolution of 1888. These revolutions were

totally different in character, but losing sight of this, the society

even went so far as to offer a formal address of “congratulation to

the national assembly on the event of the late glorious revolution in

France.” It must be in charity supposed, that a great deal of ignorance

existed as to the real character of the movement in France, otherwise it

could only be concluded that a similar spirit existed in England as in

that country. It must not be disguised, however, that England contained

a certain class of discontented speculative men, who considered their

own country deficient in the liberty which, they imagined as agreeable

to man’s natural rights; and who therefore looked upon the French

revolution as the precursor to a similar movement among ourselves: men

who, from a revolutionary ardour and a fondness for innovation, looked

on all resistance to power as commendable, confounded revolt with

liberty, and identified conspiracy with patriotism. But this section of

the community happily was not extensive: the many who admired the French

revolution did so from a generous sympathy, and while they lamented the

excesses committed, they attributed it to the old tyranny, which had

brutalized the people, and which they considered as not likely to

continue. They concluded, erroneously indeed, that a change from the old

system of despotism must be an improvement, and fondly hoped that the

alterations would produce a government in France, similar to that which

they themselves enjoyed. Others there were, however, who viewed the new

politics of France with horror. Looking from the present to the future,

they foresaw that the events which had taken place in that country,

instead of producing such a change in the condition of the French people

as every friend to rational and well-regulated freedom must desire,

would only produce the most lamentable consequences—would either

terminate in anarchy, or in the establishment of despotism. Of the great

public men of the day, Burke was perhaps the first to discern the true

character of this movement in France. The letters which he wrote during

its progress all show that he looked upon it with the utmost suspicion:

arguing from the bloody deeds with which it was consummated, deeds still

more bloody and fearful. But the keen insight into the French character

which Burke possessed was not common to the public at large, or even to

his own party and the friends of his bosom: the general impression was,

that the French people, after the first ebullitions of vengeance, would

return to their senses; and that then they would build up a fabric of

freedom on the ruins of tyranny, which might serve for a model to all

Europe: a bulwark of liberty which the iron foot of despotism should

never be able to throw down.

“But history, time’s slavish scribe, will tell

How rapidly the zealots of the cause

Disbanded—or in hostile ranks appeared:

Some, tired of honest service; these outdone,

Disgusted, therefore, or appalled, by aims

Of fiercer zealots—so confusion reigned,

And the more faithful were compelled to exclaim,

As Brutus did to virtue: ‘Liberty,

I worshipped thee, and find thee but a shade.’”

—Wordsworth.

MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.

{A.D. 1790}

The British parliament met on the 21st of January. The king, who had

now recovered from his malady, attended in person, and in his speech he

slightly glanced at the affairs of the continent, by observing that they

had engaged his most serious attention; paid an appropriate tribute

to the excellence of the British constitution; and congratulated the

country on the increase of the public revenue, the extension of commerce

and manufactures, and the general prosperity. The addresses in both

houses were voted without opposition or division. In moving that in

the commons, Lord Valletort took occasion to contrast the tranquil and

prosperous situation of England with the anarchy and licentiousness

prevailing in France, and to stigmatize the revolution as an event the

most disastrous and the most fatal that had ever taken place since

the foundation of the French monarchy. Nearly all who followed Lord

Valletort coincided in his sentiments, attributing the prosperity and

tranquillity of England to the superior excellence of its constitution,

and to the prudent administration of the executive government. The

subject was resumed in the debates which took place on the 5th and 9th

of February, in both of which Fox spoke in a laudatory manner of the

French military, and in the latter of which he extended his eulogiums

to the French revolution itself. It has been seen before that Burke’s

sentiments on this subject were foreign to those of his party, and

notwithstanding his political connection _with_, and friendship

_for_ Fox, he rose from his seat greatly agitated, and denounced the

revolution as “an irrational, unprincipled, proscribing, confiscating,

plundering, ferocious, bloody, tyrannical democracy.” In his speech,

Burke, after paying some high compliments to the genius and character

of Fox, and adverting to the danger of his opinions as sanctioned by

the authority of so great a name, entered at large into the subject. He

remarked:—“The French have shown themselves the ablest architects of

ruin that have hitherto appeared in the world. In one short summer

they have completely pulled down their monarchy, their church, their

nobility, their law, their army, and their revenue. Were we absolute

conquerors, with France prostrate at our feet, we should blush to impose

on them terms so destructive to their national consequence, as the

durance they have imposed on themselves. Our present clanger is that of

being led, from admiration, to imitate the excesses of a people whose

government is anarchy, and whose religion is atheism.” Burke expressed

his concern at hearing this strange thing called a revolution in France,

compared with the glorious event called the revolution in England.

He instituted a parallel between the two, and showed how widely they

differed from each other, and how Great Britain had risen beyond the

standard of her former self, because she had commenced with reparation,

and not with ruin. The French, he said, had made their way through

the destruction of their country to a bad constitution, when they were

absolutely in possession of a good one. Instead of redressing grievances

and improving the fabric of their state, to which they were called by

their monarch and sent by their country, they had first destroyed all

the balances and counterpoises which served to fix the state and to

give it a steady direction, melting down the whole into one incongruous,

ill-connected mass; and then, with the most atrocious perfidy and

breach of all faith, they laid the axe to the root of all property,

and consequently of all national prosperity, by the principles they

established and the example they set in confiscating all the possessions

of the church. They had made and recorded a sort of institute and

digest of anarchy, called “A Declaration of the Rights of Man;” thus

systematically destroying every hold of authority by opinion, religious

or civil, on the minds of the people. By this mad declaration they

had subverted the state, and brought on such calamities as no country,

without a long war, had been known to suffer. Burke expressed himself

astonished and troubled at the movements in France beyond measure, and

denounced it as so far from being worthy of imitation, that it ought

to have our utter abhorrence He would spend the last drop of his

blood—would quit his best friends, and join his bitterest enemies, to

oppose the least influence of such a spirit in England. Burke concluded

his noble harangue by saying that he was now near the end of his

natural, and probably still nearer the end of his political, career;

that he was weak and weary, and wished for rest; that at his time of

life, if he could not do something by weight of opinion, it would be

useless to attempt anything by mere struggle; and that, with respect to

the British constitution, he wished but few alterations in it, adding,

that he should be happy if he left it not the worse for any share he

had taken in its service. This speech, so full of patriotism and

unanswerable argument, gave rise to a grand schism among the Whigs. As

soon as Burke had concluded, Fox rose and declared his total dissent

from opinions “so hostile to the general principles of liberty,” and

which, he said, he was grieved to hear from the lips of a man whom he

loved and revered; a man by whose precepts he had been taught, and from

whom he had learned more than from all the men with whom he had ever

conversed. His speech on that day, he remarked, some arguments and

observations excepted, was among the wisest and most brilliant that had

ever been delivered in the house; but still, with all these admissions,

his opinion on the general subject remained unaltered. Fox entered into

a vindication of the conduct of the French army, in refusing to act

against their fellow-citizens, and excused the scenes of bloodshed and

cruelty which had been committed by the citizens, on the ground of their

long-suffering from tyranny. At the same time Fox declared, that he

never would lend himself to support any cabal or scheme to introduce

any dangerous innovation into our excellent constitution; and that Burke

might rest assured they could never differ in principles, although they

might disagree in the application of principles. Burke rejoined, and

expressed himself satisfied with the explanation of his right-honourable

friend; and the discussion might have ended for the present, had it not

been for Sheridan, who wished to make a speech on this grand subject.

Sheridan, in rising, said, that he felt it his duty to declare that

he differed from Burke in almost every word respecting the French

revolution. In his opinion it was as just as our own, proceeding upon

as sound a principle, and a greater provocation. Sheridan then eulogised

Lafayette, Bailly, and other patriots of that stamp, and vehemently

defended the general views and conduct of the national assembly. He

concluded his harangue by charging Burke with being an advocate for

despotism, and with having spoken of the national assembly with an

unwarrantable freedom of speech. Burke instantly rose to reply; and in

doing so he expressed his indignation at the language which Sheridan

had used, and declared that henceforth his honourable friend and he were

separated in politics. Sheridan’s language, he said, was not new, since

it was only a repetition of what was to be heard at the reforming clubs

and societies with which the honourable gentleman had recently become

entangled, and for whose plaudits he had chosen to sacrifice his

friends. He added, that his argument was chiefly an argument _ad

invidiam_, and that all the applause he could hope for from clubs was

scarcely worth the sacrifice which he had chosen to make. The Whig party

were alarmed at this breach in their camp; and attempts were instantly

made to bring about a reconciliation by means of mutual explanations.

But these attempts were fruitless; the bond of union was for ever

broken. The Whig party were rendered still more uneasy by the conduct of

Pitt, who declared that Burke had that day conferred a great obligation

upon the country, and warmly applauded the zealous and seasonable

attachment which he had displayed to the principles of the British

constitution. No man, in truth, rendered more service to the cause of

constitutional liberty than did Burke at this period. This was but

the first of a series of splendid harangues which he uttered upon the

subject of the French revolution, and which were as the sound of a

trumpet to the hearts of the English people. The contagion of its

principles were also arrested by the weighty productions of his pen; in

which productions “his fancy laid all nature under tribute, collecting

treasures from scenes of creation, and from every walk of art to adorn

his pages.” His sentiments had the more weight because they proceeded

from a mind which had ever been active in the great business of reform;

some traces of which activity were manifest in the statute-book. But the

reforms which Burke had ever advocated were founded in justice; those

which the French regenerators had adopted were subversive of all order,

and tended only to anarchy and desolation.

DEBATES ON THE TEST AND CORPORATION ACTS.

Since the decision of the last session relative to the test and

corporation acts, the Protestant dissenters had not relaxed in their

efforts to increase the number of their friends in the house of commons.

Moreover, they had held provincial meetings in all parts of the kingdom,

and by their public resolutions, in contemplation of a general election,

earnestly recommended the friends of equal and universal liberty to the

choice of electors. Unfortunately at these meetings, in their speeches

and resolutions, they warmly applauded the principles of the French

revolution; and they appear to have thought that this season of change

was favourable for pressing their old claims upon parliament. Under this

impression they resolved to bring the subject before the commons; and

instead of Mr. Beaufoy, the friend of Pitt, Fox, the tried friend of

liberty, was requested by them to become their advocate. Fox moved for

the repeal of the two acts in question, and supported his motion by a

long and able speech, in which he showed himself anxious to prove that

the application of his clients had nothing whatever to do with the

principles of the French revolution. It certainly did not emanate from

that movement, for the first application had been made three years

ago, when the keenest sagacity could not have formed anything like a

conjecture of the events which had taken place in France. It is most

certain, however, that the Protestant Dissenters, in seeking their

claims, had uttered language which savoured of a spirit of innovation.

It may have been only out of generous sympathy, but they had been among

the warmest approvers of the French revolution; and this gave offence

in high places. Hitherto, Pitt, although he opposed the repeal of the

corporation and test acts, had done so with temper and moderation; but

now, in opposing the motion, he spoke of their conduct with the utmost

indignation. At the very moment, he said, when they were reprobating the

test laws, they discovered their intention of forming associations to

impose a test on members of the house of commons. Pitt also vindicated

the necessity of a church establishment for the good of the state;

and endeavoured to show that such an institution could not exist if

toleration were extended to equality of privileges. Burke was more

emphatic in his opposition to the motion than Pitt. A wild spirit of

innovation was abroad, he said, which required not indulgence, but

restraint; and he asserted that the avowed leaders of the dissenters

had, in their speeches, resolutions, writings, and sermons, given

countenance to the revolutionary spirit which everywhere prevailed.

Burke read some extracts from dissenting divines in proof of his

assertions; and he adjured the house to let the events which had taken

place in France, and the sudden downfall of the church in that kingdom,

awaken their zeal for the preservation of our own establishment. Fox

rejoined, and urged the injustice of deciding a general question of

right upon the conduct of a few individuals; but the motion was rejected

by a majority of two hundred and ninety-four against one hundred and

five. This decided hostility to the measure chiefly arose from the time

at which it was brought forward, and the means which had been employed

to ensure success. Many members, and among them the amiable Wilberforce,

who had before voted for the repeal of these laws, now voted against it,

from a conviction that it would give an impetus to the innovating spirit

which so universally prevailed.

FLOOD’S MOTION FOR REFORM OF PARLIAMENT.

On the 4th of March, Mr. Flood, a celebrated Irish orator, moved for

leave to bring in a bill to amend the representation of the people in

parliament. This bill proposed to add one hundred members to the present

house of commons, in a proportionate ratio to the population of each

county, to be elected by resident householders. In his speech Mr. Flood

boldly asserted that the members who sat in the house were not the

adequate representatives of the people. He would not deny that they were

the legal representatives, and he acknowledged that they were a useful

and honourable council; but, to the honour of the British constitution,

we were entitled to something better. Although Mr. Flood avowed that he

was no friend to revolutions, and that he considered them an evil, yet

it was evident that his motion arose from an innovating spirit; and as

such it was opposed. Mr. Wyndham, member for Norwich, and the professed

admirer of Burke, said, that if he had approved of the measure, he

should still have objected to its being brought forward or adopted at

the present time. Where was the man, he asked, who would advise them to

repair their house in the hurricane season? Speculatists and visionaries

were at work in a neighbouring country, and that, he thought, was

sufficient. There was project against project, theory against theory,

_frontibus adversis pug-nantia_. He entreated the house to wait for the

event, and to guard with all possible care against catching the French

infection. Pitt followed Wyndham, and he declared, “that if the motion

before them were the precise resolution which he himself had formerly

proposed, he should now vote against it, from a thorough conviction

of its impropriety.” He recommended its withdrawal, promising, on some

future day, to make the subject of parliamentary reform a ministerial

measure. Fox rose to support the motion; and he affirmed, in the course

of his speech, “that no season could be more proper for the commencement

of repairs than when a hurricane was near and ready to burst forth.” At

the same time he acknowledged that he felt convinced the opinion which

he supported was neither that of the majority of the house nor of the

people. Burke combated the whole scheme and all the arguments that

had been adduced in support of it; and asserted that these attempts at

parliamentary reform were not countenanced by the people. Other members,

as Wilberforce, Granville, and Powys, spoke on the same side, and the

motion was at length withdrawn. These were the only great political

questions which engaged the attention of the commons during this

session. All change met with such an unyielding and decided opposition,

that its advocates deemed it their wisdom to remain silent. In this line

of conduct they were confirmed by the good temper of the people, who

wisely exhibited a disposition to submit to any little wrongs they might

be called upon to endure, rather than by a refractory spirit to run the

risk of incurring greater.

EAST INDIA AFFAIRS.

On the 31st of March Mr. Dundas presented to the house an account of the

financial state of India. He announced a great increase of revenue in

Bengal; which he looked upon as the strongest proof of the prosperity

and good government of the country. Dundas said, that in a few years

he trusted the company would be enabled to pay off the whole of their

arrears, and that the British possessions in India would be more

flourishing in wealth, commerce, and manufactures, than any other

part of Hindustan. In the present state of things, he remarked, we had

nothing to fear from any European nation: Holland was our ally, and

France was in no condition to disturb our foreign possessions. Tippoo

Saib, he acknowledged, was an enemy; but without European auxiliaries,

and the support of other native powers, he could never become formidable

to the British empire. Dundas, indeed, indulged himself in the pleasing

vision that this country was likely long to enjoy an undisturbed peace

at home and abroad.

PITT’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT, ETC.

Pitt opened the budget for the year on the 15th of April; and in doing

so he congratulated the house upon the prosperous state of the finances.

He regarded the increase of revenue as progressive, and spoke with

triumph of the growing greatness of England. Like Dundas, he spoke of

the continuance of peace as certain; and he concluded his speech with an

encomium upon the British constitution, to which, under Providence, the

prosperity of the nation was to be ascribed. About the same time that

the budget was opened, the house voted several sums as a recompense for

services or indemnification for losses in the cause of the country. Thus

an annuity of £1000 per annum was granted to the Rev. Dr. Willis,

who had been instrumental in restoring his majesty’s intellects; the

speakers salary was increased from £3000 to £6000; and the family of

Penn had a perpetual grant of £4000 per annum bestowed upon them out

of the consolidated fund, for the losses they had sustained during the

revolt of the American colonies.

THE SLAVE-TRADE QUESTION.

Early in this session, Mr. Wilberforce, who had continued to devote

time, life, fortune, and talent to the great subject of the slave-trade,

moved that the house would resolve itself into a committee of the whole

house, to take that trade into consideration. This motion was agreed

to; and on a subsequent day he moved and carried the appointment of

a special committee for the examination of witnesses. Wilberforce was

himself one of the most active members of this special committee; but

nothing further was done during this session beyond hearing of evidence;

every mode of procrastination being resorted to on the part of the

slave-merchants and planters. The bill of Sir William Dolben, for

limiting the number of slaves to be transported in each slave-ship, was

renewed for another year; and the further consideration of the subject

was adjourned till next session.

DISPUTES WITH SPAIN.

Although both Pitt and Dundas had so recently spoken confidently of the

long continuance of peace, yet, on the 5th of May, a royal message was

delivered, announcing circumstances which indicated the approach of

war. The circumstances from whence this message originated were briefly

these:—In his last voyage of discovery, the celebrated navigator,

Captain Cook, had touched at Nootka, or Prince William, on the Western

coast of North America, where his crew purchased some valuable furs,

which they disposed of to great advantage in China. In consequence of

the recommendation of Captain King, who published the last volume of

“Cook’s Voyages,” some mercantile adventurers from the East Indies,

with the consent of the governor-general, undertook to supply the

Chinese with fur from these regions. For this purpose they fitted out

two small vessels; and the trade proved so advantageous, that, in 1788,

the adventurers resolved to form a permanent settlement. A spot of

ground was accordingly procured from the natives at Nootka Sound, and

a regular establishment was formed, which was defended by a slight

fortification. This was, however, regarded by the Spaniards as an

encroachment of their exclusive right of sovereignty; and two Spanish

ships of war arrived in the sound, seized two English vessels with the

crews, and then took possession of the settlement. The British flag was

removed; the Spanish commandant declaring, that the whole line of coast

from Cape Horn to the 60th degree of north latitude, belonged to the

King of Spain. These incidents were notified to the court of Great

Britain by the Spanish ambassador; who, at the same time, requested that

measures might be taken for preventing his Britannic majesty’s subjects

from frequenting those coasts, and from carrying on their fisheries in

the seas contiguous to the Spanish continent, they being, it was stated,

the rights of the Spanish crown. The claims of Spain, in reference

to her right of dominion and sovereignty in America, were wholly

chimerical; and the notification and request of the Spanish ambassador,

therefore, were met by a demand of satisfaction for the insults offered

to the British nation, and reparation to the individuals who had

suffered in property and person. This satisfaction had not been given;

and intelligence having also been received that armaments were fitting

out in the Spanish ports, his Britannic majesty judged it right to

prepare on his side for supporting the rights and interests of his

kingdom. Such were the circumstances related in his majesty’s message

to the house of commons; and he requested that they would enable him to

make such an augmentation of force as necessity seemed to require. At

the same time the king expressed an earnest wish that the satisfaction

due might yet be given, and that the affair might terminate without

recourse to arms, or any interruption of the friendship and harmony

which subsisted between the two nations. The message being taken into

consideration, the commons unanimously voted an address to the king,

assuring his majesty of their determination to afford the most zealous

and effectual support in maintaining the dignity of his crown, and the

essential interests of his dominions. This was followed by a vote of

credit for £1,000,000, for the purpose of making the necessary warlike

preparations. Fox gave his warm support to the address and vote of

credit, but he blamed ministers for their exultation on the prospect of

peace, when a war with Spain had so long been threatened: though from

Pitt’s explanation it did not appear that they knew anything of

the preparations in the Spanish ports till a very few days since.

Subsequently, motions were made in both houses, by opposition, for the

production of papers to illustrate the grounds of this dispute; but

these were successfully resisted, on an established rule of policy,

prohibiting all documents relating to a negociation with a foreign power

from being produced while such negociation was still pending.

{GEORGE III. 1789–1791}

IMPEACHMENT OF WARREN HASTINGS.

The trial of Warren Hastings recommenced on the 10th of February, on

which day Mr. Anstruther went through the charge relating to the corrupt

receipt of presents. Disputes instantly arose about the evidence proper

to be admitted, and their lordships took another walk to their chamber

in order to debate and consult. Fresh objections were then made by

the counsel acting for Hastings, who said that the matter which, the

managers brought forward was neither set down nor made a charge of in

the articles of impeachment. On this their lordships adjourned again,

and after long consultation, the objections made on the part of the

defendant were held to be valid. The managers and the public by this

time seemed to consider that the trial would never be finished, and

Burke, on the 11th of May, called the attention of the house of

commons to its protracted continuance; and moved the two following

resolutions:—1. “That this house, taking into consideration the

interruptions occasioned by the occupations of the judges and the house

of lords, as also the impediments which have occurred, or may occur,

in the course of the trial of the impeachment of Warren Hastings, Esq.,

doth, without meaning to abandon the truth or importance of the charges,

authorize the managers of their said impeachment, to insist only upon

such and so many of the said charges as shall appear to them the most

conducive to the obtaining speedy and effectual justice against the

said Warren Hastings. 2. That the commons of Great Britain in parliament

assembled, from a regard to their own honour, and from the duty which

they owe to all the commons of Great Britain, in whose name, as well

as in their own, they act in the public prosecutions by them carried on

before the house of lords, are bound to persevere in their impeachment

against Warren Hastings, Esq., late governor-general of Bengal, until

judgment may be obtained upon the most important articles in the same.”

The first of these resolutions was adopted, but the latter was dropped

as unnecessary. In supporting them the managers attributed the delay to

Hastings himself, to his counsel, and to the house of lords. A day or

two after, however, Major Scott, published a letter containing a review

of the trial, and strictures upon the managers, whom he accused of being

guilty of a great crime in instituting the prosecution, and of a still

greater crime in not having brought it to a close long ago. Long and

angry debates took place on the publication of this document, the result

of which was that Major Scott was reprimanded, sitting in his place, for

the violation of his duty as a member of the house of commons. In the

meantime the impeachment still went but slowly forward. The court of

peers only sat thirteen days during the session, and did not get beyond

the charge which Anstruther had opened. After Fox had summed up and

commented upon the evidence, on the 9th of June their lordships agreed

to postpone the trial till the first sitting in the next session of

parliament.

PARLIAMENT PROROGUED, AND DISSOLVED.

On the 10th of June his majesty closed the session by a speech from

the throne, in which he informed the two houses of his intention of

dissolving the present and calling a new parliament. In his speech the

king said that he had as yet received no satisfactory answer from

the court of Madrid, and that he was therefore under the necessity of

continuing his preparations for war. He acknowledged their affectionate

and unshaken loyalty to his person; their uniform and zealous regard for

the true principles of the constitution; and their unremitting attention

to the happiness and prosperity of his people. His majesty then dwelt

upon the rapid increase of manufactures, commerce, and navigation; the

security given to our most distant possessions; and the improvement

of the public revenue. He added, after thus enumerating the salutary

effects of their counsels:—“The loyalty and public spirit, the industry

and enterprise of my subjects have well seconded your exertions. On

their sense of the advantages which they at present experience, and

their uniform attachment to my person and government, I rely for a

continuance of that harmony and confidence, which must at all times

afford the surest means of meeting the exigencies of war, or of

cultivating with increasing benefit the blessing of peace.” On the

next day parliament was dissolved by proclamation: it had existed seven

sessions.

SETTLEMENT OF DISPUTES WITH SPAIN.

The British government, desirous of avoiding hostilities, dispatched Mr.

Fitzherbert to Madrid, with full powers to settle all disputes between

the two nations. At first the Spanish court showed itself adverse to

negociation, and applied to that of France for aid. The court of France,

however, though willing to support the Bourbon compact, had lost the

power, for the people, by whom it was now kept in awe, were averse at

this time to a war with England. Unable to contend with the British

arms alone, Spain was therefore compelled to comply with the demand of

restitution and indemnification: on the 2nd of October a convention was

signed at the Escurial, by which every point in dispute was conceded.

The settlement at Nootka-Sound was restored; the free navigation and

right of fishery in the Southern Pacific were confirmed to Britain; and

a full liberty of trade and even of settlement was granted to all the

north-west coasts of America, beyond the most northerly of the Spanish

territories, though unaccompanied by any formal renunciation of

their right of sovereignty. Both nations were equally restricted from

attempting to form any settlement nearer to Cape Horn than the most

southerly plantations already established by Spain. It was also agreed,

that, in case of any future complaint, no violence should be committed,

but recourse had to an amicable adjustment between the respective

courts. This convention was generally applauded in England, though

£3,000,000 had been expended in warlike preparations.

CONTINENTAL AFFAIRS.

Early in this year the Emperor Joseph of Austria died, and was succeeded

by his brother Leopold, Grand Duke of Tuscany. On his death-bed, Joseph,

who had during his life shown himself an ambition & warrior, recommended

peace, and the first care of his successor was to free himself from

the Turkish war. Under the mediation of England, Prussia, and Holland,

negociations for peace were opened at Reichenbach, in Silesia, on the

4th of June, and a treaty of peace was settled on the _status quo_

principle, that each party should retain what it possessed previous to

the war, restoring all that it had conquered, and recovering all that

it had lost. The Czarina of Russia was invited to be a party to this

treaty, but she refused, and still carried on war with the Turks on the

one side, and the Swedes on the other.

The congress at Reichenbach interfered likewise in the affairs of the

Netherlands: England, Prussia, and Holland guaranteed to the Emperor

Leopold all the possessions of the House of Austria in Flanders,

Brabant, &c., on the condition that he acknowledged and re-established

the ancient privileges and constitution of those provinces. On the

accession of Leopold, and before the meeting at Reichenbach, or before

any kind of measure was attempted, either diplomatically or otherwise,

he had sent a memorial to the Netherlanders, in which he expressed

sincere regret for the despotic proceedings of the Austrian government,

and declared his anxiety to redress all grievances; at the same time

vindicating his claim to the sovereignty, and announcing his resolution

to maintain it with all his might. Although the Netherlanders had

established their independence, there was still among them a strong

loyal imperial party, and this address and the situation of Belgian

affairs revived the spirits of these loyalists, and they soon began to

declare themselves in favour of Leopold, and to wear the old cockade,

instead of the new patriotic ribands. By degrees, great numbers of the

populace, also, embraced their opinions, and the party soon acquired

a very imposing force. Such was the situation of affairs when Leopold

issued a second manifesto, after the meeting at Reichenbach, engaging

himself, under an inaugural oath, and the guarantee of Great Britain,

Prussia, and Holland, to govern the Belgic Netherlands according to

the constitution that was in force under Maria Theresa, and offering

an amnesty to all who should return to their duty before the 1st of

November. The mediating powers notified to the Belgian states the

approval of these terms, but that body, who had exercised sovereign

authority ever since the revolt, were loth to relinquish it; and under

these circumstances, Austrian troops entered their territory. Various

engagements took place, but resistance was vain: the arms of the emperor

were uniformly successful, and the people generally acknowledged the

heir of their ancient rulers. The leading members of opposition now

took refuge in flight, and in a convention, guaranteed by the defensive

alliance and executed on the 10th of December, the constitution of

Maria Theresa was restored to the Belgic provinces, with some additional

rights and privileges.

In the meantime the war between Russia and the Porte went on but slowly.

Early in the year the czarina made some attempts to detach the Greek

subjects of the sultan from their obedience, and a rebellion was

fomented by her means in Albania, and an extensive plan was arranged

by the Greeks for emancipating themselves from the Ottoman yoke. A

memorial, offering the sovereignty of Greece to Constantine her son, was

laid before the czarina, but before the plan could be matured she was

induced to postpone her attempts upon Turkey. It was late in the autumn

before Suvaroff received reinforcements, supplies, and positive orders

to commence operations, and he then invested Ismael, which he

captured; slaying 24,000 Turkish soldiers, and destroying 7,000 of the

inhabitants. The loss of the Russians themselves was estimated at 10,000

men, including a great number of officers, some of whom were of the

highest rank.

The King of Sweden opened the campaign early in this year, and

penetrated within one hundred miles of St. Petersburg. Alarmed at the

approach of her enemies, the czarina sent 10,000 Russians, under the

command of General Ingelstrom, to obstruct their progress. Ingelstrom

attacked the Swedes in their lines at Karnomkoksi, on the Saima Lake,

but he was defeated with the loss of 2000 men. Gustavus still advanced,

while his fleet, under the Duke of Suclermania, sailed up the Gulf

of Finland, penetrated into the harbour of Revel, in the hope of

demolishing that great naval arsenal, and a division of the Russian

fleet which lay at anchor in that harbour. He was frustrated by a storm,

and, subsequently, he was twice attacked by Russian squadrons, which on

both occasions enclosed his fleet; but each time he extricated himself

from danger, though with great loss cf ships and men. Having recruited

his shattered forces, Gustavus took the command of the fleet himself,

and having encountered a large Russian fleet, after a bloody battle,

which lasted two days, he gained a decisive victory. This defeat alarmed

the czarina, and being abandoned by Austria and threatened by England

and Prussia, she entered into negociation with Gustavus, and by the

month of August a treaty of peace was concluded between them. By this

treaty those of Abo and Nystad were confirmed; each power was to retain

what it possessed before the war; and Sweden renounced all claim to

the possessions which had once belonged to it, and which it had overrun

during the present war. Russia also granted permission to export grain

from Livonia; and it was mutually agreed to appoint commissioners

to settle in an amicable manner the line of frontier between the two

countries: the two courts further promised themselves that they should

strengthen their connexion by a close alliance, and agreed to forget

what was past.

In Paris, during this year, the national assembly pursued its

legislative labours. All ecclesiastical possessions had, at the close of

the preceding year, been declared national property, and the reformers

soon after laid their hands on the domains of the crown: with the

exception of some castles, which were to be left to the king, the rest

were transferred to the state. To facilitate the sale of the possessions

of the crown and the church, paper money was created, which was at first

ordered to last only six years, but which was subsequently declared

current money—as good as gold. These measures were followed by the

suppression of all orders and cloisters; by the suppression of the

parliaments; by an entire change of the judicial system; by the

admission of Jews to the rights of citizens; by the abolition of all the

titles of the noblesse, coats of arms, and decorations of the order

of chivalry; by an order that the estates of Protestants who fled

from France on the iniquitous repeal of the edict of Nantz, should

be restored; by a division of France into eighty-three departments,

subdivided into two hundred and forty-nine districts, each of which was

composed of from three to five cantons; and by a change in the national

representation, which was made to harmonize with this new division. To

all these decrees the king, who had no alternative, gave his unqualified

sanction, and in return the national assembly fixed the civil list of

the king at 25,000,000 of livres, besides the possession of castles of

pleasure. Harmony seemed to be restored, and to establish it a festival

of confederation was ordained, which, on the first anniversary of the

capture of the Bastille, was held in the field of Mars, when the king

and 500,000 Frenchmen swore on the altar of the country to observe the

new constitution. But notwithstanding all this show of harmony, a secret

fermentation remained. The abolition of titles and the insignia of rank

inflamed the anger of the aristocrats, and the manifestations of their

wrath increased the hatred of the commons. A new emigration took place,

and officers, as well as nobles, fled for their lives. The emigrants

assembled in arms at Coblentz, Worms, and Ettenheim, from whence,

maintaining a close connexion with their friends or dependants at home,

they cast firebrands into the interior of the kingdom. Nor did the

priesthood quietly submit to the civil constitution which the national

assembly imposed upon them: they refused to take the oath, and stirred

up many against public authority and the new constitution. The

friends of liberty were alarmed and exasperated at the open and secret

preparations of this twofold and implacable opposition. In this state of

irritation all that was known was friend and enemy; and these relations

effected the triumph of the fanatic and the fall of the moderate. One of

the first who fell was Necker, to whose counsels the nation was indebted

for most of the concessions of the king, and consequently for its

success: Necker lost all his popularity, and fled from a country which

he had contributed to ruin. The king, also, soon again declined in

popular favour; the sentiments of his heart did not accord with his

public declarations, and this becoming manifest, the popular party was

disquieted and enraged. Mirabeau, whose ardour for revolution had begun

to cool, and who now saw that the constitution was far too democratic

for a monarchy, leagued secretly with the fallen court, and laboured

with all the force of his popularity to raise it from its degraded

state, and to recover for the crown a portion of strength necessary for

its existence. But it was too late. Before this, clubs had been formed

among the members of the national assembly, in order that better

directed and more energetic efforts might be made in securing the

objects of the revolution. Pre-eminent among these clubs was that of

the deputies from Bretagne, which held its sessions in the suppressed

cloister of the Jacobins, from which cloister the members of the club

received the name of Jacobins; a name which finally obtained a bad

celebrity in the world’s history. Similar clubs were also formed in most

of the important cities of the kingdom, which maintained, with that at

Paris, the closest union of sentiments and efforts. The bonds of society

in France were, in truth, loosened, and no human skill could restore

them: the bridle had been taken from the mouth of the fiery steed,

and no human arm could arrest his headlong course. Marat, Danton, and

Robespierre-men of blood—with others of the same stamp, had already

made their execrable names known in the clubs of the Cordeliers and

Jacobins, which finally united, and these were the men who were, for a

brief period, to rule the destinies of France.

PROGRESS OF REVOLUTIONARY PRINCIPLES IN ENGLAND.

It has been well said that the season of hope and delusion ought now to

have been over—that whatever right-hearted and right-headed Englishmen

might have thought of the French revolution at the opening of the

States-general in May, 1789, they ought not at the close of this year

to have regarded it with any other sentiments than those of horror,

disgust, and pity. But “rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.” Although

it was as clear as the sun at noon-day, that the events which had

taken place in France were but the precursors of some horrible

catastrophe—that the French regenerators sought not wholesome and

legitimate reformations, but the ruin of their country, yet it is a

lamentable fact that their admirers in England were now greatly on the

increase. On the very day that the festival of confederation took place

in Paris, six hundred gentlemen in England assembled to celebrate the

event which it commemorated. The chairman of this assembly was Earl

Stanhope, who acted as president of the Revolution Society in London: a

society which, after extending its ramifications throughout the country,

entered into an active correspondence not only with the National

Assembly, but with the societies in all parts of France, instituted for

the promotion of revolutionary principles. Among the associates of this

society were men of all ranks and professions—men who could lay no

claim to a practical acquaintance with politics, or the working of

governments, and who knew little or nothing of human nature. Happily

for the country, however. Burke and other writers put forth all their

strength to show the danger which lurked in the Revolution Societies

of England, and government opposed a mighty barrier to the progress of

their dangerous principles. These wrought the salvation of the country.

The most powerful antagonist to these societies, who worked by means of

the press, was Burke, who, toward the end of this year, published his

great work on the subject, entitled “Reflections on the Revolution, &c.”

a work which sounded the knell of the old Whig confederacy. Some of

this party yielded at once to the force of his arguments, while others

retreated as they saw the development of the principles against which

they were directed. In fact, the result of this work was to make the

old appellations of Whig and Tory assume a widely different meaning from

that which had hitherto been attached to them: by the term Whig was now

understood the favourers of such democratic principles as existed in

France; by that of Tory, those who were alarmed at the progress of the

French revolution. The bold and uncompromising stand which Burke made

against these principles led to a final rupture between him and his old

friend Fox, and consequently to the permanent separation of the great

Whig party: from this time there was a division in the camp; a breach

which could not be healed.

WAR IN INDIA.

During this state of affairs in Europe, a war which directly concerned

England broke out in India. Tippoo Sultaun, whose hatred towards the

English was mortal, in the year 1789 sent a secret messenger to France,

to invite the French government to send six thousand of their best

troops to the Carnatic, with which he engaged to drive the British

forces out of every part of Hindustan. This messenger was favourably

received by the people, and even some of the king’s ministers were in

favour of the project. Louis, however, had not forgotten the lesson he

had been taught by interfering in the American war—an act for which he

was still indeed suffering—and he turned a deaf ear to the plausible

representations which were made to him in order to obtain his consent.

But before Tippoo received an answer from the French monarch, he had

commenced operations, by attacking the Rajah of Travancore, who had

long been the close ally of the English. Before the end of the year

1789 Tippoo had overrun and took possession of the greater part of the

rajah’s dominions, and subsequently he defeated a detachment of the

company’s army, under Lieutenant-Colonel Floyd. His progress, however,

was soon stopped. The Bengal government, having formed a close alliance

with the Mahrattas, the Nizam of the Deccan, and other native powers,

raised two armies; one in the Carnatic of 15,000 men, under General

Medows, and another of 7,500 men, in the presidency of Bombay, under

General Abercrombie. Thus threatened, Tippoo evacuated the Travancore

country, and retreated to his strong capital, Seringapatam. But he had

provoked the war, and it was not to close with his retreat. In June,

1790, Medows, with the Carnatic army, marched towards Seringapatam, and

took several important fortresses in his route. Medows, however, was

obliged to retrace his steps by intelligence that Tippoo had again

burst into the Carnatic, and was carrying fire and sword to the walls of

Madras. Tippoo was soon obliged to retire beyond the mountains; and

in the meantime General Abercrombie, with the Bombay army, landed at

Tellicherry, and reduced all the places which the enemy possessed on

the Malabar coast, in which he was aided by the Nairs, and the other

petty Hindu rajahs, who were glad of an opportunity of rescuing

themselves from Tippoo Sultaun’s rule. In the end the Rajah of

Travancore was re-established in his dominions, and then the campaign

closed: but the war was not yet over.

MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.

The new parliament assembled on the 25th of November. In his speech his

majesty expressed great satisfaction at the amicable adjustment of the

late disputes with Spain about Nootka Sound; observed that since the

last session of Parliament a foundation had been laid for a pacification

between Austria and the Porte, and that a separate peace had been

concluded between Russia and Sweden; noticed the hostilities which had

broken out in India; acquainted the house of commons that the expenses

of the armament, together with the estimates for the ensuing year would

be laid before them; and called particular attention to the state of the

province of Quebec. The address was carried in both houses with large

majorities; though ministers were censured by opposition, in the lords

and in the commons, for the convention which they had made with Spain.

On the 3rd of December, when copies of this convention were laid before

the two houses of parliament, it was urged in the commons that more

papers ought to be produced, and on the 13th of the same month Mr. Grey

made a motion for all that related to the affair of Nootka Sound. This

motion was negatived by a majority of nearly two to one; and on the

following day Mr. Duncombe, one of the members for Yorkshire, after

mentioning that trade and manufactures had suffered but little during

the late dispute with Spain, moved an address to his majesty on the late

successful negociations with the court of Madrid, which was carried by

a still larger majority. A similar address was moved in the lords by

the Duke of Montrose, when the Marquess of Lansclowne took occasion to

reprobate the convention in very strong language. The marquess contended

that the Spanish nation had an indisputable right to the whole of the

American coast on which Nootka Sound is situated; a right which

was acknowledged in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Overlooking the

provocation which Spain had given, and her previously concerted plan to

enter upon a war in conjunction with France, he said that ministers

had, in the arrogance of power, insulted the present weakness of that

country, and inflicted a wound which would rankle in the heart of the

Spanish people. The marquess also argued that they had alienated and

made enemies of Prance, Russia, Denmark, and Sweden, as well as of

Spain. He also argued, that by the late treaty of France, which was an

infringement of the old Methuen treaty with Portugal, ministers,

had alienated the court of Lisbon, and that had war taken place, the

Portuguese, Venetians, and Neapolitans, would have joined the Spaniards

against England. Lord Rawdon spoke on the same side; hinting a suspicion

that our fleet had been destined for the Baltic, while we were bullying

Spain, which had not offered any insult to this country; and that this

farce had been carried on until the King of Sweden had made peace with

Russia. The convention was defended by Lord Grenville, and the address

was carried by a majority of forty-three. Another debate took place on

this subject on the 15th of December, when Pitt gave in, in a separate

account, the expenses of the late armament; intimating at the same

time that some of those expenses, which arose out of the engaging an

additional number of seamen, must be continued, as these seamen

could not be all disbanded at once. The expenses incurred by the late

armament, and the funds necessary to keep up the additional number of

seamen, he said, was £3,133,000, which he thought might be defrayed

without entailing any permanent charge upon the revenue. He proposed

to defray it by temporary taxes, assisted by £500,000, which he

contemplated taking from the unclaimed dividends lying in the Bank of

England, the total amount of which he estimated at £680,000. This

latter proposition, however, excited such alarm in the great chartered

companies and to the mercantile world in general, that Pitt was obliged

to abandon it, and to accept of a loan of £500,000 from the Bank without

interest, so long as a floating balance to that amount should remain in

the hands of the cashier. The bulk of the money required was raised by

an increase of the duties upon sugar, British and foreign spirits, malt,

game licences, and by an increase of the assessed taxes, except the

commutation and land-taxes, part of which were to continue for two

years, and the rest for four only. Pitt also introduced, in aid of the

expenses of the armament, a variety of new regulations, to prevent the

evasions and frauds practised in the taxes upon receipts and bills of

exchange: these were to be permanent.