expressions of sorrow which it contained at my departure, and the
assurance, that he would be completely miserable till my return, recalled
all his former kindness to me, and I would instantly have set out on my
way home, although it was now dusk, and it rained in torrents, I had
already ordered my horse to be saddled--that horse which I had the same
evening paid a man twelve shillings to take back to my father's house
without his master, I was now eager to mount myself, that I might fly to
receive my parent's blessing, and acknowledge my error in disobeying his
commands. But my friends all entreated me to defer my departure till the
morning, to which I reluctantly consented, and retired to bed about twelve
o'clock, after having taken a most affectionate leave of the _worthy,
generous, and kind-hearted captain_. Good God! how often have I been since
rivetted to the earth, as it were with astonishment, when I contemplated
such a man being employed upon such a cruel, unjust, unchristian,
murderous traffic as that of the _slave trade_!
I certainly retired to my bed, having ordered the ostler to get my horse
ready by three o'clock; but no rest did I obtain. For the first time in my
life, I now learned what it was to go to bed without being able to go to
sleep; for two long hours, I tossed and turned about a thousand times, but
deep had flown from my eyes. I heard the quarters strike, and the watchman
go his lonely round; my thoughts were all at home, and I was wretched till
I threw myself at my poor distressed father's feet, to claim with a
certainty of receiving his blessing and forgiveness. I, who, but a few
hours before, expected and intended to bid farewell to my native land, and
to leave behind me all that was dear and valuable to me in this world; I,
who was prepared to sail the next morning, almost without regret, and had
thoughtlessly undertaken to become one of those who were the most horrid
and most unnatural of all unnatural and horrid thieves and murderers; I,
who should have gone to bed and slept as sound as a rock under such
circumstances till I was called in the morning, could not, now I was about
to return to my kindest friends, and to make myself and my father happy, I
could not sleep one moment. Gracious God! upon what a precipice had I
stood! from what a world of misery was I rescued, by the kind hand of
Providence! for if I had gone upon such an errand, and if I had been
instrumental in robbing one _human being or fellow creature_ of his life,
or of what was more valuable to him--his LIBERTY, it would afterwards have
been to me a source of never-failing misery. Thank God! I was saved from
that pang. Had my father's messenger come twelve hours later, I should
have been sailed, and in all probability have been a participator in such
crimes as I should never have forgiven myself, for having joined in
committing.
The clock struck two; I could remain in bed no longer; I jumped up, and
having found my way into the yard, I roused the ostler, and having got my
horse saddled, I passed Temple Gate just as the clock struck three; and
without drawing bit more than once, I reached home before nine o'clock, a
distance of forty-five miles. My father and my sister met me at the door;
but to attempt to describe the affecting reconciliation would be only
doing an injustice to my own feelings. My poor father, however, would
scarcely allow me to offer any apology for my undutiful behaviour; he took
all the blame to himself; he had reflected more than I had upon the
consequences of my voyage, the full particulars of which I found he knew,
he having received an account of my every movement, and known all my
plans, which had in confidence been communicated by the honest captain to
Mr. Gresley, that he might apprise my father of them and endeavour by all
the means in his power to procure for me, if possible, a reconciliation
before he sailed; he being resolved to convince himself that all hopes of
that desirable object were fruitless ere he permitted me to accompany him.
This was an instance of the most disinterested friendship, and I have
every reason to believe that he even delayed the sailing of the vessel for
several days, in order to give time for Mr. Gresley to send to my father.
This information Mr. Gresley communicated without delay, and my father no
sooner received it, than he dispatched a confidential messenger, his
neighbour, Mr. John Coward of Enford, with a strict injunction not to
spare any pains to find me, and to hasten my return home.
My Father who had hitherto, since the death, of my mother, conducted
himself towards me with a degree of austerity and rigid discipline not
altogether calculated to conciliate my hasty disposition, now relaxed his
usual strictness, and ever afterwards proved himself not only a kind
parent, but an indulgent and sincere Friend.--He lamented upon this
occasion the severe loss of my mother, in which I most heartily joined;
for we both attributed the late dispute and separation to the want of an
amiable mediator, which, if my poor mother had been alive, she would have
been upon this, as she had been in many former instances, in which she had
been of the greatest utility and benefit, as a peace-maker and promoter of
family happiness and concord. My father, who had long since witnessed with
some anxiety my aspiring disposition, now began to dread the evil
consequences of those lofty notions of patriotism, and that disinterested
love of country, which in my earlier years he had taken so much pains to
instil into my young mind, and had been so anxious that I should imbibe.
He now viewed my daring spirit with a mingled pleasure and pain; he
dreaded the result of such ardent feelings, because he foresaw that they
would lead me into the greatest difficulties and dangers, unless he
checked them by timely control. He now freely told me that he was actuated
by this motive when he refused to give me his consent to go to Portsmouth,
to witness the effects of Lord Howe's brilliant victory over the French
fleet. He told me, too, that he had the same object in view, when, the
summer before, he refused my application, to go and see the grand review
on Bagshot Heath. It was, however, at too late a period that he began to
check my patriotic ardour; he had, himself, "bent the twig," and it had
grown too powerfully in the direction which he had given to it to be
directed to any other. Although I was no politician at that time, yet my
bosom glowed with as sacred a love of country, with as strong a
predilection for the rights and liberties of the people, with as pure
disinterested love of truth and justice, as ever warmed the youthful heart
of man.--yet, notwithstanding I was a loyal man to the backbone, I never
joined in, or approved of, the persecution of any one, for holding
opinions different from those which I, myself, openly professed. I knew
many persons who were called _jacobins_ at this time, and although I
thought them violent in their principles and professions, yet I never
quarrelled with any of them upon the score of opinion. I was always the
first to stand forward to protect the oppressed; and I began sincerely to
sympathise with the labouring poor. I had now, for some years, worked with
them side by side, day by day, week by week, month by month, and year year
by year. I had toiled in the field with the labourers of my father; I had
heard their complaints; I had witnessed their increasing privations; and
although I often checked the ebullition of their discontent, which I
sometimes attributed to disaffection, yet I never mocked their misery, I
never persecuted or oppressed any one, because he was considered a
disaffected person, or what was a synonymous term a jacobin. In fact, I
sometimes got myself into very disagreeable situations, for expressing my
love of fair play. Once, in particular, I remember I was in the boxes at
the theatre at Salisbury, when there was a violent party call for "God
save the King." I was one of the loyal who as loudly demanded this tune to
be played as any loyal man in the house; after some trifling opposition
the call was complied with, and the performers came forward upon the stage
and sung it: there was then a call for hats off, and I have no doubt that
I was as zealous in this call as any one, because, in the first place I
really was a loyal man, and I was in the side boxes with a very loyal
party. There was, however, one person, in the centre of the front row of
the pit, who kept his hat on, and steadily refused to pull it off. This
caused a great uproar, and a general call to turn him out. At length, some
persons near him attempted to pull his hat off by force; but he defended
himself for some time with great success, and kept his hat still on his
head. By this time the national air was finished, but still there was a
call to pull his hat off and to turn him out; he was surrounded now by
numbers, who, urged on by those in the boxes, not only forcibly deprived
him of his hat, but likewise began to use him ill. I was now as loud in my
demand for _fair play_ as I had been previously for hats off. They still
persisted in their endeavour to turn him out, which he as manfully
resisted, although he was surrounded with a host of foes, without any one,
not even his friends who were with him, offering to give any assistance. I
cried shame! shame! shame! as loud as I could, and demanded fair play. He
had by this time at least a dozen assailing him at once, and they had
actually got him upon the spikes of the orchestra, with an intention to
throw him over out of the pit among the musicians. I felt enraged and
indignant at such unmanly conduct, and at length I sprung out of the box
into the pit, and having rushed up to him, I dealt the cowardly crew that
were attacking him some heavy falls, and soon cleared off the gang, so
that the person, whom they had literally got hanging upon the spikes, was
enabled to extricate himself. In effecting this, I received as well as
gave many severe blows; and by some I was considered as very foolish for
interfering, while all the loyal loudly blamed me for preventing his being
turned out. Although I very much disapproved of the gentleman's taste and
stubbornness, yet I could not look on and see a fellow man ill-used for
expressing his opinion, because that opinion was contrary to my own
sentiments. However, the play now proceeded, and the gentleman, Mr John
Axford of Eastcot, was allowed to keep his seat and his hat on,
uninterrupted, to the end of the performance.
In consequence of this circumstance, I afterwards became very intimate
with Mr. Axford, who was very grateful for my assistance, and I, although
I disapproved of his politics, could not but admire his independent
spirit. He was a man of a most amiable character, much intelligence, and a
quick penetration; a great reader of the political history of this and the
neighbouring countries, he possessed the most retentive memory, and could
repeat almost all that he read. Of the French Revolution, and of Mr.
Paine's Rights of Man, he was an enthusiastic admirer, and a determined
enemy to the war that England was carrying on against the people of
France. In fact, he was a lover of truth, justice and liberty, and
therefore was of course denominated a jacobin. He lived and died railing
against the unjust and unnecessary war which the ministers of England were
waging against liberty in France; and as he was a warm admirer of Mr. Fox,
he entered into almost all his views, and joined him in forcibly
predicting all that has since occurred, as to the ruin of the country by
debt and insupportable taxation. He was, indeed, a spirited and
enlightened advocate of genuine freedom; and he never failed, even in the
worst of times, publicly to avow his sentiments. He certainly possessed
more real political knowledge, and a more correct knowledge of the
situation and the affairs of the country, than any man with whom I have
ever met, with the exception of Mr. Cobbett. Although I knew him for many
years before I concurred in his sentiments, yet I found him a sincere
friend, and a most intelligent companion, and his death was lamented more
by me than that of any political acquaintance I ever had. He died before I
was much of a politician, and before I appeared much in public life; but
from him I learned much which I have never forgotten, and which has been,
and ever will be, of the greatest service to me as a public man. Were I
not to pay this well-deserved tribute to his memory, I should prove myself
to have been unworthy of his friendship, and undeserving of my own
approbation.
He was always denounced as a jacobin by the ignorant, and by the
interested sycophants of the day; but his merit and his public spirit were
duly estimated by all good and impartial men that knew him, and by no one
more than by the _late_, the _first_, Marquis of Lansdown, with whom he
was particularly intimate.
At this period, 1794, the whole country was greatly agitated with
political discussions; every one having an eye upon the bloody and
ferocious proceedings committed under the tyranny of Robespierre in Paris.
This caused great alarm in England, for fear of the progress of French
principles, and all the alarmists rallied round the Pitt administration,
and war, war, eternal war against French principles, was the watch-word of
the day. The parliament met in January, and the enormous supplies were
granted almost without any opposition. Eighty thousand men were voted for
the sea, forty thousand for the land-service, and likewise one hundred
thousand militia, and FORTY THOUSAND SUBSIDISED GERMANS. The estimates for
this service amounted to NINETEEN MILLIONS. In order to keep the people in
good humour, and to make them submit to pay the enormous increase of
taxation, the threat of INVASION was held out, and described with all its
horrors as being about to be realised. This set the John Bulls half-mad;
and, like men half-mad, half-drunk, they were ready to swallow any thing
that the minister of the day prescribed. Voluntary contributions, and
volunteer corps were raised all over the country. In the mean time Mr.
Pitt, who had deserted the cause of reform, of which, previous to his
coming into power, he had been one of the warmest and most zealous
advocates, true, _apostate-like_, took care to presecute all his former
associates, who were too honest to abandon that cause which he had
betrayed. In Scotland, that excellent and worthy man, Mr. Maurice
Margarot, and others were transported for fourteen years for having been
members of the British Convention. Mr. Thos. Walker, of Manchester, was
tried on a false accusation of high treason, at Lancaster; but was
honourably acquitted. Messrs Hardy, Tooke, Joyce, and Thelwall, were also
indicted and tried upon a pretended charge of high treason, at the Old
Bailey in London; but this premeditated cold-blooded attempt of the
ministers to destroy these innocent men, their political opponents, by
setting on the plea of constructive treason, was frustrated by the verdict
of an honest London jury. Messrs. Tooke and Thelwall were very able, and
perhaps the most powerful, advocates of liberty in England at that time;
and the ministers of the day might, with some men, have justified the
attempt to destroy such enemies upon the score of STATE POLICY; but their
attempt upon poor HARDY, who was a simple, inoffensive, harmless, plodding
shoemaker, possessing neither talent, influence, nor the smallest power to
do them any harm whatever, this was a proof of the vindictive and bloody
intentions of the men in office; and it caused a great sensation
throughout the country, and the verdicts of the jury were hailed with
pleasure by every honest thinking man in the kingdom, who was not under
the influence of an unjust prejudice. The reign of terror was now
proclaimed, and a great number of worthy men were imprisoned in dungeons,
under the suspension of the Habeas Corpus act, which tyrannical proceeding
greatly agitated the whole country. This, therefore, will not be an
improper place, to record, and bring to the recollection of the public,
_who_ were the men in power, under _whose auspices_ and by whose
directions these acts were perpetrated against the lives and liberties of
the people, and particularly against those who with patriotic energy
opposed those measures which they foretold, with a prophetic warning
voice, would bring this country to that wretched state of poverty and
slavery to which it is now reduced. Although I was too young at that time
to be much of a politician, and did not enter publicly into any of the
measures for or against these proceedings, yet, as I shall henceforward
record the particular political occurrences of each succeeding year, I
shall also take care to put upon record the names of those who were at the
head of the administration, and who took a prominent part in carrying them
into execution. Mr. PITT may be truly said to have been the ruler of the
destinies of this mighty kingdom, and by means of British gold and British
blood, he ruled also the destinies of Europe. He was the administration of
England.--He is gone, but there are some who are still alive, and who I
hope will live long enough to be brought to justice, and to answer for the
share they had in committing these atrocities upon the people. During
these times LORD GRENVILLE was Secretary of State; the Hon. Henry
Addington, now LORD SIDMOUTH, was Speaker of the House of Commons; Sir
John Scott, now LORD ELDON, was Attorney General, and conducted these
prosecutions in such a way as led to his promotion to be Lord High
Chancellor of England, where he has made such an immense sum of money, and
accumulated such a princely fortune. In the early part of this year, the
marriage of the Duke of SUSSEX with Lady Augusta Murray was made public,
which caused a great noise in the country.