reckon on Secretary Bromley,* and the Dukes of Buckingham and Ormond. Some others, such as Lord Chancellor Harcourt, may be considered as uncertain or wavering; and several, like the Bishop of London, as sincere friends to the Protestant succession. It may easily be supposed that an administration thus variously composed could not long remain cordially united. Oxford and Bolingbroke gradually came to be considered as leaders of separate and jarring divisions. The former, as far as professions could go, was indeed most smooth and complying. In his own expression, "If the company should say Harrow on the Hill or Maidenhead were the nearest way to Windsor, I would go with them, and never dispute it, if that would give content, and I might not be forced to swear it was so." But in practice, Lord Oxford was by no means the easy colleague he describes. All those who knew him bitterly complain of his little jealousies and want of confidence, of the undue share which he claimed in business, of his dilatory manner of transacting it. So early as May, 1711, we find Bolingbroke write to Lord Orrery,-"We who are reputed to be in Mr. Harley's intimacy have few opportunities of seeing him, and none of talking freely with him. As he is the only true channel through which the Queen's pleasure is conveyed to us, there is and must be a perfect stagnation, till he is pleased to open himself, and set the water flowing." The feuds between the two ministers were frequently composed, more especially by Swift, their common friend. But as the subject matter of division still remained, it always broke out afresh with aggravated rancour. Such was the state of parties when Parliament met in April, 1713. At this period the ministers were by no means apprehensive of defeat in either House. Of the Upper, Swift writes, on the day before the meeting, "Lord Treasurer is as easy as a lamb. They are mustering up the proxies of the absent Lords, but they are not in any fear of wanting a majority, which death and accidents have increased this year." In the Commons their preponderance was even more secure. But that House being then under the operation of the Triennial Act, and in its third and last session, both parties showed great timidity in all their movements, and were anxious not to commit themselves to any measures that might impair their popularity at the ensuing elections. On the 9th of May, the following message was presented from her Majesty to the House of Commons: "Anne R. As it is the undoubted prerogative of the Crown to make peace and war, I have ratified the treaties of peace and commerce with France, which had been signed by my order, and have Bromley is mentioned in Iberville's instructions as "un homme attaché presque ouvertement an parti du Roi (Jacques)." Sept. 26, 1713. Harley to Lord Godolphin, Sept. 10, 1707. Append. to Somerville, p. 625. Journal to Stella, April 8, 1713. Bolingbroke also expected that "the session will be quiet and short." To Lord Orrery, March 6, 1713. concluded a treaty with Spain, which will be signed at Utrecht as soon as the Spanish ministers are arrived there.' These treaties were then laid before the House. The stipulations being already well known, and a large majority of the Commons having shown a determination to support them, no debate was attempted on the general question. It would have been but poor generalship to have attacked the whole line with such inferior forces, instead of singling out the weakest points. The Opposition accordingly made a resolute stand on the 8th and 9th articles of the Treaty of Commerce, to which they knew that many of the Ministerial members were disinclined. This 9th article provided that all laws made in Great Britain since 1664, for prohibiting the importation of any goods coming from France, should be repealed; and that, within two months, a law should be passed that no higher custom duties should be paid for goods brought from France than were payable for the like goods brought from any other country in Europe. Now the latter clause was a direct violation of the Methuen Treaty, according to which the duties on the Portuguese wines were always to be lower by one third than the duties on the French;* and this violation would, of course, have lost the English all their trade with Portugal, which was at this time by far the most thriving and advantageous they possessed. Their rising manufactures of silk, of linen, and of paper were, moreover, threatened with unequal competition and probable ruin. The merchants and practical men of business —in that unenlightened age such men were usually preferred to theorists and speculators-with scarcely an exception, viewed this project with dismay; and it has been calculated, on apparently good grounds, that, had the project passed, the annual balance against, or loss to, Great Britain, would have been not less than 1,400,0007.:† so that, on the whole, I think we may fully agree with Bishop Burnet, that "if even we had been as often beat by the French as they had been by us, this would have been thought a very hard treaty."‡ The subject was debated in the House of Commons on the 14th of May, the day appointed to bring in a bill to make good the 8th and 9th articles of the Treaty of Commerce, when the Opposition put forth all their strength. Mr. Gould, an eminent merchant, Mr. Lechmere, an eminent lawyer, Sir Peter King, and General Stanhope, particularly distinguished themselves on that side. They were ably answered by Sir William Wyndham and Mr. Arthur Moore (a person who, by his industry and abilities, had, much to his honour, raised himself from the station of a footman); and, though they were joined by several of the other party, such as Sir George Newland and Mr. Heysham, they were, on the division, outvoted by 252 against 130. Yet Bolingbroke himself admits that "the treaties met with the coldest reception when they were laid before the Houses; and those who were frightened out of their senses lest they * See the treaty in the Commons' Journals for 1713, p. 348. should not be made, affected to appear very indifferent to them when they were made.”* On the 9th of June, the House resolved itself into committee on the Bill, and heard several merchants at their bar argue and protest against it. A debate then ensued, remarkable for a singular burst of party feeling. General Stanhope, to confirm the statements of one of the merchants, had quoted in his speech some words from the preamble of an act passed in Charles the Second's reign. Upon this, the Speaker, supposing Stanhope to be mistaken, rose, and exclaimed, "There is no such thing in that Act!" The General hereupon desired the clerk at the table to read the Act in question, when it appeared that his quotation was right, and both he and several other members then inveighed with much passion on the Speaker's blunder. This little anecdote most strongly shows the mutual animosities and rancour of the times. In the House of Commons, any rude interruption from the Speaker, or any harsh invectives against him, are, perhaps, the very furthest extremity to which its party spirit ever runs! On the following days, some more mercantile petitioners were heard at the bar against the Bill; and the former speakers on that side renewed and enforced their arguments, thus backed by the testimony of practical men. Through these means, a powerful effect was made upon the Ministerial phalanx. Sir Thomas Hanmer, member for Suffolk, a man of great weight with the House on all occasions, and more peculiarly on this, because in his general politics a Tory, supported the objections of the Whigs; and at last, on the 18th of June, on the question that the Bill should be engrossed, it was decided in the negative by 194 to 185. Thus was warded off one at least of the dangers of the inglorious negotiations at Utrecht!† Emboldened by this hard-won victory, the Whig leaders determined to try an address in both Houses, entreating the Queen "to use her most pressing instances for removing the Pretender from the Duke of Lorraine's dominions." This was moved in the Lords by the Earl of Wharton, on the 29th of June, without any previous notice. The Court party were taken completely by surprise. A pause ensued. At last, Lord North rose, and endeavoured to have the motion set aside, observing that it would show a distrust of her Majesty's intentions. He asked, also, where after all they would have the Pretender live; since most, if not all, the powers of Europe were, like the Duke of Lorraine, on terms of friendship with her Majesty. But, no one venturing openly to oppose the motion, it was unanimously carried. On the 1st of July, General Stanhope brought forward the same * To Mr. Prior, July 4, 1713. Corresp., vol. ii. p. 437. † According to Bolingbroke, "The reason of the majority was, that there had been, during two or three days' uncertainty, an opinion spread that the Lord Treasurer gave up the point." To Lord Strafford, June 20, 1713. 1 [See Bunbury's Memoir and Correspondence of Sir Thomas Hanmer, p. 31, etc.] motion in the Commons. Here also no opposition was attempted. But Sir William Whitlocke artfully threw out, that he "remembered the like address was formerly made to the Protector for having Charles Stuart removed out of France." This was meant to remind the House how soon afterwards, in spite of that vote, Charles had been restored to the throne. The Jacobites, however, having the fear of the approaching elections before their eyes, remained perfectly quiet; and the two addresses were carried up to her Majesty, whose answers were in the same sense, but evidently cold and constrained. The negotiation opened in consequence at Paris led to no good result. It was always skilfully eluded by the French ministers, and never heartily pressed by the English. Their agent, Prior, speaks of it with ridicule in his letters. "To say the truth, my dear Lord Bolingbroke, M. de Torcy thinks us all mad. He asked me many questions, which, for the best reason in the world, I did not answer; as, for instance, how we can oblige a man to go from one place when we forbid all others to receive him?"* But even further, it is asserted, in the secret correspondence of Gaultier, that Bolingbroke himself had, with singular baseness, privately suggested to the Duke of Lorraine the pretexts for eluding his own public demands!† Some other proceedings of this session seem to deserve attention. The House of Commons proposed to renew the duty on malt for another year. A question then arose whether or not this duty should be laid on the whole island; the Scotch members being most eager and vehement against bearing any share of it. Finding themselves outvoted, and the Bill passed the Commons, they held several private conferences with the peers of their party; sent an address to the Queen; and, finding this ineffectual, indignantly agreed to move for an act for dissolving the union between the two kingdoms. Such a motion was accordingly brought forward by the Earl of Findlater, on the 1st of June, and produced a long debate. Lord Peterborough indulged his lively fancy. He observed, "that though sometimes there happened a difference between man and wife, yet it did not presently break the marriage; so, in the like manner, though England, who in this national marriage must be supposed to be the husband, might, in some instances, have been unkind to the lady, yet she ought not presently to sue for a divorce, the rather because she had very much mended her fortune by this match." The Duke of Argyle said, "that it was true he had a great hand in making the Union: that the chief reason that moved him to it was the securing the Protestant succession, but that he was satisfied that might be done as well now if the Union were dissolved; and that, if it were not, he did not expect long to have either property left in Scotland or liberty in England!" Bolingbroke's Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 678. To M. de Torcy, Dec. 13 and 14, 1713. Parliamentary History, vol. vi. p. 1217. See also Lockhart's Comment. (p. 414-437), for a very full account of this proceeding. It does not appear that Bolingbroke, undoubtedly the greatest orator of the time, took any part in the debate. But his remarks upon the subject in a letter to the Duke of Shrewsbury, may excite some serious reflections at the present period: "Your Grace will wonder when I tell you that they intend to move in our House, on Monday, to dissolve the Union. You may be sure that all those whose spirits are naturally turbulent and restless-all those who have languished under expectation, and all those who have any personal resentment, take this occasion to add to the cry and to pursue their own views by intermingling them in this cause. We shall, I believe, ground on this motion a bill to make it high treason, by any overt act, to attempt the dissolution of the Union. If, after this, we go on to show them all reasonable indulgence, and at the same time to show to them and to all mankind a firmness of resolution and a steadiness of conduct, good will have come out of evil, and we shall reap some benefit from this CONTRETEMPS. To any one who considers either the nature of this question, or the usual feelings and conduct of the House of Lords, the division on Lord Findlater's motion will appear not a little surprising. Fiftyfour peers voted for it, and exactly as many against it. Proxies were then called for; and, there being 13 in the affirmative and 17 in the negative, it was rejected by a majority of only four. But the fact is, that this subject, like every other in the session, was considered not so much on national as on party grounds. And if such a course could ever deserve indulgence, it would surely be at a crisis when the fate of the Hanover succession hung trembling in the balance, and with it the fate of the Protestant establishment, of the British Constitution,-of everything that we cherish as dear, or respect as venerable!† Another party matter was the favour shown by the House of Commons to Dr. Sacheverell. The sentence of the House of Lords, forbidding him to preach during the space of three years, expired on the 23d of March; and on the Sunday following he held forth, for the first time, at his own church of St. Saviour's, and, taking for his text the words, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do," drew an unseemly parallel between his own sufferings and the Redeemer's Passion. The House of Commons, anxious to show their disapprobation of the former proceedings against him, appointed him to the honour of preaching before them on the Restoration Day; and the Court was no less forward in conferring a * Bolingbroke's Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 409. † A curious account of this division is given in a letter to Swift from Erasmus Lewis, at that time M. P. for Lestwithiel. He tells us that both the Tory peers who voted with the Lord Treasurer against the dissolution of the Union, and the Scotch who voted for it, were "under agonies" lest they themselves should be victorious! "In all the time I have been conversant in business, I never before observed both sides at the same time acting parts which they thought contrary to their interests!" See Swift's Works, vol. xvi. p. 71. St. Luke, ch. xxiii. 34. On this sermon we find in Swift's Journal to Stella, April 2: "I went to Lord Treasurer's at six, where I found Dr. Sacheverell, who told us that the bookseller had given him 1001. for his sermon preached last Sunday, and intended to print 30,000. I believe he will be confoundedly bit, and will hardly sell above half.” |