Ashley himself he said, that as it was an unusual and unna tural privilege, so it never would be allowed in any court of justice, which would exact both account and discharge; and if he (Lord A.) depended on the exemption in the grant, he would live to repent it.'

In truth, no lawyer could in those days hold otherwise, or form to his mind any idea of a separate and private property in the Crown. The principles of the law, from time immemorial, have been fixed on this cardinal point, that the King of England is altogether a publick person, and has no property but what he holds jure Corona. All the lands the King

næ ;

hath' (says the first legal authority), are his, jure Coro and are called sacra patrimonia and dominica Coronæ.' Co. Litt. 1. 6. So those he was seised of in his private capacity, before the Crown was demised to him, become his, jure Corona, on his accession.-Per Holt. Skin. 603.-Pl. Com. 213. 6. And so of such as he inherits from his mother, and of such as are granted him by a statute not mentioning that they are to be parcel of the Crown.-Ib. 105.-see, too, the venerable authority of Lord Hale. The King is a corporation; and purchas es made by him vest in him in his politick capacity.

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As to acquisitions by conquest, as Man, the plantations on these are ⚫ annexed to his Crown, as his purchases are.'-Hale, MSS. Ap. Harg. Co. Litt. 15. 6.

So stood our law until Mr Pitt, by his act of 39 Geo. III. for the first time gave the King a several and private estate which he might give and devise and bequeath in all chattels and lands purchased by him with his savings, or with monies coming from any source other than that whence the Crown shall descend, and in all property of whatever sort coming not with the Crown. Contrary to every idea of English law, he is even enabled to take copyhold tenements, and, by means of trustees, to be tenant to a subject; that is, to have, as far as the equitable estate is concerned, a lord over him, to whom suit and service shall be due. Surely, if any Reformer had propounded such a scheme, the whole law department would have been up in arms; and the least of the charges brought against the daring innovator, would have been, that he showed an utter ignorance of the principles of our jurisprudence, and a contempt of the dignity of the Crown. The last statute which had been passed upon the subject in the better days of the Constitution, was the Civil-List Act of Queen Anne; and it afforded a remarkable contrast to its immediate successor. By that act, the sovereign was restrained from granting, alienating, or letting any of the crown lands, for a term exceeding three lives, or one-and-thirty years.

It clearly follows from all these things, that the funds in question never were private property of the Crown, but stood on the same footing with all the other branches of the hereditary revenue; that, like them, it was to be taken by the Crown cum onere, and enjoyed by the performance of the condition annexed; that when the other branches were relieved from the burthen of supporting the national government and defence, this was relieved too; and that, when they were, in consequence, transferred to the country, whose funds were thenceforth to bear the whole weight of the publick expenditure, the fund in question ought to have been conveyed over along with the rest. Parliament and the Crown have, however, willed otherwise; and the Droits remain a separate and peculiar fund in the Sovereign, without any direct controul of the House of Commons, and only liable to be examined from time to time in that place. As no vote of Parliament is required to raise it, so no consent of Parliament is ever asked before applying it. The representatives of the people only know from time to time how much has been raised, and how much has been expended.

In consequence of these occasional examinations, we are enabled particularly to state its amount. From 1760 to the present time, it reached the large sum of 9,562,614/.; and, if we add to this the other sums received by the Crown upon a similar title, and equally independent of Parliamentary controul, namely, the four and a half Leeward-Island Duties, 2,116,4847.-Surplus Gibraltar Revenues, 124,256l.-Surplus Scotch Civil List, 207,700.-Escheats, 214,647.- Aliens' Property, 108,777.Sales of Captured Lands in the West Indies, 106,300l.-Revenues of Conquered Colonies, 159,816., and Casualties there, 104,865., we shall have a total of 12,705,459.-From this, it is said that there are to be made several deductions to a considerable amount, chiefly for expenses of meritorious captors; but as even these payments are altogether voluntary, much influence is derived from them; and therefore, in the point of view in which we are at present regarding this fund (as a source of influence), no such deduction can be considered. Indeed, the instance of its operation which we are presently to cite from the Tract before us, abundantly shows the accuracy of this remark.

The manner too in which the fund arises, deserves peculiar at tention. It comes in large masses, and occasionally. Thus, we should form a most imperfect idea of its nature and operation, were we to average the late reign, and reckon the droits as an income of 170,000l. a year to the Crown. In fact, nearly the whole fund accrued during thirty years of war-and by large sums at a

time. Thus, in 1804, one ship brought 105,000l.; in 1798, another brought in 55,000l.; in 1800, one was worth 65,000l.; in 1806, several taken at once netted 155,000l. The Dutch ships at one seizure brought 1,030,000/;—the Spanish ships 2,200,000l. So large are the sums at one and the same moment in this rich fund, that the Crown, one year, after paying many hundred thousands to captors, and many thousands to different branches of the Royal Family, gave a million out of the residue to the public service. It is plain that this large sum was at the free disposal of the Crown, and might have been worse bestowed.

The instance of misapplication of this fund selected by our author, next merits our attention. No one can doubt the liability of the clear revenue to be used for purposes of influence; and even the most innocent part of it, that which is distributed among captors, is liable to the same abuse. It is quite discretionary, when a commander takes a vessel as a droit, and has her condemned, whether he shall have a farthing of the proceeds or not. They vest in the Crown instantly. But suppose the practice of making the officer some allowance, to be so strongly recommended by usage that something must be allowed almost as a right, the quantum is mere matter of favour: and who can doubt that a man's politicks, as it is called-and those of his connexions-his or their votes in Parliament-his or their borough affairs, will influence the apportionment of his reward? Many questions arising in such inquiries are of great nicety, where, without any manifest injustice, a decision may be given either for or against the captor's conduct. A King's ship takes a neutral, and the Court restores, awarding costs and damages. The captor may quite manifestly have done only his duty; and out of the fund in question, a reward may be his due, to indemnify him for the rigour of the law, the strict letter of which he has violated. But it may be a doubtful case. Then let him and his beware how they act, speak and vote, while the gallant officer's memorial is before the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. On this subject, nothing further needs be said. But the case given by our author belongs to a somewhat different class. It is that of an unsuccessful claimant being rewarded, and a meritorious captor neglected.

It appears that Sir Home Popham, during the peace after the late American war, went over to Ostend, and embarked largely in a trade to India, deemed illicit by our law. His vessel was caught-seized-brought into port by a King's ship-proceeded against in the Admiralty Courts, and condemned as a droit of the Crown. The value was about 25,000l.; and the gallant Captain had also got into a difficulty, consequent upon smug

gling some teas ashore, independent of the contraband nature of the whole voyage. There was in his political conduct and connexions, however, a something which, it should seem, was found sufficient to outweigh all these considerations;-and accordingly, a grant of the proceeds was made to him, amounting in all to about 25,000l. It has further been stated, that he had incurred no loss himself, the ship and cargo having belonged to a house at Ostend, which failed in consequence of the seizure and condemnation, and contrived to throw the ultimate payment of the above sum upon a great English house, their creditors. The officer who made the capture received nothing. This transaction is complete in all its parts; and amply bears out our author's sharp remarks upon the subject. When Dr Lushington most ably brought it before the House, and moved, "that Sir Home Popham, in being detected in knowingly car❝rying on an illegal traffic, had acted in contempt of the laws "of his country, contrary to the duty of a British subject, and "to the disgrace of the character of a British officer; and fur"ther, that the grant of 25,000l., by Mr Long to him, out of "the droits of Admiralty, had been a gross misapplication of "public money," a debate arose on this question; and although not a single fact was denied or disputed, Sir Home Popham and Mr Long were fully acquitted of all blame by a majority of 126 to 57. When one member of Parliament,' says the author, can thus give to another such a sum of money as 25,000l. out of the droits of the Admiralty, it accounts for that loyal clamour which we hear so incessantly in Parliament, of this fund being the private property of the King. It exposes, ⚫ without the necessity of any comment, the fixed determina⚫tion of the House of Commons, to draw all sources of emolu•ment within their own hands; and, above all, it demonstrates to us, the Electors of Great Britain, the absolute necessity that there is, in our approaching agreement with the new Sovereign, for ever to separate this enormous fund, the Droits of Admiralty, from the grasp of the members of the House of Commons. '

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We have remarked, that the occasional nature of the droits is one strong argument against the existence of such a fund; because it every now and then puts a large sum in the hands of those who may be thus either enabled, or even tempted, by having the means, to pursue the business of corruption. The same remark may be applied to other funds of a similar nature, though of far inferior amount; as the escheats by failure of heirs, alienage, &c. It appears from the Parliamentary returns, that, in 1807, two sums came to the Crown in this way, the one of VOL. XXXIII. No. 66. I i

47,000l., the other of 113,000l.; and in 1809, a sum of 61,7777. accrued in the same manner. But annual and regular funds of a similar description are not wanting, to afford the means of pensioning those whom it may be worth while to influence, and not easy to gain except by such a provision, or whom it may peradventure not be safe to trust with a provision once for all, but more prudent to pay from year to year. The four and a half per cent. West-India duties falls within this description; and our author has thrown a great light upon both the origin and the application of this convenient revenue. He states it at between thirty and forty thousand a year; and thus gives its history, and the uses to which it is put.

It was created originally by à colonial law of Barbadoes, one hundred and sixty years ago; and, by the terms of the act, was to be applied to purely colonial purposes. This fund seems to have been first diverted from its original and legal application, in the latter end of Charles II.'s time. It was seized by the courtiers in those times, and continued apparently to be abused till the reign of Queen Anne. Upon her accession, there is a statement in the Journals of the House of Commons of the misapplication of this fund. and a formal renunciation of it by the Queen and Parliament in favour of the island of Barbadoes, and the original purposes of the act creating it. At the present day, however, the House of Commons have got almost exclusive possession of this fund. The two principal performers in the smuggling transaction, so lately referred to, are here to be found also. Sir Home Popham has a pension of five hundred per annum, with reversion to Lady Popham; and his benefactor, Mr Long, has a pension of one thousand five hundred pounds per annum charged upon this fund also. In short, it is nearly exhausted amongst members of Parliament, their wives, or sisters.

There is one name on this fund that ought never to be forgotter by the people of England. We all remember the fatal expedition to Walcheren, when an army of forty thousand men, the finest that ever left our shores, was sent only to perish in that pestilential climate. When this distressing subject became matter of discussion and complaint in the House of Commons; when it was made apparent to every man in England, that it was to the wilful ignorance of our Mi, nisters, respecting the nature of the climate of Walcheren, that this great national calamity was to be attributed, it was nevertheless resolved in the House of Commons, by a majority of two hundred and seventy-five to two hundred and twenty five, to negative the censure which was moved by Lord Portchester (now Lord Carnarvon) against the Ministers on that occasion. But a severer trial still was to be made of the House of Commons. A vote of approbation of the Ministers, was absolutely moved for this frightful Walcheren expedition; and was adopt d by a majority of two hundred and fifty-five to two hundred and thirty two!-The Member of the House of Com