to elude the hand of juftice. There were other stories afloat at the fame period equally ridiculous, and ramified into various rumours. It was faid that numbers were kept in pay; that they were drilled and difciplined in dark rooms by a ferjeant in a brown coat; and that, on a certain fignal being given, they would fally forth from porter rooms and back parlours, and finally fubvert the conftitution. Such were the idle ftories with which for months the people have been amufed. There was another circumstance which ftruck a panic into Government, the planting the tree of liberty in Dundee. But this was like "Birnam wood coming to Dunfinane.”

This infurrection, as it was called, originated with a few school boys, the chastisement of whom by their master, restored them to their loyalty, and prevented them from overturning the conftitution. Some perfons, through a motive of indefenfible humour, had written a letter to Sir George Yonge, informing him of an infurrection at Salisbury, when no fuch infurrection really exifted. It was likewife faid that there was an infurrection at Shields. The military were inftantly dif patched; but the infurrection had ceased, and the feditious infurgents were voluntarily affifting in getting off a King's ship that had run on ground. He next instanced what had been deemed a feditious tumult at Yarmouth, which was equally well founded as what he had before noticed. If Mr. Pitt was not fo ftiff-necked and lofty-if he condefcended to mix in public meetings, he would not be apt to be led into those errors which were practifed, he must suppose with too much fuccefs, on his credulity. In all the various accounts of pretended infurrections, he maintained that there was not the leaft proof of discontent in the public mind, or difaffection to Government in any one of these, but that the whole arofe from other causes. These things entitled him to say, that there was ground for inquiry into the fubject, and that an inquiry ought to take place to fet the public mind at reft upon fuch topics. He then touched upon the addreffes tranfmitted from patriots in pot-houses to the National Convention, a long list of which had been compiled under the aufpices of the Treasury. One of them was figned by Mr. Hardy, an honeft fhoemaker, who Jittle dreamt, God help him, how near he had been overturning the constitution,

He next took notice of the effect of the fyftem of delufion in the metropolis, and the hardflips under which many individuals laboured in confequence of that fyftem; where publicans had been told by different Magiftrates of the effect of their allowing any converfation upon politics in their houfes; that if they conducted themfelves in the leaft degree displeasing to the Court, they fhould lofe their licenfes; and ftili farther, they were afked, what papers they took in. "Do you take in the Morning Chronicle or Polt?"-Yes, Sir." Take care there is no fedition in it; for if there is, you are liable to punish"ment for diftributing it to your customers." There was one very particular cafe in this refpect.-The Unicorn in Covent Garden, where a Society had long met to difenfs the propriety of a parliamentary reform. The landlord was fent for to Sir Sampfon Wright; the man appeared, and explained the nature of the fociety. Sir Sampfon Wright faid, it was perfectly a harmless meeting in itself, but advised him not to fuffer the Society to meet again, because it might give offence to the higher powers. So that a man was not to have a newspaper which he liked, or which his cuftomers might be defirous of fecing, nor was a harmless society to be held, because it might be difagreeable to the higher powers. He was given to understand also that every thing that had paffed in his house for months was perfectly known to the Magiftrates, as well as that of every other public houfe; for that they had agents employed for this purpose.

He then took notice of the expreffion of the Attorney General at the opening of this feffion of Parliament, of his having 200 cafes to bring forward for profecution only; a very few of whom had been at all brought forward, and many of thofe only book fellers for felling in the way of trade, the Rights of Man, omitting all the parts objected to by the Attorney General in the trial of Mr. Paine, and for felling Mr. Paine's Address to the Addreffers, and the Jockey Club. Mr. Sheridan faid, he had 200 cafes to fubmit to the Attorney General, and to that Houfe, of real hardship fuftained by innocent individuals, and which he fhould have stated this night, but that the accidental and unexpected diligence of the Lords had called for fo much of his time last week on the trial of Mr. Haftings, as not to allow him time to collect these cafes, but which might

be hereafter attended to and difcuffed in that Houfe. Many of them arose out of the spirit of the Alien bill-a bill in its nature oppreffive-a bill, the exercife of which muft foon incapaciate for ever any man from being a proper Minister of a free country. It was impoffible that Minifters could know the proper objects in all cafes to be fent away, and if they did not know of any fuch, they became conftrained to fend fome away to fave appearances, and to keep themfelves in counteThis reflection led him to take notice of the practice of erecting barracks all over this kingdom, alfo part of the same system, and tending with all their other measures uniformly to the point of defpotifin.

nance.

The next point which came to be noticed was the mode adopted on the part of the Treafury, to difcover perfons who diftribute feditious books. This was done by means of a circular letter all over the country, from Meff. Chamberlaine and White, Solicitors to the Treafury, to various attornies, employing them as agents in this bufinefs. This, Mr. Sheridan observed, was to the last degree dangerous; because it went to the effect of placing in a fituation to be tempted, a fet of men not highly diftinguifhed for fuperior morality, and of making them derive emolument from the litigation, which themselves, not their clients, were to create. Many Attornies, he faid, had, to their honour, rejected the offer with fcorn and indignation. The books chiefly to be noticed were, as he had faid before, the works of Mr. Paine and the Jockey Club; he had no occafion to say any thing of these books; but neither thefe, nor any other books, could launch out more freely on the neceffity of a Parliamentary Reform, than the fpeeches of Mr. Chancellor Pitt, and the Duke of Richmond; or more grofsly against Kings, than the right honourable gentleman (Mr. Burke) upon former occafions. To prove this, he read paffages from the noble Duke's addrefs to the county of Suffex, and to Colonel Sharman and the volunteers of Ireland, in which he afferted that it was in vain for the people to look to the Houfe of Commons for redrefs, that they could find it only in themselves; that they ought to affert their right, and not to defift till they fhould have eftablifhed a House of Commons truly reprefenting every man in the kingdom. From Mr. Burke's fpeech on his motion for leave to bring in his

bill of reform, he read a paffage, calculated to represent the Peers of the realm in the most abject, degraded state. He faid, he was forry that the report was not made to the King in Council, of the conviction of perfons charged with misdemeanors; if it were ufual to make fuch a report, he fhould like very much to hear the obfervations of His Majesty's Minifters, on the cafes of fome of the wretched bill ftickers, convicted of publishing feditious libels. When the feditious pasfages were read, the noble Duke might fay, "he borrowed "that from the preamble to my reform bill." The right honourable gentleman might fay, " that expreffion was stolen "from the speech which I made, when I propofed to the "Houfe of Commons my plan for a Parliamentary Reform." Mr. Sheridan faid, he wondered how thefe perfonages could bear their own feelings, when they knew that fome poor wretches were lying upon ftraw in the gloom of a prifon, for having published fentiments, which they had folemnly profeffed in and out of Parliament. The offence was the fame in all, but mark the difference of the treatment? Punishment and a prison were the lot of the one fet, whilst the others were honoured with places and emoluments, and feats in His Majefty's Council.

He then took notice of the principles of the Society, of which Mr. Reeves was the leader, and of all others formed upon that plan. Thele Societies were defcribed by Mr. Law, in the letter which he publifhed on the 24th of January laft, in the Morning Chronicle, ftating his reafons for withdrawing from that Society; and ftating, amongst other things, that they proceeded againft republicans and levellers upon private anonymous letters; nothing, he faid, could be more infamous. than fuch a principle.

He took notice of a fermon preached before the House of Lords, by a learned prelate, in which his Lordship complained of the folly with which people had of late fuffered themselves to be carried away by a spirit of difcuffion about the origin of Government. The flavishness of this high church doctrine, which discountenanced inquiry, could, Mr. Sheridan faid, be equalled only by the want of charity, which appeared in another part of the fermon, in which the public indignation was directed against a particular description of men (Protestant

Dillenters) who were reprefented as unworthy of the name of fellow Chriftians. He touched also upon a publication of Dr. Tatham, in which he accufes Dr. Priestley as an accomplice in the murder of the King of France, and told him, that whatever pretenfion he might have to reputation for abilities, he muft give up his heart, which could in no light whatever be defended. Here Mr. Sheridan took notice of the difgraceful riots at Birmingham, and of the difficulties thrown in the way of payment of the money ordered by verdicts of juries upon trials for the damages fuftained by thefe riots. But even this was exceeded by what had taken place in Cambridge, for, to fuch a pitch of infolent injustice had the fyftem of political oppreffion been carried against publicans, that they were compelled to take an oath that they not only would not fuffer political difputes in their houfes, but that they would give an account of the behaviour and converfation of every republican they might happen to know or hear of. All this was infamous, but it was the effect of the panic he had fo frequently alluded to; it was owing to that panic, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer objected the other day to the bringing up, and receiving of the petition from the inhabitants of Nottingham, ftating the neceflity of a Parliamentary Reform, a petition not half so objectionable as the Chefter petition, which had been received. It was owing to that panic, that a right honourable gentleman (Mr. Burke) did not of late speak with the eloquence with which he ufed to command the admiration. of his auditors. For now really the taste of his mind, and the character of his understanding was altered. It was owing to that panic, that another right honourable gentleman (Mr. Windham) had brought his mind to approve what his heart had for years before abhorred; he meant the erection of barracks. It was owing to that panic that that right honourable gentleman had prevailed upon himself to fupport a Minifter, because he had a bad opinion of him. It was owing to that panic that a noble and learned Lord (Loughborough) in the other House, had given his difinterefted fupport to Government, and had actually accepted of the feals of an adminiftration he had uniformly reprobated from its commencement. If that noble and learned Lord acted from the fame principle of the right honourable gentleman; that of fupporting an Adminiftration VOL. XXXV.

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