ONE:The commercial treaty with France, Pitt's greatest achievement as a financier, was not signed until the recess��namely, in September. It was conceived entirely in the spirit of Free Trade, and was an honest attempt to establish a perpetual alliance between the two nations. Its terms were:��That it was to continue in force for twelve years; with some few exceptions prohibitory duties between the two countries were repealed; the wines of France were admitted at the same rate as those of Portugal; privateers belonging to any nation at war with one of the contracting parties might no longer equip themselves in the ports of the other; and complete religious and civil liberty was granted to the inhabitants of each country while residing in the other. One result of the treaty was the revival of the taste for light French wines which had prevailed before the wars of the Revolution, and a decline in the sale of the fiery wines of the Peninsula. But the treaty was bitterly attacked by the Opposition. Flood reproduced the absurd argument that wealth consists of money, and that trade can only be beneficial to the country which obtains the largest return in gold. Fox and Burke, with singular lack of foresight, declaimed against Pitt for making a treaty with France, "the natural political enemy of Great Britain," and denounced the perfidy with which the French had fostered the American revolt. In spite of the illiberality of these arguments, Pitt, with the acquiescence of the commercial classes, carried the treaty through Parliament by majorities of more than two to one.

ONE:[See larger version]Lord Grey declared that when he entered office in November, 1830, he found the counties round London in open insurrection, and that no measures had been taken by the late Government to put down these disturbances. This was true so far as incendiary fires were concerned. A system of outrage commenced in Kent before the harvest was fully gathered in. The disturbers of the peace did not generally assume the form of mobs, nor did they seek any political object. Threatening letters were circulated very freely, demanding higher wages and denouncing machinery, and the attacks of the rioters were directed entirely against private property. In the day armed bands went forth, wrecking mills and destroying machinery, especially threshing-machines. At night, corn-stacks, hayricks, barns, and farm buildings were seen blazing in different parts of the county. Even live stock were cruelly burned[326] to death. In addition to this wholesale destruction the rioters plundered the houses of the farmers as they went along. These disorders extended into Hants, Wilts, Bucks, Sussex, and Surrey, and they continued during the months of October, November, and December. In fact, life and property in those counties were, to a great extent, at the mercy of lawless men. Lord Melbourne lost no time in announcing his determination to punish sternly those disturbers of the peace, and to restore at every cost the dominion of law and order. He would give his most anxious attention to measures for the relief of distress, but it was his determined resolution, wherever outrages were perpetrated or excesses committed, to suppress them with vigour. In pursuance of this determination, two special commissions were issued to try the offenders. They finished their painful duties early in January. On the 9th of that month judgment of death was recorded against twenty-three persons for the destruction of machinery in Buckinghamshire. In Dorset, at Norwich, at Ipswich, at Petworth, at Gloucester, at Oxford, at Winchester, and at Salisbury, large numbers were convicted of various outrages; altogether, upwards of 800 offenders were tried, and a large proportion of them capitally convicted. Only four, however, were executed; the rest were all sentenced to various terms of transportation or imprisonment. The prosecutions were conducted with firmness, but with moderation, and they were decidedly successful in restoring public tranquillity.

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These mischiefs it was proposed wholly to remove by enacting that "the charge for primary distribution��that is to say, the postage on all letters received in a post town, and delivered in the same or in any other post town in the British Isles��shall be at the uniform rate of one penny for each half-ounce; all letters and other papers, whether single or multiple, forming one packet, and not weighing more than half an ounce, being charged one penny, and heavier packets to any convenient limit being charged an additional penny for each additional half-ounce." And it was further proposed that stamped covers should be sold to the public at such a price as to include the postage, which would thus be collected in advance. By the public generally, and preeminently by the trading public, the plan was received with great favour. By the functionaries of the Post Office it was at once denounced as ruinous, and ridiculed as fanciful. Lord Lichfield, then Postmaster-General, said of it in the House of Lords, "Of all the wild and visionary schemes I ever heard, it is the most extravagant." On another occasion, he assured the House that if the anticipated increase of letters should be realised, "the mails will have to carry twelve times as much in weight, and therefore the charge for transmission, instead of ��100,000, as now, must be twelve times that amount. The walls of the Post Office would burst; the whole area in which the building stands would not be large enough to receive the clerks and the letters." In the course of the following year (1838) petitions were poured into the House of Commons. A select Committee was appointed, which held nearly seventy sittings, and examined nearly eighty-three witnesses in addition to the officers of the department. Its report weakly recommended the substitution of a twopenny for a penny rate, but this was overruled by the Cabinet. During the Session of Parliament that followed the presentation of[465] this report, about 2,000 petitions in favour of penny postage were presented to both Houses, and at length the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought in a Bill to enable the Treasury to carry it into effect. The measure was carried in the House of Commons by a majority of 100, and became law on the 17th of August, 1839. A new but only temporary office under the Treasury was created, to enable Mr. Hill to superintend (although, as it proved, with very inadequate arrangements) the working out of his plan. The first step taken was to reduce, on the 5th of December, 1839, the London district postage to one penny, and the general inland postage to fourpence, the half ounce, except as respected places to which letters were previously carried at lower rates, these rates being continued. On the 10th of January, 1840, the uniform penny rate came into operation throughout the United Kingdom; the scale of weight advancing from one penny for each of the first two half-ounces, by gradations of twopence for each additional ounce or fraction of an ounce, up to sixteen ounces. The postage was to be prepaid, or charged at double rates, and Parliamentary franking was abolished. Postage stamps were introduced on the 6th of May following. The facilities of despatch were soon afterwards increased, especially by the establishment of day mails. But on the important points of simplification in the internal economy of the Post Office, with the object of reducing its cost without diminishing its working power, very little was done. For the time being the loss incurred by the change was more than ��1,000,000.When Sir Robert Peel delivered up the seals of office, the first thing the king did was to send for Earl Grey, who declined the task of forming an Administration. He advised his Majesty to entrust it to Viscount Melbourne. The business, therefore, devolved upon Melbourne, and he hastened to complete it out of such materials as he had at his command. These were substantially the same as those which composed his former Administration. Lord Brougham, however, was now left out, as Lord Melbourne, in a series of plain-spoken letters, had already informed him he would be; also Lord Althorp, who, being in the Upper House[386] as Earl Spencer, did not seem to have any ambition for the toils and honours of office. Lord Howick, the eldest son of Earl Grey, became a member of the Cabinet. There was no Lord Chancellor appointed for the present, out of consideration for Brougham's feelings. The Great Seal was put in commission, the three Commissioners being the Master of the Rolls, the Vice-Chancellor, and Mr. Justice Bosanquet. The offices were distributed as follows:��Lord Melbourne, Premier; the Marquis of Lansdowne, President of the Council; Lord Palmerston, Foreign Secretary; Lord John Russell, Home Secretary; Mr. Charles Grant, Colonial Secretary; Mr. Spring-Rice, Chancellor of the Exchequer; Viscount Duncannon, Lord Privy Seal and Chief Commissioner of Woods and Forests; Lord Auckland, First Lord of the Admiralty; Sir John Hobhouse, President of the Indian Board; Mr. Poulett Thompson, President of the Board of Trade; Lord Howick, Secretary-at-War; Lord Holland, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. The appointments not in the Cabinet were��Sir Henry Parnell, Paymaster of the Forces; Mr. Charles Wood, Secretary to the Admiralty; Sir George Grey, Under-Secretary of the Colonies; the Honourable Fox Maule, Under-Secretary for the Home Department; Mr. Labouchere, Vice-President of the Board of Trade and Master of the Mint; Attorney-General, Sir John Campbell; Solicitor-General, Mr. Rolfe. The Irish appointments were��The Earl of Mulgrave, Lord-Lieutenant; Lord Morpeth, Chief Secretary; Lord Plunket, Chancellor.