Rodney, who was still commanding in the West Indies, had been on the look-out for De Grasse, but, missing him, he had dispatched Sir Samuel Hood after him, supposing that he had made for New York. Hood had with him fourteen ships of the line, and, arriving at Sandy Hook on the 28th of August, he found that De Grasse had then sailed for the Chesapeake. Admiral Arbuthnot had been replaced by Admiral Graves, but Graves had only seven ships of the line, and of these only five fit for action. Taking the chief command, with these twenty-one ships Graves set sail for the Chesapeake, with Hood as second in command. There, on the 5th of September, he discerned the fleet of De Grasse at anchor, just within the Capes of Virginia, and blocking up York River with his frigates. Graves had his nineteen ships, De Grasse twenty-eight, and Nelson could have desired nothing better than such a sight in the narrow waters of the Chesapeake: not a ship would have escaped him; but Graves was no Nelson, and allowed De Grasse to cut his cables and run out to sea. There, indeed, Graves attacked him, but under infinitely greater disadvantages, at four o'clock in the afternoon. The night parted them, and De Grasse returned to his old anchorage in the Chesapeake, and Graves sailed away again for New York.
"My lords and gentlemen," said his Majesty, "I have come to meet you for the purpose of proroguing this Parliament, with a view to its instant dissolution." The voice of the king rose, and became still more shrill and piercing, as he reached the last clause of the sentence; and a loud buzz and hum, the loudest such a presence permitted, immediately followed, and nearly drowned all the succeeding sentences. The dissolution speedily followed the prorogation, and a new Parliament was summoned to meet on the 14th of June.
THREE:[219]Walpole ridiculed the notion which had gone abroad that the revenue officers would be increased into quite a standing army, and would endanger the common liberty by their being empowered to enter private dwellings to search for concealed excisable articles. He said the increase would be only a hundred and twenty-six persons and that the Customs now possessed more searching power than he proposed to give to the Excise.
TWO:"The Minister might ask Parliament for power to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act, and to place all Ireland under military law. To ask for less would be ridiculous; because the Act against unlawful assemblies had failed, and, on account of its helplessness, was suffered to expire. Now, would Parliament grant such extensive powers to any Government merely that the Government might be enabled to debar his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects a little longer from enjoying equal political privileges with Protestants? The issue was very doubtfulperhaps it was not doubtful at all. Parliament would never grant such powers. But, assuming that the powers were given, what must follow?a general insurrection, to be put down after much bloodshed and suffering, and then a return to that state of sullen discontent which would render Ireland, ten times more than she had ever been, a millstone round the neck of Great Britain, and by-and-by, when military law ceased, and the same measure of personal liberty was granted to Irishmen which the natives of England and Scotland enjoyed, a renewal of agitation, only in a more hostile spirit, and the necessity of either reverting again and again to measures of coercion, or of yielding at last what, upon every principle of humanity and common sense, ought not to have been thus far withheld. But the Minister, if the existing Parliament refused to give him the powers which he asked, might dissolve, and go to the country with a strong Protestant cry; and this cry might serve his purpose in England and Scotland. Doubtless; but what would occur in Ireland?the return of Roman Catholic members in the proportion of four to one over Protestants, and the virtual disfranchisement thereby of four-fifths of the Irish people. Would Ireland submit quietly to any law carried against herself in a House of Commons so constituted? Was it not much more probable that a dissolution would only lead to the same results which had been shown to be inevitable in the event of the existing Parliament acquiescing in the Ministers' views? And was there not, at all events, a chance that the electors, even, of England and Scotland, might refuse to abet a policy so pregnant with danger to themselves and to the commonwealth? But why move at all? Mr. O'Connell had been elected by the priests and rabble of Clare to represent them in Parliament. Let him retain this empty honour; or, better still, let him be summoned by a call of the House to the bar, and, on his refusal to take the oaths, issue a new writ, and go to a new election. In the first place, Mr. O'Connell could not be forced to attend to a call of the House, such call being obligatory only on members chosen at a general election; and in the next, if he did attend, what then? As soon as the new writ was issued, he would take the field again as a candidate, and again be elected; and so the game would continue to be played, till a dissolution occurred, when all those consequences of which we have elsewhere spoken would inevitably come to pass."Mr. Jemison, as commissioner for distributing a million and a half of this compensation money! 1,200
TWO:Grattan determined to call these Acts in question in the Irish Parliament, and at least abolish them there. This alarmed even Burke, who, writing to Ireland, said, "Will no one stop that madman, Grattan?" But Grattan, on the 19th of April, 1780, submitted to the Irish House of Commons a resolution asserting the perfect legislative independence of Ireland. He did not carry his motion then, but his speechin his own opinion, the finest he ever madehad a wonderful effect on the Irish public. Other matters connected with sugar duties, and an Irish Mutiny Bill, in which Grattan took the lead, fanned the popular flame, and the Volunteer body at the same time continued to assume such rapidly growing activity that it was deemed necessary by Government to send over the Earl of Carlisle to supersede the Earl of Buckinghamshire, and to give him an able secretary in Mr. Eden. But this did not prevent the Irish Volunteers from meeting at Dungannon on the 15th of February, 1782. There were two hundred and forty-two delegates, with their general-in-chief, Lord Charlemont, at their head, and they unanimously passed a resolution prepared by Grattan, "That a claim of any body of men other than the King, Lords, and Commons of Ireland, to bind this kingdom, is unconstitutional, illegal, and a grievance." On the 22nd, Grattan moved a similar resolution in the Irish House of Commons, which was only got rid of by the Attorney-General asking for some time to consider it. Two days only before Grattan had made his motion on Irish rights, that is, on the 20th of February, he seconded a Bill for further relief of Roman Catholics in Ireland, introduced by Mr. Gardiner. The Bill was passed, and wonderfully increased the influence of Grattan by adding the grateful support of all the Catholics. Such was the tone of Ireland, and such the transcendent influence of Grattan there, when the new Whig Ministry assumed office.
At the Church of St. Anne, Shandon, under a kind of shed attached to a guard-house, lay huddled up in their filthy fetid rags about forty human creaturesmen, women, children, and infants of the tenderest agestarving and fever-stricken, most of them in a dying state, some dead, and all gaunt, yellow, hideous from the combined effects of famine and disease. Under this open shed they had remained during the night, and until that hourabout ten in the morningwhen the funeral procession was passing by, and their indescribable misery was beheld by the leading citizens of Cork, including the mayor, and several members of the board of guardians. The odour which proceeded from that huddled-up heap of human beings was of itself enough to generate a plague.[See larger version]Meanwhile, the British and Prussian armies advanced, and on the 1st of July Wellington was within a few miles of Paris, with his right on the heights of Richebourg, and his left on the forest of Bondy; and Blucher, at the same time, crossing the Seine on the 2nd, posted his army, with its right at Plessis-Piquet, his left at St. Cloud, and his reserve at Versailles. In this position, Commissioners were sent by the Provisional Government to Wellington, desiring a suspension of hostilities, informing him that Buonaparte had abdicated and retired from Paris. The Duke replied, that so long as the army remained in Paris there could be no suspension of hostilities, and that he had no authority to treat on any question of government. The Commissioners demanded whether the Allies would stop if Napoleon II. was proclaimed? Wellington said "No." Whether they would stop provided they chose another prince of a royal house?probably meaning the Duke of Orleans. As the Duke said he had no orders to accept any such proposals, they were useless, and he handed to them the proclamation of Louis XVIII., offering to grant constitutional liberties, and to pardon all offenders, excepting a few who had committed the most recent and aggravated treason. These were supposed to mean Ney, Labdoyre, and some others. Wellington offered, however, to remain where he was on condition that the regular troops should be sent beyond the Loire, and the town be held by the National Guard till the king's arrival. The Commissioners did not comply with this demand; and the necessity of such compliance was sufficiently shown by this army disputing the advance of the Prussians on the 2nd of July. They had resisted Blucher at St. Cloud, Meudon, and in the village of Issy. Blucher succeeded, but with considerable loss; and the next day the French made another attack to recover Issy, but without effect.
荣誉榜
THREE:On the 17th of February he introduced this plan in two Bills. He declared that his policy had always been pacific; that he had never proposed any tax on the Americanswhen he came into office he had found them taxed already; that he had tried conciliatory means before the sword was drawn, and would still gladly try them. He had thought the former propositions to the Americans very reasonable, and he thought so still. Forgetful of the hopes that he had held out, of assisting the revenues of Great Britain by the taxation of Americans, he now surprised his auditors by asserting that he had never expected to derive much revenue from America, and that, in reality, the taxes imposed had not paid the expenses of the attempt to collect them. The first of his Bills, therefore, he entitled one "For removing all doubts and apprehensions concerning taxation by the Parliament of Great Britain in any of the colonies." It repealed entirely the tea duty in America, and declared "that from and after the passing of this Act, the king and Parliament of Great Britain will not impose any duty, tax, or assessment whatever, in any of his Majesty's colonies, except only such duties as it may be expedient to impose for the regulation of commerce, the nett produce of such duty to be always paid and applied to and for the use of the colony in which the same shall be levied." The second Bill removed some otherwise insuperable obstacles to a treaty. The Commissionersfive in numberwere to raise no difficulties as to the legal ranks or titles of those with whom they would have to negotiate. They were empowered to proclaim a cessation of hostilities on the part of the king's forces by sea or land for any necessary term and on any necessary conditions. They might suspend all the Acts of Parliament respecting America passed since 1763, yet the Bill excepted the repeal of the Massachusetts Charter, and introduced that into a separate Actanother weak measure, for on such an occasion the only wisdom was to wipe away all Acts, or repeal of Acts, which had arisen out of these unhappy differences. The effect of this statement has been well described in the Annual Register of that year, in an article supposed to be from the hand of Burke:"A dull, melancholy silence for some time succeeded this speech. It had been heard with profound attention, but without a single mark of approbation of any part, from any description of men, or any particular man in the House. Astonishment, dejection, and fear overclouded the whole assembly. Although the Minister had declared that the sentiments he had expressed that day had been those which he always entertained, it is certain that few or none had understood him in that manner, and he had been represented to the nation at large as the person in it the most tenacious of those Parliamentary rights which he now proposed to resign, and the most adverse to the submissions which he now proposed to make."[See larger version]
THREE:On the 13th of August, 1836, an Act was passed establishing the Ecclesiastical Commissioners permanently as "one body politic and corporate, by the name of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners for England." The number of Commissioners incorporated was thirteen, of whom eight were ex officio membersnamely: the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishop of London, the Lord Chancellor, the Lord President of the Council, the First Lord of the Treasury, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and one of the Principal Secretaries of State, who was to be nominated by the sign-manual. There were five other Commissioners, including two bishops, who were to be removable at the pleasure of the Crown. The lay members were required to sign a declaration that they were members of the united Church of England and Ireland by law established. A subsequent Act, passed in August, 1840, considerably modified the constitution of this Commission. The following were added to the list of ex officio members: all the Bishops of England and Wales; the Deans of Canterbury, St. Paul's, and Westminster; the two Chief Justices; the Master of the Rolls; the Chief Baron; and the Judges of the Prerogative and Admiralty Courts. By this Act the Crown was empowered to appoint four laymen, and the Archbishop of Canterbury two, in addition to the three appointed under the former Act; and it was provided that, instead of being removable[409] at the pleasure of the Crown, the non ex officio members should continue so long as they should "well demean themselves" in the execution of their duties.Instead of taking means to conciliate the public, Bute, stung by these testimonies of dislike, and by the pamphlets and lampoons which issued like swarms of wasps, revenged himself by others, which only intensified the hatred against him. Still worse for him, he had caused the Dukes of Newcastle and Grafton, and the Marquis of Rockingham, to be dismissed from the Lord-Lieutenancies of their respective counties, because they voted against the peace on Bute's terms. With a still more petty rancour he had visited the sins of these noblemen on the persons in small clerkships and other posts who had been recommended by them, turning them all out. Sir Henry Fox joined him relentlessly in these pitiful revenges, and would have carried them farther had he not been checked by others.
