FORE:
FORE:France ceded Canada, Nova Scotia, and Cape Breton, stipulating for the free exercise of their religion by the inhabitants of Canada, and for their leaving the country if they preferred it, carrying away their effects, if done within eighteen months. Nova Scotia and Cape Breton were given up unconditionally. The boundaries of Louisiana were more clearly defined. The French retained the right to fish on part of the coast of Newfoundland and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and to retain the two little islets of St. Pierre and Miquelon, as places of shelter for their fishermen, on condition that no batteries should be raised on them, nor more than fifty soldiers keep guard there. Their fishermen were not to approach within fifteen miles of Cape Breton.
FORE:So strongly did the latter feel the urgency of the case that Parliament was called together again on the 6th of December. It was opened by the king in person, who, in his Speech, recommended the speedy settlement of the Reform question; referred to the opposition made to the payment of tithes in Ireland; announced the conclusion of a convention with France for the suppression of the African slave trade; deplored the outrages at Bristol; and recommended improvements in the municipal police of the kingdom. On the 12th Lord John Russell introduced the Reform Bill the third time. It is said that his manner, like his proposal, had undergone a striking alteration. His opening speech was not now a song of triumph, inspired by the joyous enthusiasm of the people. He no longer treated the Opposition in a tone of almost contemptuous defiance. The spirit which had dictated the celebrated reply to the Birmingham Political union about the voice of the nation and the whisper of a faction seemed to have died within him. Lord John Russell proceeded to explain the changes and modifications that had been made in the Bill since it was last before the House. As the census of 1831 was now available, the census of 1821 was abandoned. But a new element was introduced in order to test the claim of a borough to be represented in Parliament. Numbers alone were no longer relied upon. There might be a very populous town consisting of mean houses inhabited by poor people. With numbers therefore, the Government took property, ascertained by the amount of assessed taxes; and upon the combination of these two elements the franchise was based. The calculations needed to determine the standard were worked out by Lieutenant Drummond, afterwards Under Secretary for Ireland. Upon the information obtained by the Government as to the limits of each borough, its population, and the amount of assessed taxes it paid, he made out a series of a hundred boroughs, beginning with the lowest, and taking the number of houses and the amount of their assessed taxes together, as the basis of their relative importance. Thus Schedule A was framed. In the original Bill this schedule contained sixty boroughs; in the present Bill it contained only fifty-six. The consequence of taking Mr. Drummond's report as a basis of disfranchisement was, that some boroughs, which formerly escaped as populous and large, were now placed in Schedule A; while others, which were better towns, were taken out of that schedule and placed in Schedule B, which now contained only thirty instead of forty boroughs, as in the former Bill. The diminution in this schedule, consisting of boroughs whose members were to be reduced from two to one, was owing to the fact that the Government had given up the point about reducing the number of members in the House of Commons, which was to remain as before, 658. Thus a number of small boroughs escaped which ought to have but one member eachso small that every one of them ought to have been in Schedule A, that their members might be given to new, prosperous, and progressive communities. Twenty-three members were now to be distributed. Ten were given to the largest towns placed in the original Schedule B, one to Chatham, one to the county of Monmouth, and the rest to the large towns, which, by the former Bill, obtained power to return one member only. The new Bill retained the 10 qualification. Every man who occupied a house of the value of 10 a year was to have a vote, provided he was rated for the poor. It was not the rating, however, that determined the value; it did not matter to what amount he was rated, if only at 5 or 1, if the holding was really worth 10 a year.The restless spirit of Buonaparte did not allow him any repose, even after his subjugation of the greater part of the north of Europe. Whilst he had been contending with the Russians, he had been planning fresh campaignsfresh conquests at the opposite extremity of the Continent. Godoy, the favourite of the King of Spain, and the paramour of his dissolute queen, who had professed great admiration of Buonaparte, seeing him so deeply engaged in Germany, had suddenly called out a considerable army, and addressed it in a vaunting but mysterious way. The news of this reached Buonaparte on the field of Jena, and, discovering by this means the real sentiments of the Spanish favourite towards him, he vowed vengeance on Spain. It was by no means the first time that he had contemplated the conquest of Spain and Portugal, but this circumstance inspired him with a new impulse in that direction, and a plausible excuse. In his interviews with Alexander of Russia, these views had been avowed; and now, no sooner had he returned to Paris than he commenced his operations for that purpose. He blended this scheme, at the same time, with his great one of shutting out the British trade from the whole Continent. Russia had, by the Treaty of Tilsit, entered into a compact to enforce his system in her ports. Holland was compelled to submit to it. The kingdom of Westphalia was now in the hands of his brother Jerome, who had been forced to separate from his American wife, Elizabeth Paterson, and had been married to a daughter of the King of Würtemberg, so that the territories now comprised in the new kingdom of Westphalia were under the same law of exclusion. He had extended it to the Prussian ports since his conquest of that country, and to the Hanseatic towns. Denmark was ready to comply, and the treaty with Russia extended his embargo ostensibly to the whole western shores of the Baltic. Sweden refused to accept it, and the foolhardy King Christian IV. declared war on Russia, and invaded Norway. He promptly lost Finland and Pomerania. Sir[547] John Moore, with an army of 10,000 men, was sent to his assistance, but found him so unreasonable that he thought it better to return without landing the troops. Christian was soon afterwards deposed, and his uncle established in his place, who accepted the Continental system. But Alexander was as little faithful in this part of the Treaty as in other parts. In fact, he dared not strictly enforce the exclusion of British trade, were he so disposed. Nearly the whole heavy produce of Russiahemp, iron, timber, wax, pitch, and naval stores, which constituted the chief revenues of the Russian nobleswas taken by the British, and paid for in their manufactures. To have cut off his trade would have made the life of Alexander as little secure as that of his father, Paul, had been. The Russian and British trade therefore continued, under certain devices, and notwithstanding the decrees of the Czar to the contrary. Buonaparte knew it, but was not prepared to open up a new war with Russia on that accountat least, at present. He was now turning his attention to the south.
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THREE:The conduct of the trades unions excited a great deal of angry feeling amongst the wealthier classes; and the Government were vehemently condemned for not putting down the combination with a strong hand. It was said that the mischief they created was well known; that though their interference with trade, "their atrocious oaths, impious ceremonies, desperate tyranny, and secret assassinations had been brought under their observation," Ministers could not be stirred to any exhibition of energy for the protection of the manufacturer, the workman, or the public. On the 28th of April the Duke of Newcastle had brought the trades unions under the consideration of the House of Lords, and questioned Ministers as to their neglect respecting the disturbances these combinations occasioned. Lord Grey contented himself with a quiet expression of regret for their existence, and of a hope that they would die out if let alone; meanwhile, the Government were ready to put down disorderly meetings. This apparent indifference called forth indignant protests from the Marquis of Londonderry and Lord Eldon. The Lord Chancellor declared that the meetings were illegal, and that they were likely to produce great mischief; adding, "Of all the worst things, and of all the most pernicious devices that could be imagined for the injury of the interests of the working classes, as well as of the interests of the country at large, nothing was half so bad as their existence." He also stated that there could not remain the shadow of a doubt of the justice of the conviction of the Dorchester labourers. Strikes and combinations, however, continued during the summer. At the Chester Assizes, on the 5th of August, two men were indicted for the murder of a manufacturer during a strike in 1831. It appeared on evidence that the deceased had excited the ill feeling of the trades unions of the place, where he had a mill, in which he gave employment to a great number of people. Two of his own workmen had agreed to assassinate him for the sum of 3 6s. 8d. each, paid by the union. They shot him as he was passing through a lane to his mills. Being found guilty, they were executed. On the 18th of the same month the workmen employed by the builders of London struck to the number of 10,000, including the artisans at the Government works. This course was adopted in consequence of a combined declaration of the master-builders, requiring them to abandon their connection with trades unions.
