FORE:[453]The majority obtained on their Irish policy was about the number the Ministry could count upon on every vital question. It was not sufficiently large to exempt them from the imputation of holding office on sufferance; but if they were defeated, and were succeeded by the Conservatives, the new Government, it was plain, could not hope to exist even on those terms; while Lord Melbourne had this advantage over Sir Robert Peel, that he was cordially supported by the Sovereign. Having escaped the Irish ordeal, it might be supposed that he was safe for a considerable time. But another question arose very soon after, on which the Cabinet sustained a virtual defeat. The Assembly in Jamaica had proved very refractory, and, in order to avoid the evil consequences of its perversity, Mr. Labouchere, on the 9th of April, brought forward a measure which was a virtual suspension of the constitution of the island for five years, vesting the government in the Governor and Council, with three commissioners sent from England to assist in ameliorating the condition of the negroes, improving prison discipline, and establishing a system of poor laws. This measure was denounced by the whole strength of the Opposition. The question may be thus briefly stated. Before the Act of Emancipation in 1833, all punishments were inflicted on slaves by the domestics of the master, who was unwilling to lose the benefit of their services by sending them to prison. But when emancipation took place, that domestic power was terminated, and new prison regulations became necessary. The Colonial Legislature, however, persistently refused to adopt any, and continued a course of systematic resistance to the will of the supreme Government, whose earnest and repeated recommendations had been utterly disregarded. Under the apprenticeship system negroes were treated worse than they were under the old condition of slavery, because the planters knew that the time of enfranchisement was at hand. But though, when the hour of liberty, August 1st, 1840, was seen to be very near, the Jamaica Assembly voluntarily brought the apprenticeship system to a termination, they accompanied the measure with an angry protest against any interference by the British Parliament. It was contended, on the part of the Government, that if such a state of things were permitted to exist, the authority of Great Britain over its colonies would speedily be lost, and every little island that owed its political existence to the protection afforded by the Imperial Government, would, without scruple, set its power at defiance. Such being the state of the case, it might be supposed that no serious objection would be raised to the course adopted, in the interests of humanity and good government. But the Conservatives seized the opportunity for another party contest, and became quite vehement in their defence of the constitutional rights of the Jamaica planters. The debate was protracted for several nights, and counsel against the Bill were heard at great length. Eventually the division took place at five in the morning on the 6th of May, when the numbers were 294 to 289, giving the Government a majority of only five, which was regarded as tantamount to a defeat. On the 7th of May, therefore, Lord John Russell announced that Ministers had tendered their resignation, which was accepted by the Queen. He assigned as the reason for this step that the vote which had passed must weaken the authority of the Crown in the colonies, by giving support to the contumacy of Jamaica, and encouraging other colonies to follow its bad example. This obvious consideration rendered more painfully apparent the weakness of the Government, arising from division among its supporters; for if anything could have induced the different sections of the Liberal party to suppress their differences, it would have been the necessity of interposing, in the manner proposed by the Government, to shield the unhappy negroes from the oppression of their exasperated taskmasters. Indeed, in spite of various attempts to patch up the Cabinet, its members were at hopeless cross-purposes.
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FORE:About the same time Sir James Yeo, who had dared to attack the superior squadron of Commodore Chauncey on Lake Ontario, and took two of his schooners, now prevailed on the spiritless Sir George Prevost to join him in an attack on Sacketts Harbour. Here the Americans had a dockyard, where they built vessels for the lake fleet, and had now a frigate nearly ready for launching. Sir George consented, but, on reconnoitring the place, his heart failed him, and he returned across the water towards Kingston. Sir James was highly chagrined, but prevailed on this faint-hearted governor to make the attempt. Seven hundred and fifty men were landed, who drove the Americans at the point of the bayonet from the harbour, and set fire to the new frigate, to a gun-brig, and to the naval barracks and arsenal abounding with stores. Some of the Americans were in full flight into the woods, and others shut themselves up in log barracks, whence they could soon have been burnt out. In the midst of this success the miserable Sir George Prevost commanded a retreat. Men and officers, astonished at the order, and highly indignant at serving under so dastardly a commander, were, however, obliged to draw off. The Americans, equally amazed, turned back to endeavour to extinguish the flames. The arsenal, the brig, and the stores were too far gone; but the new frigate, being built of green wood, had refused to burn, and they recovered it but little injured. Thus, however, was lost the chance of crushing the American superiority on the lake, which must have been the case had Sacketts Harbour been completely destroyed.The calculations of no political party had ever been more completely falsified than those of the Jacobites and their congeners the Tories on the death of the queen. They had relied on the fact that the House of Hanover was regarded with dislike as successors to the throne of England by all the Catholic Powers of Europe, on account of their Protestantism, and many of the Protestant Powers from jealousy; and reckoned that, whilst France would be disposed to support the claims of the Pretender, there were no Continental countries which would support those of Hanover, except Holland and the new kingdom of Prussia, neither of which gave them much alarm. Prussia was but a minor Power, not capable of furnishing much aid to a contest in England. Holland had been too much exhausted by a long war to be willing to engage in another, except for a cause which vitally concerned itself. In England, the Tories being in power, and Bolingbroke earnest in the interest of the Pretender, the Duke of Ormonde at the head of the army, there appeared to the minds of the Jacobites nothing to fear but the too early demise of the queen, which might find their plans yet unmatured. To this they, in fact, attributed their failure; but we may very confidently assert that, even had Anne lived as long as they desired her, there was one element omitted in their calculations which would have overthrown all their attemptsthe invincible antipathy to Popery in the heart of the nation, which the steadfast temper of the Pretender showed must inevitably come back with him to renew all the old struggles. The event of the queen's death discovered, too, the comparative weakness of the Tory faction, the strength and activity of the Whigs. The king showing no haste to arrive, gave ample opportunity to the Jacobiteshad they been in any degree prepared, as they ought to have been, after so many years, for this great crisisto introduce the Pretender and rally round his standard. But whilst George I. lingered, no Stuart appeared; and the Whigs had taken such careful and energetic precautions, that without him every attempt must only have brought destruction on the movers. The measures of Shrewsbury were complete. The way by sea was secured for the Protestant king, and the Regency Act provided for the security of every department of Government at home.
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