The National Register. — London, England, 1817-02-24 00:00:00

VHAT.InfIAi 0 ,1,110. ftw0.a1.... tt 0 No. 472.—V0t. X. POLITICAL DISQUISITION. THE imummrEs. efh! sure such a pair." Host thou not suspect my place ? Dost thou not suspect my years? 0 that he were here to write me down an ass! But, masters, remember that I am an ass, although it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass. No, thou %Main, thonch art full of piety, as shall be proved upon thee, by Good witness : I am a wise fellow, and which h which is more, an householder ; und whirl* is more, as Pretty a piece or •I s any in Mes aim*, and one that knows the law: go to, and a lien ?dhow enough ; go to, and a fellow that hatli hail losses, and one that hatli two gust's.. and every thing handsome about Bring bins away. 0 that I had Leen writ down an ass!" Dogberry, in Nholempeare's Play of Much Ado about Nothing.. " Write down, that they hope they serve Heaven; and write Heaven first ; for Heaven defend, but Heaven shall go be fore such villainy.—Masters, it is proved already that you are Fade better than falseknaves, and it will go near to be thought so, shortly ; bow answer you for yourselves ?" Town Clerk, is Shakespeare's Huy of Much Ado about Nothing.' The two prominent characters in the broad farce of the present day are those paragons of virtuous principle, those disciples of consistency, those sworn friends, and boon companions Mwtsrs. Hunt and Cobbett. The one, drives his tandem, makes tremendous long speeches, abuses indiscriminately, and valiantly offers to box with his landlord. The other, after having shifted to every point of the compass, turns master hawker, snugly pockets the pence, accompanies his friend to the boxing school, and there, with laughable solemnity, boldly asserts he would be unworthy the high political character he sustains if he did condescend to enter the pugilistic list with honest Boniface. Neither these Rcfnrming Quixotes, nor their absurdi ties, not to give their follies a harsher name, would be deserving the least public notice, were it not, that, by contriving to mix up their extravaganza's with its progress, they have a tendency to injure an excellent cause, and finally to bring it into contempt. There is indeed every reason to doubt the sincerity of these redoubtable champions ; at all events no one will be hardy enough to question their unfitness for the busi. mess they have undertaken, as well as their total want of proper diguity, to procure the object of their pursuit, the one, has professedly written on the other side of the question, with all the vituperative acrimony of which he is master, and surely no honest man could wish► his bitterest enemy should be subjected to snore ; take some of his titles, for example; .‘ the Bloody Buoy," "A Bone for the Democrats" &c. &c. this line he pursued as long as he found it his interest so to do, that is somewhat longer than his works would fetch any profit ; these may now be had at a very considerable reduction under the original costs : being completely despised by one side, and of no kind of use to the other, except to insult the►a, the other, by his coume vulgarity, by bis obstreperous abuse of men who have devoted their whole lives to the furtherance of their country's weal, brings a certain degree of odium upon the cause he advocates, and thus lays prostrate with the dust the bantling he would fain persuade us he is willing to rear into an athletic state of manhood. It is more than pro bable had not the sterling good sense of the country • .emdetlthe discretion of these two furious Demagogues scenes of horror would have unfhlded themselves in the s.mtemplution of which, the most determined reformer must have trembled. Mr. Hunt, is a very facetious kind of Gentleman, alike remarkable for the coarseness of his joke, the stale ness of its idea, the meanness of its conception and its complete want of point ; he seems indeed in the true spirit of vandalism to derive a degree of self-complacency to constitute a kind of false glory in being an illiterate knave : with great gravity of manner, and a pomposity peculiarly his own, he assures his hearers he does not speak either Algebra, Greek, or Latin : nevarthe 'less, it is his misfortune, poor man, sometimes to travel out of the record, to venture upon such phrases as Magna (liana, which besides its scouted lattinity is we fear topic to him equally incomprehensi ble : although he so heartily disclaims the learned lan ruai;e, we do not question but he Las hard with sonic pleasure, tile term used by his companions, amongst the moon-rakers perhaps, coupled with observations wkich, although :!empletely dissonant, hi: happy state iltiOn ILI t titittV+ Our Eting, Comititution attb MONDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1817. of consummate ignorance, has led him to believe iden tified. The child in all probability was too much a pet, too much its mother's darling and papa's deli,,At, to have its pleasures disturbed by reading books, thus we may be able to account for his round assertion, a spe cies of rhetoric, in which by the bye he and his friend are both wholesale dealers, that the Great Charter, we translate in compliment to his avowed dislike to any thing foreign, guaranteed to the People Annual Par liaments, meaning thereby a yearly re-election of the House er Representatives. We feel persuaded that even Mr. Hunt himself with all his ready wit, must have just sense enough, and it may be sufficient honesty to acknowledge that an institution which had no exist ence at the time, that was not then contemplated could not very well become even the subject of disetu.sion, much less of a direct confiranation. The plain fact is, the famous Charter ?f Runnemede, which, although it provided that the Parliament should hold three Sessions annually, no otherwise noticed the great bulk of the people, then in a state of slavery, than to provide " that no villain or rustic should by any fine be be reaved of his carts, ploughs, and instruments of hus bandry." This was obtained in 1215, when there was nothing that bore the least semblance to the present state of Parliament, which is a terns derived front the Nor man French, we wonder Mr. Hunt can endure, except the great Council of the Nation, consisting of the same materials as the present House of Lords, namely, the dignified Clergy, the Judges, and the Nobility assem bled at the King's pleasure in one Chamber, who were rather the registry of his will than* deliberative body : which, indeed, was one of the privileges fur which they contended. We have no notice of a second Chamber, or Commons House of Parliament, for nearly half a century after: not until 1::!58, during the usurpation and ambitious schemes of Henry the Third's brother in-law, the Earl of Leicester, a man of daring habits, and considerable abilities, who had long aspired to the Throne, who, taking advantage of the King's weakness, gave him the lie, and placing himself at the head of the twenty-four Barons, entrusted, by what was after wards called the Meed Parliament, with the supreme authority, aimed, through their means, at compass ing the sovereign power,atl to farther discredit the de clining interests of the feeble Monarch with his sub jects, adopted the novel plan of summoning, on the I th June, four Knights to be chosen by each county who should meet in a separate House and examine into the grievances of their constituents. 'The Usurper, however, did not find these so compliant with his wishes as he desired ; hut having now nearly attained the summit of his ambition, and completely eugrossed in his own person the royal functions ; having also as his prisoners Henry the Third taken at the fatal battle of Lewes, Henry's brother, Richard King of the Romans, and young Edward, Henry's son, afterwards Edward the First, he determined, in order to counteract the Nobles, who viewed his elevation with extreme jea lousy, to make one bold push for the diadem, and ac cordingly ordered returns to be made of two Knights from every shire, besides l)eputiea from the boroughs : thus arose the British House of Commons : it has since undergone many changes, experienced many modifica tions, and is in all probability destined still to suffer other mutations : but most assuredly it had nothing whatever to do either directly or indirectly with the Chatter granted by John, for had the towering Earl succeeded in his projects, there cannot remain a doubt, from his well known character, he would have sunk the whole in a rank despotism. The good genius of our ancestors however joined to their determined fidelity to the cause of the people, fortunately for their descend ants ordered it otherwise. When the Spa-fields Ranter, bundled up the sticks, to be presented with the Bristol Petition, evidence in controvertible of his haying accidently formed some kind of acqunintarcc with the venerable /Esop, albeit he wrote in Greek, it is to I.)a hoped he did not forget, to put in a rough one, to represent himself, and crook ed one to typify his tergiversating fricad Corporal Cob butt : As tIICSt: sticks, were to be an tmswer to the fa mous dagger scene, of the great Edmund Burke, we have to congratulate the noisy orator, that it fell to the lot of so gallant a man es Loris Cochrane, anti that be himself was not personally obliged to be the presenter to the Cinntnon, as it must pow be quite efidt-nt, from the late atlitir with Morley, that the unlettered Man of words, would, upon his visual organs coming into con tact with the death-dealing instrument, have once utore displayed the gay plumage of hi 6 Nkiiefruthert. PRICE 9id. IMPERIAL PARLIAME A" 7'. HOUSE OF LORDS. MONDAY, FEB. 17. The only business of public interest done this day was a notice by the Earl of Lauderdale that lie would move to-mor row [Tuesday] for an official intimation, given by the Mini sters, on the subject of the French Loan. 'File Noble Earl Droved that the Lords be summoned. Ordered.—Adjourned. TUESDAY, FEB. 13. Lord F.aseine presented a Petition from Birmingham, playing fur Reform.—Laid on the Table. REPORT OF THE SECRET COMMITTEE OF PEERS. Lord HARROWay presented to the House the Report of the Secret Committee of their Lordships, appoiuted to take into coltishly; ation the Papers laid before the House by older of the Prince Regent, respecting the existence of eertain meetings. practices, and combinations, hi the metropolis, anal in other parts (tithe country. The Report commenced by stating that the Committee, having examined the Papers referred to Ilwm, had mud front the evidence contained therein, that there WA. , no LI we that ti easonable const•iracies had been formed in the we:, weilis and elsewhere, which had for their object the total overthrow of the laws and government as they ,at present exist, and the indiscriminate plunder and division of property. 't hat as early as the mouth of August last different meetings hail ;wen held in the metropolis, with a view to promote the ob,er ls above alluded to. Arms were purchased for that piir;.o‘e, and other tneasnres of the like kind resorted to. At s lose quent consultations it was ra solved us the best mode of col lecting together a great number of people, to call 4 rielie meeting in Spa Fields, which was fixed fur the 1.11 , of No• vernber. The Report next adverted to the inlia.nni iry • hand bills and advertisements which preceded that inertial', for the purpose of exciting the people t. , outra...e and pt.'r,tier. • After .olvertilig to the first meeting which took ;.I •ce , ir • pa Fields, and its adjonrinnent to the 2tl of December, it prise eeeds to detail a variety of circumstances tending to pea ve the atrocious intentions of the conspirators. Arming tinier facts detailed, were those of their having prepared addresses and circulate ,1 them in the ga rls, informing the p. aarnra x hat they would shortly be set at liberty, and to hold tit ein.elveg in readiness for that event, whet' they weall be armed ny the Provisional Government. In these addresses they were also desired to prepare themselves with trivioloured cockades, emblematic of the approaelsiog revolution. Plans were ants formed fur an attack upon We Tower—pikes were mannfac tured to arm the people—leaders were appointed to conduct the assaults in different districts, and fire-arms were distri buted among those who were considered most woo thy of con fidence. While these arrangements were formed, the leaders of the conspiracy wrre found night after night iii public houses, working up the minds of the tiersons whom they might meet there, so as to render them ready histitiments to exe , cute any project, however desperate. Exertions were also made to win over the soldiers to their cause. Tri-colmored flags were prepared, together with a banner on which was inscribed the words, " The brave Sulditrs are our Friends, treat them kindly;' and it ap.wareil down the eve of the 2r; of December, they had the fullest confidence of success. It further appeared, that communications regulaily took place between the conspirators the metropolis, and persons Rem itted by feelings equally evil in other parts of the country ; and that matters were so regulated, as that their efforts ehould be devoted to the same purpose in different quarters at the same time. For which purpose, it WAS agreed that they should all hold meetings on the same day, anti thereby effect a general rising at once ; and this was to be dune under the pretence that they were to petition the Prince Regent, the real object being to promote a spirit of insubordination—a contempt of all laws, whether religious or otherwise—an equal division of all property, and a restoration of wh at was termed natural rights. The next point upon which the Report touched was, the existence of societies in various parts of the kingdom, tinier the titles of Hampden Clubs, Spencean Phi. lanthropists, &c. the object of which was, tinder the guise of constitutional proceedings, to extend the plans of ales astation and destruction already described. It disclaimed a general imputation of disloyalty against the numbers of some Of these clubs ; but at the ' , awe time remaiked on the pernicious use which was made of such cloaks. A reference was then had to the administration of secret oaths, anal to the extraordinary measures which acre taken by the conspirators to prevent discovery of their plots—plots which were found to bate existence in almost all the great mamitiretni in: towns through. out the country, Glasgow, Manchester. Birmieelistin. &c. 'the last topic alluded to was, the publication of inttanimatery and seditious works at a cheap rate; the end and intention of which was, to root out all feeling to religion anal morality, and to errata a hatred and contempt for the existing s ate of things. 'Else Committee, in liar, ittriloited the late attack neon the Prince Regent to the etteet produced by those poll. lications, and expressed it as their decided opinion, that the Civil Power, as at present constituted, under all the circuits stasices stated, was insufficient for the preservation of the public peace. Lord Lis keroni, moved that this Report should be taken into eousideration on Friday. he Lou I of GROS* . I NOR said, it was unprecedt•nti d to ge into such nut important discussion, unless all the information were previonsly laid before the Howe, sr latch had been sub 'nil oval to the consideration of the Committee. Whatever disaffection existed the country er outrage had been corn. 'flitted, the laws Inad 11C1'111011111d Sll ' lleil.lll to tun them (town ; and fur himself lie would ensititaiii, that there uas mo greater I II ony of his country than he who would take ads - antler or a partial disaffection to drat oy the liberties of the people. The Earl of 11 satßoss al said, the urpninini tit of a Se cret Cori eee it tee gas e to that Committee powers of great trust ; and eouservieart; tt1e)...1i.1 not think lit to lay all their intur . • 0,