The National Register.
London, England, 1811-02-17 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL REGISTER.

'CR

COI? RESPOADENGZ

SE rWrEN
THE PRINCE REGENT AND MR. PERCEVAL.

Copies of the Letters that passed between his Royal Highness
the Prince Regent and Mr. Perceval,on the annunciation of
his Royal Highness's determination to retain the prtsent
Ministers iu his service.

nig PRINCE REGENT'S LETTER.
Car'iton-House, February 4, tell.
The Prince of Wales considers the moment to he arrived,
which calls for his decision with respect to the persons to be
emplo.yed by him, in the administration of the Execativc Go-
vernment of the Country, accordieg to the Powers vested in
him by the Bill passed by the two ouses of Parliament, and
now on the point of recei H
ving the sanction of the Great Seal.
The Prince feels it incumbent upon him, at this precise junc-
ture, to communicate to Mr. Perce‘ al his intention not to re-
move 'from their stations those whom he finds there, as his
Majesty's official servants. At the same time the Prince owes
it. to the truth and sincerity of character, which, he trusts, will
appear in eve :-y action of his life, in whatever situation placed,
ckplicitly to declare, that the irresistible impulse of filial duty
sad alit.ction to his beloved and afflicted Father, leads him to
dread that any act of the Regent might, in the smallest degree,
have the effect of interfering with the pi-ogre:it; of his Sovereign's
re.:overy. This ewsideration ALONE dictates the decision now
connimni,ated to Mr. Perceval.

lEvi:.g thus performed. an ach of indispensable duty, from a
just sense of what is due to his own consistency and honour, the
Trim,: has onlx to add, that, ati,ong the many blessings to be
del ivi!..l from his Majt:sty's restoration to lieJih, and to the
rersonal exercise of his Royal Functions, it will not, in the
Ji'rince's eatimatimation, be the least, that that most fortunote
event will at once rescue him from a sittia!ion of unexamphed
embarrassment, and put an end to a state of affairs, ill calcu-
lted, lie fears, to sustain the imer...stsof the United Kingdom,
in this awful and perilous crisis, and must difficult to the genuine
principles of the British Constitution.

THE REGENT'S COURT.

Thursday being appointed by his Royal Highness the Prince
Regent for receiving the Address of the Corporation of the
City of London, upon his being appointed Regent of the United
Kingdom, and also for holding.a Privy Council, a few minutes
before one o'clock the C orporation of the City of London arriv-:
ed ; when the whole suite of elegant rooms were thrown open
for the inspection of the citizens. A number of yeoman of the
guards and his Royal Highness's servants, in their state liveries,
lined the grand inel, from respect to the corporation. At a quar-
ter past two o'clock, his Royal Highness the Prince Regent,
being seated on the throne, attended by the .Ministers of State,
his Chancellor (Mr. Adapt,) &c. &c. the Lord Mayor and Citi-
zens were introduced, and having approached his Royal High-
ness, the Recorder read the following Address
MAY IT PLEASE YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESS,
We the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Commons of the City
of London in Common Council assembled, most humbly ap-
proach your Royal Highness with the warmest assurances of
affectionate attachment to your Royal Person, and unshaken
adherence to those sacred principles which seated your Family
upon the Throne of the Realm, fully convinced that those prin-
ciples afford the best security to the honour and dignity of the
Sovereign, and the rights and interests of the people.
Whilst we offer to . yeur Royal Highness our sincere
condolence upon the severe visitation with which it has
pleased Divine Providence to afflict our Most gracious
Sovereign, which has o:casioned a suspension of the Royal
Functions, it is with heartfelt consolation, that in canonic-ea
with all ranks of our fellow-subjects, we behold in the person of
your Royal Highness, a Prince highly endowed anti eminently
qualified to exercise the Regal Duties; a Prince who has so
greatly endeared himself to the People by his moderation and
forbearance on various trying occasions, and the attachment he
has so uniformly shewn to their Rights and i .iberties.
Had indeed the desire and expectation of the United King-
dom been reelised, by vesting in your Royal Highness the
foil powers of the Executive Authority, we should have had
just cause for congratulation, confident as we feel that those
powers would have been wisely and beueficiaily exercised to
enable us to meet the extraordinary exigencies of so perilous a
crisis.
Deeply Impressed with a sense of the many tud great difficul-
ties, which, with powers so timited, your Royal Highness must
have to encounter in the discharge of duties so arduous, and
feeling towards your Royal Highness the fullness of that loyal
affection which in deeds well as in words, we have so lung
demonstrated towards your Royal Father and family, we would
fain have forborne to cloud the dawn of our intercourse with
your Royal Highness, by even a glance at our grievances, math,
fold and weighty as they are—but duty to our Sovereign, duty
to our country, the example of our forefathers, justice to puss
terity, the fanie and the safety of the Kingdom, all, with voice
imperious, forbid us to disguise our thoughts or to smother our.
feelings..
Far he it from us, insulted as the Corporation of this ancient
(and, at ail former times, respected) City has recently been, by
the Servants of the Crown, far be it trout us to indulge in com-s
plaints of grievances peculiar to ourselves, ready and willing as
we are to share in all the necessary burdens and all the dan-
gers of our country. It is of general grievances—grievances
sorely felt in all ranks of life, of accumulated and ever aceumu-
latine taxation, rendered doubly grievous by the oppressive.
mode of exaction, and of the increased and increasing distress
and misery therefrom, arising out of the improvident expend/•
ture of the immerse sums thus wrung front industry and labour
—of the waste of life and of treasure, in ill-contrived and ill-
conducted expeditions—.of the at' empts which for many years
past, and especially- within the last three years, have been made,
and with but too much success, to crush public liberty in a/I its
branches, and especially the liberty of freely discussing
the conduct of public men, and the nature and tendency cif'
public measui es.
Can we refrain from humbly expressing our complaints, when
we have seen those Ministers who have so long usurped the
Royal Authority; and who, it is now discovered, have by
practising the most criminal deception upon the Parliament and'
the people carried on the Government during his Majesty's
banter incapacit, , exerting their influence to degrade the Kiegly
office—when we have seen measures adopted evincing the Most
unfounded jealousy and mistrust of your Royal Hlghnesaea
when we have seen the Prerogatives of the Crown curtailed
and within id—wlisn we have seen a new estate established io
the Realm, highly dangerous and unconstitutional—when
we have seen power, influence, and emolument, t}rus'set apart
to controul and embarrass the Executive Governtnent at ;edit
of such unprecedented difficulty, when all the energies el ;he
State are necessary to enable us to surmount the dangers wit!