jurious to himself. His honour was also the honour of the nation. He hoped his Royal Highness was incapable of agreeing to such shameful restrictions, and consenting to such indignities as were offered to him in this bill. If he did agree to them, he could only say it reminded him of a passage in the work of a great poet"Is such a man fit to reign?" nor should he be sorry, in such a case, to add the rest of the passage. The bill was altogether an heterogeneous mass, a variegated tissue, a hodge-podge of absurdity.

The question being put, that the speaker do now leave the chair, the House divided:

YEAS

NOES

long? To the Prince who had paid for it, certainly. And yet they were to be made heir looms: so that parliament might say to the Prince-" You have furnished Carlton-house more expensively than you ought to have done, but we shall have it." This was a little unfair with regard to the Prince: it was very unfair with regard to the creditors; because the furniture, if this provision was not in the bill, would be moveable assets, subject to the pay ment of the debts; and perhaps this would operate to the prejudice of those very creditors who had provided this furniture. Now, if he voted for the Speaker leaving the chair, it must be under an understanding that these difficulties should be removed. As to the duchy of Cornwall, he was exceedingly anxious that it should be wholly sold. He confessed there would be some difficulty in ascertaining precisely the value of the interest which his Royal Highness had in that duchy, because it was not a life estate that he had in it, it was only while he continued Prince of Wales; but in any event, the sale would produce more than it would produce to his Royal Highness in its present state. He thought it would produce 600,000l. The sum to be appropriated out of that for his debts, instead of 13,000l. a year, would amount to 30,000l. If this was called bargaining with the Prince, and therefore unworthy of the House of Commons, he should answer, that it was a perfectly constitutional proceeding, and that this country never had better security for its liberty than when it made these kind of bargains with its Princes. He should wish that something of this kind should be moved, and he had rather that any other person should move it than himself. If no other person did move it, perhaps he might; this, however, he did not pledge himself to do.

Mr. Sheridan thought himself bound to negative the motion, because no an. swer had been given to the question, whether the Prince's debts could be paid by any other means than that of raising money on the people of this country? He was convinced they might do themselves credit, do the king credit, and the Prince of Wales credit, if they would consent to sell the duchy of Cornwall, and also the Crown lands. An hon. friend of his had said, that the Prince agreed to these restrictions. But whatever the Prince might choose to do, that House should take care that he did not agree to any thing in

The House having resolved itself into the committee, Mr. Anstruther moved, "That the blank in the clause for granting his Royal Highness an additional allowance, be filled up with the words, 65,000l." Mr. Wilberforce moved, "That instead of 65,000l. the sum of 40,000l. be inserted."

The Speaker said, he had always been for the larger sum, because he thought it barely adequate to the situation in which the Prince was placed, and not equal to what his grandfather had enjoyed, when the difference of expense between the two periods was taken into consideration. He lamented the circumstance of his Royal Highness's incumbrances, but he equally differed with those who wished to swell the burthen which the public was to sustain, and those who wished not to deduct any part of the income for the payment of debts. After the gracious communication which the House had recently received from his Royal Highness, he thought they had every reason to place a reliance on an avowal that must give them so much satisfaction—a communication equally brilliant and constitutional upon the part of his Royal Highness, and particularly to be admired when the principle upon which it came to them was considered, namely, the principle that the public opinion in this country must always operate on the sentiments of persons even the most exalted in birth and situation, and would always have its due weight.

The committee divided: For the larger sum, 141; For the smaller 38.

June 15. The bill being reported, general Smith moved a clause, " directing the commissioners to institute suits for trying the right of his Royal Highness to the rents, issues, and profits of the duchy of Cornwall, which accrued due between the time of his birth and his attaining the age of twenty-one years, and for obtain ing an account of such rents, issues, and profits, and for compelling the payment of the balance of such account."

The Attorney General began with admitting, that he had not been quite accurate in the statement which he had formerly given on the subject. The duchy of Cornwall was a tenure neither held by knights service, nor by soccage; it was of a nature so peculiar, as to be difficult for him to describe. The exact nature and extent of this species of estate was not legally defined. He therefore could but speak on general principles, and those principles he must derive from the usages which were made under former princes in the disposition of this estate. From hence, seeing that it was neither a tenure in knights service, nor a tenure in soccage, and this he proved from the reigns of Edward 3rd Henry 7th, and Charles 1st, when this right was called into debate, he would define it as nothing else than as a fund appropriated by the original grant of parliament for the maintenance of the Prince of Wales-who had very properly been represented as "major à die nativitatis. In support of this opinion, he went through the different cases which had been brought forward. The question of the right of the Prince he confessed to be exceedingly difficult. If this was a fund for the support of the Prince of Wales from the period of his birth, the king, as his natural guardian, had the disposal of that fund during his minority. The difficulty was increased by the long period which had intervened since that minority, which would render any claim on the part of the Prince extremely doubtful in the decision, if it was at all proper to be brought forward.

Mr. Pitt said, that if there existed any claim, it was a claim upon the public. The revenues of the duchy of Cornwall had been applied in aid of the civil-list; as such, they had been recognized by parliament, by whom the debts of that civil-list had been more than once paid. But it was next to be considered, how far, in point of substantial justice, any thing was due from the public to the Prince of

Wales. If this was a fund for the support of the state and dignity of the Prince of Wales, it was certainly intended that the appropriation of it should prevent any expense from falling either upon the civil list, or the public. The public would then have a right to set off against the amount of the income, during the minority, any expense which might have been incurred on account of his Royal Highness. This amounted to upwards of 300,000l. He conceived the present discussion could have no other effect than that of stirring a difficult and abstruse question, without any chance of practical benefit either to the Prince or the public. Neither the Prince himself, his creditors, nor parliament, had proceeded upon a supposition of any such sum being due to him.

Mr. Fox said, he saw the business in a very different light; and even if the assumptions of the right hon. gentleman were right, he thought a very opposite conclusion was to be drawn from them. What the attorney-general had said, had only confirmed him in his former opinion upon the subject. He had stated, that this was a fund granted for the support of the state and dignity of the Prince of Wales; but this was not the only fund conceived to be necessary, since afterwards the principality of Wales and the earldom of Chester, were granted for the same purpose. He conceived what had been urged, that the expense would fall upon the public, to be a most unseemly argument. Natural feeling suggested that the king, like every other father, ought to be chargeable with the education of his own son; and because parlia ment had paid a debt of the civil-list, to the amount of 600,000l. it was not to be inferred, though it might probably have been the case, that they would, with the same facility, have paid a debt of 800,0007. He conceived it to be of the utmost importance to ascertain what was due to the Prince, at a moment when they were complaining of his debts, and talking of the liberality which they had shown in their conduct towards him.

The Solicitor General said, that the House had formerly acted upon the consideration of his majesty's applying the revenues of the duchy of Cornwall to the civil list; nor could he think the Prince had any interest in the present motion. The Prince's claim, if he had any, ought to be left to a court of law-a remedy to

Mr. Rose considered it as the same thing, since the money arising from the revenues of the Crown lands was applied to those contingencies for the public service, which must otherwise be defrayed from the consolidated fund.

Mr. Fox said, that the reason why no assistance could be derived from the Crown lands on the present occasion was one very easy to guess, though very difficult to he stated, by those who were most immediately interested. It was It was a fund, which had been stated as a resource by a very respectable committee of that House; but any proposition to resort to it was sure to meet with resistance, because it was found to afford a source of influence.

The Solicitor General said, there could not be a greater extravagance than to sell the Crown lands at this period, when they would not fetch a fourth part of their value. With respect to the application of the profits of them to the present bill, which was a quarterly annuity, he was at a loss to conceive how it could be done.

General Smith wished to hold out to the public, the claim which the Prince had to the revenue of the duchy of Cornwall. He strongly insisted on the inference to be drawn from the opinion given by the first law officer of the crown, that the right of his Royal Highness to the amount of that revenue was doubtful.

Mr. Sheridan said, he must oppose the bill, because it went to burthen the public with taxes to the amount of 65,000l. As to the arrears of the duchy, they ought to be accounted for to the Prince. It was an unfortunate circumstance for his Royal Highness that his advisers thought so lightly of his claim. But, if he had his former advisers, who were honourable and learned gentlemen, he had no doubt but that the claim would be made; for they were the friends of the Prince, and not less his friends for being also the friends of the public. He proceeded to show that this measure was not an establishment for the Prince suitable to his rank and dignity; he therefore, for one, should not consider this subject as closed, but open for discussion at any future time. He thought that a sum of money ought to be raised immediately for the discharge of the debts; for by the present plan the Prince's name would appear indorsed on all his bills for eight or nine years together. This was improper with regard to the creditors also, whom some gentlemen put together as a gang of robbers in a lump, but many of

them, he believed to have fair and just claims upon his Royal Highness: those creditors were ill-treated by this measure; they would lose four or five per cent. for discount of the debentures, after their claims should be allowed; so that, after all, the tradesmen would not have the whole of their demands settled. Think. ing, therefore, that the public and the Prince were ill treated, he found himself bound to oppose the bill altogether.

The question being put, That the said bill be now read the third time, the House divided:

Debate in the Lords on the Prince of Wales's Annuity Bill.] June 24. Lord Grenville having moved the order of the day for the second reading of this bill,

Lord Cholmondeley stated, that he was authorized by his Royal Highness to say, "That he would acquiesce in whatever measures the wisdom of parliament might think fit to recommend."

The Duke of Clarence said, that he rose to deliver his sentiments, before an opportunity had been afforded to noble lords to mingle political observations with the discussion. Whatever were his sentiments with respect to the bill, he should certainly vote that it might pass. Though he objected to its principle there were parts of it which met with his entire approbation. He should chiefly confine his observations to that part of it which related to the provision to be made for the payment of the creditors. It naturally and properly became an object to grant a suitable establishment to the Prince on account of his marriage. In granting this establishment, it might have been supposed that the Prince had now come to an age, at which he was fully capable of acting for himself, and would of his own accord have been disposed to take measures to free himself from any incumbrances which he might have contracted. But instead of allowing him the merit of taking measures of his own accord to pay his creditors, the authors of the bill had taken the popularity of such a step out of his hands. That other provision, which made the different officers of his Royal Highness re