cularly, that when he was secretary of state, intelligence was brought him that a noble duke, one of the first nobility in the kingdom, had not only built a new chapel for the exercise of that religion which he professed, but had instituted a kind of academy or seminary for the education of young persons; the moment he heard of it, he did not adopt the modern custom of letting matters proceed till they ripened into mischief, he did not wait till the cause produced its effect; he struck at the cause immediately, he applied to the duke, he told him what his duty as Secretary of State obliged him to do, and gave him notice that if the seminary was not put an end to, he must interpose his authority; the noble duke acted in the affair as became him, and the consequence was, the seminary was abolished instantly and not more heard of. In a late instance, likewise, he had been applied to, and told that a meeting to discuss religious matters had been instituted at Coachmaker's-hall, where such topics were agitated, as gave him reason to see the seeds of great popular tumult and disorder would be sown, if government were not apprised of it, and did not take effectual measures to put a stop to it. Had he been the enemy of government which administration and its creatures had endeavoured to make the public believe he was, he should have laughed at the information, have told the person that brought it to him, "Oh, it is a foolish matter, too ridiculous to merit attention; don't mind it, it will come to no mischievous end, it is perfectly harmless!" Instead of treating it in this light manner, he had done his duty, and seeing most clearly that mischief was at the bottom of it, that it contained the seeds of serious danger, his answer to the informant had been this, "Go to government, apprise them as fully as you have apprised me of the circumstances, don't conceal a tittle of what you have said, and they can't but see their danger, and will, I make no doubt, take the proper measures for preventing it." Did this look like enmity? Did it wear the face, had it a single feature of personal rancour? Having acted in this manner, he thought he felt himself warranted to give government some advice now, and to expect that his advice should be attended to.

In comparing the events of yesterday, and the declaration of the justice of peace at their lordships' bar, with what had fallen from the noble lord at the head of the

council, it must be evident to every one of their lordships that the police of Westminster was an imperfect, inadequate, and wretched system; that the commission of the peace was filled by men, base to the last degree, and capable of every mean act, derogatory and opposite to the justice of the laws, which their office obliged them to administer with truth, equity, and wisdom. The miserableness of the Westminster police was so obvious, that the example of yesterday pointed it out as the fit object of reformation, and shewed most forcibly that it ought to be entirely new modelled, and that immediately. their lordships, at least those of them who were in administration, recollect what the police of France was; let them examine its good, and not be blind to its evil. They would find its construction excellent, its use and direction abominable. Let them embrace the one and shun the other. The police of France was wise to the last degree in its institution, but being perverted in its use, its very merit became its mischief. Instead of applying it to the general benefit of the kingdom, the ministers of France had applied it to the particular political purposes of themselves; they had perverted it into an espionage, a word, which he thanked God, would not yet admit of an English interpretation; they had made it a system of spies, employed to watch the private dinners of individuals, to pry into their family concerns, to hunt out their secrets, and to render the life of every denomination of the subjects, a life of terror and a life of danger. This mischievous application of it so totally destroyed its use, that it became ineffectual in all the great points, which alone had been the objects of its establishment. He recollected perfectly well, that when a rising happened a few years ago in France, about the increased price of corn, the police having been so grossly perverted, and having from that reason grown into universal disrepute and unpopularity, attempted to interfere in vain; it was of no effect at all, the people laughed at it, and disregarded it universally. He cautioned ministers therefore about the mode of their establishing a new police in Westminster; if they imitated the French plan according to the original design of the French, it would be wise; if government took upon themselves the appointment of the magistrates, their views would be suspected, and particularly if they kept in their own hand the nomination of the per

sons, their power of abusing the institution as the French ministers had abused it, would excite jealousy and create disgust. Let the appointment of magistrates be elective; let the people have a power to vote for them and chuse them by their suffrages, the election would then be pure, no jealousy of government could prevail, and the end of such a police would be most fully answered. Perhaps it might not be unworthy the attention of those in power, to consider for a moment the police of the city of London, a police abundantly better regulated and more effectual than that of Westminster. The city was divided into wards, and subdivided into parishes, each of which, both in the division and subdivision, had its separate police so constituted, as to make a part of the whole police of the city. Might it not be worth the while of government to copy the example, and make Westminster a corporation as London was? The project was not difficult, and all the danger of altering the police lay entirely with government. If they perverted the alteration to an extension of influence, they would do harm, and increase the mischiefs of the present system of police; if they avoided assuming fresh power, and left the people at liberty to elect for their magistrates, those whose character, ability, and independence, serve to point them out as proper in their eyes to fill the office of magistrates, they would act wisely, and would find by the effort, that they had done what was right, and that they had instituted a police, answering every good and desirable end, both public and pri

vate.

Having, with his usual ability, opened this idea of instituting a new police, his lordship proceeded to animadvert on the intentions of government, with regard to prosecuting the rioters, and said, that if they confined themselves merely to wreak ing vengeance on the poor deluded people who had assembled in the streets, they would act like unskilful surgeons, who idly imagine themselves perfect masters of their art, because they possessed all those instruments that the invention and science of skilful men had discovered to be useful, but which the experienced surgeon never handled, except in cases of the utmost necessity, whereas the unskilful practitioner no sooner found a case at his disposal, than he had recourse to the cutting knife, he tore open the wound, he made what was bad worse, and instead of stop

ping the mischief where it was, he contrived, by his injudicious treatment, to extend it, and make it more general, and more difficult of cure. He declared further, that the people who had assembled, were objects rather of pity than resentment; that he had passed them with safety both in coming to and going from the House, and had listened to what they said. Their chief argument was, " No Popery! we shall be burnt; no more bonfires in Smithfield, let us have the Protestant religion, and let us have peace!" He added, that he looked in the faces of those who uttered these sentiments, and he saw evident marks of sincerity in their countenances; he saw that the people, from what motives he would not undertake to say, believed what they said, and acted from that conviction. It behoved government, therefore, to conduct themselves with prudence, to distinguish between the efforts of religi ous opinion, however ill-directed, however erroneous, and the violence of ill-intentioned men. Let them not madly have recourse to the cutting knife; having the law in their power, and at their will, let them use it with caution, and, at any rate, accompany it with such other measures as would shew a liberality of sentiment and an equal readiness to enforce the claims of justice, and to do what was right in compliance with the wishes and petitions of the people. Prosecution, however rigorous, however certain of effect, singly, would do more harm than good; accompanied with other measures, it would prove equally wise and effectual. There were three subjects under discussion, each easy to be embraced-The punishment of the rioters, the repeal of the Quebec Act, and the regulation of the police of Westminster. Take them up together, and there could be no doubt of producing all that sober, considerate politicians could wish for under the present circumstances!

The Duke of Manchester said, he was not in the House when the noble lord at the head of the council opened the debate; he wished therefore to have some little explanation of the wording of the motion. The term "outrages" was very extensive, he should be glad therefore to know what sort of facts government designed to take notice of, and what those indictments were, which the noble lord had talked of. Were the poor deluded people, who hallooed out in the streets, No Popery," to be prosecuted on indictments for capital felony, or in what

manner

against ?

were they to be proceeded

Earl Bathurst said, he would readily satisfy the noble duke; that these persons who were apprehended in the Sardinian ambassador's chapel, in Duke-street, Lincoln's Inn-fields, in the very act of setting fire to the wainscot and such parts of it as they could not remove into the street, being apprehended in the fact of committing capital felony, would be proceeded against accordingly: and others, just as, upon the examination of witnesses, and as the evidence went, it should appear proper, but that it was not the intention of government to prosecute those, who wearing blue cockades, had merely joined or made a part of the mob, and called out "No Popery, &c.:" that it would be beneath the dignity of government to institute any such prosecutions, and he most certainly, for one, should have advised to the contrary, had any person in the council hinted at such an idea.

The Duke of Manchester declared no one of their lordships was more an enemy to such licentious proceedings as those of the day before, than he was; he only wished that government might act with that caution which ought to govern every judicial proceeding, and not give occasion for any suspicion, that they had been under the influence of dastardness during the riot, and that, now the danger was over, they were actuated with a rage for revenge.

The Marquis of Rockingham supported the motion, but severely reprehended the inattention of ministers, who, having had the advertisement of lord George Gordon before their eyes, for some days, did not take effectual means for preventing the assembling of such a mob, as had insulted their lordships, and done so much mischief to the chapels of the foreign ambassadors. The marquis said, every wise statesman always preferred a preventive to a remedy, and that the chief use of the authority office gave, was to intervene in great cases, and forerun mischief. That when he was in office, it happened that while he was in the country, intelligence was brought him that a bellman of a neighbouring village had delivered handbills about for a considerable extent of country, summoning all persons residing in that district, to meet on an appointed day in the market place at Pontefract, in order to prevent by force the price of corn from being raised. This intelligence

was no sooner given him, than he rode 17 miles from Wentworth to a justice of peace who lived near the bellman, and directed him immediately to issue his warrant for apprehending the bellman, and if it should appear on his examination that he had delivered any such hand-bills, to commit him to York-castle. The justice, the marquis said, took his advice, and there was no mob; for the moment they heard that the bellman, who had summoned them together, was in York-castle, they were afraid of being sent there likewise, and therefore never went to Pontefract. The same sort of conduct ought to have obtained in this case. Lord George Gordon should have been proceeded against, and his loud-tongued followers would have been appalled. As a noble friend of his had stated, what he had heard the mob say, he would do the same, he had heard them call out "No Popery," and clapping his hands to his watch to secure it, he had felt several hands directed to it; it was pretty obvious therefore what some of the mob came for. His lordship did not approve of immediately repealing the Quebec act, because he thought that Canada might not be in our hands at the time that intelligence might arrive in Canada of the repeal of it: another session it would be right to proceed upon it. [The duke of Richmond here shook his head, and said, "by all means repeal it immediately."] The marquis declared, if it were possible to repeal it now, he certainly had no objection, but he thought it more wise to proceed immediately to other points. He reprobated in most decisive terms the willingness of ministers to call out the military, and said, when he was minister he always opposed it. That the justices in Yorkshire were repeatedly writing to him to that end, but that he used one general argument to dissuade them from such a measure, and after a little time, he found no great difficulty in putting an end to any farther application on the subject. He commended the motion, but advised moderation in the use of the means government had in their power,

The Duke of Richmond and other lords having said a great deal relative to Mr. Wright's declaration at the bar, and his grace having observed, that in justice to that gentleman, it would be right to send for him, and hear what he had to say in his defence,

The Earl of Pembroke (who had been

The Duke of Northumberland immediately informed the House, that there must, he apprehended, be some mistake, for that Mr. Wright, who had been examined the preceding day, was a very respectable and worthy magistrate, who had on every occasion, during the time of his being in the commission, in which he had been for many years, done great credit to himself, and essential service to the city of Westminster. His grace then went into an examination of the office of a justice of peace for the city of Westminster, and shewed that it was an exceeding troublesome office; and that those who executed it, got very little thanks for their pains. That, for this reason, it was impossible to persuade gentlemen of family and fortune to undertake it, and that, notwithstanding the popular prejudices to the contrary, if the House would give themselves the trouble to enquire into the characters of many of the gentlemen now in the commission for Westminster, they would find the greatest part of them very liberal minded, honest, worthy men; that every pains had been taken by him as custos rotulorum for Middlesex, and by the gentlemen of the commission themselves, to extirpate and keep out of it, all doubtful characters and every individual who could stoop to dirty practices. His grace described the establishment and regulations of the different public offices in Westminster, and particularly shewed that the office in Litchfield-street was constituted on the most liberal plan. That the gentlemen who sat there, acted without fee or reward to themselves, and that the receipts upon warrants, &c. were appropriated solely to the discharge of the rent of the house in which the office was held, and that the magistrates who attended there, never put a shilling of the general receipt into their own pockets. His grace

An order was immediately made for the attendance of Mr. Wright, and as the Lord President of the council had stated, that Mr. Chamberlayn, solicitor to the Treasury, was the person who carried the orders to the magistrates from the first lord of the Treasury, a messenger was at the same time dispatched to him, that he and Mr. Wright might be confronted and heard at the bar together.

The motion was then agreed to nem. dis. Mr. Wright and Mr. Chamberlayn were then called to the bar, when the latter stated very distinctly the whole transaction from the moment of his having received orders from lord North to prepare the magistracy, and instruct them to have the civil power in readiness to prevent any riot, on the preceding day to that hour. Mr. Wright also gave a clear account of his conduct, and proved beyond contradiction, that he had not heard of any orders from lord North, and that his visitation of Westminster on Friday as a magistrate, arose rather from his own wishes to preserve the peace, than from any instructions either from lord North, or any other quarter. The two gentlemen were dismissed from the bar, having acquitted themselves respectively to the entire satisfaction of their lordships.

The Duke of Richmond presents his Bill for Annual Parliaments, &c.] The order of the day being read,

The Duke of Richmond presented to the House a Bill intitled "An Act for declaring and restoring the natural, unalienable and equal right of all the Commons of Great Britain (infants, persons of insane mind and criminals incapacitated by law only excepted) to vote in the election of their representatives in parliament; for regulating the mode and manner of such elections; for restoring annual parliaments, for giving an hereditary seat to the sixteen peers which shall be elected for Scotland, and for establishing more equitable regulations concerning the peerage of Scotland." He said that as it was