ANNUAL REGISTER. VOL. II. FROM JULY TO DECEMBER, 1802. AND LONDON: PRINTED BY COX AND BAYLIS, GREAT QUEEN STREET, SOLD BY E. HARDING, PALL-MALL; R. BAGSHAW, BOW-STREET; J. MERCIER, PREFACE. WHEN I first described the nature and proposed contents of this work, I prepared my readers for "such alterations, additions and improvements, as time and experience might suggest." Many and useful have been the suggestions of these patient monitors. After having finished the two volumes, wich complete the first year of the work, I now regard it as having assumed its permanent form and manner. This volume, like the former one, may be considered as divided into two parts; the first consisting of the numbers, which have been published weekly during the half year, or, of a reprint of those numbers; the second, of the Supplement. The former of these divisions contains a collection of all authentic documents, appertaining to state affairs, or to matters of political economy, whether they immediately relate to this country or not; and, in making this collection, care has constantly been taken to recur to such compacts and transactions of past times, as do, or may affect the circumstances of the present time.-During the Session of Parliament, a weekly account of the proceedings is given, reserving the Debates, corrected and at full length, to be given in the Supplement to the volume. As occasion requires, and time affords opportunity, brief Notices are given of such new Books as relate to history, politics, or political economy, or that bear upon subjects connected therewith. The preceding heads are followed by a selection of such Foreign and Domestic Intelligence as appears to be of public importance; to which is added, a Record of Appointments, of Bankruptcies, Births, Deaths, Marriages, Prices. The scale of these articles has, in the latter numbers, been abridged; but whatever has been left out in the body of the work, will be found in the Supplement. Besides the aforementioned A 2 matter, which is necessarily supplied by time and events, each sheet of the work contains the Editor's observations relative to all the most important current events and transactions. These observations are, for want of a more comprehensive phrase, called Summaries of Politics, and, upon an uninterrupted perusal of them, they will, I think, be found to form a complete series of statements, arguments, and reflections and, when, to this series, are added the detached articles from correspondents, whether in the form of Essays, Letters, or Extracts, the whole of the numbers, taken together, forms a Chronicle, not only of events and transactions, but of the opinions, feelings, and motives. connected therewith. The compilers of Annual Registers have adopted a different, and, in my opinion, a far less perfect mode of arranging their materials, which it is their custom to divide into classes, instead of placing them in the order in which they were first communicated to the Public. According to their method, all the State Papers are so inserted as to follow each other without the intervention of other matter; and so of the Proceedings in Parliament, the Historical Remarks, &c. &c. But it is, I think, evi. dent, that this classification can be attended with no one advantage, while it has many very great disadvantages. Considering the Register merely as a book of reference, it is of little import how the materials are arranged, so that they are all included in the book, and are pointed to by the Index in such a manner as to be found with perfect facility; but, as a book for perusal, the chronological order is certainly the most favourable to a clear, an easy, and satisfactory comprehension of the divers matters contained in it. At first sight, it may appear, that the chronological order, followed without reference to the difference in the kind of materials, produces, in one and the same sheet, a heterogeneous mass of Treaties with Foreign Powers, Debates in the Parliament, Intelligence from abroad, Occurrences at home, Fluctuations in the Stocks, Price of Bread, Political Reflections, &c. &c. Yet, upon closer observation, it will be found, that there is a very intimate connexion between all these; that they explain and elucidate each other, and that, though widely different in their nature, the reader must see them all, and all together too, in order to have a full and fair view of the political picture, of which they are the component parts. An article, on the contrary, contained in a Register where the classifying order is pursued, has seldom any connexion with those which immediately precede or come after it; and, in the studying of it, the reader very rarely indeed derives. any aid from the situation in which it is found. Where, for instance, is the connexion between two State Papers? What help, in general, does the one afford towards the just appreciation of the other? To know what was thought and said of the new division of Germany, to obtain any knowledge respecting it, other than that which is to be drawn from the Declaration of France and Russia, recourse must be had to those other sources of information, which here accompany the Declaration, but which, in a work otherwise constructed, must be sought for elsewhere, not always with a certainty of success, and never without considerable pains. The twenty-six sheets, which form the Chronicle for the half year, did not, however, appear to me to be quite sufficient to render the work complete. Several articles presented themselves, which, though too long to be inserted in the Weekly Numbers, were absolutely necessary to the completion of my plan. These, I therefore, resolved to publish in a half yearly Supplement, to be supplied, at a moderate price, to the purchasers of the Weekly Numbers; and, in this second volume, I have taken advantage of the convenience offered by this plan to render the work a complete Parliamentary Register also, which it was not, at first, my intention to do. The contents of the Supplement to this volume are as follows. 1. PARLIAMENTARY PAPERS.-All the principal reports, returns, accounts, estimates, &c. &c. (being upwards of sixty in number) which were laid before the Parliament during the last session. 2. PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES, at length, on the Preliminary and Definitive Treaties with France. These debates, which were the only ones of much interest during the session, and which are, and long will be, constantly wanted to refer to, are here collecte: and arranged with great care, and from the best materials. This head, tog ther with the preceding one and the reports of Parliamentary Proceedings in the body and supplement of Vol. I. will be found to form a Parliamentary Register of the last session much more complete, as well as more interesting, than any other that has been published. 3. A LIST OF THE NEW PARLIAMENT, together with a selection of the addresses to the Electors, in different parts of the kingdom. 4. PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES, from the commencement of the present session to the recess, collected and arranged with great care.-These debates, together with the sort of Journal of Proceeding which has been kept, during this session, in the weekly Numbers, forms a complete Register of the Parliament down to the recess; and the next Volume will, of course, continue it down to the end of the session, including all the accounts reports, estimates, &c &c. 5. PAPERS RELATIVE TO INDIA -Under this head are contained, not only the Official Papers laid before Parliament, but all such others as I have been able to collect, and |