Haarlem; and the principal magiftrates of Alkmaer, Woerden, Gouda, and fome other towns. The ftates of Holland likewife reftored to their feats the depofed members of the regency in Amfterdam and other places, as well as the legal officers of the militia in the former. Thefe changes were hardlyborne by the burghers and populace in Amfterdam, and gave occafion to fome diforders and riots.

Amfterdam, befides confenting to all the resolutions paffed by the ftates, was obliged to annul the prohibition of orange ribbons, and to confent to the difarming of all perfons in the town except the legal militia, whether under the denomination of patriots, volunteers, auxiliaries, or troops or refugees from Utrecht. This was not only a grievous mortification, but it became a matter of no fmall difficulty in the execution, to deprive of their arms and cartridges fo great and fo mixed a multitude; nor, if the bufinefs had even been willingly undertaken, would it have been easy to find them out in the concealments which fuch a city afforded. The duke of Brunfwick was accordingly more than once obliged to infift peremptorily upon the due obfervance of this condition, and at length to demand the giving up of the Leyden Gate to the Pruifian troops, in order that they might facilitate its perform

ance.

This produced a conference between the duke and a deputation from the city, in which the terms of capitulation were fettled. By thefe, only 250 Pruffians, with two pieces of cannon, were allowed to take poffeffion of the Leyden Gate. Two quadrons of light horfe only, to be quartered at Overtoom. None of

the king's troops to enter the city without the permiffion of the magiftrates. That the magiftracy thall guard and be anfwerable for the fluices: that they shall give the duke a daily account of the progrefs made in difarming; and that a Pruffian commiffioner fhall attend to receive the arms, and fee that the condition is faithfully complied with.

The roth of October was the fatal day, that the haughty city of Amfterdam, which had fo often given the law to other ftates, and to powerful nations, was condemned to furrender its keys to the duke of Brunfwick, to behold a foreign garrifon in poffeffion of one of its principal and maiden gates, and in effe& mafters of the whole. A fingular ftory is related upon this occafion, and affirmed to be a fact; that when the deputies had figned the capitu. lation, they made it a request to the duke, that none of the English officers, who were volunteers in the army, fhould be allowed to be prefent when the troops took poffeffion of the gate.

On the day that the Leyden Gate was delivered to the Pruffians, great riots took place between the exasperated members of the oppofite parties in different parts of the city, in which fome blood was thed. The Jews, who had hewn the most unanimous and inviolable attachment to the ftadtholder's caufe, were particularly fufferers upon this occafion. In the mean time the magiftracy applied to the ftates of Holland for a garrifon, to answer the double purpose of preferving or refloring the peace of the city, and of affording an opportunity for the departure of the Pruffian troops, who, notwithstanding the admirable or

der

der and difcipline they obferved, were exceedingly terrible to a people, who, befides their being foreigners, had not been used to the military appearance they exhibited. A regiment of Swifs, the Orange Naffau regiment, with the horie guards from the Hague, and a few other troops, amounting to between two and three thousand men, was the garrifon now allotted to Amfterdam. The fullen indignation fhewn by the republican party, upon the introduction of this garrifon, does them no difcredit. Confining themselves to their houfes, they difdained to look at the marks of their difgrace and the inftruments of their fubjection; and, while the troops marched through the streets,

the very women and children of the party repreffed that ftrong curiofity fo natural to both, by refraining from going to the windows to behold a fight fo novel and fo difgraceful. For a conqueft gained over citizens by foreign troops, is, even to the fuccefstul party, a triumph mixed with confiderable alloy. The measure of calling in foreign force to decide domeftic differences, if ever it is to be reforted to, is always to be lamented; fince the vanquished party are treated, not as honourable enemies, but as culprits, by a power to which they are not naturally amenable, while the conquering party muft partake of the fervitude which it helps to impofe.

CHAP

D

URING the long recefs, with which the members of parliament were this year indulged, Great Britain continued to enjoy an undisturbed tranquillity and repofe; for it is fcarcely neceffary to except the momentary alarm, occafioned by the danger, to which the perfon of the fovereign was expofed from the attempt of a miferable lunatic, as related in our laft volume; nor that

conteft of loyalty and affection, which it called forth amongst every clafs and defcription of his fubjects. On the 29th of September a treaty of commerce and navigation with France was figued at Verfailles by Mr. Eden, to whom the negotiation of that measure had been entrufted on the part of Great Britain. We fhall forbear making any other remark upon this new and important event, than that it appears to have caufed much alarm and apprehenfion amongst the manufacturing part of the French nation: its expediency and policy, with refpe&t to this country, will be found amply difcuffed in the proceedings of the British parliament.

The ftate of political parties remained alfo without any confiderable variation. The right hon. Charles Jenkinfon was advanced to the dignity of a peer of Great Britain, and made chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, and prefident of the board of trade, and, though not admitted in form to a feat in his majesty's cabinet councils, was fuppofed to be confidentially confulted upon all affairs of importance; the

earl Gower was made marquis of Stafford, and lord Camden an earl; and the duke of Athol, earl of Abercorn, duke of Montague (with remainder to the fecond fon of the duke of Buccleugh) the duke of Queensbury, earl of Tyrone, earl of Shannon, lord Delaval, fir Harbord Harbord, and fir Guy Carleton, were created peers of Great Britain.

On the 23d of January

pre

his majesty opened the 23d Jan. fourth feffion of the 1787. fent parliament by a fpeech from the throne, in which,after mentioning the friendly difpofition of foreign powers towards this country, he informed the two houses, that he had concluded a treaty of commerce with the French king, and bad ordered a copy of it to be laid before them. He recommended, as the first object of their deliberations, the neceffary measures for carrying it into effect; and expreffed his truft, that they would find the provifions contained in it to be calculated for the encouragement of induftry, and the extenfion of lawful commerce in both countries; and, by promoting a beneficial intercourfe between their respective inhabitants, likely to give additional permancy to the bleflings of peace.

To the house of commons he recommended the state of the revenue as a conftant object of their attention; and expreffed his hopes tha fome regulations would, in this feffion, be carried into effect for the eafe of the merchants, and for fimplifying the public accounts.

The

The ufual addreffes were moved and feconded, in the houfe of lords by the earl of Rochford and lord Dacre, and in the lower house by lord Compton and Mr. Matthew Montague, the member for Bofliney. As they contained nothing but matters of mere compliment to the king, they paffed without oppofition; but in the houfe of commons Mr. Fox thought himself bound to take notice of fome general principles which had been lain down by the propofers of the addrefs, apparently as the ground upon which it was intended to defend the treaty, that had lately been concluded with the court of Verfailles. He obferved that much stress had been laid upon certain propofitions, which he readily admitted were in themselves incontrovertible ; - that peace, for instance, was preferable to war, and commerce to conqueft, and that mutual jealoufies were the caufe of frequent mifchiefs; but he denied that they were any way peculiar ly applicable to our circumstances at the present moment. They were principles, he said, upon which the government of this country had been uniformly and wifely conducted for the last century; but it remained to be seen how far they would juftify any innovation in the established fyftem of our policy, fhould the treaty, which was foon to become the fubject of their confideration, contain in fact fuch innovation. All the wars of Great Britain had been wars of néceffity; and that jealousy of the power of France, which we were now called upon to lay afide, had been founded upon the fulleft experience of her ambitious defigns. Where then was the neceffity of inculcating forbearance upon thofe who had never acted wantonly, or

the prudence of arguing against a jealoufy, to which we owed our very fafety?

He deprecated the imputation of being governed by vulgar prejudices, but at the fame time he declared it to be his opinion, that the external circumstances of the two nations rendered a rivalship and, in fome degree, an enmity between them inevitable, and that it was impoffible to prevent them by any meafure which human fpeculation could devife-Nay, he would not hefitate to pronounce, that were fuch an event poffible, it was not to be wifhed for by any lover of this country.

The treaty, he faid, muft be either commercial, or partly commer cial and partly political; and in one or other of thefe points of view its merits were to be estimated. If, as he fincerely wished, it was a mere commercial treaty, the framers of it had only to prove that the new channel of trade which it opened would not obftruct or would be more beneficial than all the other ancient channels, which this kingdom had long been in poffeflion of, and which had been found to be the fources of her commercial wealth and profperity: but if, on the other hand, minifters avowed that the treaty was intended as a political measure, and that they had in view fome more clofe and intimate connection with France, fuch as fhould render it in future more difficult for the two countries to go to war than heretofore, they then would have to fhew ftrong and fatisfactory reasons for having purfued and concluded a meafure fo new in the hiftory of these kingdoms, and of such infinite magnitude and importance. He faid, he might venture how[E] 2

ever