vernment, and finally adopted, was to the following effect:-That the house, taking into consideration the necessity of destroying the increasing naval force of the enemy, and the propriety of effecting a diversion in favour of Austria, approved of the conduct of ministers in sending a large force to the Scheldt; and were of opinion that ministers were not responsible for the failure of the alterior objects of the expedition, from the unforeseen circumstances of wind and weather. The retention of the island of Walcheren, under all the circumstances of the case, was also declared to be proper.

We are perfectly aware of the degree in which the human mind is apt to be biassed in its judgment of any particular transaction by the success which attends it. After every endeavour, however, to divest our minds of this bias, and with every disposition to give weight to the arguments of ministers, as well as to think favourably of their intentions, we do not feel inclined to qualify materially the opinions respecting this expedition. which we ventured to express in our last number. All parties concur if acquitting the military and naval commanders from any share of blame. The evidence also shews, that great obstacles arose from the state of wind and weather; and it must of necessity remain, in some degree, a doubtful point, whether, if these obstacles had not arisen, the expedition might not have succeeded. The probabilities appear to us to be against its success. Nevertheless, it must be coneeded, that this is a point which admitted of great latitude of opinion, and therefore that the blame attending an erroneous decision would be, at least, of a more venial kind than it was represented to be in the motion of Lord Porchester. We cannot think, at the same time, that the expedition, under all its circun tances, was one which justified a vote of a obation. The imaieuse sacrifice of life with which, in the months of July and August, it could not fail to be attended, combined with the natural uncertainties of wind and weather, seems to have required that the likelihood of success should be much stronger than it appears at any time to have been. On the whole, we feel much more disposed to blame than to approve; but still we would remember (and it is very material in forming a sound and impartial judgment ou such a case to remember), that our decision is adopted after the event, and is almost unavoidably affected by it: whereas that of ministers was necessarily taken with out any such light to influence and guide their deliberations. It cannot, at the same fime, be denied, that the resolutions which

the House of Commons has passed in favour of the Scheldt expedition, do not accord with the general sentiments of the nation.

Before we enter upon the great question respecting the privileges of the House of Commons, which has produced so much agitation during the present month, we will advert to one or two other points of parlia mentary discussion.

The

The Hon. Capt. Lake, of the navy, some time since put a seaman, of the name of Jeffery, who had committed some offence, ashore on the desert island of Sombrero, in the West Indies. Whether the poor man perished in consequence, has not yet been ascertained, although the probabilities seem to favour that supposition. For this monstrous act of oppression and cruelty, Capt. Lake was tried by a court-martial, and sentenced to be dismissed the service. punishment, however, appearing to be hardly commensurate to the offence, which, in case Jeffery had died from the inhuman act of his captain, could be regarded in no other light than as a murder, the affair was brought before the House of Commons by Sir Francis Burdett. After a considerable discussion, in which all sides of the house seemed desirous of promoting the ends of justice, it was agreed to address his Majesty to cause farther search to be made on the island of Sombrero and elsewhere, in order to ascertain the facts of the case, with a view to such ulterior proceedings as might be proper. A ship of war has since been sent out to pursue this inquiry.

Mr. Parnell brought forward a proposition for the appointment of a committee, to consider the subject of the commutation of tithes in Ireland. The motion was negatived, on the ground that the mover admitted that he had no specific plan of substitution to propose.

We now proceed to notice, as briefly as we can, what has proved by far the most interesting transaction of the present month.

We stated in our last number, that the House of Commons was on the point of coming to some resolution, on the subject of the letter of Sir Francis Burdett to his constituents, which appeared to be generally considered as a libel on the house; and we intimated an opinion, that his commitment to the Tower might possibly be the measure which would be resorted to. That measure has been adopted. We also took occasion to remark, that Sir Francis, though he denied generally the right of the house to commit for a breach of privilege, had happily restricted his doctrine to the case of persons

most all those who opposed the measure, did it, not from an idea that Sir Francis had not merited punishment, but on this professed principle, that a reprimand from the Speaker. would be much less acceptable to the Baronet, than a committal to the Tower. The event will probably shew whether the stronger or the milder course was preferable.

On the morning of Friday the 6th instant, the serjeant at arms, having received the warrant from the Speaker, went to the house of Sir Francis; but he was not at home. The serjeant, after having first sent a polite letter, stating his business, called about four in the afternoon, and, in an interview to which he was admitted, received an assurance from Sir Francis, that he should be ready next day at eleven o'clock*, and that he would write a letter to the Speaker. The serjeant returned with this communication to the Speaker, who advised him to go back and execute his warrant. He had another

interview with Sir Francis about nine in the evening, when the Baronet, having resolved on the course he should pursue, expressed his determination to resist the execution of the warrant by force. The serjeant on this withdrew.

It is impossible to acquit the serjeant of blame in this affair. He was twice in the presence of Sir Francis, and might unquestionably have proceeded to the formal arrest of the Baronet, by laying his hand on

• These words certainly convey an engagemeut on the part of Sir Francis to give himself up. Many attempts have been made by the Baronet's partizans to parry this charge; but they appear to us to have wholly failed. No fair man, as we think, can deny, that the words must have been derstood by the serjeant (and that Sir Francis must have been aware that they were so understood), as implying a promise to surrender himself on the following day. It is impossible, therefore, to acquit him of deliberate deception. He possibly, at this time, may have meant to give himself up, but the rapid increase of the tumult in the evening of that day, may have led him, as we have already supposed, to change his plan. Towards the serjeant, however, there is no denying that his conduct was highly disLoourable; and this was fully admitted by tee of his warmest advocates in the House of Commons. The discredit which attaches to this proceeding is certainly not lessened, when we consider the mischiefs which it has occasioned, and which he must have

foreseen.

him. This would have changed the whole aspect of the case. It would at least have divested it of some of its difficulties...

As soon as it was known that the House of Commons had voted the committal of Sir Francis to the Tower, crowds of people began to assemble both in Piccadilly, opposite to his house, and on Tower Hill. The crowd in Piccadilly increased prodigiously on the evening of Friday; and in order to il lustrate their ideas of liberty and independence, attacked the houses of several members of Parliament, who were obnoxious to them. The windows of Lord Castlereagh, Sir John Anstruther, &c. were completely demolished; and an attempt was made on Mr. Perceval's house. On this the Guards were ordered out, and additional troops were drawn towards the metropolis*. Throughout the whole of Saturday and Sunday the mob continued to collect in immense numbers; and even in open day assaulted with mud every person who refused, on passing by the house of Sir Francis, to take off his hat, and cry out, " Burdett for ever!" To put a stop to this outrage, as well as to prevent ulterior mischief, it became necessary to line Piccadilly with soldiers, and at length, through the obstinacy of the mob in resisting the civil power, to have recourse to military interference. Several persons were killed and wounded; but it is universally admitted that the soldiery, though they suf

* Much misrepresentation has been studiously circulated, by Mr. Cobbett and others, on the subject of the calling out of the soldiery. They were called out, not to execute the Speaker's warrant, but to quell a mob, which had proceeded to acts of the grossest outrage, and were likely to involve the metropolis in all the horrors it had experienced in 1780. Those who exult, as Mr. Cobbett does, in the popularity of Sir Francis, as it was manifested in the crowds that were collected to support him, and in the necessity which arose of bringing together an army to arrest him, ought to remember, that precisely the same language, might have been employed by the rioters of 1780. An army was required to subdue their turbulence, and to prevent the continuance of their incendiary acts. We see nothing in the mob of 1810, which distintinguishes it in its character from that of 1780, except that it was sooner arrested in its career of violence; nor can we regard it as a legitimate matter of boast, that a man should be popular (nay, the hero, the idol) with the class of persons who compose suck mobs.

fered not only much abuse, but also much pelting with mud and brick-bats, and were even frequently shot at, conducted them selves throughout with the most exemplary coolness and forbearance.

The serjeant at arms applied, in his difficulties, to Mr. Ryder, the secretary of state, and to the Attorney-General, for counsel; and having satisfied himself respecting his right to force an entrance into the house of Sir Francis, broke into it on Monday morning, attended by several magistrates and peace officers, and followed by a body of soldiers; when Sir Francis, still refusing to yield himself voluntarily, was arrested by the constables, and carried to the Tower. A considerable agitation was produced by this event in every part of London; and such was the violence of the mob towards the soldiers who had assisted in conducting Sir Francis to the Tower, that they were obliged to fire in self-defence. One man was killed, and several wounded. Before night, however, tranquillity was restored, and no symptoms of tumult have since appeared. This we must attribute, under Providence, to the promptitude with which a large military force was collected in London and its vicinity, and to the firmness, yet moderation, with which it was employed.

That Sir Francis is, in a great degree, responsible for the painful occurrences which have been narrated, we can have no doubt. All the more intelligent of his friends are understood to have strongly advised him not to protract his resistance, and to have pressed it upon him, that, for every purpose of trying the question legally, it was sufficient that the serjeant should employ even the smallest shew of force in arresting him. Sir Francis, however, was inflexible.

It is impossible to overlook one circumstance of this affair which has given occasion to much remark: we mean that Mr. Roger O'Connor, the brother of the wellknown traitor Arthur, was the constant at tendant of the Baronet during his three days of resistance to the Speaker's warrant. It was, to say the least of it, a suspicious circumstance: for even if it were true, as Mr. Cobbett has affirmed, that Roger O'Connor was guiltless of all participation in his brother's schemes of treason, still it would have been much more seemly not to have admitted him to his familiarity and chief confidence on such an occasion. But the fact is otherwise. Roger O'Connor appears to have been privy to the traitorous conspiracy in which his brother confessed that he was engaged against his lawful Sovereign, and was one of the

persons who on that account were put into close confinement in one of the fortresses in the north of Scotland. He was afterwards freed from all restraint, not because he was not privy to the conspiracy, but because his guilt was not of so determinate a character as that of others. Mr. Lyttleton, a member of the House of Commons, who had hitherto been a particular friend of Sir Francis, declared that both on account of his intimacy with this person, the brother of a convicted traitor, whose pen was now hired by Bonaparte to vilify his country, and of his breach of good faith towards the serjeant at arms, he renounced a connexion with him in future, not only as a political but as a private friend.

Certainly the known intimacy of the Hon. Baronet both with the O'Comors and with Despard, is not calculated to produce a particularly favourable impression of his patriotism.

But we return now to the House of Com mons. The letter which Sir Francis told the serjeant he should send to the Speaker is dated on the 6th inst. (Friday); but was not delivered till after the house had risen. It contains a distinct declaration of defiance, and is expressed in the most contumelious manner. When the house met on Monday, the letter of Sir Francis was read; but the consideration of it was postponed to the following day. It was then unanimous ly voted to be a high and flagrant breach of the privileges of the house; but as the offender was in the Tower, it did not seem necessary to proceed farther in the business. We were happy to perceive that there was on this occasion an almost entire concur rence among the members of the House of Commons in condemning the conduct par sued by Sir Francis; and the chief objec tion made to the conduct of government respected, not their having employed armed force to preserve the peace, but their having been so tardy in employing it. It was thought by the opposition, that they should have been much more prompt, both in causing the warrant to be executed, and

On the 7th, Sir Francis applied by let ter to the Sheriffs of Middlesex for their protection against the military force which had beset his house, for the purpose, as he alleged, of furthering an attempt illegally to deprive him of his liberty. The fallacy of this representation was too obvious to produce any effect; the military having been called in merely to repress the violence and outrage of a mob, which bis ill-advised resistance had excited.