hon. gentleman had attacked him for bringing charges against his colleagues, who were not in that house to defend themselves; he had taken up the glove for the first lord of the admiralty. For his part, he had really a respect for that noble lord as a man of business, that did not pretend to more talents than he possessed; but there were many differences between him and his predecessor in office; he had no occasion to be at his desk by four o'clock in the morning examining abuses; but, on the other hand, he went in a boat to superintend, or rather to judge with critical eye of the explosion of his own catamarans. At Walmer Castle, he and his right hon. friend had another Alexander's feast. Whether they had a Timotheus of their party report does not say; the jolly dog, however, was not absent. There, like Alexander," they seized a torch with fury to destroy ;" and, if they did not succeed, perhaps it was because there was no Thais at Walmer Castle.-But (continued Mr. Sheridan) the right hon. gentleman (Mr. Pitt) has thought fit to charge me with insincerity in the support I gave to the late administration. I say that this charge is contrary to the fact; I gave my support to it with the utmost good faith, and I know that Lord Sidmouth has always been ready to acknowledge it. But, supposing I had not supported him with fidelity and firmness; what then? I never had professed to do so, either to that ministry or to this house. I approved of their measures, and I thought besides, that their continuance in office was a security against the right hon. gentleman's return to power, which I always considered as the greatest national calamity. If, indeed, I had, like him, recommended Mr. Addington to his Majesty and the public, as the fittest person to fill his high station, because it was a convenient step to my own safety, in retiring from a station which I had so grossly abused, and which I could no longer fill with honour or security; if, having done so from such unwarrantable motives, I should have tapered off by degrees, from a promised support, when I saw the minister of my own choice was acquiring a greater stability and popularity than I wished for; and if, when I saw an opening to my own return to power at a safer period than when I had left it, I had entered into a combination with others whom I meant also to betray, from the sole lust of power and office, in order to remove him; and if, under the dominion of these base appetites, I had

then treated with ridicule and contempt the very man whom I just before held up to the choice of my sovereign, and the approbation of this house and the public, I should, indeed, have deserved the contempt of all sound politicians, and the execration of every honest private man: I should, indeed, have deserved to be told not merely that I was hollow and insincere in my support, but that I was mean, base, and perfidious. For the motion 127; against it 267.

MAY 13, 1806.

REPEAL OF ADDITIONAL FORCE BILL.

Mr. Wyndham moved the order of the day, for the third reading of the additional force act repeal bill.

MR. SHERIDAN did not consider these constant insinuations of gentlemen on that side of the house, wishing to triumph over the measures or memory of a great man, who is now no more, as being at all justified by any part of their conduct. This was now the fourth debate which the house had had upon this bill. In the first, it seemed as if there had been a council held among the opposers of it, and that it had been resolved, "Let us attack all the measures that have been proposed or suggested, but let no man say a word about the bill." In that debate they therefore cautiously abstained from meddling with the bill itself. The second debate was began by a military general (Sir James Pulteney), certainly of very high consideration. That general, however, entirely abstained from the military view of the question, and confined himself to its civil operation. In the third debate, both the civil and military questions were declined, and the argument was principally about the clause of refunding, which was the chief subject of the right hon. gentleman's argument upon the present occasion. If the gentlemen on the other side of the house had been twenty months before they could understand their own bill, they were not to triumph much even if they should find any omission in the present. He did not think it quite decent of the learned gentleman (Mr. Perceval) to say, that his right hon. friend had not read the bill that he proposed to repeal. Since he had made that assertion, he thought himself warranted in saying, that the bill had been drawn up in a manner so confused and unintelligible, that he could not but

consider the learned gentleman himself as the framer of it (a laugh); and from the little knowledge he discovered of that bill, he was only the more confirmed in his opinion. The learned gentleman, in ridiculing another system, said that some men had such an idea of the wonders that might be discovered, as to suppose a plough might be constructed to do its work by itself. Now, certainly the parish bill was not a machine of that construction, for with forty teams of horses, or rather with forty teams of asses (for so it seemed the parish officers were to be described), it did not work at all. The right hon. gentleman had warned his Majesty's ministers not to be intoxicated by the sweets of power, nor led away by the pleasure of triumphing over the measures of their rivals: he, therefore, thought that he had a right, from the "bed of roses" on which they supposed his Majesty's ministers to be placed, to warn the gentlemen on the other side of the house not to be too much mortified by their disappointment, nor to be so excessively soured by their change of situation, as to look on everything in an unfavourable light— (a laugh). The right hon. and learned gentleman had said, that if his right hon. friend (Mr. Wyndham) would but take time to consider, he was sure he would change his sentiments; and yet the principal accusation against his right hon. friend had been, that he had taken too much time to consider, and that he delayed his measure too long. The noble lord (Castlereagh) had said, that if his wish had been to overturn the present government, the mode he should have taken would be to hold his tongue, and let them carry their own measures in such a way as must completely disgust the country. He believed, however, that that sort of hostility was not much dreaded by his Majesty's ministers, and that they would be better pleased that those gentlemen should hold their tongues, than that they should misrepresent, and endeavour to inflame the country by those misrepresentations He believed that it would hardly be contended that there was a single parish in England that had raised its quota of men in obedience to the law; and, therefore, when the learned gentleman spoke so much of the dignity of parliament requiring that the laws should be obeyed, he should have recollected that the parishes which violated the law, were those who raised men contrary to the provisions of the act; and the parishes that did not violate the law, were those who raised no

men. In Leicestershire, it appeared, there was a wholesale crimp, by whose assistance that county procured its quota. There appearing to be some difference of opinion on this subject, between two representatives of that county, it had been stated, in the course of the debate on a former night, that one of them did not reside in the county he represented, and that probably his constituents would remember that on the next general election. He must compliment the constituents of the right hon. gentleman who made the observation for his residence among them. He wished, however, to know whether he had ever seen the place he represented (Tralee in Ireland), or whether he knew the name of one of his constituents? When it was seen, that in some districts a considerable number of men had been got, and in others none at all, it was impossible to suppose, that it was because there was a great deal of loyalty and zeal in one parish, or district, and none in that which immediately adjoined it. The reason was very different. In some cases it was represented as necessary, in order to support the characters of the ministers who brought in the bill, that some men should be got, and for that reason exertions were made to procure them, by means that were contrary to the law. In the parish of Marylebone, the same crimp who had raised men for other parishes, offered his services, but his offer was refused, as that parish did not wish to violate the law. In St. Anne's parish, however, they were not so nice, and they got some men. [He then read the advertisement of the parish of St. Anne, which began with " The largest bounty in England for recruits," and ended with the following postscript, "No Irishmen, Germans, or boys, will be taken."] In St. Luke's also, they raised some men, by adding £12 to the government bounty. As to getting men at the bounties fixed by government, it was impossible. If government were to want a levy of cavalry horses, and would allow no more than £5 or £10 to be given for them, the parishes might answer, that it would be as easy for them to raise as many elephants, rhinoceroses, or any other strange animals, as to get good horses for such a price. It was the same thing in the case of the recruits. There was an utter impossibility of procuring them for the bounties stated in the act. He felt convinced that the right hon. framer of the bill would not (if he were now living) support the bill. When he himself moved for the repeal of it last session, that right hon.

gentleman expressly stated, that if upon trial it failed to produce the men, he should himself move for the repeal of it. The act had completely failed, and in order to give the appearance of its having partially succeeded, scandalous measures were resorted to by the government. He considered the letter of Lord Hawkesbury, of the 31st of December, as a most atrocious act, which the right hon. gentleman (Mr. Pitt) would never have consented to. That letter of instruction allowed the men to be raised contrary to law, and gave the recruiting serjeants a privilege to libel the regular army, and point out this additional force as much more eligible to enlist in. As the right hon. and learned gentleman (Mr. Perceval) had suggested a form for acts of parliament to run, he also should name a title which would have been more fitting for the additional force act than that which it had borne. It should rather have been called, an act "for degrading the magistracy of the country, for raising the bounties, perverting the public morals, destroying the regular army, and encouraging mutiny and desertion." Such an act should be immediately repealed as a great evil. If he saw a person afflicted with a wen, or a stranguary, or any other disorder, and spoke of curing him, he did not think he could fairly be asked, what other disorder he proposed to substitute in its place? Or if he were to see a mad dog in the street, he should conceive himself justified in killing it, without providing any substitute for it, and this was precisely his feeling with respect to the present bill. The famous letter of Lord Hawkesbury began by stating, "Whereas information has been received that the additional force bill has generally failed, on account of the negligence and supineness of the parish officers." He had read all the correspondence on the subject, and he would venture to say, that the Earl of Essex was the only person who gave such information. The letter, therefore, began with a violation of truth (in saying violation of truth, he did not allude to the noble lord personally, but to the act of the government), and proceeded to order the violation of the law by increasing the bounties. Colonel Campbell, who acted under the directions of the secretary of state, gave notice, that there was no occasion for being very nice in the manner the men were raised, so they were got. It was also a subject worthy of serious observation that, by the law the recruit was obliged to take an oath that he was a native of the