learnt from the arrogance of Buonaparte. He says "he is an instrument in the hands of Providence-an envoy of God." He says "he is an instrument in the hands of Providence to restore Switzerland to happiness, and to elevate Italy to splendour and importance." Sir, I think he is an instrument in the hands of Providence to make the English love their constitution the better; to cling to it with more fondness; to hang round it with truer tenderness. Every man feels, when he returns from France, that he is coming from a dungeon to enjoy the light and life of British independence. Sir, whatever abuses exist, we shall still look with pride and pleasure upon the substantial blessings we still enjoy. I believe too, sir, that he is an instrument in the hands of Providence to make us more liberal in our political differences, and to render us determined, with one hand and heart, to oppose any aggressions that may be made upon us. If that aggression be made, my hon. friend will, I am sure, agree with me, that we ought to meet it with a spirit worthy of these islands; that we ought to meet it with a conviction of the truth of this assertion, that the country which has achieved such greatness, has no retreat in littleness; that if we could be content to abandon everything, we should find no safety in poverty, no security in abject submission. Finally, sir, that we ought to meet it with a fixed determination to perish in the same grave with the honour and independence of the country.

FEBRUARY 23, 1803.

PRINCE OF WALES'S ESTABLISHMENT.

The chancellor of the exchequer moved, "That his Majesty be empowered to issue annually to the Prince of Wales a sum not exceeding sixty thousand pounds.” MR. SHERIDAN said, he would have wished to have abstained from troubling the house, but that some points were absolutely necessary to be explained. He was ready to admit the arguments employed in support of the proposition by the right hon. and learned gentleman (the solicitor-general) opposite to him; the proposition itself was equally satisfactory to those who wished to replace his royal highness in his constitutional splendour, and to those who watched with a jealous eye the expenditure of the public money. There was, however, one thing which did not appear to be admitted, and which he was particularly desirous should be stated; it was not admitted that the Prince of

Wales, so far from burdening the public, had, on the contrary, made a considerable sacrifice to them; this certainly was the fact, and it should be known to the country. He was himself a real friend to the comforts and splendour which his royal highness ought to enjoy, but he was, at the same time, a greater friend to his, honour and character. The prince came forward for the third time. Upon the first application, notwithstanding the arguments employed by the learned and unlearned, notwithstanding the vast fund of legal and historical erudition which was displayed, nothing was ascertained with regard to the petition of right. First, it was to be presented to the lord chancellor; then it was discovered that the chancellor was not the proper person, but that the petition should be given to Lord Pelham. Afterwards it was to be laid before the chancellor, and then it came into this house. An assurance had been given, that there was no compromise whatever, and that the prince was at liberty to prosecute his suit; but, for his own part, he gave his support to the proposition, because the prince did not come forward as a claimant upon the public, but asserting a just demand. As to the idea of a compromise, there appeared in that nothing of a disgraceful kind. An adjustment, by way of composition, when no other mode could be devised, was fair and satisfactory. The measure now adopted was, without doubt, the shortest; for had the suit gone on, it would have been spun out to a most tedious and insufferable length. The late chancellor kept the papers in his pocket for six years before he could make up his opinion; and if the suit had been carried on, it must, no doubt, have partaken of that glorious uncertainty which was one of the excellencies of the British laws. If he conceived the ground rightly, upon which the right hon. the chancellor of the exchequer formed his motion, it was to be understood that the sum was to be appropriated in immediately enabling his royal highness to resume the state and splendour appropriate to his high rank. He wished to know whether the house was to understerstand this to be the real fact? If so, he should have much greater pleasure in supporting the motion? but he begged to know from the right hon. gentleman if he was warranted from any authentic quarter to give this assurance to the house; because if they voted the sum under such an idea, and that afterwards it should be found that the resumption of that state, on

the part of the prince, was to be still protracted, much discontent and disappointment must be the natural consequence. Nor could that minister be fairly understood to consult the honour of the prince, in deceiving the house into a vote, under an idea, that by such a vote his royal highness was to be immediately restored to his rank in life, when in reality he must remain under embarrassments that must still longer oblige him to remain in obscurity. But in all events, whatever the fact was, it ought to be fully understood. An hon. member had this night moved for the reading of some passages in his Majesty's message on a former occasion, respecting the prince's affairs, in order to prove that the prince was thereby precluded from any further claims upon parliament, because he was thereby constructively precluded from contracting any new debts. But although the letter of those passages certainly did not expressly restrict his royal highness from contracting debts, yet, he was ready to allow, his royal highness was as firmly bound in honour upon that point to abstain from contracting new debts, after the vote then passed, as if bound thereto by a condition worded in the strongest manner! but the fact was, his royal highness had contracted no new debts; nor had he made any claims on the public for payment of his former debts; for surely the submittal to excessive restraints upon his own income for the liquidation of his royal highness's debts, was not to be termed a burthen on the country for that purpose. But though his royal highness had contracted no new debts, yet it was to be recollected, that if those arrangements made with a former chancellor of the exchequer for the liquidation of his debts, had failed in some instances of their intended effect, the prince, feeling himself bound in honour to make good the deficiency, was still embarrassed, under the sense of that honourable obligation. On the former occasion, a sum of £600,000 was voted in advance to the prince for the liquidation of his debts, to be vested in the hands of trustees; but, when by public advertisement all the claims of his royal highwere called in, the aggregate was found to amount to £650,000; consequently there was a deficit of £50,000. It was not thought advisable to make a further application to parliament; but the commissioners, to supply the deficiency, proposed to the creditors an abatement, on their respective debts, of no less than 10 per cent. This deduction was not upon claims

ness

considered as any ways fraudulent or overcharged, but upon debts fairly tested, and admitted to be just and reasonable. This, he contended was, in direct terms, compromising the honour of his royal highness; it was not paying, but compounding his debts; and his royal highness, he said, had authorized him to declare, on a former occasion, that he had much rather again apply to parliament, and solicit a restriction of one year more upon his income, in order to pay in full every claim against him, than submit to a measure which his royal highness conceived to be so degrading to his honour; nor could he conceive that honour satisfied until he had paid the last farthing. If, then, his royal highness was still to remain burthened with claims, which he conceived himself bound, as debts of honour, to discharge, it was obvious the chief end proposed to the house, of enabling his royal highness immediately to resume his rank and appropriate splendour, would not be attained by the vote proposed. If it was said he was, in consequence of this vote, to be restored to his whole income, but not yet to resume his rank and state, in God's name let the circumstances be explained to the house; and some definitive time mentioned at which an expectation, so anxiously and so generally entertained by the nation, was really to be fulfilled.

The resolution was agreed to without a division.

MARCH 4.

PRINCE OF WALES'S ESTABLISHMENT.

Mr. Calcraft moved, "That the house, anxiously desirous to give full effect to the important objects contained in his Majesty's most gracious message of the 16th of February, do appoint a select committee to inquire into the embarrassments of the Prince of Wales, and into the most effectual means of relieving them as speedily as possible, in order to enable his Royal Highness to resume the splendour and dignity due to his exalted station."

MR. SHERIDAN, after the manner in which this question had been deprecated, and the manifest indisposition that had been shown on the other side to enter into it, thought it unnecessary to assure the house, that it was not his intention to detain them long. Unquestionably, if a division were to take place, he should vote for the original motion; but so little real difference of opinion did he see, that he could have no apprehension of

coming to a division. There was but one object professed on both sides, and he was sure the manner of attaining that object, though it might, in the first instance, strike gentlemen very differently, would not ultimately be a cause of dissension. From the tardiness of the right hon. gentleman (the chancellor of the exchequer) and those about him, to reply to the arguments of his right hon. friend (Mr. Fox), he had reason to conclude that they were ready to do that justice to his royal highness to which he is undoubtedly entitled. His royal highness, upon the gracious intention conceived by his Majesty, and communicated to the house by his Majesty's message, with the advice of his law officers, adopted the resolution of abandoning his claims to the duchy of Cornwall. There was no doubt but his royal highness's advisers, the one who had a seat in that house (Mr. Erskine), as well as the one who had not (Mr. Adam), had given his royal highness the advice most consistent with his dignity. But it was not for the house to consider that he did not act on the authority of private communications; he was bound as a member of parliament not to do so. Was there any reason to believe that his royal highness was indifferent to the restoration of his rank and state, or to the restoration to the same rank of that family which had shared in his obscurity? Let gentlemen look to the communication made by his royal highness, and they would there find it acknowledged that he was not indifferent. This was not information from private authority. The house had it from his royal highness himself; they had it on the face of their journals. All opinions were therefore agreed as to the object that was to be attained. His hon. friend, if the form of his motion produced any difficulty, would, he was sure, not hesitate to change it to the shape that would be least exceptionable. Let it be said, that the house would consider of it. The right hon. gentleman (the chancellor of the exchequer) had said, "his royal highness was in a situation in which it was not to be entertained that he should continue one hour longer; that he was in a situation in which he could not have that interchange of hospitality with the noble families of the country which it was most material that the heir apparent of the crown should keep up; that he could not promote the arts, patronise talent, or contribute to the advancement of those various laudable institutions for which the present time was so remarkable. The house appeared to feel