They plighted their vows, thought with joy on the past, And promis'd fidelity e'en to the last. And gaily set off for six weeks to the Lakes. To his sorrow he found he was pair'd, but She could warble most sweetly, but oh, to her shame, Of domestic economy knew not the name. He finds the gay flirt he has chosen for life, He oft more than once in the course of the day, mate, Disgustingly turn'd from her presence away. Displeas'd with himself, even more than his [too late; That he saw not these follies before 'twas That with all his discernment he was not [snare ; aware A Syren could catch him so soon in her Like others whose thoughts seek for nothing but pleasure, He marries in haste, to repent at his leisure. 2. Certaines Conditions et qualitez principalement requises en gens de plusieurs estatz. Lansdowne MS. 380. Fol. verso. 133. EN prince loyaulté En prelat sapience En riche homme largesse A sergent obeyr A herault congnoissance En vin bonne saveur A mestier grant gaing A laboureur beguin A larron cler ayer A accremisseur1 appertie2 1 Qu. from achréme vieillard que By a Mother in 1815. AS the sweet flower which scents the morn, But withers in the rising day; Thus lovely was my Henry's dawn, Thus swiftly fled his life away. And as the flower that early dies Escapes from many a coming woe, No lustre lends to guilty eyes, Nor blushes ou a guilty brow. So the sad hour that took my boy, He died before his infant soul Had ever burnt with wrong desires; But for a moment felt the rod; Then springing on the viewless air, HISTORICAL CHRONICLE. PROCEEDINGS IN PARLIAMENT. HOUSE OF COMMONS, May 1. The House met this day, and owing to the recent changes in the Administration, the most intense interest was excited. Every avenue was crowded, and the attendance of Members was unusually great. On the Ministerial benches sat Mr. Tierney, Sir Francis Burdett, Mr. Calcraft, Sir John Newport, Lord Stanley, Mr. Brougham, Mr. Spring Rice, Sir Robert Wilson, Mr. Fowell Buxton, and several other gentlemen who formerly sat on the Opposition benches. Mr. Peel and his brethren took their seats on the lower benches near the spot occupied by Mr. Canning, when out of office. On the motion for a new writ for Ashburton, in the room of the Right Hon. W. S. Bourne, who had become Home Secretary, Mr. Peel rose, and explained the circumstances which had induced him to retire from the public service. He said, that in withdrawing from the service of the Crown, he was actuated by no motives that could be construed into levity, jealousy, or disrespect towards any one. No private pique, nor personal feeling, had swayed his actions; he retired upon principle, and had he done otherwise, he should have felt unworthy the confidence of the House. "The House and the country are well aware, "said the Right Hon. Gent. " that there is a great constitutional question, to one particular side of which I profess myself fervently attached. For 18 years I have pursued an undeviating course of opposition-have always offered the most uncompromising hostility-against any measure for granting further concessions to the Roman Catholics. During 14 of those 18 years, I have held office under the Crown, and during 11 of those 14 years, that office has been closely and intimately connected with the affairs and interests of Ireland. I still retain, and without the slightest variation, the opinions I have so long advocated; and, having so done, I felt that it would not be consistent with the maintenance of my character as a public man, to acquiesce in any arrangement, which, while it conferred benefit on me, and enabled me to retain office, was calculated materially to promote the success of the question, to which, under other circumstances, I had offered the strongest resistance." The Right Hon. Gentleman said, he lost no time in making up his mind to retire from the public service, when he found that his colleagues would differ upon this subject. He particularly directed the attention of the House to the relative situations of Prime Minister and Secretary of State for the Home Department. The church preferments laid with the former, and the latter had to attach his signature to them. Here, then, was one plain reason why the persons who filled these two situations ought not to differ on either political or religious questions. He embraced that opportunity of repelling with indignation the accusation, that himself and his colleagues had formed a cabal. The course which the individuals to whom he alluded pursued, was a course founded on the honest opinion which each individual entertained, and which ought to be held up as an example to every other officer of the Crown. With respect to the Lord Chancellor and a distinguished individual (the Duke of Wellington), whose name was stamped with the gratitude of his country,-when he found that they were attacked by the most shameful accusations, he felt the indignation which every honest mind must feel at such revolting ingratitude. His separation from his right hon. friend, with whom he had acted with so much cordiality, had been to him a source of great regret. He retired from the public service without entertaining any personal feeling either as regarded party or spirit. Sir F. Burdett said, the ground on which he and his friends thought it incumbent to support the present Administration was, the hope of advancing that principle which induced the Right Hon. Gent. to withdraw, and which the whole civilized world acknowledged, with the exception of England. Sir Thos. Lethbridge expressed himself as strongly opposed to the present Administration, and called for a trial of strength at once on the Catholic question. Mr. Dawson (late Under Secretary for the Home Department) denounced the coalition between Mr. Canning and the Whigs, as the basest, most unnatural, and unprecedented that had ever taken place. He attacked the press, which was in favour of the new arrangements, as corrupted to the very heart's core, for hardly a portion of it gave expression to the real opinions of the country; and he contended that the parties who had recently joined the new Ministers were only anxious to participate in the sweets of office. Mr. Brougham replied with much sarcasm to the preceding speaker, and said that he gave the present Administration his support most cordially and heartily; but he had from the first voluntarily refused office, because he would not throw any obstacles in the way of such an arrangement being perfected as would be conducive to the happiness of benighted Ireland. -- Mr. Canning then addressed the House in a most powerful and impressive speech. He entered into a history of his conduct with reference to the Catholic question and the late Ministerial transactions. He spoke in the highest terms of Mr. Peel's candour and sincerity, and hoped their separation would be only for a time. He intimated that his Majesty's opinions were Anti-Catholic; and stated, that when first applied to for advice, he recommended a Government conformable to these opinions, which of course involved his own retirement. For a time, he knew not whether this advice would be acted upon; at length it was distinctly stated, that such a Government could not be formed, and he received his Majesty's commands to model one on the principles of Lord Liverpool. To have placed at the head of this Government, as had been required of him, another person holding Lord Liverpool's sentiments on the Catholic question, would have been virtually to admit, that he was himself disqualified from that high office by his peculiar opinions; and sooner than disgrace himself by sauctioning such a principle, he would retire for ever from public life, be proscribed and persecuted, and betake himself to perpetual banishment. If the new Cabinet did not embrace an equal proportion of the supporters of both sides of the question, it was not because he had been guilty of any breach of faith. "When (continued the Right Honourable Gentleman), upon the 12th of April, 1 went to the chamber of my Sovereign, intending to propose a plan and arrangement, which should comprise all the Members of Lord Liverpool's Government, and embrace, therefore, an equality of Protestant and Catholic votes, or rather, I should say, a preponderancy of Protestant voices-a circumstance occurred which prevented that intention from taking effect. Was it my fault, Sir, that by any sort of concert I certainly will not venture to say, but by a singular coincidence, undoubtedly—at that very time, on that very day, and in that very chamber, five Protestant resignations (I call them Protestant only in the parlance of this House) were put into my hands? Five Protestant resignations came into the King's hands, within twenty-four hours; and thus, five of the members on whom I had reckoned for the new Cabinet, were at once withdrawn: and, upon this statement, I ask, whether it is fair to impute to me a wilful non-execution of the orders of my Sovereign, in the formation of that Cabinet. (Hear.) But did the matter rest here, Sir? I received these resiguations about the middle of Thursday, and within some two hours of the meeting of this House. I had already given directions for the moving of the new writ-(for the borough of Newport, we presume)-when I received these resignations. Upon receiving them, I said to my Sovereign, Here, Sire, is that which disables me from executing the orders I have received from you, respecting the formation of a new Administration. It is now open to your Majesty to adopt a new course, for no step has yet been taken in the execution of those orders that is irrevocable; but I must fairly state to your Majesty, that if I am to go on the same position where you have been pleased to place me, my writ must be moved for today, for if we wait until the holidays without adopting any definitive steps, I see that it is quite hopeless for me to attempt to persevere in the objects I have undertaken.' I need not repeat to the House, the words in which my Sovereign graciously replied to this representation, but I may state that he gave me his hand to kiss, and confirmed me in the office to which I had been named. (Loud cheers.) These, then, Sir, are the steps which I really have taken; these are the means by which I have been placed in the station I at present fill. I have meddled not with the conduct or the opinions of any other man. What have been the principles of conduct of others among my late colleagues, for the best of reasons and the wisest, I do not pretend to say; for really I do not know them.-(Hear.) I had never offended them intentionally, nor did I know that I had ever excited among them unwittingly any feeling so hostile or personal to me, as to be at all likely to lead to this result."-Hear, hear.) The Right Hon. Gent. then stated that with the new Government the Catholic Question was not to be a Cabinet question, but stood exactly as it did in 1812. Much as he estimated the importance of the measure, he knew there was a strong feeling in the country against it, and no consideration should induce him to run hostile to that, for he valued a week of peace in England, above the accomplishment of almost any theoretical or practical good. He had no doubt, however, the time was ripening, and the measure would finally triumph. HOUSE OF LORDS, May 2. On the opening of the House, the newlycreated Peers, Lord Lyndhurst, Viscount Goderich, Lord Plunket, and Lord Tenderden, took their seats. Lord Ellenborough (from the Opposition side) said, that since the adjournment of the House, an entirely new Ministry had been formed on different principles from the last, or on no principle at all, and noble persons who had seceded from that Administration had been so grossly assailed, he hoped they would take the very first opportunity afforded to them of rebutting these charges. The Earl of Eldon said, that he learned for the first moment that he and the noble Lords who had resigned their offices, had been charged with concert in resigning those offices, and with the unpardonable offence of dictating to their Sovereign. That he himself should be supposed to have been guilty-after having sustained all the principles he had so undeviatingly sustained, through evil and through good report-of yielding to a doctrine so unconstitutional as to affect to dictate to his Sovereign-who should have the government of the country, subject to that controul which belonged to the two Houses of Parliament, constituted as the Parliament of this country was, was a thing that he would never hear stated, as far as regarded himself, without declaring that it was a base and scandalous falsehood. -(Cheers.) On the other hand, he would take the liberty of saying, that he had a right, for the sake of his Sovereign's safety, whom he had so long served, in dutiful attention to him, and in dutiful attention to the memory of his father, whom he had so long served, to state in that House, and to his Majesty, that he never disguised from him any opinion he ever entertained on any subject submitted to his consideration.He spoke in the presence of many who knew that for years past it had been a question with him whether he ought to resign or not. And when the circumstance of this change took place, the question with him was, not whether he should maintain a purpose of resignation, but whether he should fulfil that purpose of resignation which, for some years past, he had expressed. Meaning to resign, if an Administration of principles similar to his own had been formed, could it be supposed that he ought not to have resigned when an Administration had been formed-as they had been told, though he did not know whether it had or not-of perfectly different principles? With respect to the Catholic Question, his opinion was, that the decision of a question so important, should not be deferred. He had certainly, hitherto, been one of those most anxious to oppose the bringing forward of this question, but he now was clearly of opinion, that the time had come when it should and ought to be brought forward. His Lordship denied most solemnly before his God, that he had acted in concert with any man, and declared that he had not even seen their communications." The Duke of Wellington stated that he had been most unjustifiably and calumniously treated. He had been abused day after day, by a press, which if not in the pay, was under the direct influence of Government. In reference to his late resigna tion, he stated, that on the 10th of April he received a letter from the Right Hon. Gent. who now filled the office of Prime Minister, which stated that the King had desired the writer to lay before him, with as little delay as possible, a plan for the reconstruction of an Administration ;— and that it was his Majesty's wish, as well as his own, that the new Administration should adhere to the line of policy pursued by Lord Liverpool: he then hoped that his Grace had no objection to form a part in such new Administration. Now their Lordships would observe, that the letter did not inform him as to the persons of whom the new Cabinet was to consist, nor as to those members of the old Cabinet, who either had resigned, or were expected to resign; and as these explanations had, he understood, been given to his other colleagues, he was rather astonished at the omission in his case. On the 11th of April, he wrote to acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Canning's letter, and expressed his anxiety to serve in the Councils of his Majesty, with the same colleagues that formed the Administration of Lord Liverpool, but, before he gave his answer, he wished to know from Mr. Canning, who was to be placed at the head of the New Administration. On the same evening, he received a reply from Mr. Canning, stating that he felt it his duty to submit his (the Duke's) letter, with his answer to it, to his Majesty. Mr. Canning theu added, that it was a well-understood arrangement that, whenever his Majesty entrusted to any individual the formation of an Administration, that individual was to he at the head of the Government: he concluded by stating, that he had no reason to believe that his Majesty intended in this case to depart from the usual arrangements, and that he (Mr. Canning) was appointed at the head of the new Administration. He (the Duke) wrote an answer to this letter, in which he stated, that he had understood from Mr. Canning, that he had had a different arrangement in contemplation from that which he was then fulfilling-that he had not felt himself warranted in collecting from the communication of the Right Hon. Gent, that he himself was to be at the head of the Administration;-that he had diligently turned the subject in his mind, with a view of seeing how far he could, consistently with his principles, take a share in the new Administration;-that he sincerely wished he could bring himself to a conviction, that the new Government was to adhere to the line of policy pursued by Lord Liverpool, but he was afraid that it would not ;-that he conceived the principles of Lord Liverpool's policy had been already abandoned; —that the measures of a Government, constituted on the principles of Mr. Canning, would be viewed with suspicion by foreign Governments, and would give no satisfaction to the people at home; and that under these circumstances, he requested Mr. Canning to communicate to his Majesty that he wished to be excused from forming a part of the new Cabinet. He was bound to avow to their Lordships, that the present Cabinet materially differed from that of which Lord Liverpool had been the head; and the chief difference between them was this-that the Cabinet of Lord Liverpool was founded on the principle of maintaining the laws as they were; whilst that of the Right Hon. Gentleman was founded on the principle of subverting them. (Hear, hear.) The principles of the noble Earl were principles by which any man might safely abide; the principles of the Right Hon. Gentleman fluctuated every day, and depended upon transitory reasons of temporary expedience. As to the charge of conspiracy between him and his colleagues, it was a foul falsehood, and he cared not who said it. The office of Commander-in-Chief of necessity placed the holder of it in a constant confidential relation with the Prime Minister, who had in fact the chief controul in his own hands, and from all the communication he had had with the Right Hon. Gent. he saw that it would be impossible to consider the continuance of his relation with him either serviceable to the country, or creditable to himself. He then referred to ministerial negociations which had taken place at former periods, in some of which Mr. Canning was a party, to show that the person employed to negociate was not expected, as a matter of course, to be at the head of an Administration. Lord Bexley said, that after having tendered his resignation, he was induced again to resume office by the assurance he had received that the line of policy adopted in the Administration of Lord Liverpool would not be abandoned. He acquitted the noble Duke, and those of the late Administration who had resigned, of any thing like a conspiracy. As to the question of making one of a divided Administration, the noble Lord observed, that in this respect there was no departure from the principle of Lord Liverpool's Administration. Viscount Goderich (late Mr. Robinson) said, he had witnessed the late separations in his Majesty's Councils with the deepest regret. He disavowed all participation in the calunnies which had been cast upon the noble Lords, and said, that, from what he knew of the character of the public press, and the connexion subsisting between it and the Government, he had no hesitation in expressing his opinion, that the press was an engine too powerful and independent to be made use of in the way alluded to. The changes which had taken place were to be ascribed, not to the Ministers who remained, but to those who had fallen off. They refused to form an Administration them selves, and was his right hon. friend to say to his Majesty, "I will run away and leave you in such a predicament as no Sovereign was ever placed in before?" He should throw himself upon the indulgence of their lordships, declaring that he aimed at nothing but the honour of his King, and the good of his country. (Cheers.) Earl Bathurst observed, that he retired because, when the Duke of Wellington, Lord Eldon, Lord Liverpool, and Mr. Peel, were no longer in office, there was such a blank formed, as would not justify him in retaining office. He denied that there had been any concert in the resignations. The Earl of Westmoreland said, that it was the invariable practice of public men to decline office when differences of opinion arose between them. He had served his Majesty many and many a year, and no man was more proud of it than he was, while under the guidance of the late Administration; but he resigned office when he could not longer be of any use to his King and country. Lord Melville said, it could not be expected that he was to embark in a new government, without knowing the members of which it was to be composed. It was precisely upon that ground he stood. He estimated highly the talents of his Right Hon. friend, Mr. Cauning, but he confessed he did not think he could form an efficient government, such as the exigency of the country required, if stripped of his old associates. Lords Londonderry and Ellenborough concurred in one common sentiment of un compromising hostility to the Government, as it was then composed. The Earl of Winchelsea said, that no period of the political history since the Revolution of this country, could at all compare with the present era. He con trasted the characters of the ex-ministers with those who retained their places, and those individuals who had succeeded to new appointments; and, with reference to Mr. Canning, he concluded by observing, that consistency in him was never observable. Ambition and the love of place were the pivots of his whole political life. |