injunction for having the money arifing from it paid into the British exchequer; and, at laft, his majefty being indifpofed, received the royal affent by commiffion on the 22d of March 1765. Befides this bill's enacting, that the money arifing from the duties impofed by it, fhould be referved for defraying the charge of protecting the colonies, there paffed another to encourage the importation of all kinds of timber from them; which, confidering how plentiful that article is in moft parts of North America, and the little time neceffary to cut down trees, to what is requifite to raife flax and hemp, might in fome places compenfate the operations of the ftamp-duty, at leaft much more readily than the douceurs allowed in the preceding feffion could counteract the effects of the import and export duties laid on at the fame time. But it feems the colonies were by this time too much foured for the most powerful sweetners to have any falutary effects upon them. Interesting however as the confequences have been, it would be unpardonable in us, after mentioning the king's illness, not to lay afide the thoughts of them and every thing else, till we have confidered thofe of an event, which, independent of that gratitude, to which his majesty's conftant attention to the happinefs of his people fo juftly entitles him, could not but fill their breafts with the greatest anxiety. for their own welfare, confidering the infancy of his majesty's children, and the tempeft expected in North America, the weathering of which might require that difpatch and vigour incompatible with a divided or delegated command. CHA P. IX. King's Speech to parliament propofing a regency bill. Bill thereupon brought into the boufe of lords; fent down to the house of commons in a form no way anfwerable to his majesty's just expectations; mended in the house of comThe lords agree to the amendments. Royal affent given to it. Fourneymen filk-weavers affemble to petition the king and parliament for a total prohibition of foreign filks. Measures taken to quiet them. mons. NXIOUS as the people a king to be deftitute of all domef A might be for his majefly's tic feelings, no fober man would health and life from principles of gratitude and intereft, he appears to have been equally fo for their fafety and welfare, from motives of princely duty and parental affection, joined to that tender concern for his children and family, which, notwithstanding the rants of fome writers who would have ferioufly wish to fee a king want, fince it is by what a monarch feels in his own breast he can alone form any judgment of what his fubjects muft feel in theirs; and, therefore, did he wish them ever fo well, might, without fuch feelings, often mistake the means of making them happy. Till Till the reign of his late majefty, it had been ufual with the kings of England to appoint, by their own mere motion and authority, regents to their dominions, and guardians to their heirs, in cafe of their fucceeding to the crown at an age too feeble to bear the weight of it. But trufts of this kind had been fo often altered by parliament, or abused by the truftees to the difadvantage of their pupils and the people, for want of a legal check upon them, that it now appeared high time to purfue fome middle courfe, in which whatever share of choice the king might part with fhould be made up to him by the ftability of what he retained and the fubjects, at the fame time, indulged with fuch a participation of a truft fo highly concerning them, as might feem their due, in virtue of the late alterations made in the conflitution for their benefit. ; This important end, it is plain, could only be obtained by an act of the legislature, in which the parliament fhould confirm the king's nomination of a regent and guardian, or approve of a certain number of perfons for his majefty to chufe fome one or other of them, whom he might think propereft to truft with fo momentous a charge. And, as his making known his nomination of any one fingle perfon, and fill more that nomination being confirmed by parliament, might create expectations of the prefent king's death injurious to his life, the latter method was thought the most eligible; and it was, accordingly, that purfued on the death of the prince of Wales, father to his present Majefty. It could not be expected, that the late king fhould be more anxious for the fafety and welfare of his grandchildren, and of fubjects amongst whom he was not born, than the prefent, for that of his immediate iffue, and of a people whom he is pleafed to glory in calling his countrymen, and to whom he had given fo many proofs of his really confidering them as fuch. The meafures, therefore, fo wifely pursued in the late reign, could not fail of being adopted in this. Accordingly, as foon as his Majefty's health Apr. 24th, would permit him to 1765. appear abroad, he repaired to parliament, and after mentioning his illness, and the thoughts, with which, though not attended with danger, it had affected him touching the welfare of his children and his people, proposed to their confideration, whether, under the prefent circumftances, it might not be expedient to veft in him the power of appointing, from time to time, by inftruments in writing under his fign manual, the queen or fome other perfon of his royal family ufually refiding in Great-Britain, to be the guardian of any of his children, that might fucceed to the throne before the age of eighteen, and the regent of his kingdoms, until his fucceffor fhould attain that age, fubject to the reftrictions and regulations fpecified in the act made on occafion of his father's death; the regent fo appointed to be affifted by a council, compofed of the feveral perfons, who, by reafon of their dignities and offices, were conflituted members of the council established by that act, together with those whom they might think proper to leave to his majefty's nomination. [D] 4 This This affecting and gracious fpeech having been anfwered, as foon as forms would admit, by a joint addrefs from both houfes, well adapted to exprefs thofe fentiments, which it deferved, and thofe fenfations, which the occafion of it had fo juftly excited, the lords, being the houfe in which it was propereft fuch a bill fhould take its rife, as it did not relate to any tax, and their lordships could befides command the immediate affiftance of the judges, fo neceffary in an affair of that importance, ordered a bill to be brought in, in conformity to his majefty's fpeech; and, when paffed their houfe, fent it to the commons, who, being early apprized of the lords being before-hand with them, in taking up the affair, deferred all confideration of the matter, till they should hear from their lordfhips. One would be apt to imagine, that it being ufual with, if not the bufinefs of, the fervants of the crown to move affairs of this na ture, and the fecretaries of ftate, the most immediate fervants of the crown, being both in the upper houfe, this bill would not only have been brought into that house, but have paffed it likewife in fuch a form, as might do juftice to that wisdom and goodness, manifefted by his majesty on every occafion, in which the happiness of his people was concerned. But fo far from it, no perfon, by this bill, in the form it had paffed the houfe of lords, could be named guardian and regent except the queen, or fome one perfon of the royal family defcended from the late king, whofe ufual refidence, at the time of paffing this act, fhould have been, and from thenceforth until fuch nomination, fhould continue to be in Great-Britain;` nor any of his Majefty's family appointed of the council of regency, along with the great officers of ftate, except his Majesty's brothers, and his uncle the duke of Cumberland: nor any perfon permitted to be named by his majefty to fucceed them in case of death, that was not a natural born fubject of the realm: by which claufes, the princess of Wales was not only fet afide as guardian or regent, but even, as not being born in the British dominions, though naturalized by act of parliament, utterly excluded from the council of regency, though next to the queen the must be allowed the perfon, whom it was moit natural for his majefty to wish invested with thefe trufts, as one to whom, next to their own mother, the lives and fafety of his children could not fail of being dearest ; not to mention her inability to fucceed to the throne, and which, therefore, in lefs virtuous times, and in a lefs virtuous family than the prefent royal family of GreatBritain, might be an equal motive to the naming of her. Notwithstanding thefe facrifices made of his majefty's most tender feelings, the bill fent down by the houfe of lords had fcarcely been read in the houfe of commons, when a motion was made to addrefs his majely, that, out of his tender and paternal regard for his people, he would be graciously pleased to name the perfon or perfons, whom in his royal wifdom he fhould think fit to propofe to the confideration of parliament for the execution of the high trufts of guardians and re genta gent, the houfe apprehending it not warranted by precedent, nor agreeable to the principles of the free conftitution of Great-Britain, to veft fuch trufts in any perfon or perfons, not particularly named and approved of in parlia ment. ac greatly injured by the too free ufe of French and other wrought filks, affembled by beat of drum, with their wives and children, to the amount of many thousands, in Spital fields, and Moor-fields, in order to petition for redrefs by a total prohibition of that article ; Not only this motion, as placing and from thence, directed by the affair in a very wrong light, leaders, and arrayed under fuch paffed in the negative by a very colours as might not only congreat majority; but, as it were tribute to keep them together, to make his majesty's family fome but remind themselves and amends for the many infults of quaint the public with the fupfered to it by one, who had be- pofed caufes of that diftrefs, which longed to that houfe, and by many their pallid looks and emaciatof the unthinking people repre- ed carcafes made fufficiently evifented by it, the princefs dowager dent, marched feveral ways, fome of Wales was named next after through the city, others through the queen as one of the perfons, St. George's-fields, and a third whom his majefty might appoint party through Holborn and St. to the guardianship of his fuc- Giles's, or the new north road ceffors under age, and to the made between the east and weft regency of his realms. This, ends of the town, to St. James's however, did not pafs without and Weftminfter-fall; and not fuch a debate, as rendered it im- only furrounded the palace and proper to infift upon any further the two houses of parliament, amendment; fo that, whatever de- but by their numbers, in fome fire the friends of the royal family measure, obftructed the commumight have to fecure to the prin- nication between them. They even cefs of Wales a feat in the coun- flopt feveral of the members in cil of regency, or at least a door their chairs and coaches; and, to it, they thought it moft, expe- though it was only to befeech them dient not to propofe it at prefent. in the humbleft terms to pity their The bill therefore, without any wretched condition, fo unusual a other amendment, was returned ftep, confidering the reports fpread to the house of lords; and that of the weavers of the inland towns amendment being approved by and their dependents in trade comtheir lordships, received the roying up to join their diftreffed breal affent on the 15th of May 1755. Whilft this important affair was under the confideration of the legislature, the journeymen filk weavers of London, re-inforced by thofe of all the other trades more immediately depending upon that branch, conceiving themfelves thren in Locdon, could not fail of creating the moft alarming apprehenfions for the public tranquillity. For had this once happened, or had thefe afflicted members, inftead of feeking redrefs from the head, taken upon them to redrefs themfelves, there is no telling how far the flame might have fpread, or or what ravages it might have made before it could be extinguish ed. But, providentially, their rage, which was prevented from breaking out into greater outrages by a mild yet fteady exertion of the civil power, affifted by the military, as part of that conftitutional force, called the poffe comitatus, after spending itself in befetting the house of a nobleman fufpected of favouring the wear of French goods, and of having de livered his fentiments concerning them with uncommon harfhnefs, and in breaking the windows of fome houfes accused of felling French filks, was finally appeafed, without further mifchief, by a feafonable fubfcription for their prefent relief, and an affociation amongst the principal filk mercers to recall all the orders they had given for foreign manufactures. CHA P. X. Impreffions to the difadvantage of the ministry made on the mind of the K. by the events recorded in the preceding chapters. Their impolitic conduct on the occafion. Difficulty in replacing them. New miniftry recommended by the D. of C. Lord chief juftice Pratt created a peer. Objections to the new miniftry. They are feverely glanced at in an addrefs of the city of London. Duke of Cumberland's Death. His character. their zeal for the honour of the royal family was greatly abated, or that perfonal refentment had a greater thare in their proceedings against the above injurious paper than difinterested loyalty; fo, on the other hand, it was impoffible, that, in the course of the debates in council occafioned by the alarming commotions amongít the journeymen filk weavers, it should not appear, that whatever they themfelves might take to be the caufes of their diftrefs, it was more owing to a want of the ufual call for the work of their looms from the British colonies, on account of the late injudicious reftraints and taxes laid on colony trade, than any extraordinary importation of French or other foreign filks. the |