respect to the right hon. gentleman alluded to, I believe no man to have excelled him in public and private virtues, in acuteness of intellect or mildness of temper: but however I may respect or esteem the virtues of an individual, it does not follow that I am to consider him a fit man to be placed at the bead of a Government. I highly respect and esteem my noble friend (Lord Liverpool), for so I must still call him, but it does not follow from that that I am bound to consider him as a fit man to be placed at the head of the Government. An intimate knowledge of the virtues of the right hon. gentleman before alluded to, could only be gained by a long acquaintance. I had little personal acquaintance with him, but so far as I could judge, I highly respected his virtues; and I consider the act which deprived him of existence as a stain upon humanity. The purity of his character has thrown the lustre of martyrdom around his memory; but with all that respect for his virtues and the excellence of his character, I feel it my duty to say, that I did not consider him as a fit man to lead the Councils of this great empire.-I will now proceed to another part of the noble earl's speech, in which he asserted that I had never expressed any difference of opinion from the rest of the Cabinet. It is true that I might continue to act in unison with the other Members on particular points; I might approve of their conduct partially; but because I did not dissent from them on every question, is it to be presumed that my sentiments on all subjects, however great and im- ' portant, were in perfect coincidence? The noble lord says that I never disagreed; and his statement, as compared with my conduct, puts me in mind of a certain counsellor in India, who, in any remonstrance he made, was never supposed to be in earnest until he threw an inkstand at the head of the Governor-General-(laughter.) In the Cabinet I certainly never went so far; I always endeavoured to act, as far as I could, with perfect cordiality; but I did imagine, until now, that I had shewn sufficient ill-humour to convince my coadjutors of the opinions I entertained. I approved of many of their measures, but if I were wrong in so doing, I can only say, that if, upon the same terms, we should ever meet again, I will endeavour to correct my error (laughter.) There yet remains another charge to be repelled, I mean the publication of the correspondence which passed during the negociation which I was employed to conduct. I may, perhaps, have been blameable in VOL. III.-1812.

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allowing it, but if I have erred, I have erred from habit; for it is a very ordinary practice to satisfy the public by authentic information, upon a subject to which they look with the most painful anxiety. I am not aware that in the letters which were written on either side, there was one word that ought to be concealed. I protest most solemnly, that I thought I was acting in a way best calculated to secure the characters of the noble lord and myself. But further I am accused of not publishing, of the same day, the explanatory letter transmitted to me by the noble earl (Liverpool), and which he, for good reasons, no doubt, begged that I would not answer. I was desired, however, to annex it to the correspondence, and how was it possible for me to imagine that it was not to share the general fate? There might be some cause of complaint if I had not published it at all, but it was not published on the same day. I own most honestly that I really thought the explanation wholly extraneous: as a friend of mine expressed it in another place, I believed it to be entirely of a controversial nature, and if it did not accompany the other documents, I was of opinion that it ought never to have appeared at all. It has been maintained, however, that the want of a knowledge of this letter had occasioned a very disagreeable vote in another place. This, however, is by no means the fact, for the friends of the noble earl took care to remedy the evil, by printing it several hours before the discussion which ended in this disagreeable vote commenced: it was printed too without any reply to it; and here I think I have a right to charge the noble earl (Liverpool) with something like unfair. ness (Hear, hear!) I protest to God, that so far from thinking that I had acted unkindly, I imagined that, by forbearing to publish his explanatory epistle, I did him a favour; and I unfeignedly believe that his friend who caused its promulgation, did the noble earl a most essential injury. The complaint is to be made not against me who withheld it, but against him who published it—(Hear, hear!) These, however, my Lords, are quite trivial considerations, and Í am ashamed that the noble ear] (Harrowby) felt himself reduced to the necessity of going into the detail of such insignificant points. The House will judge upon the whole case whether every circumstance stated and relied upon by the other side does not in the strongest manner confirm the positions which alone entitled me to address your lordships, that obstacles had been opposed by the noble earl to the

establishment of an Administration, and that these obstacles had originated in feelings of a personal nature."(Hear, hear!)

The Earl of Harrowby-" I confess that the publication first alluded to by the noble marquis, regarding the war in the Peninsula, did leave a heavy weight upon my mind, from which I am happy that by his explanation I am now relieved; but if, indeed, it were so extremely unpleasant to his feelings that it should go forth into the country, I should have imagined that I should have seen in the paper immediately succeeding, a complete disavowal that it had been printed under the authority and with the approbation of the noble marquis."

- Marquis Wellesley-"I beg to declare most positively and solemnly, that I knew nothing of the publication until it was shewn me by my friend in the newspaper in which it was contained."

Earl Grey-" In the greater portion of this interesting discussion having no concern, I should not have interfered but for one circumstance. The noble marquis has acted with his usual manliness in coming forward, not to explain, but to re-assert with justifiable distinctness, the expressions he employed on a former occasion(Hear, hear!) The statement he has made in confirmation carried conviction to my mind, and I believe to that of the House (Hear, hear!)-that the words were not used inadvertently; and if I had entertained a hope that they were unfounded, the speech of the noble earl (Harrowby) would have completely disappointed it; for although in the first instance he indig nantly pleaded not guilty to the charge of personal animosity, he occupied nearly the whole of his address, not in a denial of its existence, but in a statement of language and reasoning in justification of the feeling which operated upon him and his friends in rejecting the proposal made by the noble marquis. I admit that it is painful to be convinced that personal animosity, in times like these, can be found to agitatate any bosom; but I am gratified at the proceeding we have this night witnessed, because it has given my noble friend an opportunity of giving an explanation regarding the publication of a certain paper, which has relieved him from the charge of impropriety, and it has besides removed from the mind of the noble earl opposite a most oppressive burden. No allusion having been made to my conduct, or to that of my friends, during these transactionsy I should

not now have risen to trouble the House, were it not for a remark that dropped from the noble earl (Harrowby), towards the conclusion of his speech. He stated, that in consequence of the vote of the House of Commons, declaring them inefficient, his noble friends had deemed it proper to resign the situations which they then occupied, and to which they are now restored. In my judgment they acted rightly and constitutionally in so doing, and if this conduct had been different they would have set an example that might have been fatal to the practice of the Constitution. But it now appears that they are re-placed in those offices, and having before thought it their duty to withdraw, they now feel it equally their duty to resume situations from which they had been driven by a vote of the House of Commons, which declared them incapable of conducting the affairs of the nation. They had now, however, retaken their seats, that the Government may not fall into the hands of persons of whose principles and measures, according to their assertion, the country universally disapproves. It may perhaps be necessary that I should enter more at large into the reasons which governed my conduct, and as a key and explanation to them, I beg to state, that the attempts made to form an Administration, as far as we were included, were made upon the following terms:-That we should be morally certain that the principles which we have maintained and acted upon through life would be over-ruled in the Cabinet (Hear, hear, hear!) I had a strong suspicion (and I will fairly confess that the existence of such a feeling as suspicion did operate upon my mind, with regard to the proposal made) of that which has now been distinctly and unequivocally granted, either that we were not to be admitted into the Cabinet at all, or that we were to be bound down in such a manner that the public.should have security that the principles and measures to which, during our own parliamentary existence, we have been pledged, should be decidedly over-ruled. Was this, I appeal to the House, I appeal to the Country, a fit, a decent proposal for us to accept? (Hear, hear, hear!) What is there in my conduct, what is there in my life, which should induce even a momentary belief that I would consent to degrade myself into an instrument, a tool, to accomplish the designs of others? (Hear, hear!) Was it really believed that I would now support measures I have strenuously and uniformly condemned? Shall I permit myself for an instant

to indulge the idea, that any man could dare to hope that, for the despicable emoluments of office, I would barter the principles that have actuated my life, or that I would now at once abandon those measures which, in my opinion (formed after no little labour and experience) are essential to the salvation of the state?-Hear, hear!) My Lords, I wish to make no lofty pretensions to disinterestedness: I ask for nothing but what I have a right to claim: my life is before my country, and my countrymen shall be my judges→ (Hear, hear, hear!) But I am aware that I have a duty to perform to my friends, and a duty to discharge to my country; to those friends to whose steady and honourable attachment I owe so much, and to that country whose misfortunes and whose miseries I so deeply deplore. There is

no man more anxious than myself, as far as is consistent with my honour, to outstretch a feeble but a ready hand to save the sinking nation; whenever my humble services are called for, there is no danger that shall appal me, no difficulty from which I shall shrink-(Hear, hear, hear!) Give me leave, however, my Lords, to remark, that I stand in a situation in which I am justified in saying, that unless I am called to Government consistently with the principles I have throughout professed; unless I am allowed to recommend and support measures in the Cabinet that I have recommended and supported in the House; unless I can still act with that honour it has been my pride hitherto to maintain, there is no extremity of poverty which I would not embrace with chearfulness, and no accumulation of misery that I would not endure with resignation, rather than consent, by the abandonment of character, to lose that by which dignity and wealth should ever be accompanied—(Hear, hear!) For myself, my Lords, I will never become one of any Government, unless I have complete security and assurance that the principles I have professed shall be fully and fairly discussed, and the measures adopted, and with these sentiments I have now little prospect of being called to the Councils of my Sovereign. I would rather at any time enjoy mental tranquillity than personal ease, and resting on the bosom of my country, I shall pity her sorrows, and lament that I am not permitted to attempt their relief(Hear, hear!) I lamented in the speech of the noble earl opposite (Harrowby) to witness a spirit which in these distressful times cannot be too much deprecated, and which was far from the mode in which it has been met on this side