1707.

is a manifest presumption, and usurpation of the BOOK V rights of succeeding generations, for any assembly of persons, however constituted, to pretend to fix bounds and limits to the exercise of their discretion. The bill, quickly passing through both houses, received in a short time the royal

assent.

ment.

On the 4th of Feb. 1707, the house of commons, Articles of in a grand committee, took into consideration the ratified by the English articles of the union as ratified by the Scottish par- Parlia liament. The propositions were severally gone through, and successively approved, in a space of time too short to admit of very minute discussion ; and on the 15th of the same month they were submitted to the lords. Many objections were suggested by, the earls of Rochester, Nottingham, Anglesey, &c. but overruled-and a bill for ratifying the same was prepared by sir Simon Harcourt, the solicitor general, and so modelled as, by a very singular effort of political dexterity, to preclude any revival of the debate; which the tories hoped and expected to resume, as the bill proceeded through its several stages, at more leisure and with greater effect. For it was so contrived, that the articles of the treaty as finally approved and ratified, together with the bills for securing the two national church establishments, should be recited in the preamble of the act, and the whole converted into a law by a single enact

BOOK V. ing clause. The tories being thus reduced to the 1707. necessity of combating the general clause, and

tion.

that alone, the recital being merely matter of fact, the act passed triumphantly and with great facility through both houses, and immediately received the royal assent-the queen making upon the occasion a speech, in which she declared it to be her peculiar happiness, that an object had been accomplished in her reign, which in the course of above 100 years had been so repeatedly attempted in vain. When the question of the union was about to come under the consideration of Proceed the English parliament, a committee was named ings of the convoca- by the lower house of convocation to consider the present danger of the church: but in order to prevent an interference so subversive of the public welfare and repose, a prorogation immediately took place; and the queen now, by advice of her present whig ministers, determined, after the example of her great predecessor, to discontinue the sittings of this restless and factious assembly: and during the remainder of this and the whole period of the next parliament the convocation was prorogued from time to time, and not suffered to enter upon business. But they vented their spleen by rancorous invectives against the whig and low church party, to which denomination they were sarcastically said to be well entitled, from the low condition to which they were desirous to reduce the church.

union cele

great re

The parliament was prorogued on the 30th of BOOK V. April; and on the succeeding day, agreeably to 1707. the union act, the two nations of England and Scotland were indissolubly incorporated into one Act of kingdom-ever afterwards to be known by the brated with appellation of GREAT BRITAIN. On this occa-joicings. sion, congratulatory addresses were sent up from all parts of England; and the 1st of May was celebrated by a public thanksgiving in all the churches. But Scotland observed a sullen and Scotland indignant and expressive silence; and the day was kept in many resentful. parts of that kingdom as a day of fasting and humiliation, indicating the idea entertained of the union with England, as a judgment inflicted upon them by Divine Providence. While the parliament was yet sitting, the duke of Queensberry set out from Edinburgh for London with a great equipage. "I had," says an intelligent member of the late Scottish legislature, sir John Clerk," an invitation from him to attend him to London in one of his coaches; which I accepted of. I can therefore bear testimony that he was quite otherwise treated in England than he had been in Scotland. Here he had many times been in peril of his life from an unruly mob, that had been instigated against the union and its wellwishers; whereas in England he was every where caressed and received with great acclamations of joy. At Berwick, Newcastle, Durham, and other

1707.

BOOK V. cities, as he passed, he was waited on and complimented by the chief magistrates. Every where the people, running together, testified their joy on the happy event in which he had been so instrumental. All the Scots in his retinue were likewise treated with the utmost civilities; so that all of us had the greatest reason imaginable to expect success in the transaction we had just come from finishing. At Barnet, Highgate, and other places within twenty miles of London, all the queen's ministers, all the peers and commons of parliament, waited upon him in their coaches; so that I am persuaded there, never was so great and joyful a concourse of people seen since the entry of king James the VIth, of Scotland, on the union of the crowns*."

Intrigues

at Court.

Various promotions took place at this period. The marquis of Montrose and the earl of Roxburgh were created dukes in Scotland; lord Cowper was declared lord high chancellor ; the earl of Stamford, first lord of trade, &c. But by far Dismission the most remarkable change had been made in Charles the course of the session by the dismission of sir Hedges. Charles Hedges, secretary of state, and the transfer of the seals to the earl of Sunderland, who had lately succeeded to that title on the death of

of Sir

*Sir JOHN CLERK'S MSS. Vide SOMERVILLE's History of Queer Ame, 4th Appendix, p. 295.

1707.

his father, and who was nearly allied to the duke BOOK V. of Marlborough by marriage with his second daughter. This promotion seemed very favorable to the interest and influence of the whigs, by whom it was earnestly desired; but it proved in reality far otherwise. The queen parted with sir Charles Hedges, for whom she entertained a great esteem, with extreme reluctance, and not till after much importunate solicitation; and she retained a permanent resentment of the force and constraint which she acted under upon this occasion. In the month of October the duke of Marlborough had written to the duchess to urge this matter upon the queen; which she had the folly and indiscretion to do in a style of singular insolence. She pretended that the lords Godolphin and Marlborough would, in consequence of the queen's partiality to the tories, be under the necessity of leaving her service. "You will then," said the duchess, "find yourself in the hands of a violent party, who, I am sure, will have very little mercy, or even humanity, for you: whereas you ought to prevent all these misfortunes by giving my lord treasurer and my lord Marlborough, whom you may so safely trust, leave to propose those things to you which they know and can judge to be absolutely necessary your service."

for

About this period a new favorite had arisen in