was brought from Newgate, where he was now lying, and examined at the bar of the house. Burnet says, "Their enemies tried again what use could be made of Kydd's business, for he was taken in our northern plantations in America and brought over. He was examined by the house; but either he could not lay a probable story together, or remnants of honesty, raised in him by the near prospect of death, restrained him. He accused no person of having advised or encouraged his turning pirate; he had never talked alone with any of the lords, and never at all with lord Somers; he said he had no orders from them but to pursue his voyage against the pirates in Madagascar. All endeavours were used to persuade him to accuse the lords. He was assured that, if he did it, he should be preserved, and, if he did not, he should certainly die for his piracy. Yet this did not prevail on him to charge them; so he, with some of his crew, were hanged, there appearing not so much as a colour to fasten any imputation on those lords." miserable with the prospects on the continent and his fastfailing health. The commons now determined to impeach Portland and Somers on the ground of their concern in the second partition treaty, contrary to the constitutional usages of the country. They passed a resolution that "William earl of Portland, by negotiating and concluding the treaty of partition, which was destructive to the trade of this kingdom and dangerous to the peace of Europe, was guilty of a high crime and misdemeanour." They ordered Sir John Leveson Gower to impeach him at the bar of the lords, and named a committee to prepare the articles against him. They then demanded a conference with the lords, and desired them to communicate the particulars of what had passed before them between the earl of Portland and secretary Vernon, as well as what information they had obtained in regard to the treaties of partition of the Spanish monarchy. To this demand the lords demurred, and, returning no answer for six days, the commons applied to his majesty for copies of the treaty of the grand alliance, of the treaties of partition, and of the powers granted for negotiating these treaties. The copies were accordingly furnished by the king; but secretary Vernon informed the house that there were no instructions in writing. On this the commons had another conference with the lords, and they then received, through Sheffield, marquis of Normanby, and afterwards duke of Buckingham, two papers in Latin, the first containing full powers granted at Loo, July 1st, 1690, to the earls of Portland and Jersey to treat with France, Holland, and Germany for peace, but containing nothing regarding the Spanish succession; the second, dated at Kensington, January 2nd, 1690-1700, with full powers to sign the second treaty of partition. Normanby also handed to them a paper contain-made him prefer death to the baseness of accusing honouring the following statement made in writing by the earl of Portland, when charged by them with acting in this negotiation. It was not, however, signed by him :-" At the beginning of the summer, '99, when I was in Holland at my country house, and when the king would have me be concerned in the negotiating of this treaty with the emperor, the French king and the States, being very unwilling to meddle with business again, from which I was retired, before I would engage myself I would advise with my friends in Holland, and writ into England to the secretary Vernon, as my particular friend, whether it was advisable for me to engage in any business again. To which Mr. Vernon answered in substance that it would not engage me but for a little while; that I, being upon the place and generally acquainted with the foreign ministers, it would be easier for the king, and properer for me to be employed in it than anybody else that must be otherwise sent for on purpose." These and some other memorandums were ordered to be translated and laid before a committee, and, on examining these, the animus of the commons against Portland and Somers became glaringly apparent. Though it was shown that the earl of Jersey, Mr. Vernon, and Sir Joseph Williamson had been equally concerned in the management of the treaty-Williamson having actually signed it yet these persons were carefully passed over, and the whole vial of wrath poured on the heads of Portland, Somers, Orford, and Halifax, the two latter being added to the accused. To procure fresh matter against them, the pirate, captain Kydd, These lords and others, it will be recollected, had, at their own expense, sent out Kydd to put down the pirates, and when he had betrayed them, any treasure found on him or his ship was ordered to be paid over to them to reimburse them. This, too, was seized on as a crime, and contrary to the constitution, but it would not stand in law; and so far from attaching blame to them, the highest legal authorities declared that it was quite proper, and that their whole conduct in that business had been highly patriotic and meritorious. The conduct of Kydd also showed that though the fascination of a roving sea life had led him astray, as it had done the buccaneers, yet, like them, amid much crime, there was a fine, honest nature in the man, which able men. So vindictively, however, did the commons adhere to this attempt to implicate such men as Portland and Somers in piracy and lawless plunder, that the matter was not dismissed until it had been four times debated, and then only by a small majority. They then turned to a more legitimate argument. In consenting to act in a negotiation with foreign powers unknown to the cabinet, though known to several members of it, and though commanded by the king, they had fairly incurred the censure of parliament, as they had clearly sinned against the constitution. On this head they now resolved to impeach them, and on this ground alone they ought to have stood. Somers, in affixing the great seal to a carte blanche for the king to fill up in treaty with France and Holland as they might agree, and that only at the command of the king, had certainly committed a serious offence. The moment that he heard that the question of his impeachment was mooted in the commons, he desired to be heard at their bar. He was admitted, and stated in self-defence that when he received the king's letter with the order to send over the necessary powers with all secresy and despatch, he did not think he was authorised to put a stop by his refusal to a treaty of so much consequence, the life of the king of Spain hanging, as it were, by a thread; for had the king died before the treaty was finished, then he should have been blamed for defeating the treaty. That he considered the king's letter to be really a warrant ; nevertheless, he had objected to various particulars, and proposed others which A.D. 1701.] PETITION OF THE MEN OF KENT. he deemed more for the good of the country. That he thought himself bound to put the great seal to the treaty when finished; that he had acted as a privy councillor to the best of his judgment; and discharged his duty as lord chancellor as seemed to him most faithfully. He then withdrew, but returned, and begged to leave with the house a copy of a letter which he had received from the king and his answer, and this he said he was authorised to do by his majesty. The statement of Somers seems to have excited a violent debate in the house, though the particulars of it have not come down to us, and very different reports have been made as to its effect on the members. Burnet says that nothing could be more convincing and successful; on the contrary, lord Dartmouth, who was equally hostile to the king and the whigs, commenting on Burnet's statement, says, "I was in the house of commons during the whole debate. What the bishop says of lord Somers making an impression in his favour is so far from true, that I never saw that house in so great a flame as they were upon his withdrawing. He justified his putting the great seal to a blank so poorly, and insisted that the king's letter, which he produced, was a good warrant, which everybody knew to be none-nor did the contents sufficiently justify him if it had been any-and his endeavour to throw everything upon the king, provoked them to such a degree, that he left them in a much worse disposition than he found them; and I have heard many of his best friends say they heartily wished he had never come thither." There seems to be great truth in these remarks. We have seen that Somers endeavoured to get Vernon to issue a warrant for the affixing the seal to the carte blanche, but Vernon would not. Somers, therefore, showed that he knew very well that the king's command was not a warrant of itself, yet he took the responsibility of affixing the seal; and now to produce the king's letter and plead his command, certainly was an attempt to excuse himself at the expense of the king. This, however, has been so regularly the practice of facile or corrupt ministers, that the plea has been taken from them by the maxim that "the king can do no wrong," leaving the responsibility of yielding to illegal demands from the monarch on the ministers in all cases. From Somers, however, we have been led to expect better things, but, however just and honourable in general, this case sufficiently testifies that he was not one of those truly great characters, who are ready to sacrifice place rather than consent to an unconstitutional demand from the monarch. The commons, evidently, were of the same sentiment, for when he had withdrawn, amid that flame of excitement which lord Dartmouth mentions, a resolution was moved and carried, "That John lord Somers, by advising his majesty in 1699 to the treaty for dividing the Spanish monarchy, whereby large territories of the king of Spain's dominions were to be delivered up to France, is guilty of a high crime and Similar resolutions were next carried against the lords Orford and Halifax, whom it was resolved to impeach at the bar of the house of lords. An address was also carried, praying his majesty to remove from his council and presence for ever Somers, Portland, Orford, and Halifax, and that without a division. There was, however, misdemeanour." 153 instantly a counter address moved in the house of lords, and carried by a majority of twenty, that his majesty would be pleased not to pass any censure on these noblemen until they had been tried by their peers according to the law of the land. The king replied to the address of the commons by assuring them that he would employ none in his service but such as he thought most likely to increase the confidence betwixt him and his people; but when the counter address was presented from the lords, confounded by the conflicting prayers, he remained silent, but allowed the names of the accused lords to remain in the council-book. The commons appear to have carried their object, that of branding the characters of these ministers, for they took no active steps to carry out the resolutions of impeachment. On the 5th of May the house of lords sent a message to the commons, reminding them that no articles had yet been exhibited by them against the noblemen whom they had impeached. The commons immediately drew up a charge against the earl of Orford, accusing him of having received enormous grants from the crown; of having been connected with the pirate Kydd in his lawless enterprise; of having committed gross abuses in managing and victualling the fleet whilst it lay on the coast of Spain; and finally, of having advised the partition treaty. The earl defended himself in the lords by stating that the only grant he had received from the crown was a very distant reversion, and ten thousand pounds after his defeat of the French fleet at La Hogue; that in Kydd's affair he had done nothing illegal, but had acted at his own cost and heavy loss for the benefit of the country; that his accounts for the fleet hal been examined and passed, yet he was ready to waive any advantage on that score, and answer any charge brought against him; that as to the partition treaty, he denied having advised on the subject at all. No immediate replication was made to these statements by the commons. king adjourned parliament, and on its reassembling, secretary Hedges informed the house that the States-General were resolved not to take any steps in the negotiation with France, without the concurrence of his majesty, and returned him their hearty thanks for the assistance promised in case of their being attacked by France. The The commons voted an additional aid to support this charge of three shillings in the pound as a tax on land; but at the same time they laid their hands on various sums which the court was treating quietly as its own. The fifty thousand pounds a year allotted as dowry to the queen of James II. not being paid, they claimed, as well as thirty thousand pounds a year fallen in by the death of Catherine, the queen of Charles II., and twenty thousand pounds a year by the death of the duke of Gloucester, and passed a resolution that this sum of one hundred thousand pounds a year should be appropriated to assist in defraying the public debt. This was extremely mortifying to the court, and many of the whigs, who were now anxious to win favour and regain power, voted against it, but in vain; the resolution was carried by two hundred and fourteen to one hundred and sixty-nine. At this juncture the men of Kent manifested their old public spirit by sending in a petition, praying the house to endeavour to rise above their party squabbles, and to com bine for the furtherance of the public business. The whole community were beginning to grow disgusted with the dissensions, which had evidently more of party rancour than patriotism at their bottom. This petition had been got up and signed by grand jurors, magistrates, and freeholders of the county assembled at Maidstone, and confided to Sir Thomas Hales, one of their members. But Sir Thomas, on looking over it, was so much alarmed, that he handed it to the other member, Mr. Meredith. Meredith, in his turn, was so impressed with the hazardous nature of the petition, that, on presenting it, he informed the house that some of the supporters of it, five gentlemen of fortune and distinction, were in the lobby and ready to attest their signatures. They were called in accordingly, and owned their signatures, when they were ordered to withdraw, and the petition was read. It concluded by saying, "that the experience of all ages made it manifest that no nation can be great or happy without union. We hope that no pretence whatever shall be able to create a misunderstanding amongst ourselves, or the least distrust of his most sacred majesty, whose great actions for this nation are writ in the hearts of his subjects, and can never, without the blackest ingratitude, be forgot. We most humbly implore this honourable house to have regard to the voice of the people, that our religion and safety may be effectually provided for, that your addresses may be turned into bills of supply, and that his most sacred majesty, whose propitious and unblemished reign over us we pray God long to continue, may be able powerfully to assist his allies before it is too late." In proportion to the excellence of the advice was the indignation with which it was received by the angry com mons. When men are conscious that they are acting from private motives of no very respectable kind under the mask of patriotism, the discovery that they are seen through invariably exasperates them. Accordingly, the house was furious at this very seasonable petition. Some of the members went out to the petitioners, and called upon them to make a proper submission to the affronted house; but they stoutly refused, contending that they had only done their duty; whereupon the house voted that the petition was scandalous, insolent, seditious, and tending to the destruction of the constitution; and they ordered the sergeant-at-arms to take the petitioners into custody. But the stout men of Kent were not secured without a vigorous resistance. They were then sent to the Gate-House; but their treatment only damaged the commons, for the public were greatly of the same opinion. Similar petitions were soon preparing in different quarters, and these gentlemen were much visited in their confinement, which continued till the prorogation. It was, moreover, much questioned whether the commons had not greatly outstripped their real authority, and infringed the statute of the 13th of Charles II., which guarantees the right of petition. These angry proceedings were again interrupted by a message from the king, laying before them the critical state of Holland from the unprincipled encroachments of France. He accompanied them with a letter from the States-General, which detailed the French conduct, and then most earnestly implored the assistance of England. They relied, they said, on the treaty made with Charles II., in 1678, and they added "We will tell you, sir, in what condition France puts itself, and your majesty will judge by that if our fear, which reanimates our demand, be ill-founded. France, not contented with having taken possession of all the places in the Netherlands that remain to Spain, has thrown into them, and causes actually every day formidable forces to march thither. They draw a line from the Scheldt, near Antwerp, to the Meuse; they are going to draw such a line, according to our advices, from Antwerp to Ostend; they send a numerous artillery into the places that are nearest to our frontier; they make with great diligence many magazines in Flanders, in Brabant, in Guelderland, and at Namur, which they fill with all sorts of ammunition for war and subsistence, besides the great stores for forage which they gather from all parts. They build forts under the cannon of our places; they have worked, and work still continually, to draw the princes that are our friends from our interests, to make them enter int their alliance, or to engage them to a neutrality at least. In short, by intrigues and divisions in the empire, they make our friends useless, and increase those of France. Thus we are almost surrounded on all sides, except on the side of the The last observation was meant to imply how completely the Dutch depended on the assistance from England which had been given so preeminently in the last war. But they did not content themselves with implying; they made the most direct and earnest appeals for it. They declared tha: they were worse off than when in a state of war, because then they could take measures to hinder these attempts They declared that they were compelled to cut their dykes and overflow their country for protection; and they looked forward with deep alarm to the approaching summer. This piteous appeal was confirmed by Mr. Stanhope, the English ambassador at the Hague. He complained of the double-dealing of D'Avaux, the French ambassador-extraordinary, and of the numbers of French troops pouring into the Netherlands, and of the transport of vast quantities of cannon, mortars, bombs, and ammunition which were advanced towards the frontiers. It was clear that France, which had always been the restless disturber of Europe, could not long remain quiet. It was not enough that it had obtained the long-desired dominion of Spain and all its dependencies; that acquisition only the more inspired it with the desire to domineer over every people within its reach. To William's great relief the commons, who, how ever averse to a continental war, were bound by treaties to support Holland, from which they could not at such a juncture recede with honour, took into consideration the papers and messages sent down to them by the king, and resolved to enable him to assist his allies in maintaining the liberties of Europe, and to provide the succours demanded by the States-General. On the heels of this resolution the emperor's ambassador, count Wratislaw, announced to the king his imperial master's determination to assert his rights to Spain and its dependencies in opposition to France. He stated that he was quite aware of the formidable nature of the attempt, but he relied on the support of the kings and princes who had entered into the late confederacy, and first and foremost on the king of England. He assumed that the old confederacy was still in force, and that all the parties A.D. 1701.] THE "LEGION" MEMORIAL. 155 to it were bound to furnish their stipulated quotas of men our treaties, unkind to our confederates, dishonourable to and money, though the treaty of Ryswick and the two par- the English nation, and negligent of the safety of both tition treaties had virtually dissolved and superseded that our neighbours and ourselves. Addressing the king to discompact. All parties were still looking to England to sacri- place his friends on base surmises, before the legal trial or fice herself for their particular interests, and the tone of the any article proven, which it pronounced illegal, contrary to house of lords was of a kind to encourage this expectation. the course of law, and putting execution before judgment. They sent to William an address, assuring him that they Delaying proceedings on impeachments to blast the reputafelt deeply the imminent danger of the States-General; that tions of the accused without proving the charges, which is they regarded the interests of England and Holland as illegal, oppressive, destructive to the liberties of Englishmen, inseparable, and they prayed the king to renew all his and a reproach to parliaments. In the same strain it treaties with his old allies, including the emperor of Ger- criticised the attacks on the king's person, especially those many, and expressed their confidence that his subjects of that "impudent rascal John Howe," who had said openly would second his efforts in so righteous a cause as the that his majesty had made a felonious treaty. Insinuating defence of the liberties of Europe, with their property and that the partition treaty was a combination to rob the king their lives. They did not, however, conceal from him that of Spain, when it was quite as just as to blow up one man's they held him bound rather by treaties into which he had been house to save that of his neighbour. The commons were led by fatal counsels, than by natural claims upon England admonished to mend their ways, as shown to them in the had those treaties been kept clear of. William, notwith-memorial, on pain of incurring the resentment of an injured standing this bitter drop in the cup of encouragement, nation; and the document concluded thus, "for Englishmen thanked them for their address, assuring them that was a are no more to be slaves to parliament than to kings-our policy which would raise England to the pitch of national name is Legion, and we are many." honour. The tory party in the commons then returned to their prosecutions of the late whig ministers; but on the very day that the lords carried their martial address to the king at Kensington, Harley, the speaker of the commons, received a packet from the hands of a poor woman as he entered the house. Such an incident could not take place now, the commons having protected themselves from such irregular missives by making it necessary that all petitions should have the names of the places, as well as the persons whence they came, clearly stated, and be confided to the care of a member in good time for him to note its character and contents. This, however, turned out to be no petition, but a command. "The enclosed memorial," it was stated in a letter accompanying, "you are charged with in behalf of many thousands of the good people of England. There is neither popish, Jacobite, seditious, court, or party interest concerned in it, but honesty and truth. You are commanded by two hundred thousand Englishmen to deliver it to the house of commons, and to inform them that it is no banter, but serious truth, and a serious regard to it is expected. Nothing but justice and their duty is required; and it is required by them who have both a right to require and power to compel it—namely, the people of England. We could have come to the house strong enough to oblige you to hear us, but we have avoided any tumults, not desiring to embroil, but to serve our native country. If you refuse to communicate it to them, you will find cause in a short time to repent it." This strange memorial was signed LEGION, and charged the house with unwarrantable practices under fifteen heads. A new claim of right was arranged under seven heads. Amongst the reprehensible proceedings of the commons were stated to be, voting the partition treaty fatal to Europe, because it gave too much of the Spanish dominions to the French, and not concerning themselves to prevent them taking possession of them all. Deserting the Dutch when the French were almost at their doors, and till it was almost too late to help them, it declared to be unjust to No sooner was this paper read, than the blustering commons were filled with consternation. They summoned all the members of the house by the sergeant-at-arms; anticipations of sedition and tumult were expressed, and an address to his majesty was drawn up in all haste, calling on him to take measures for the public peace. Howe, one of the noisiest men in the house, and accustomed to say very bold things, and other tory members, declared their lives in danger; others got away into the country, believing that "Legion" was on the point of attacking the parliament. A committee was appointed to sit permanently in the speaker's chamber, to take every means for averting a catastrophe, with power to call before them all persons necessary for throwing light on the danger, and to examine all papers. At length, however, as "Legion" did not appear, and all remained quiet, the house began to recover its senses; it began at the same time to dawn upon their apprehensions, that they had been hoaxed by some clever wag. This wag was universally believed to be no other than Daniel Defoe, the inimitable author of "Robinson Crusoe," and one of the shrewdest political writers of the time. Defoe had seen the hollowness of the tory faction, which, under the mask of patriotism, was pursuing only its own malice, and must have luxuriated in the terror into which he had thrown them. In the midst of the affright of the commons the lords sent to remind them that though they had exhibited articles against Orford, they had exhibited none against the others accused, and that these noblemen were suffering from the delay in not being able to clear their characters. The commons, therefore, made haste to send up the charges against Somers. These charges were, his affixing the great seal to the carte blanche for the partition treaty, and afterwards to the treaty itself, and having made many unreasonable and exorbitant grants under it, especially of the forfeited estates in Ireland; of having himself received also great and unreasonable grants of manors, lands, tenements, &c., besides an additional pension of four thousand pounds. To these charges Somers returned the usual ministerial pleas in |