late Election for your county, I do acknowledge, that I rather sought a Public, than a seat in Parliament. I sought for, and have found, amongst you, Freeholders who would vote for themselves, and not for any Candidate,-who would not give their votes as a favour conferred, but as a sacred truft reposed in an honeft man, to enable him to stem the torrent against these venal Coalition Whigs, who are, by their own avowal, hunting the People of this country from the second floor to the garret.-That this. system of corruption and oppreffion may cease, is the only ardent with, and, in spite of every calumny, shall ever be the constant and unremitting endeavour of, Gentlemen, your most obedient and respectful humble Servant,

FRANCIS BURDETT.

MAJOR CARTWRIGHT'S TWO LETTERS TO MR. WHITBREAD, CONTAINING STRICTURES ON THAT GENTLEMAN'S LETTER TO SIR FRANCIS BURDETT (See p. 321.)

Letter the Firf.

Dear Sir,It was not till Monday I first saw, in Lincolnshire, your letter to Sir F. Burdett, bearing date the 5th of this month; fince which, until the present moment, I have not had time to express the sentiments to which it gave rise. Being of opinion, that not only the provocation given by the Baronet to your political party, but the retort it has produced, have tendencies injurious to that country which both, I am sure, sincerely defire to serve, I 3L 2 flall

fhall exercise that fragment of liberty, which is almoft all that remains to us, to ftate to you the grounds of my opinion. I lament the conduct of both, and I hope both will hear me with patience and candour.-When the calamitous, and, as I must ever call it, the pernicious ministry of Mr. Pitt, was succeeded by a miniftry of which Mr. Fox was the inspiring soul, the hope, the expectation, the confident truft of English patriotism was, that the day was then near at hand when the political liberty which it was the wish of his grand mind might bless his species "all over the world" should at least be fully restored in England. If, Sir, month after month was seen to elapse, without any intimation being given of intended measures to that end; if those months were not diftinguished by proceedings to indicate a different syftem of Adminiftration from that which had brought upon us the heaviest calamities and the greatest dangers; that which had actually confiscated a part of our estates, by the operation called "selling the Land Tax," and which had, for aught we could discover to the contrary, also conveyed the remainder of our property to the King's Exchequer, to be paid in, whenever it should be voted by a House of Commons which did not represent the people; if, Sir, this was our fituation, could it surprise a gentleman, with whom I had, some years ago, the honour of belonging to the Society of the Friends of the People, associated for a reformation of parliament, that a man of Sir F. Burdett's acuteness of feeling, in whatever regards the freedom of his country, fhould

fhould give vent to the poignant emotions which must have kept his ardent mind on the rack, or fhould not even refrain from the language of indignant satire? To Mr. Whitbread's heart I address myself for an answer. I am not justifying the Baronet's want of patience, I am not vindicating his want of temper. As patience and temper are virtues, God knows, of which we never ftood more in need, I wish they had more abounded; I wish they had not obftructed his own road to Parliament; I wish they had not excited against him any unnecessary enmity or prejudice. Whatever might have been his displeasure towards men in office,— whatever his fears, whatever his suspicions, I still blame him for not fhewing more patience and more temper. In his provocation to your political friends, I think there was a censureable defect of self-command. In your retort, which may well pass for a state paper, breathing the sentiments of your party, you will pardon me, I doubt not, when I speak of it as deficient in magnanimity.-Feelings of a genuine love of liberty; a consciousness of intending that reform by which alone it can be restored; a determination to execute with fidelity in power, that for which, when out of power, you in vain contended, might Sir, I humbly think, have preserved in you a dignified filence at the present moment, even under the provocations of suspicion and reproach, rather than have, in any degree, divided the friends of reformation. Such a conduct was not more than might have been expected from men whose task it is, not merely to serve, but to save their country.

Much,

Much, Sir, as your letter, penned in the true manner of a gentleman, is to be admired, I would to God that you had, on this occafion, resembled the Lacedemonian, whom not even blows could move to a resentment hurtful to his country! Might you not, Sir, even under the provocation of reproaches and sarcasms, with truth have nobly said-" The honeft Baronet thinks us tardy; he fears that coalitions have diluted our public virtue; he suspects we are adding one more inftance to the many that have gone before, in which the Circean taste of power has oblivioned all remembrance of the former man; we must forgive him; we must bear with his anger; we know his inestimable value, and with what ardour he will support us when he finds us sincere. Let him anticipate our early exertions for reftoring to the people their due weight in the legiflature, by our favouring, in every way that is conftitutional and honourable, his election for the metropolitan county of England! Then fhall we have a noble revenge for the injury of his invectives !"-Give me leave, Sir, now to advert to that part of your letter in which you" utterly deny it to be an opinion founded in truth, that a person holding an office under the crown, however otherwise eftimable, cannot at any time become the fit representative of a free, incorrupt, and independent people." Here, Sir, I confess you have surprised me; and no less so, when you add that "the people, by the acceptance of the Baronet's doctrine, would reduce themselves to the hard neceffity of being governed by the worst of mankind." Not laying, Sir, any firess (for I despise

cavil) upon an erroneous interpretation of Sir Francis's words, taken by you as extending "to exclude all the executive servants of government from seats in either House of Parliament," whereas they are confined to the " Representative," or Commons' House only; I muft ftill express my aftonishment, that the exclufion thought neceffary by Sir F. Burdett, namely, an exclufion of the servants of the crown from among the representatives of the people, fhould, by a patriot statesman, be represented as expofing that people" to the hard neceflity of being governed by "the worst of mankind;" and equally was I the other day astonished, in reading it as the declaration of another patriot ftatesman (Mr. Sheridan), that "such an exclufion was contrary to the English conGitution," or words to that effect, for I quote from memory.-Does not Mr. Whitbread know, that in the Seventeen American Houses of Commons, there sits not among the representatives of the people, a single placeman in the pay of the executive mugißrate? Are, then, I afk, all these seventeen American nations . governed by the worst of mankind" Have we observed in that country any such mismanagement of its affairs, any such perverfions of its conftitution, any such underminings of its feeedom, or any such flagrant corruptions, or abuses, as to indicate that it is. governed by the worst of mankind?" When those legiflatures, without being affifted by the wisdom of men in office, succeflively placed the executive sove- . reignty in the hands of a Washington, an Adams, and a Jefferson, did this bespeak a defect in their conftitution, whereby "the people were reduced to

the