154 Ch. 35. 1795 REMONSTRANCES OF THE OPPOSITION. be sequestrated and formed into a sinking fund which, at the end of twenty-seven years, would extinguish the principal debt. Twenty-five thousand pounds a year were to be set aside for the payment of interest. All this was plain matter of business; but the plan, by which it was proposed to guard against the growth of future claims upon the patience of the country, was nothing less than the enactment of a special law of contract for the particular case. The officers and servants of his Royal Highness were to be liable for the contracts which they should enter into on his behalf; and the legal remedy, for the recovery of any debt due by the Prince, should cease after the expiration of three months from the time when the debt accrued. Pitt had named a distant day for the Committee of Supply in the hope that the House would cool. But the heat had only grown more intense, and had spread beyond the Prince of Wales to the King, the Royal Family, and even to monarchy itself. The leaders of Opposition could no longer refrain from offering their opinion. Fox said that he took a view of the matter which would be acceptable to none of the parties concerned. He thought the Prince had rashly undertaken in 1787 to make no further application to Parliament; but having made the promise, he was bound in honour to keep it. He was willing, however, to grant the increased income, provision being made either by a sinking fund or by the sale of the duchy lands, for the FOX SUPPORTS THE GOVERNMENT. enact 1795 155 liquidation of the debt. He censured the king Ch. 35. and the ministers for having suffered the matter to come before Parliament. He contended that the debts ought to have been defrayed out of the civil list; and deprecated the invidious proposal to make special provision by Act of Parliament against the future liabilities of the Prince of Wales. He would support such an ment, if it was made to apply to the Royal Family in general, as a permanent law. Sheridan and other members, some of whom were connected neither with the Prince, nor with the Opposition, followed in the same sense. An amendment moved by Grey, to reduce the proposed additional annuity by twenty-five thousand pounds, was rejected by a majority of only two to one, which, considering the state of the House at that period, might be regarded as a strong expression of its real opinion in favour of the amendment. A great struggle was made to refuse any parliamentary recognition of the debts, and to provide only for the additional establishment which the Prince's marriage might be supposed to render necessary. Grey and Sheridan took this view, but Fox supported the proposal of the Government, that sixty-five thousand pounds of the additional income, together with the revenues of the Duchy, should be applied to the payment of debts, leaving a clear sixty thousand a year as available income. A commission was appointed for the administration of the funds so appropriated; 156 Ch. 35. 1795 ACQUITTAL OF WARREN HASTINGS. and the stringent provisions against future debts, which Pitt had proposed, and which nothing but the incorrigible conduct of the heir apparent could justify, were likewise adopted. The discussions of these various details were continued until the close of the Session; and the irritation attending them was not abated by the whispers which were circulated before the Bill had left the Commons. It was said that the royal bridegroom having gained the end of his marriage, had already cast aside his wife, and returned to his paramour. This was the commencement of a chapter of scandal and infamy, of which the existing generation did not see the close. In this Session, Warren Hastings was acquitted upon all the articles of impeachment exhibited by the Commons. If a jury were justified in refusing to find a man guilty of a charge, which it took nine hours to state,s much more difficult was it to convict a man of a charge which it took eight years to prove. The whole trial, if trial it is to be called, was a preposterous caricature-a mon 'With reference to this subject, Fox writes to Lord Holland: The Prince's business turned out as I foretold you, Pitt adopted my plan, for which, though I believe the King and the Prince are a good deal displeased at him, they are not more pleased with me. However, I could not do otherwise than I have done, and I am sure it is the best plan for the Prince's real interests, and the only one which can operate to soften in any degree the general odium against him.'-Fox's Correspondence, June 14, 1795. Ante, p.94; Hardy's trial. LAW'S ABLE DEFENCE. strous thing, whose proportions could not be measured by any known rule of justice. A prosecution which was opened by a succession of orations, embellished with all the arts of rhetoric, exaggerating every fact, and replete with inflammatory comments, was so great a perversion of all rule and practice, that, from the first, it was impossible to regard the proceeding as one which really involved penal consequences. As the trial proceeded, it was plain to all men that there could be no practical result, and the great speeches having been delivered, all public interest in the matter was exhausted. The case for the prosecution having been brought to a close, in the fifth year of the trial, the counsel for the prisoner, Law, a King's Bench barrister of promise, gravely rose to address the Court for the defence. Law had conducted his case throughout with great skill and judgment. Not attempting to emulate the high-flown eloquence of the managers, he opposed to their sounding periods, their metaphors, their invectives, their perorations, the impenetrable shield of legal learning, of common sense, and professional practice. The managers, although themselves assisted by counsel, conducted the examination of the witnesses, for the most part, with an utter disregard to the rules of evidence; and whenever the counsel for the prisoner attempted to restrain the evidence within legal h Afterwards Lord Ellenborough, C. J. 157 Ch. 35. 1795 158 Ch. 35. 1795 CHARACTER OF THE PROCEEDINGS bounds, Burke flew into a passion, asked them how they dared interrupt the Commons of England, called them pettifoggers, and accused them of attempting to suppress the truth. Sometimes, however, the law lords interposed; and on one occasion, after the counsel, the chancellor, and several peers, had in vain attempted to moderate the violence of Burke, the primate stood up and declared the conduct of the manager to be intolerable. If Robespierre and Marat,' said his Grace, were in the manager's box, they could not say anything more inhuman, and more against all sentiments of honour and morality, than what we have been often used to since this trial has commenced.' Another time, when the defendant complained of the hardship to which he was exposed by the great length of the trial, Burke replied, that the trial was protracted by the defendant's counsel, who would persist in making objections to evidence. The proceedings in Westminster Hall were diversified by debates on legal points in the House of Commons, in which the guilt and innocence of the defendant were incidentally canvassed by the partisans on both sides. Burke went so far as to say that Major Scott, who systematically defended Hastings, and was supposed to have owed his seat to the Indian interest, ought to be expelled the House. The best case that ever was launched would infallibly have been ruined by such management as this. The people of England, who have always |