Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

a long duration of his life and health.

What! and do we understand you rightly, when you express your dislike

would fain divide us from our ruler; 'but, in this you never will succeed as long as we continue to see, that his ene

[ocr errors]

' of the return of peace to Europe, be-mies are the enemies of the power, the

glory, and happiness of France ?'Such would certainly be, in substance, the answer of the French people to any invitation that the everlasting-war faction might give them to assassinate Napoleon; and, therefore, whatever converts they may make at home, they may, with respect to the people of France, follow the old precept, and "keep their breath to cool their porridge." And, I am of opinion, too, that the Allies would not be very anxious to get many more bloody noses in a war, which was to have the above objects in view. The powers of the Continent would hardly run any very considerable risk for the sake of upholding our war-taxes, though these sentiments of the writer in the Times may furnish them with information that they were not possessed of before.

cause then your navy will "find no 'prizes?" We would fain not believe you | serious here. The ideas we have always 'heretofore had, and expressed, of the justice and generosity of the English character must, at least, make us con'clude, that those Englishmen, who express such sentiments are few in number; otherwise we must suppose, that your nation has been so much changed by the war and by the writings of mercenary writers, as to have become most shockingly debased. What! would you continue • war with all its miseries for the purpose, in part, at least, of enabling your naval officers and seamen to enrich themselves at the expense of innocent traders? Would 'you see the world remain in its present unhappy state; would you keep in existence all those millions of evils which humanity deplores, for the sake of putting prize-money into the pockets of a part of the English nation? And would you have us murder Napoleon, because he is, as you infer, an enemy to your making those gains?Again, you object to peace with Napoleon, because it will give us • colonies and commerce; and thus you show how sincere your regard is for us, how firm a reliance we may place on your friendship, at the same time that you make a happy discovery of your own moderation, your abhorrence of conquests and ambition, and you give a clear clucidation of that disinterestedness, with which you have laboured in the deliverance of Europe. So that your war, after having been, first, a war for social order and re-important to him and to the public, name⚫gular government; secondly, a war for the "blessed comforts of religion," as described by George Rose; thirdly, a "war for "indemnity for the past and se'curity for the future;" fourthly, a war for the deliverance of Europe," is, now, agreeably, to the language of your faction, a war for the keeping of our conscripts in prison, for preventing your war taxes from falling off, for giving prizes to your navy, and for (what our Emperor has always, as you say, falsely • accused you of) engrossing all the colonies ⚫ and commerce to yourselves.--- -Away, therefore, with your advice! Your declarations, if they were as numerous as or the millions of your debt, would have no weight with us. You

JAL

your

MR. MANT AND CAPT. CAMPBELL.In consequence of the article, containing the Statement and Affidavit of Mr. Mant, which was published in the Register of the 19th of February, Capt. Campbell has thought it necessary to publish, through the same channel, a very short statement of facts, unaccompanied with any reasoning upon the subject, and also an Affidavit, not made by himself, but by Capt. Wilson, of the Navy, who was, as will be seen, at the time referred to, the First Lieutenant of the Frigate Unité, on board of which Mr. Mant served, and which Affidavit he submits to a comparison with that of Mr. Mant. Capt. Campbell states, that, with regard to the point which is the most

ly, the illegality of the selling of prizes, and the other transactions, of which Mr. Mant, in his pamphlet, speaks in so loose a manner, the transactions were all made matter of charge against him by Mr. Mant to the Admiralty, in 1812, while Capt. Campbell was abroad, and after he had, by writing to the Transport Board, prevented Mr. Mant from being appointed to a Prison Ship; that, upon receiving this charge against him, the Lords of the Admiralty ordered Sir Edward Pellew, then become the Commander in Chief in the Mediterranean, to inquire into the matter; that Sir Edward Pellew, after such inquiry, informed their Lordships, that there was no ground for the charge, which he denominated a base attempt; that the Lords of

which Affidavit, he is persuaded that no person will need any thing more in answer to any charge resting upon the veracity of Mr. Mant.

MR. WILSON'S AFFIDAVIT.

John Wilson, commander in the Royal Navy, maketh oath, That in the years 1806, 1807, and until Oct. 1808, he was senior Lieutenant of His Majesty's ship Unité, of which ship, and during which time, Mr. Thomas Mant was Surgeon; that Captain Patrick Campbell took command of the said ship (then off Cadiz) in August 1806, and was immediately ordered, with command of a small squadron, to the Adriatic. That the said Mr. Thoinas Mant, in consequence of his knowledge of the Italian language, was intrusted to manage the prize concerns of the squadron at Trieste, &c.; that in the month of October 1807, the ship then off the Island of Lussin, on her way to cruize off Corfu, information was received, that passes intrusted by Captain Campbell to Mr. Mant, to deliver to merchants at Trieste, had been sold, and that Mr. Mant had derived emolument from such sale, and also received money for undervaluing prizes. That on the ship's arrival at Malta in December following, Mr. Mant made application to Captain Campbell to be allowed to go home, on pretence of ill health, or to exchange into another ship, which Captain Campbell refused, and told him, in the Deponent's presence, of the accusations against him, of receiving money for passes and under

the Admiralty hereupon informed Sir Edward Pellew, that his report was perfectly satisfactory to them; and he states, that, in the transactions, as far as they really did take place, there was nothing contrary to the laws and usages in force, and in constant practice in the Mediterranean. He states, that, with regard to the commencement of this dispute, Mr. Mant not only began it by preferring charges against him while he was abroad, but that he found, upon his return home, that Mr. Mant had long been in the practice of showing to several respectable persons about Southampton the papers of which he speaks in his pamphlet, and also of reflecting most scandalously on Capt. Campbell's character, which induced Capt. Campbell to show the papers he possessed, in his own vindication, to his friends, and particularly to his brother officers in that neighbourhood; and that the real reason why he declined furnishing Mr. Mant with copies of the papers was, that he thought the request quite im pertinent, seeing that Mr. Mant knew so well what the nature of the charges was, and seeing that the papers were, for the most part, in his own hand writing; besides which, Capt. Campbell wished, of all things, to avoid any thing like a controversy with Mr. Mant. Capt. Campbell has no desire to add to the weight with which Mr. Mant is loaded, and would fain avoid saying one word as to his conduct in the transactions referred to; but, justice to himself and to the public demands a fact or two on that subject. He, therefore, states, that, with regard to Mr. Mant's ig-valuing prizes, and until these charges were norance of the pretended illegality of the transactions, and to his having resigned his occupation as agent in the concerns when he discovered their illegality, the fact is, that he was removed by the captors, on account of their conviction, that he had acted un-two hundred dollars for letting him (Jurfairly in the business, and was, from the same cause, excluded from messing with the officers in the Unité, as he had formerly done, which facts are known to so many persons, that they must be deemed indisputable. As to the fact, alleged so stoutly by Mr. Mant, and to which so much weight is given in his defence; namely, that he was not fully informed of the accusations against him, nor of the name of his accuser, until it was too late to confront him with that accuser, a fact, if true, of very great importance, Captain Campbell states nothing, but refers the public to the subjoined Affidavit of Capt. Wilson, who was, at the time referred to, the First Lieutenant of the Ship; after the perusal of

done away he could not comply with his request. That on the ship's return to the Adriatic early in 1808, this Deponent informed Mr. Mant, that George Jursovich, who accused him (Mr. Mant) of receiving

sovich) have, on advantageous terms, prize goods which he bought, was then on board, and that it was necessary he (Mr. Mant) should clear himself from such accusation, or that he should be considered guilty of the charge; his reply was, that Jursovich was a damned rascal, and his word was as good as Jursovich's. The ship was several months up the Adriatic after this conversation took place; and although Jursovich was frequently on board, which Mr. Mant could not be ignorant of, yet Mr. Mant, to the Deponent's knowledge, never attempted to clear himself. In another conversation nearly about the same time, which the Deponent had with Mr. Mant relative to the sale of passes and undervaluing prizes,

lay his hand on his heart and say, he (Mr.
Mant) had never received money on either
account; Mr. Mant answered the Deponent
by saying, it was nothing to him whether
he received any or not, that he had taken
the opinion of counsel on the subject and
was desired not to criminate himself. This
Deponent further saith, That he never
heard Mr. Mant express any compunction
for the share he had in the supposed ille-
gality of the disposal of prize property in
which he was a voluntary agent, and in-
stead of withdrawing himself from the said
agency, from any such compunction, he
was removed from it by the captors, they
having lost their confidence in him.

J. WILSON, Captain,
Royal Navy.

Sworn before me at Southamp-
ton, 1st March, 1814,
Thomas Ducell, J. P. for
the Town of Southampton.

the Deponent asked Mr. Mant, if he could | panions, gave them, what may be justly called, a good dinner; namely, roast beef, plum pudding, and four gallons of porter. On that very day, a friend of mine called at the donor's house, where he found a wife and five children who actually had not bread to eat, until the uncle (for such my friend really was to the infants) gave the mother a guinea to purchase food. I need not tell you, Sir, that such a character was unworthy the name of a husband and a father, and a disgrace to both. Will not the same observation, when applied to an individual, hold good as to a nation that acts in a similar manner? You have heard of a gentleman who, in a tavern speech, lamented that he was not so high in the church as his nephew was in the army. I suppose the good man (for I verily believe him to be a good man) meant, that if he was a bishop, every parish church in his diocese should be opened for a collection for the suffering Germans. He has since tried the experiment in his own chapel, and I am informed that he collected 4001. Very well; let the suffering Germans have it; and if those warm advocates for these Germans had made private subscriptions amongst themselves; nay, had they sent their whole fortunes to Germany, they would have heard nothing from me. But why make a parish affair of it? The hint, Sir, is taken by the church, and you may be sure that it will spread to the utmost corners of the empire. Every minister that will not open his mouth for the suffering Germans, will be looked upon as disaffected to the state. But that is not the extent of the evil. The parish officers will hold the dishes (for plates will be too small) at the churchdoor.

GERMAN SUFFERERS. SIR,-We are not called upon to ransack the library of the novelist for melancholy and affecting tales; the common occurrences of life will always furnish mankind, at least those of a mental turn, with matter sufficient to depress the powers of levity. But cominon concerns are of little moment when compared with those which now command the attention of Europe, and in which the fate of millions of human beings are deeply involved. Emperors, Kings, and Princes are tearing their subjects from the bosom of their families, to die-Where?-why, in what they are pleased to call the field of honor. But, however honorable such a death may be in their estimation, I can hear but of one, amongst the whole group, who makes a point of coming within the range of a cannon-ball; the rest rather choosing, for reasons of state, to preserve their valuable lives to the latest period, that they may then pour out their last breath on the bed of ease and indolence.

However, this reflection is not the only motive which induces me to solicit a page in your useful Register, and which, if I am refused, will neither hurt my pride nor wound my feelings, as I shall enjoy the consolation of having used my endeavour to prevent an evil which appears to me calculated to promote animosities and discord in many parishes.A good name is certainly valuable; but let me take just and proper methods to acquire that good name. Some years ago, a being, in human form, in order to gain the esteem of his pot-com

[ocr errors]

They know each housekeeper; and every inhabitant who may think that his poor suffering neighbour has a greater claim to his bounty than the suffering Germans, and chooses to pass the dish without a donation, will be immediately denominated a Jacobin, an enemy to his country, and a friend of Buonaparté. But a small donation will not do. The minister, who is to preach next Sunday for the benefit of the suffering Germans, declared, that he expected his congregation to be very liberal; it was for the honor of the nation. I know "Church and State" to be an old song. Religion, that is to say, genuine religion and politics, have no affinity to each other, and can no more claim an union than the mire of the streets can pretend to be sterling gold: it is a most unpleasant mixture, and

-

true; but those fears sprung from quite a different source. Theirs was a fear of losing their Sinecures and lucrative places, which, rather than part with, they preferred reducing the nation to what it now is. However those two unmanly spirits are, by the aid of some divines, (Bishops I suppose) happily laid for a limited period. Not in the Red Sea, where the old women's spirits are usually laid, but in the snuff-box of a Minister of State. -But: why, in the name of fortune, should there be so much sympathy for the suffering Germans, and so little feeling for the suf

speeches, proposing a general opening of church pulpits, (this severe winter) for the benefit of the many, many thousands of our own suffering poor, who have actually. wanted bread.-I know but of one church in the City of London, the pulpit of which has been devoted to so laudable a purpose; and, to the honor of the Rector be it spoken, (whose heart is abundantly blest with the milk of human kindness and fellow feeling,) it was that of the church of St. Ann, Blackfriars.The same gentleman, I understand, proposes, from the best of motives, though he has not taken into consideration the extent of the injury, to de-, vote the same pulpit for the Benefit of the suffering Germans.- It should be re

is as unsavory to the mind as a compound of honey and mustard would be to the palate. I say, politics must make a part of the sermon; the distress of the suffering Germans must be pointed out; then the cause of the distress, which is the war.Here I could wish to make a very long pause, as I cannot help thinking, that there are bundreds of thousands of suffering English and Irish in the United Kingdom, who have a much greater claim upon the humanity and honor of the nation, than the suffering Germans. I deny that the Germans have any claim upon the gratitude of the nation, as a nation. But I will al-fering English? I have heard of no Tavern. low, that they have a claim upon many thousands of individuals in the nation, now living. They have a claim upon the whole body of the alarmists, at the head of whom stood that political apostate Pitt; that bitter scourge to Britain and to civil liberty. They have a clain upon the life and fortune gentlemen. They have a claim upon the Corporate Bodies. They have a claim upon the Rotten Boroughs, who have bound themselves, by their signatures to their addresses; and they have a claim upon Government Contractors of every description. All these compose what may properly be called the war-faction.These are the men, the very men, upon whom the suffering Germans have a claim. They have been the cause, the only cause of the war It is un-membered, however, that the Germans just to say that the suffering Germans have a claim upon the nation.Take the nation at large, eighteen out of twenty, were against going to war with the French, because they chose to make an alteration in their Government.-The very best friends the nation then had, and still have, were entirely against the war, and are so to this hour. Had their advice been attended to, Britain, in point of circumstances, would have been just the reverse of what she now is, and Germany in a state of tranquillity. It is true, the friends of the country wished a reform, and I humbly hope they will one day obtain it. It is certain the real friend of his country did not desire a reformation before it was greatly wanted. It is equally certain, it was not a revolution he looked for. The alarmists, to gain their point, instantly let loose their favourite Hobgoblins, Fear and Dread, twisted, and dressed up in the most terrific form and colours. To oppose and attack those two monsters, the whole Regiment of these renowned Knights the Life and Fortune gentlemen, turned out to a man. -But the alarmists were too wise to be scared by ghosts of their own raising; they had their fears 'tis

have been fighting,-not for us, but for themselves. They have been fighting their own battles, in which, as a nation, we are not interested. It is true, our good souls have given to the respective sovereigns of Germany, who have caused their troops to take the field, many millions of pounds. in hard cash, by way of subsidy ;-and it is. equally true, if there is any comfort in the information, that our children, and, great, great grand children, will have to toil and labour for money to pay the interest of the many millions of hard guineas which have so pleasingly filled the coffers of the German princes. Therefore, it is to their respective sovereigns, that the suffering Germans. ought to look for assistance. Their princes have received the British guineas, and their princes are in duty bound to attend to the wants of their suffering subjects.I{ I. had a few dollars to spare (as for guineas they are all fled to the Continent,) I should think myself a base wretch to send them to the suffering Germans, while I have so many suffering neighbours, who cannot procure sufficient bread for themselves and families.I should, by such an act, be an exact copy of that worthless being I

States General, and erecting in its stead a hereditary kingly government, "a sovereign

have mentioned above, who, to gain a good name, indulged Jack Noaks and Tom Styles with a good dinner, while his feel-" prince of the United Netherlands." Obing heart left his wife and family without serve, I say, how soon these men changed bread. No rather let me attend to the their note, when the giving of a king to wants of those dear children, those sixty Holland was done in a way which conformout of seventy school-boys, who had noted to their views, and in which they somewherewith to break their fast, until the what participated. The measure became, humanity of the school-master supplied all on a sudden, a grand and sublime effort their craving wants.--How many, many of the genius of this country; a bright thousands of my fellow countrymen are at emanation from that "happy constitution" this very moment in a similar situation, which is the "envy of the world," and of who have a much stronger claim upon my which none can form a just estimate but bounty than foreigners, for I am taught to those who live under its "benign_influbelieve, that "charity begins at home." "ence." Here the magnanimity of EngYou are at liberty to bestow what lishmen had reached its climax; for what name or appellation upon me you please, could be more generous, what more noble, but I am convinced, from my own feelings, what more elevated, than to confer a porthat I am a FRIEND TO HUMANITY. tion of that liberty which Englishmen enBlackfriars, 2d March, 1814. joy upon a people who were no way solicitous about it?-One would have thought that this unlooked for favour; this unexampled generosity; this anxiety to restore a whole nation to independence, to happiness, and to security, equal to what we enjoy under "the best government on earth," would have called forth the warmest ac knowledgments of the Dutch; have stimulated them to throw off the Napoleon yoke; have roused them to expel their oppressors; and led them to present a barrier to the future encroachments of Buonaparté, which even all his legions could never overthrow. Had this people been in reality the unwilling and abject slaves of the ruler of France; had their sufferings been even less severe than they were represented, it was unquestionably the fittest moment they could have

DUTCH INDEPENDENCE. -It appears at last that the wise-acres, who lately excited the clamour of Orange Boovan, and saw nothing in the restoration of the house of Orange but the overthrow of Napoleon's dynasty, begin to think that they were too sanguine in their expectations, and that the Dutch, like all other nations who have once tasted of liberty, are not so wedded to the divine rights of kings, or to hereditary monarchy, as to be insensible of the difference between a free representative government, and that in which the dictum of one individual is paramount to the law. When the French Emperor ventured to give Holland a king, the enormity of the deed was stigmatized as without a parallel: it was held up as an instance of despotism far surpass-chosen to emancipate themselves from this ing all his former acts of tyranny, and the deplorable situation to which the Dutch people were thereby reduced, was said to be infinitely worse than that of the most abject state of slavery recorded in history. The miseries of the poor Hollanders were, indeed, painted in such glowing colours, that even the "flinty heart of their tyrant" was said at times to relent, when he contemplated the "fell havock" which his "cursed ambition" had made amongst this gallant people. But mark the difference when the inauguration of a sovereign, vested with the same unlimited powers of a Buonaparté, came to be the act and deed, at least to receive the countenance and support of the good people of this country; when they assumed to themselves the right of establishing a new order of things, of putting down even the bare semblance of a Republic, and of destroying the last remains of liberty in the extinction of the

disgraceful vassalage, when the power of their oppressor was broken, when he himself was under the necessity of becoming a supplicant, and when the whole strength and resources of Great Britain were employed in endeavouring to crush him for ever, and to raise from the dust all those nations who had been compelled to acknowledge his "tremendous sway."-It appears, however, that the Dutch entertained a very different view of the matter from what was held on this side the water. If, they were in reality oppressed by one sovereign, they seem to have thought that they might be oppressed by another. Buonaparté had altered the form of their government, in lieu of which he had established his own sovereignty. The Prince of Orange had supplanted this assumption of power by declaring himself the sovereign prince of the Netherlands. Here, then, was a mere change of masters, in which the peo

« ZurückWeiter »