CHAPTER XX. BRITISH HISTORY: Observations on the declining Power of France-Meeting of Parliament- BOOK IV. AMONG the striking examples of vicis- : ertions worthy of his former fame. He fell in- The domestic history of the year exhibits a The new parliament assembled on Tuesday, the deepest concern at the continuance of his majesty's lamented indisposition, and the diminished hopes of his ultimate recovery. His royal highness next adverted to the successes in the peninsula under Lord Wellington, and expressed his confident reliance on the determination of parliament to continue to afford every aid that might be necessary in support of the important contest, which had given to Europe the example of persevering and successful resistance to the power of France. The restoration of peace and friendship between this country and the courts of St. Petersburg and Stockholm was next announced by his royal highness, who spoke in the highest terms of admiration of the resistance made by Russia to the arms of her invaders. His royal highness then informed parliament that a supplementary treaty had been entered into with his Sicilian Majesty, and new measures concerted for the active co-operation of that island in the common cause. With regard to the declaration of war by the United States of America, he observed, that it was made under circumstances which might have afforded a reasonable expectation, that the amicable relations between the two countries would not be long interrupted, but the conduct and pretensions of the American government had hitherto prevented the conclusion of any pacific arrangement. In conclusion, the speech recommended an early consideration of a provision for the effectual government of the provinces of India, in consequence of the approaching expiration of the Charter of the East India Company; it adverted to the success of the means employed for suppressing the spirit of outrage and insubordination which had appeared in some parts of this country, and expressed a hope that atrocities so repugnant to the British character would never recur; and closed with the usual declaration of confidence in the wisdom of parliament, and in the loyalty of the people. The usual complimentary address on the speech from the throne was moved in the house of peers by Lord Longford, seconded by Lord Rolle; and in the commons by Lord Clive, seconded by Mr. Hart Davis, and carried in both houses without a division. One of the first acts of the new parliament was to grant a sum not exceeding two hundred thousand pounds, for the relief of such parts of the inhabitants of the empire of Russia as had suffered "in their persons and property, in consequence of the unprovoked and atrocious invasion of that country by the Ruler of France."* On the meeting of parliament after the 1813 Christmas recess, the papers relative to the BOOK IV. Sir Samuel Romilly, with that persever- * Message of the Prince Regent, presented to Parliament December 17, 1812. BOOK IV. undue severity of the law the offender escaped with impunity.* 1813 CHAP. XX. The next bill which he proposed to introduce related to a part of the punishment for the crime of high treason, which was not at present carried into execution. The sentence for that crime, as the law now stood, was, that the criminal should be dragged upon a hurdle to the place of execution; that he should be hanged by the neck, but cut down before he was dead; and that his bowels should then be taken out and burned before his face. As to that part of the sentence which related to embowelling, it was never executed now; but this omission was owing to accident, or to the mercy of the executioner, not to the discretion of the judge. These bills, with a third, to take away the corruption of blood as a consequence of attainder of high treason or felony, were allowed to be brought in, and the first passed through the house of commons, but was thrown out by the peers. The other two bills were both lost in the lower house of parliament. On the 23d of February, a subject was brought forward in the house of commons by Sir Francis Burdett, which, if not of present political importance, touched upon a curious and interesting point of the constitution, and appears to have made a more serious impression than was at first expected. The hon. baronet, in his introductory speech, said, that it appeared to him that violent incroachments had been made on the true principles of the constitution, by those measures which had been adopted in consequence of the unfortunate malady of his majesty. The first of these was in 1788, when it had been determined that the heir apparent to the crown had no more right to the government of the nation than any other subject. The steps taken at this period were justified on the plea of necessity; but in his opinion there were two principles which governed the whole of this question: 1st, That the powers and prerogatives annexed by the common law to the crown descend by hereditary succession, and not by election: 2d, That its powers are never suspended; for if the functions of royalty were for any time to cease, one of the three branches of the constitution would be abrogated, and a dissolution of legal government would ensue.' Both these principles, he thought, were unnecessarily and unwarrantably departed from at the period referred to. In 1810, this mischievous precedent was followed; the usurpation was renewed, and a fiction was resorted to, creating a phantom of royalty, in order to elect and appoint an executive magistrate. As a further usurpation of power, restrictions were placed upon the person selected to possess some of the prerogatives of the crown, all of which were bestowed by the law for the benefit of the people. His object was, to prevent on future occasions this lawless assumption of authority, and to destroy that pretence of necessity, which in fact never existed, because many legal remedies remained. He did not mean to tie down the house to any distinct proposition, but simply to provide against any interruption in the exercise of the royal authority in the event of the death of the prince regent during the continuance of his majesty's malady; he, however, did not hesitate to state, that in his view, it would be right to give to the regent powers as uncontrolled as those belonging to the king himself. Further, he should propose that the powers now exercised by the prince regent, should, in case of the death or disability of his royal highness, be exercised by the heir to the crown, the Princess Charlotte of Wales. He concluded with moving, "that leave be given to bring in a bill to provide against any interruption of the exercise of the royal authority, in the event of the death of his royal highness the prince regent, during the continuance of his majesty's malady." It was contended, in opposition to this motion, that the consideration of such a topic was at present unnecessary, and that it might safely be left to the two houses of parliament to provide for such cases when they should occur. As to the right in the heir of the crown to exercise the royal authority in the event of an interruption of the regal functions, that was a question which might now be considered as at rest, since no doubts had been raised concerning it during the progress of the last regency bill. It appeared, that the honourable baronet's object was to destroy the discretionary power of parliament * On this subject Mr. Burke has well observed-" The question is, whether, in a well constituted commonwealth, it is wise to retain laws not put in force? A penal law not ordinarily executed, must be deficient in justice or wisdom, or both. But we are told that we must trust to the operation of manners to relax the law; on the contrary, the law ought to be always in unison with the manners, and corroborative of them, otherwise the effect of both will be lessened. Our passions ought not to be right, and our reason, of which law is the organ, wrong." ↑ Harrison, one of the regicides, executed in the reign of Charles II. held a conversation with his execu tiouer after his bowels were taken out. On the principle of "The king is dead-long live the king." § Mr. Bathurst. 1 upon the subject, and that he preferred the determination of the question on the hereditary principle. Whichever way it was determined, there was a balance of inconveniences: but the reason why it was better that it should rest in the discretion of parliament was, that this body felt it to be its first duty to take care that the royal power should be returned undiminished into the hands of its legitimate possessor, as soon as the incapacity of exercising it was removed; whereas, upon the hereditary principle, the royal power being immediately and fully transferred to the regent, there was not the same security for its resumption.* In reply to these objections it was urged, that there was only one life between us and the recurrence of former difficulties, and that the most proper time for a parliamentary arrangement on a great constitutional subject of this nature, was such a time as the present, when party heats were so much allayed, and when there was no danger of reviving the animosities to which former discussions had given birth.† On a division of the house there appeared for the motion seventythree, against it two hundred and thirty-eight voices. During the present year no subject of a domestic nature fixed upon the public mind with so much force as the discords and alienation which had for years subsisted between the prince regent and his illustrious consort. The original cause of these dissensions it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to trace, except to the vague and unsatisfactory source of incompatibility of inclinations; but that they originated at a period so early as the first year of the resi. dence of the Princess of Wales in this country, and that they were of such a nature as almost to dissolve the marriage contract, is clear from a correspondence which took place between those illustrious personages in the year 1796. The inarriage of the Prince and Princess of Wales was solemnized on the 8th of April, 1795; the date of the birth of their only child was the 7th of January following; and in the month of April, in the same year, a message from the prince was conveyed to the Princess of Wales, through the medium of Lord Cholmondeley, informing her that the intercourse between herself and the prince was in future to be of the most restrictive nature-in fact, that a separation as to all conjugal relations was, from that time, and for ever, to take place. In this arrangement the princess expressed her acquiescence, but she considered the subject of too important a nature to rest merely on verbal communication, and in * Lord Castlereagh. compliance with her request, the pleasure of his BOOK IV. royal highness was communicated to her in writing.‡ In the year 1805, while the Prince and Princess of Wales were living in a state of separation, the Duke of Sussex informed the prince, that Sir John Douglas had made known to him some circumstances respecting the behaviour of the Princess of Wales, which, in the opinion of the duke, it was of the highest importance the prince should hear, as they might, if true, not only affect the honour and peace of mind of his royal highness, but also the succession to the throne. Sir John and Lady Douglas, having made a formal declaration of the charges they thought proper to advance against the Princess of Wales, this declaration was submitted by the prince to Lord Thurlow, who gave it as his opinion that his royal highness had no alternative but to submit the matter to the king. In consequence of this opinion, and some further examinations which took place, the declarations of William and Sarah Lampert, servants to Sir John Douglas; William Cole, Robert and Sarah Bidgood, Frances Lloyd, and Sir John and Lady Douglas; were laid before his majesty; who thereupon issued a warrant, dated the 29th of May, 1806, directing and authorising Lord Erskine, as lord chancellor ; Lord Grenville, as first lord of the treasury; Earl Spencer, as one of his majesty's principal secretaries of state; and Lord Ellenborough, as chief justice of the court of king's bench; to inquire "into the truth of the said allegations, and to report to him thereon." The commissioners so appointed first examined on oath the principal informants, Sir John Douglas, and Charlotte his wife; who both positively swore, the former, to his having observed the fact of the pregnancy of her royal highness; and the latter, not only that she had observed it, but that her royal highness had made not the least scruple of talking about it with her, and describing the stratagems she meant to resort to in order to avoid detection. It was further deposed by Lady Douglas, that in the course of the year 1802, the princess was secretly delivered of a female child, which had been brought up in her own house, and under her own inspection! On this part of the inquiry, the commissioners, in their report to his majesty, declared, that there is no foundation whatever for believing that the child now living with the princess, is the child of her royal highness, or that she was delivered of any child in the year 1802; nor had any thing appeared to † Mr. Brand and Mr. Whitbread. CHAP. XX. 1813 BOOK IV. them that could warrant the belief that she was pregnant in that year, or at any other period CHAP. XX. within the compass of their inquiries. That child was, beyond all doubt, born in the Brownlow-Street Hospital, on the 11th day of July, 1802, of the body of Sophia Austin, and was first brought to the princess's house in the month of November following. 1813 But the commissioners did not feel them- Immediately on the receipt of a copy of this report, the Princess of Wales addressed a letter to his majesty on the subject; in which, in the face of the Almighty, she assured his majesty, not only of her innocence as to the weightier parts of the charge preferred against her by her enemies, but of her freedom from all the indecorums and improprieties which had been imputed to her by the lords commissioners, upon the evidence of persons who spoke as falsely as Sir John and Lady Douglas themselves. On the 17th of August she again wrote to the king, having in the mean time consulted with her legal advisers, requesting that she might have authenticated copies of the report, and of the declarations and depositions on which it proceeded, a request with which his majesty was graciously pleased to comply. Having received these papers, the Princess of Wales submitted them to her legal advisers, the principal of whom were Lord Eldon, Mr. Perceval, and Sir Thomas Plomer, and on the 2d of October she transmitted to his majesty an elaborate letter, containing her observations on the charges against her, and the evidence on which they rested. This letter is drawn up with uncommon ability; and while it displays a considerable portion of acuteness and penetra. tion, such as might have been expected from the legal experience and talents of her counsel, contains many passages distinguished by that dignified solemnity and pathetic tone of remonstrance and feeling, which could only have proceeded from the person most interested in the subject. After stating that the extravagance of the malice of Sir John and Lady Douglas had defeated itself, she states that there still remained imputations "strongly sanctioned and countenanced by the report," respecting which she could not remain silent without incurring the most fatal consequences to her honour and cha. racter. Against the substance of the proceeding itself, and the manner in which it was conducted, she considered herself bound to protest. The report proceeded upon ex parte examination, without affording her an opportunity of explaining or defending her conduct, or without the lords commissioners even hearing one word which she could urge in her own defence. For more than two years, she had been informed, her conduct had been made the subject of investigation; but the cause of this she did not learn till the investigation had actually taken place, and then she found that the charge against her was high treason, committed in the infamous crime of adultery. Her royal highness dwells with great force of argument on the extreme improbability of Lady Douglas's accusation respecting her pregnancy. But as the commissioners most unequivocally and decidedly acquaint her of that charge, she proceeds to examine the evidence of those In the depositions of Bidgood and Cole it was stated, that certain levities, of a nature unbecoming her rank and station, and incompatible with the character of a virtuous woman, had been practised by the Princess of Wales, in the years 1802-3; and that Sir Sidney Smith, Mr. Lawrence, the portrait painter, and Captain Manby, of the ship Africaine, had been admitted to her house on a footing that warranted suspicion of criminal intercourse. Frances Lloyd spoke less distinctly to the same fact; and Mrs Lisle, a lady of the princess's household, whose evidence was principally relied upon, deposed, that the behaviour of the princess towards Captain Manby, who often visited at Montague-House, was a flirting conduct, and such as, in the witness's opinion, did not become a married woman, + Report of the Lord Commissioners, dated July 14, 1806. Letter of the Princess of Wales to the King, dated August 12, 1806. |