least profpect of a more auspicious termination. As to the repugnance to treat with the prefent rulers of France, had not the minifter himfelf treated with Chauvelin, — and Lord Aukland with Dumouriez ? Ought charges of Jacobinifm to stand in the way of nations? or fhould ftudied obftacles prevent the reconciliation of states?

This long and obftinate dif cuffion concluded with 208 votes for the previous queftion, and only 55 against it.

HE progrefs of what were

French, fcarcely lefs alarming than that of their arms, produced in Britain arreftations, trials, and difcuffions both in parliament and courts of juftice, concerning the Spirit and import of certain laws relating to fedition and treafon.

By fentences of the court of jufficiary at Edinburgh, and of the circuit-court at Perth, in Auguft and September 1793, Mr. Muir and Mr. Palmer, for the crime of kang-making t, were adjudged to transportation; and Botany Bay was understood at the time the fentences were paffed, to be the place to

which they would be tranfported.

which transportation was impofed by the court of justiciary in Scot land for an offence of that nature. In the laft feffion of parliament, within a few days after, the Houfe of Lords had finally decided, that no appeal was competent from the court of jufticiary in matters of law.

Mr. Adam gave notice of his intention to propofe early in this feffion, fome alterations in the criminal law of Scotland, particularly on appeals from the court of justiciary in matters of law. Accordingly, on the 27th of January 1794,

$4

five

five days after the meeting of parliament in the prefent feffion, he intimated to the Houle, that he would, on the 4th of February, move for a bill to grant fuch an ap. peal. He ftated at the fame time that the cafes of Mr. Muir and Mr. Palmer, which were unforeseen at the period of his original notice, would lead him, in fome measure, to cularge his plan, by moving, if the bill Thould be received, for an inftruction to the committee on the bill to infert a claufe that fhould have a retrofpect to all cafes in which the courts of jufticiary had pronounced judgments in the year 1793; thereby rendering it competent for Mr. Muir and Mr. Palmer to appeal for error in law.

Mr. Adam's motion for leave to bring in fuch a bill being rejected, he gave notice on the 14th of February, that he would bring forward a motion for the relief of Meffrs. Muir and Palmer, in another form. The confideration of his motion was deferred to the 24th of February and in the mean time, Mr. Sheridan prefented a petition from Mr. Palmer, reprefenting, that he conceived the fentence paffed upon him by the high court of jufticiary, from which there was no appeal, to be unjuft.

Mr. Pitt objected to the receiving of this petition, which, he faid, would be an undue interpofition between the fentence of a competent court and its execution.

The petition was justified by Mr. Fox, on the principle that it was the duty of the legiflature to attend to all the complaints of the fubject: But Mr. Dundas fignified, that the fentence was already executed; the warrant for the tranfportation of Mr. Palmer being both figned

and iffued. This proceeding was loudly condemned by oppofition, which afferted, that while the Houle was about to deliberate on the law. fulness of the fentence, to fuffer it to be executed was a mockery of juftice. A motion was directly made to ftop the failing of the tranfport; but negatived by a great majority, and the difcuffion of the petition was put off to the 27th.

Mr. Sheridan produced on that day fuch valid precedents in proof of the right to prefent it, that Mr. Pitt was obliged to retract his words; and the petition was admitted.

Mr. Adam, on the 10th of March, moved accordingly for a review of the trials of Thomas Muir and the Rev. Fofter Palmer. From the records demanded, his object, he faid, was to queftion the legality of the fentences paffed upon them. But as no appeal could lie from the decifion of the court, however questionable, he propofed in confequence of the doubtfulness of the cafe, to move for the production of certain records relating to the trial, and for a petition to the crown in their favour. The crimes for which thofe men were indicted, were stated in Scotland leafing-making, corresponding to that mifdemeanor in England, called a public libel on the government, and tending to disturb the peace. No other crime was charged in their indictment; and tranfportation could not be legally inflicted for leafing - making: the only punishment for which by law, was fine, imprisonment, or banishment. Nor, if the acts charged in the indictments did not amount to leafing-making, were they charged with any crime known to the laws of Scotland. He then adverted to various circumftances attending the

trial, which he decidedly reprobated as oppreffive and unjust; and condemned the fentence altogether, as illegal, arbitrary, and unwarrantable. On thefe grounds, Mr. Adam maintained, that their punifhment exceeded all the bounds of equity and moderation. He concluded by declaring, that he had undertaken the prefent business neither from interested motives, perfonal affection to the fufferers, whom he knew not, nor difrespect to the judges who had prefided at this trial; but folely from a perfuafion, that an impartial adminiftration of juftice was the fureft prefervative of public liberty, and that the perverfion of the law, where the intereft of the whole community was at ftake, tended to introduce defpotifm or anarchy.

A multitude of arguments and reafonings were brought forward on this important fubject. The Lord Advocate of Scotland, Mr. Wyndham, and Mr. Pitt, contended ftrongly for the propriety of the fentence, and of the proceedings of the Scotch courts. The firft of thefe gentlemen even went fo far as to affert the fuperiority of the Scotch over the English laws, for the punishment of libels and the fuppreffion of fedition.-The fecond feemed to infinuate, that if the English laws were not equal to thofe purposes, the Scottish law fhould be fubftituted. The fupporters of Mr. Adam's motion were Mr. Fox and Mr. Sheridan. The former fpoke in very fevere terms of the fentiments and opinions delivered by the Lords of jufticiary, one of whom had faid, that no man had a right to speak of the conftitution, unless he poffeffed landed property: and another had afferted, that

Affociations, faid Mr. Fox, had not many years before been formed in England, on the very plan and principles of thofe formed in Scotland by Mr. Muir and his affociates. Thee unfortunate men, faid Mr. Fox, did no more than the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Duke of Richmond had done before them. The addreffes of thefe two noblemen to the people of England, were not merely to petition for a reform in parliamentnot fimply to state abules, and pray for redrefs, but to demand them as their right.

Mr. Sheridan was not lefs pointed at the Lord Advocate, whom he reprehended with the moft animated indignation for his preference of the Scotch to the English law. Such affertions, he faid, ought not to be made in the hearing of the Houfe of Commons, without meeting explicit abhorrence and contempt. He examined with great freedom and fpirit the particulars of the trial, which both he and Mr. Fox exerted their utmost abilities to reprefent as a bafe and iniquitous ftretch of legal tyranny. The motion was on a divifion rejected by 139 against 32.

Mr. Adam ftill perfifted in his determination to introduce, if pollible, fome regulations into the Scottish courts of jufticiary, that would be more favourable than the present to the liberty of the fubject, and to a milder administration of justice.

But he was moft ftrenuously oppofed by Mr. Dundas, who coincided with the Lord Advocate in declaring, that the English laws were not fufficiently fevere in their punishment

were the firft fignals to the minifterial and the popular parties in this country, to engage in that violent and acrimonious conteft, which is not yet terminated. These two famous performances revived, as it were, the royal and republican parties that had divided this nation in the last century, and that had lain dormant fince the Revolution in 1688. They now returned to the charge with a rage and animofity equal to that which characterized our ancestors during the civil wars in the reign of King Charles the First; and it remained a long time in fufpenfe, whether this renewed conteft would not be attended with the fame calamities: fo eager were the partizans of the refpective tenets contained in thofe performances, to affert them with unbounded vehemence.

Among those who publicly and unequivocally maintained the doctrines contained in the publication ftyled the Rights of Man, were all the popular focieties in the three kingdoms. The book written by Mr. Burke was chiefly patronized by the upper claffes. But this, inftead of intimidating the lower, ferved rather to rouze them to dangerous enquiries into the nature of that fuperiority claimed over them by thofe very claffes. Thus, the difpute between the higher and the lower orders became every day more virulent, and threatened very ferious confequences. It was not however till the middle of 1792, that government took any formal notice of thofe tranfactions. They then iffued a proclamation against feditious meetings; which, inftead of preventing the reading of that performance, against which it was chiefly levelled, the Rights of

Man, contributed to its diffemination throughout every part of Great Britain and Ireland, and gained it more readers and profelytes than ever. In the courfe of that year, the events that had happened in France fo much alarmed government, that it was thought neceffary to counteract the focieties in this country, by opposing to them other focieties, on principles wholly contradictory to theirs. With this view were inftituted the affociations against republicans and levellers. But thefe, affociations, tho' numerous, and compofed of the genteeler parties in fociety, did not deter their ftill more numerous antagonists. Thefe continued refolutely to act on the plan they had primarily adopted, and to manifeft a fpirit of refiftance to their new opponents; which afforded fufficient ground of alarm to the friends of domeftic tranquillity. Government in the mean time kept a watchful eye on the proceedings of the popular focieties. Thefe continued to hold their meetings as ufual, and to declare their fentiments with unlimited freedom. In fome of those meetings, however, they exceeded the bounds of difcretion fo far as to ufe expreffions that laid them open to the charge of fedition: but the circumftance which principally rendered them obnoxious was, the regular correfpondence they had established with the many focieties in the kingdom acting on their own principles; but chiefly the intimate communication they held with the convention that affembled in Scotland, and to which they fent deputies to reprefent them; intendiag fhortly to fummon a convention in England on the fame plan, and composed of the deputies from all

the