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tance. Their cannon were mounted on the walls and works, and on the approach of the stadtholder's little army, as they called the regular forces by way of contempt, fired feveral rounds of artillery with great brifkness, but with fo little judgment in the direction, as not to produce the fmalleft effect. As foon as Spengler arrived within a proper distance, he pointed his artillery, in order to do the leaft poffible mifchief, at the chimnies and tops of the houses only. This, however, along with the bold advance and near approach of the troops, foon produced the defired effect; the armed burghers, with their adherents and auxiliaries, abandoned the town; and Spengler's men entered at one gate, as they were retiring through another. Elbourg was abandoned in the fame manner, and with ftill lefs trouble.

As the public papers were entirely in the hands of the republicans, fo nothing could be more ridiculous than the pompous and gafconading accounts published of the paltry affair at Hattem. The armed burghers and volunteers were defcribed as inheriting all the valour, and all the prowess, which had ever been at tributed to the heroic ages. The contemptible invading army had been repulfed and put to flight, with a confiderable flaughter of men and officers, who were plainly diftinguished as they dropped or were carried off; and, to give the better colour to the tale, fome fmall lofs was acknowledged on their own fide. Yet, in the moment of victory, they abandoned all thefe advantages, merely in compliance with the requifitions of many of their diftant and most respectable friends, who, huddering under the apprehenfion

of any wanton or needlefs profufion of patriotic blood, preffed them to referve their courage for fome occafion more worthy of it-than the defence of their native town, and the protection of their houses, poffeffions, wives, and families.

In the fame ftyle of delufion, nothing could be more, fhocking or deplorable than the accounts which they published of the enormities, the plunder, and cruelties, committed by the troops upon their gaining poffeffion of Hattem and Elbourg. It was no wonder that the public at large, and efp cially thofe at a distance, should have been impofed on by thefe reprefentations, when even the states of Guelderland, notwithstanding their vicinity, fwallowed the delufion fo implicitly, that under the double impreffion of indignation at the conduct of the troops, and compaffion for the fuppofed fufferers, they iffued a hafty proclamation, promifing fully to indemnify and to grant adequate fatisfaction to all perfons who had fuftained lofs or injury from them.

To the difappointment and mortification, however, of all lovers of the marvellous, as well as to the great vexation of the faction themfelves, general Spengler's detail to his matters, the ftates, of the operations of the troops under his command, was foon published, by which it appeared that not a fingle man had been killed or wounded on either fide in the boafted action of Hattem; and that the difcipline of the troops had been fo exact, and their conduct fo laudable, that there was not a fingle complainant from either town to appear against them.

In the mean time the felf-exiled burghers of thofe two towns, with their armed confederates, fuddenly [F] 4 changing

changing their late boafting into lamentation, and, notwithstanding that the ftates of Guelderland had published an amnesty in favour of all who would return to their houfes within a limited time, filled all places with their clamours, on the woeful detail of their loffes and fufferings; the effect of their complaints being the more quickened by the heavy burthen which they proved to their friends, in the various towns where they took refuge.

The taking of thefe two towns was confidered or represented by the adverse faction, not only as the fignal, but the actual commencement of civil war; and, nothing was to be heard but execrations, as well against the ftates of Gueldres, as the prince ftadtholder. In the province of Holland especially, the flames feemed to be blown up nearly to the greatest height at which they were capable of arriving. All regard to forms was now laid afide, in completing the depofition by force of thofe magiftrates, fenators, and members of the respective town councils, who were known or fufpected to be of the oppofite party.

Sept. 22d.

The ftates of Holland, without regard to the miffion and prefence of the count de Goertz, immediately fufpended, for an indefinite time, the prince ftadtholder from all the functions appertaining to his office of captain general within their province; and discharged the troops from that part of their military oath which bound them to obey his orders. At the fame time they recalled their regiments from Maftricht, and other garrifons without the province, and ordered a strong line of troops to be formed along the inland frontier towards Utrecht and Guelderland, and magazines to be provided for their fubfiftence during the winter ; general Van Ryffel, their mander, being likewife ordered to be in conftant force and readiness for fuccouring and protecting the city of Utrecht, if any attempt fhould be made upon it, under the orders of the ftates of that province, who were affembled at Amersfort. Such was the deplorable state of af. fairs in this once great and flourishing republic, towards the clofe of the year 1786.

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CHAP.

CHA P. V.

Opening of the third feffion of parliament. Amendment moved upon the addrefs in both boufes, and negatived without a divifion. Mr. Fox's obfervations on the king's speech-on the state of foreign alliances-treaty between France and the United Provinces-Germanic league-treaty with Ruffia-commercial treaty with France-prepofterous mode of conducting the public bufinefs-Irish propofitions-affairs of India. Mr. Pitt's reply; his obfervations on Mr. Fox's dexterity in debate; his account of the Ruffian treaty and German confederacy; his opinion refpecting the connection between Hanover and Great Britain; defence of his India bill; flourishing ftate of the revenues. Remarks by Mr. Fox on the minifter's opinion concerning the political connection between Great Britain and Hanover. Major Scott calls on Mr. Burke to bring forward his charges against Mr. Haftings. Mr. Burke relates in reply an anecdote of the duke of Parma. Grand debate on the duke of Richmond's propofed fortification of the dockyards. Inftructions to the board of land and fea-officers, and extracts from their report. Mr. Pitt's motion and arguments in fupport of the plan propofed, as neceffary, as beft adapted to their purpose, as tending to increase the effects of our naval force, and to reduce the army. Amendment to Mr. Pitt's motion by Mr. Baftard and Sir William Lemon. Mr. Sheridan's Speech in favour of the amendment; first he fhews that the plan propofed was dangerous to the conftitution; he denies it would reduce the ftanding army, and if it did, he proves that in the fame proportion it would increafe its power; zdly, he denies that it is fanctioned by the report of the board of officers, the extracts from the report prove the members were not agreed; the report itself founded on hypothetical fuggeftions from the mafter general. Mr. Pitt's motion rejected by the cafting vote of the fpeaker. Debate in the house of lords on the new claufe in the mutiny bill for fubjecting officers by brevet to the military law; amendment proposed by lords Carlifle and Stormont; rejected on a divifion; question started, whether an officer could refign bis commiffion at pleasure; opinions of the lord chancellor and lord Loughborough.

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HE third feffion of the prefent parliament was opened on the 24th of January 1786, by a fpeech from the throne, in which his majesty, after having mentioned the amicable conclufion to which the difputes that threatened an interruption to the tranquillity of Europe had been brought, the friendly difpofition of foreign powers towards this country, the extenfion of trade, the improvement of the revenue,

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and the increase of public credit, informed his parliament that the refolutions which they had laid before him, as the bafis of an adjustment of the commercial intercourfe between Great Britain and Ireland, had been by his direction recommended to the parliament of that kingdom, but that no effectual ftep had hitherto been taken thereupon, which could enable them to make any further progrefs in that falutary

work.

work. He afterwards called the attention of the houfe of commons to the establishment of a fixed plan for the reduction of the national debt, a measure which he trufted the flourishing state of the revenue would be fufficient to effect, with little addition to the public burthens. He concluded with faying, that the vigour and refources of the country, fo fully manifested in its prefent fituation, would encourage his parliament to give their utmost attention to every object of national concern; particularly to the confideration of fuch meafures as might be neceffary, in order to give further fecurity to the revenue, and to promote and extend, as far as poffible, the trade and general industry of his fubjects.

An addrefs in the ufual form being moved and read in the house of lords, the earl Fitzwilliam propofed to omit that part of it which related to the commercial negocia tions with Ireland; firft, as nugatory, it being acknowledged in the fpeech that nothing more could be done on the fubject; fecondly, as containing an indirect reflection upon the conduct of the parliament of Ireland; and thirdly, as tending to revive the difcuffion of a meafure almoft univerfally reprobated in one kingdom, received with great jealoufy and alarm in this, and marked with the difapprobation of a confiderable minority in both houfes of parliament. An amendment to the fame purpofe, and for the fame reafons, was moved in the house of commons by lord Surry; and al

though both the addreffes were carried as originally moved, without any divifion, yet the fpeech itself underwent a confiderable degree of animadverfion in both houses, principally on account of the vague and general terms in which it was worded, and the fcanty information it held out to parliament.

As the debate on the addrefs to his majefty on the first day of the feffion, is always confidered as open to any general obfervations on the ftate of the nation, Mr. Fox took this opportunity to enter at large into the fituation in which we ftcod with respect to the feveral powers of Europe. He ftrongly cenfured the impolitic conduct of his majesty's minifters, in not cultivating continental alliances, and their negligence in being perpetually behind hand in all their foreign negotiations. It was owing, he faid, to their criminal misconduct that the house of Bourbon had got the start of us in their late treaty with the United Provinces, and that our ambaffador at the Hague had been expofed to the ridicule of prefenting an ufelefs memorial to the ftates on the subject, after the above treaty had been actually ratified. This treaty, which the court of Verfailles had perfuaded the United States to enter into (rafhly indeed he thought, and impolitically on the part of the latter) and which effectually fecured Holland in its interests, he confidered as highly dangerous and hoftile to this country, in as much as it combined France, Spain, and Holland, three of the most powerful maritime pow

*The addrefs in the house of lords was moved by the earl of Morton, and seconded by lord Fortefcue; in the house of commons it was moved by Mr. Smyth, member for Pomfret, and feconded by Mr. Addington, member for the Devizes.

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ers of Europe, in a confederacy againft Great Britain.

In order to counterbalance the mischievous tendency of this confederacy, a more clofe connection with the courts of Petersburg and Vienna feemed naturally to fuggeft itself. But what had been the conduct of his majesty's minifters? The emperor, who was the most able, as well as the most likely, to cut out work for France, in cafe of a future war, had been imprudently dif gufted by the part which the king, as elector of Hanover, had taken with respect to the electorate of Bavaria, and by his joining with the Germanic princes in a league, found. ed on the plea of preferving the liberties of the empire. He defired the house to recollect, that in all her wars, France had been moft embarraffed by her continental fituation, and the dread of an attack from the neighbouring powers; the whole of her policy therefore had been directed to engage them in fuch a manner as to fecure their neutrality, and by that means free her 0 from the burthen of maintaining a ruinous frontier eftablishment; and hence it was, that in her late conteft with Great Britain, she had been enabled to aid her refources by a reduction of her army in the midst of a war, and to apply the favings to the increase of her maritime ftrength. And what were we to expect in a future war? She was fafe by the family compact on the fide of Spain; fhe had, by the late treaty, fecured Holland in her intereft. The em peror (whofe defigns, notwithstanding the treaties fubfifting between them, and all the endearing bonds of family connection, it was well known fhe still watched with jealous apprehenfions) was the only power

in Europe fhe had any cause to dread. France therefore had nothing to wish for before the late league was made, but that fome circumstances should happen to create a jealousy and dislike of Great Britain in the emperor. That circumftance we had ourselves provided; by the effects of that league we had fecured the frontier of France gratis, at a moment when she would have paid any price for it, as was apparent from the great fums fhe had expended in bringing about the peace between the United Provinces and the emperor. The most fanguine dreamer of national good fortune could not have pictured to himself the poffibility of such a for

tunate event.

With respect to Ruffia, a crifis had occurred two years ago, of which this country ought to have taken advantage, and which he himself had at the precife moment pointed out in that houfe: the moment to which he alluded was that when the emprefs of Ruffia had settled her differences with the Porte on the fubject of the Crimea, when overtures of the most advantageous nature were made to the British court. At the fame time, though he was convinced that the beft opportunity for treating with Ruffia had been loft, yet he expreffed his fatisfaction at having heard, from good authority, that a treaty was then actually negociating, and in a fair way of being concluded.

Mr. Fox next adverted to the negociation for a commercial treaty, which was then on the point of being opened at Paris. He gave a decifive opinion against the policy of fuch a measure; appealing to the experience of former times, which, he faid, proved that this nation had

grown

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