whenever any of them came to London, by orders for admission at Drury Lane and the Opera House.

But though a petition was presented against the return, on the charges of bribery and corruption, it failed for want of positive proof; and the sitting members for the borough of Stafford were declared to be duly elected. When the petition was brought into the house, Mr. Sheridan treated it as frivolous and malicious, in a speech which drew some droll remarks from Mr. Rigby, who was sarcastically severe upon that part which manifested in the speaker a tender regard for the moral character of his constituents. Mr. Sheridan was relieved by the address of his friend Mr. Fox from the embarrassment into which he had been thrown by his own precipitancy, and the arch insinuations of an experienced veteran in electioneering matters; but the conversation was closed by the authority of the chair, on the ground that there was no question before the house.

This was the first essay of Mr. Sheridan as a parliamentary orator; and though the subject was comparatively one of little interest, he was heard with marked attention, the members being uncommonly still all the time he was speaking. A few days afterwards he had occasion to deliver his sentiments upon public affairs, when a motion for a vote of thanks to Earl Cornwallis and Sir Henry Clinton was made by Mr. Coke. Though Mr. Sheridan did not oppose the motion, he seized this opportunity of expressing his entire disapprobation of the American war; but he seems to have been principally induced to rise in the course of the debate out of pique at what had shortly before fallen from Mr. Rigby, who, having again exercised his wit at the expense of some of the gentlemen in opposition, laid himself fairly open to an attack in

return.

CHAPTER VI.

Mr. Sheridan's Motion on the Police of Westminster.-His Observations on Lotteries. His spirited Opposition to Mr. Fox on the Marriage Act.

THE scandalous riots which had disgraced the metropolis, and astonished the kingdom, in the preceding summer, afforded Mr. Sheridan an opportunity of displaying his powers to great advantage on the meeting of parliament. It was a fact well known, that the inactivity of the magistrates during those outrages, and especially at the commencement, had rendered the interference of the military indispensable. Upon this occasion, Mr. Sheridan brought forward, on the fifth of March, a motion for an inquiry into the subject. In this speech he apologized for having undertaken to bring so important a question before parliament, and which he was but ill qualified to discuss. He then proceeded in a strain of declamation to inveigh bitterly against the employment of the military in civil disturbances; and having quoted that part of His Majesty's speech, in which the necessity of the case was alleged as a justification of the measure, he called upon ministers to apply for a bill of indemnity, that they might stand excused for having adopted an unconstitutional measure in desperate circumstances. Having descanted largely upon the danger of trusting to the interposition of soldiers for the suppression of outrages and riots, Mr. Sheridan lamented, justly enough, the defective state of the metropolis as the main cause of the mischief, and concluded a desultory speech with moving the following resolutions:-1st, "That it is illegal and unjustifiable to order the military to act without the intervention

of the civil magistrates, except in cases of the most extreme necessity, when the civil power is absolutely borne down. 2dly, That it appears, from the necessity of employing the military to quell the riots in June last, that there is some great defect in the civil constitution, or police of the City of Westminster. 3dly, That a committee be appointed to inquire into the state of the police of the said city, and report to the house such improvements as shall appear to them necessary for constituting a police, that might prove equal to the preservation of the peace and tranquillity thereof." This motion was seconded by the Honourable Richard Fitzpatrick, who, in allusion to his own military rank, declared that he was, in common with his fellow soldiers, extremely anxious to have the question brought to a final issue, so that it might no longer remain in doubt and perplexity.

The late Duke of Norfolk, then Earl of Surrey, took a technical objection to the first resolution, on the ground that it was vague and indeterminate; remarking, that "overthrowing the civil power," was an expression that would admit of various acceptations; and if a discretion should be thus apparently given to government to interpret that charge, agreeable to their own will and ideas, it might be applied improperly and unconstitutionally to every riotous proceeding whatever.

Mr. Sheridan, in explanation, defended his resolution upon the plea that Lord Surrey had not accurately attended to the words of his proposition. He asserted that he had himself adverted to the latitude which might be taken in interpreting the exception; and therefore, instead of stating the order for the employment of the military, even in such cases, to be legal, he had only called it justifiable, leaving the specific justification open to the review and determination of parliament in any particular emergency. He declared, however, at the same time, his willingness to leave out that

clause, and was anxious that it should be immediately expunged. But the Speaker informed him, that the motion having been made, and seconded, the course of parliament could only permit it to be altered by another motion for an amendment; on which Mr. Sheridan replied, that he had no objection to withdraw the first part of his motion entirely, since it was merely declaratory; but this was checked by the interposition of the Solicitor-General, the present Sir James Mansfield, who rose to oppose the whole proposition.

He conceived that the questions brought forward for discussion by the first part of the resolutions had nothing to do with a reform of the police of Westminster, which was the ostensible object of the motion. The learned gentleman contended, that, in a constitutional point of view, the power of suppressing commotions was left entirely to the magistracy, without any express provision for military assistance; and therefore he deprecated the formation of abstract opinions into resolutions of the house. The Solicitor-General, in the course of his speech, threw out some sarcastic observations on the universality of knowledge claimed by the members of opposition, who were not only perfectly conversant in naval affairs and military tactics, but were "such a congregation of lawyers as could not be paralleled in the world." This piece of irony brought up Mr. Thomas Townshend, who defended his friend Sheridan, by asserting, that, in making his motion, he had expressed all the diffidence which became him as a young and inexperienced member of that house; but that his speech proved him equal to any task which he might think proper to undertake. The motion was also supported by Sir George Savile, Mr. Fox, and some other members of the opposition; but after Mr. Sheridan had withdrawn his first resolution with the leave of the house, the two last were lost by a considerable majority.

On the second of May the Solicitor-General obtained leave to

bring in a bill for the prevention of profanations of the Lord's-day; and the statement which he gave as the ground of his application exhibited a deplorable picture of the public morals at that time. A practice, he said, had of late obtained, of opening places of amusement on Sundays: some were held out avowedly as such, while others affected to be places of instruction, where religious questions were discussed. Of the former description was Carlisle House, whither, for the seeming purpose of walking, and drinking tea and coffee, persons of the most abandoned cast were wont to resort. Thus virtue was undermined, and religion was sacrificed to vice. In the places set apart for debating theological questions, religion was trampled under foot by the vulgar and ignorant, who wished to acquire a reputation for eloquence in assemblies composed of the young and illiterate. The Solicitor-General brought forward abundant proofs of the truth of what he had stated: and though some opposition was made to his proposition, he obtained leave to bring in his bill, which was carried in a committee on the fifteenth of the same month, when Mr. Sheridan took occasion, from some remarks that were made in the course of the debate about the nuisance of fashionable gaming houses, to deliver his sentiments. He said that he should not oppose the bill; but he thought that it did not go far enough; nor could he bring himself to believe that any restraint upon gaming could be effectual, so long as gaming was encouraged by government, who entered into partnership with it, and shared the profits, which was done by licensing lottery-offices. He wished, he said, to see that practice abolished; and that as the learned gentleman, the Solicitor-General, had assumed the office of Censor Morum, and Arbiter Elegantiarum, being at once the Cato and Petronius of the age, he would turn his thoughts to the framing of a bill for the purpose of suppressing gaming, and particularly of putting down lottery-offices.

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