that could not be disclosed-and was, therefore, most assiduously kept back. If there was no such secret reason, he asked if the Princesses were to have a separate establishment? he believed that they were not. He was convinced that those amiable personages would not hear of abandoning their royal father in his present calamity, and the Queen in her afflic tions, in order to spend 36,000l. a year under another roof. Then where was the necessity of the grant, unless so give the Princesses an opportunity of laying by so much money every year? He would, however, put the question directly to the right hon. gentleman, and ask him, were the Princesses to have an establishment independent of the Queen? He put the question so directly, that he did not think the right hon. gentleman could help answering it. If so, what was to be done with the saving that must in that case arise out of the civil list, as to the general expendi ture of the Queen's household? But, then, for want of something better they were told that the Princesses had arrived at a certain age; but had not the Princes, their royal brothers, arrived at a certain age? and was not this a reason as applicable to the one as the other, if admissible in the case of either? As to what had been said of the necessity of independent establishments for those illustrious personages, he contended, that this added nothing to their independence, but made them, as far as it could, dependent on the Prince Regent, at whose pleasure the annuities were to be paid. Another strong objection to the Bill was, the fund upon which these an. nuities were charged:-instead of being charged upon the hereditary revenue of the crown, they were charged upon the consolidated fund. Had they been charged, as they ought to have been, on the hereditary revenue, then, in case of the demise of the crown, the charge would have fallen as it ought; but according to the present Bill, there was no chance upon any event of a relief to this pressure upon the public. But his main objection was to the thing itself as a whole. There had been throughout the entire conduct of it a struggle to disguise, to confuse and to deceive. But the simple question was, if 184,000l. a year was not enough to provide for the comforts and splendour of the Queen and her royal daughters? The different items of their joint establishment already amounted to 184,000l. a year. Why then were they called upon to give more difficult he had found it. As to the mere increase of 6,000l. a year, in addition to the 30,000l. settled by the former Bill, to that he had no objection; but if the former Bill was the professed model of the present, why did the present Act depart from it in the most essential provision; the time at which the Act was to take effect? He could very well understand, how a Bill giving 36,000l. a year to the Princesses might be not essentially different from one giving but 30,000l. a year, but what he felt it difficult to comprehend, was, why the present Act was to take effect immediately, when the former was intended not to take effect till after the King's demise? Had any thing occurred since the enactment of the former Bill, that rendered an immediate provision necessary? Was there any thing in the present state of the country that made it desirable to increase its expenditure? One might suppose that the straitened state of our finances, the distresses of our manufacturers, and the calamities that marked the present times, did not particularly recommend the present as a period at which we should be more prompt to impose a charge upon the public than we were disposed to be at a former and much more favourable period. Unfortunately, however, the right hon. gentleman thought otherwise, and as he never thought without good reason, he would see why the right hon. gentleman thought so. He had given two reasons, one, the present state of the King; and the other, the present state of the Prince. The right hon. gentleman had spared himself the trouble of shewing why the indisposition of his Majesty made it necessary for the Princesses to have more money to spend, and he had been quite as satisfactory in his explanation of his second reason. For after having been urged in some measure to explain what he meant by the present state of the Prince, it turned out that the present state of the Prince meant neither more nor less than the present time of life of his Royal Highness, which was saying in other words, pretty much to this purpose, that because the ordinary revolution of twelve months had added one year to the age of the Prince Regent, parliament was bound to give annually to his Royal Highness 36,000l. a year of the public money. But the right hon. gentleman must excuse him if he said, that he did not believe that either of these reasons had any thing to do with the business. There must have been some other-one the Princesses 36,000l. a year? A good reason might be very reasonably demand-most suspicious in the whole transaction ed in such times; and what was the reason? Why, the time of life of the Prince Regent. Did this" time of life" break out as a new light upon his Majesty's ministers? Was it altogether a sudden discovery? Did they not know last year how old his Royal Highness would be this? And why did they not then propose this provision for the Princesses? For let the right hon. gentleman argue as he might, the Prince Regent was now but one year older than he was a year ago. It had been more than insinuated at the time of asking for more money for the King's household, that his Majesty was in a state which enabled him to derive gratification from his recognition of the persons in daily attendance upon him. Here he would put another plain question to the right hon. gentleman: Did he know that his Majesty, since the passing of that Bill, had any personal intercourse with one of the lords of the bed-chamber, or the grooms or equerries then voted? It was remarkable too, that the moment that Bill past, the Bulletins were reduced from once a week to once a month. It appeared, that on a recent occasion no groom was in attendance, and that an equerry had acted in his stead. What did all this prove? Why, that the whole scheme was little other than an ingenious mode of providing for those who had the good fortune to be in favour with the minister; and was this a way of answering the petitions they had heard read that day? But why antedate the Bill? Unless to give the Princesses an advance of 9,000l. Did they want this? Were they in debt or distress? If they were, in the name of truth and common sense why not say so at once, and come down with a message to the House to that effect; but according to the present mode parliament were telling the public as plainly as they could, that they did not think it necessary to explain why they voted away that money the country found it so difficult to contribute. He should propose, therefore, as an amendment, that instead of dating the Bill from the 18th of February last, it should be limited to take effect upon the King's demise. He again protested against the mode in which the whole business had been thrown upon the House, and hurried through it. He believed that there were very few of the gentlemen, then in the House, who knew the nature of the two Bills, which had then been passed; there was something there certainly was some curious secret at the bottom. He acquitted the royal Prin cesses of the slightest concert in the business. He had the highest personal respect for each and all of them. There had been, however, some way or other, a deal of juggling; one could see throughout the whole of the business an anxious and stirring bustle to divert people from the true scent. There certainly was a something that was to be concealed at the expence of revealing any thing else. Before he sat down, he could not help adverting to the singular circumstauces in which her royal highness the Princess Regent was left to appear before the country. It seemed as if her fate was already sealed, abandoned as she was by her once chivalrous champion, her old friend, her faithful counsellor. But if the right hon. gentleman had found reason to change his opinion with respect to her, why had the Princess Charlotte of Wales, the future hope of England, been altogether overlooked in these arrangements? She was now bordering upon her 17th year, and not, either from her rank, prospects, or time of life, wholly exempted from the right hon. gentleman's consideration. The Chancellor of the Exchequer replied to part of the objections of the last speaker, and to part only, because he conceived that no inconsiderable portion of the arguments made use of by the right hon. gentleman were wholly inapplicable to the question immediately before the House. The greater part of the speech they had just heard was to points which had already gone by, and which the House had already decided upon. With respect to the suggestion of the propriety of creating a new fund by the abolition of the King's Household, he put it to the House, whether if the King's state of health was wholly irrecoverable, they would hear of any proposition to abolish during his life those provisions they had already made for his comfort and splendor, as far as either could be consulted. But even if the reduction did take place, he denied that the saving resulting therefrom would do more than provide for two of the Princesses. As to the fund upon which it was charged, the objection could have scarcely been meant in seriousness, because it was notorious that the hereditary revenues had merged in the consolidated fund. Ha certainly could not consent to the change proposed, as to the time at which the Bill was to take effect. There was a great difference between the Princesses setting up a separate establishment (of which he believed they had no intention) and being compelled to confine their residence to Windsor for the remainder of their lives, under any circumstances whatever. As to their dependence on the Prince Regent, he contended that though the annuities were nominally during pleasure, they were to all intents and purposes effectually during life. Mr. Whitbread said, that the speech of the right hon. gentleman was much more remarkable for what it had omitted to say, than for any thing it had said. The two most important points in the speech of his right hon. friend (Mr. Tierney) had been passed over without the slightest allusion to either. He did not censure the right hon. gentleman for not attempting to do what he might have found it very difficult to do well-in certain cases where no ingenuity could defend, perhaps silence was at once the most prudent and the most candid extenuation. Be the motive what it might, it was certain that the right hon. gentleman did not say one word respecting either the Princess of Wales or the Princess Charlotte of Wales. Why the minister thought it prudent to say nothing upon a subject of such general importance he should not pretend to explain, but he questioned much if the country in general would be disposed to put the best construction upon a silence that was at best suspicious. With respect to those topics upon which the right hon. gentleman was not afraid to speak out, he (Mr. Whitbread) did not think him much more successful than those upon which he had been silent. He had not explained why he did not, in the first instance, upon the memorable 18th of February, state at once the whole system of this increase of the household establishment. He had said, that the hereditary revenue merged in the consolidated fund, and that therefore it was immaterial upon which fund those annuities were charged; never was there a greater fallacy in point of argument; because, though it had so merged, was there a doubt that upon the demise of the king, the hereditary revenues only would be answerable to the claims of the annuitants, provided those annuities had been charged upon that fund? He had told them that the Princesses approved of this increase. Of that there could be no doubt; but did the right hon. gentleman, when he con- does he retain his former opinions of the unexceptionable conduct of the Princess of Wales? I ask him if he did not lately in this House solemnly record his confirmation of that opinion; and if it is now what it was the the other night, I call upon him to explain, if he can, his apparent desertion of her just claims to that respect, notice, provision, and consideration due to her? These are questions, which, as he values his own consistency, as he values the character and claims of the Princess, and as he respects the Prince his master, he is bound to answer. Sir J. Newport opposed the Bill, and asked why the right hon. gentleman had deviated from the former proceeding of charging the annuity to the Princesses on the hereditary revenue, for the purpose of charging it on the consolidated fund. The Chancellor of the Exchequer replied, that in the former Bill the grant was to take place at a future period, but that in the present Bill it was to take place immediately, and must therefore be charged on the fund immediately applicable. In 1806, when an additional grant was made to the Princes, the ministers of that day naturally proposed that it should be charged on the consolidated fund; and he believed no instance could be found of a grant which was to take place immediately having been charged on the hereditary revenue. Mr. Courtenay confirmed the statement just made by the right hon. gentleman, and supported the Bill. Mr. Tierney said, that the present grant might be charged on that part of the consolidated fund, which was constituted by the hereditary revenue. tleman's mistake. He had confounded the hereditary revenue of the crown with the temporary revenue which had been settled on all the sovereigns of the country from the time of queen Anne, at the period of their accession. The hereditary revenue did not at present exceed 350,0001. a year. He Mr. W. Smith opposed the Bill. solemnly declared that from his soul he pitied the right hon. gentleman, when he reflected upon the feelings he must have experienced before he could have made up his mind to come down at such a time with such a proposition to the House. Mr. Secretary Ryder was suprised that now, for the first time, the hon. gentleman should have found an opportunity of giving vent to his feelings, upon so late a stage as the third reading of the Bill. Mr. W. Smith begged pardon for interrupting the right hon. gentleman, but he had fallen into a slight mistake. Instead of this being the first time that he (Mr. Smith) had spoken against the Bill, it so happened that it was only the fourth! Mr. Secretary Ryder had no hesitation in acknowledging the error he had fallen into, in supposing that the speech he had just heard was the first made by the hon. gentleman; but however mistaken he might be as to him, he believed he was accurate in saying that many gentlemen at that end of the House, who had been that night so vehement against the Bill, particularly one honourable gentleman then in his eye, had not spoken against the Bill in any of its former stages. Mr. Whitbread begged pardon of the right hon. gentleman, but if he was the person alluded to, it was another slight The Chancellor of the Exchequer explain-mistake, for he had resisted the Bill in ed the manner in which the hereditary re- every stage. venue was merged in the consolidated fund, and which rendered it impossible to make a charge on any distinct part of it. Mr. Tierney merely wanted the grant to be charged on the hereditary revenue, so that on the demise of the crown, parliament would be enabled to ascertain what were the exact sums with which the revenue was burdened. Mr. Rose repeated the observations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The hereditary revenue of the crown was by no means so large as gentlemen opposite seemed to think. Mr. Tierney said, that it was 1,400,000l. per annum. Mr. Rose discovered the right hon. gen Mr. Secretary Ryder contended, that there had been objections thrown out in the debate of that night, which they had never before heard of. He thought the claims of the Princesses irresistible, whe ther in reference to themselves personally, or as the daughters of their afflicted and venerable monarch-He did not court that sort of popularity to which certain gentlemen laid exclusive claim; he was persuaded however that the measure was a popu lar one. As to the Princess of Wales, she already had an independent provision, which the Princesses had not. He hoped that his right hon. friend would continue true to the confidence reposed in him, and not be tempted by any threats or attacks to deviate from that proper and respectful | printed, at a private press in his house, a silence which he had hitherto maintain- large number of copies of a detail of the ed upon the subject. (Hear! hear! from transaction, for the purpose of giving them the Opposition side of the House.) He to the world? Why the work had been was not afraid to repeat what he had said. suppressed, he did not know. But he As to the drawing-room, it was the Queen's knew that several copies which had got right to hold one, if she pleased. It had abroad were bought up at a large expence, been stated as extraordinary, that her Ma- and he believed that certain advertisejesty was about to hold a drawing-room. ments offering rewards to those who would He did not know what view the hon. gen. bring copies of the work to one Lindsell, tleman entertained of the case, but his a bookseller, proceeded from the right Majesty, notwithstanding his unfortunate hon. gentleman or his agents, When affliction, was still King; of course her these facts were notorious, he knew not Majesty was still Queen of these realms, why members of that House were to be and under those circumstances he knew arraigned for asking questions; certainly not who ought to hold a drawing-room un- in one point of view, of a private nature, less it were her Majesty. but of very great national importance in another. Mr. Whitbread, in explanation, denied having asserted, that it was improper for the Queen to hold a drawing-room. All that he said was, that the Princess of Wales ought to be placed in such a situation, as to enable her Royal Highness also to hold a drawing-room. Lord A. Hamilton observed, that the additional sum granted in the early part of the present session to her Majesty, was so granted on the express representation that the Princesses were to remain with her : and now they came forward for separate establishments. The establishment of the Princess of Wales was only 5,000 a year, and therefore he did not think any delicacy was exhibited towards her Royal Highness by those who talked so much about it. The Bill was read a third time. The Chancellor of the Exchequer then introduced several new clauses. On that being proposed by which the commencement of the operation of the Bill was fixed for the 18th of February last, Mr. Whitbread, adverting to what the right hon. Secretary of State had said of delicacy, expressed his surprise that the right hon. Secretary bad made this observation, at the same time that he must be aware of the course and conduct pursued by the right hon. gentleman (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) who sat next him, on an occasion highly interesting to that illustrious individual. He would ask if there had not been at a former period a solemn proceeding on the case of the Princess of Wales-if that case had not been referred by his Majesty to his ministers for their advice-if on that advice, her Royal Highness had not been received at court-if the right hon. gentleman's right hon. friend had not then caused to be (VOL. XXII.) Mr. Secretary Ryder said, he did not rise for the purpose of answering the questions which had been put by the hon. gentleman. When he spoke of the conduct pursued by him and his friends, on the present and on similar occasions, when he had talked of delicacy, he did not flatter himself that his observations would be attended with much effect. But he thought it his duty to state his opinion, which he did not look upon as that of a single individual; for, if he knew any thing of the feelings of the public on this subject, there was no part of the conduct of the hon. gentlemen opposite which had created more disgust and disapprobation than the manner in which they had introduced this matter to the House. Though he by no means expected that what he had before said would have any weight with them, still he was surprised that the hon. gentleman should put a question to him on a business, with all the details of which he must be aware he (Mr. Ryder) was not acquainted. But, after the opinion he had given on the subject, if he even were perfectly master of those details, he should conceive himself as acting with extreme inconsist ency if he returned an answer. Mr. Tierney proposed his amendment, that instead of " the 18th February, 1812," "the demise of his Majesty" should be substituted. On this amendment the House divided, Ayes 35, Noes 101, Majority 66. The original clause was then agreed to; and the Bill was passed. GOLDSMID'S ESTATE BILL.] • On the motion for the third reading of this Bill, Lord Folkestone having adverted to the little attention which had been paid to its (2 G) |