HC Deb 11 July 1820 vol 2 cc362-3
Mr. R. Martin

said, he was sorry to trouble the House with any thing that referred personally to himself. On a former occasion he had brought under their notice a breach of privilege with which his name was connected in "The Morning Herald" newspaper. At that time he had refrained from making a complaint, and merely mentioned the subject by way of admonition. He had afterwards seen the gentleman, who avowed that he was the person who reported his speech on that occasion. Indeed, the gentleman, when he spoke with him, talked of his situation and condition very unreservedly. But he (Mr. M.) was not prepared to put the matter to issue on the principle of a trial by battle. The gentleman used the following expression;—"In future, Mr. Martin, you shall have no cause of complaint; we shall lay down the pen when you speak." What he said then was, that he should be very much obliged to him not to report his speeches at all, if they were to be done in the way he complained of. In the same paper of this day the reporter had made him utter sentiments which it would not become any man to use who was not a fit subject for a certain receptacle. In consequence of this repetition of offence, he was under the necessity of moving, that the printer and publisher of the paper in question be ordered to attend at the bar. The hon. member then handed The Morning Herald, containing the passage he complained of, to the clerk at the table, who read it as follows:—"Mr. Martin, of Galway, compared the opposition gentlemen, who were attacking the ministers for the purpose of getting into their places, to a big-bellied hackney coachman whom he once met in Paris, who spoke in disrespectful terms of the king of France, and said he himself would make a better king if put in his place." He then moved, that J. Robeson, the printer, and T. P. Glassington, the publisher, be ordered to attend that House on Friday.—Ordered.