The Marquis of Londonderry, seeing the noble Earl at the head of the Administration in his place, wished to ask the noble Earl some questions relative to the papers which he had last night laid on the Table. Their Lordships would observe, that the Protocol was dated the 17th of April last, and that the communication of that Protocol to the French government, by the letter addressed to Prince Talleyrand, was dated on the 14th of July, about three months subsequent to the date of the Protocol. Now, one of the questions which he wished to ask of the noble Earl was, whether any communication of the Protocol had been made to the French government before the letter of the 14th of July? This was a question of considerable importance;
* The Gentleman referred to in the text, whose name, it appears, was Seymour, had been sitting under the gallery, in the place allotted to strangers, and upon a division taking place, he followed the Members who were going up to one of the side galleries. He was soon pointed out as being a "stranger," and consigned to the custody of the Serjeant-at-Arms, in which he remained till liberated at the close of the debate.515 because, if a previous communication had been made, there might have been some answer given to it; and he wished to know, whether any such answer had been given? Then, with respect to the communication of the 14th of July, he wished to know, whether any answer had been given to it? The concluding words were—"The undersigned see no objection to giving; the same publicity to the Protocol as may be given to the other acts of the negotiations which have taken place since the month of November, 1830, on the affairs of Belgium." These words seemed to imply that some previous communication had been made to the French government, and that, an answer had been returned containing something about the publicity to be given to the Protocol. But if there had been no such previous communication and answer, he wished to know whether any answer had been given by the French government to the letter? He also wished to know from the noble Earl, whether the communication to the French government was voluntarily made, or whether it was made in consequence of a demand of the French government? He hoped, that the noble Earl would, in courtesy, favour him with an answer to these questions.
§ Earl Greydid not know, whether the answers which he could give to the noble Marquis's questions would be satisfactory to him or not. With regard to the question as to whether any communication of the Protocol had been made to the French government previous to the letter of the 14th of July, his answer was, that no formal communication in writing, such as could be presented to that House, had been previously made, although there had been a verbal communication. As to the question whether the French government had given any answer to the communication, his answer was, that no formal answer in writing, such as could be laid before the House, had been given.