Sitting of 18 August 1820

Preamble
The counsel for and against the Bill of Pains and Penalties having been called in,
Mr. Denman, her majesty's Solicitor-general, then addressed their lordships. He commenced his address to the House by thanking their lordships for the indulgence which had on the preceding day been extended to him. It now became his duty, the learned counsel said, to state to the House the objections he had to urge against the bill which was before them; and it would require no argument of his to convince their lordships, that the
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question to which he was about to address himself—the principle of the bill—was as open to opposition in the present stage of the proceedings as it could have been at any previous period. That fact had been fully established in the case of the duchess of Norfolk; and, indeed, if he were to be considered as precluded by any thing which had passed from entering into the fullest discussion of the present and of the original measure, it would be waste of time for him to proceed at all. He should, however, address himself to the subject just as if no proceedings had yet been taken, and as if the bill were now for the first time presented to a House of Peers which, in point of law as well as in point of fact, had never heard one syllable of the intentions of those by whom the bill had been promoted. If then, it was open to the House at this time to enter into a full consideration of the principles of the bill in all its bearings, it followed of necessity, that if the House, as it was now constituted, should happen to take a different view of the question from that which had been acted upon, there would be no inconsistency, no impropriety, no retractation, in their adopting such view. The House had no steps to retrace, because no steps had been taken—because the House stood at the present moment upon the very threshold of the measure; and upon that threshold he would make his first stand against it. He had looked at this bill, of tremendous importance, attentively, and to the principle of it he thought it impossible for any constitutional or legal mind not to feel the strongest aversion; but he must confess that, proceeding technically, he felt some difficulty in raising the point with which he was to contend. When he read the bill, and asked himself what particular principle he should assail, he was at a loss to abstract that particular point from the mass; he was puzzled to see what was the especial doctrine meant to be established; what was the precedent supposed to be followed, or sought to be laid down; what were the lights derived from the past, or what the example held up to the future. It was in vain that he had tried to abstract the bill; and, although he had exerted his faculties upon the preamble, he could draw from that document no precise charge—he could grapple with nothing which directly affected either the conduct, the character, or the interest of his client.

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Before he pursued that part of his subject, however, he felt it his duty to say, that he was even now addressing their lordships under an election which his client had been compelled to make. He did not complain of that which to the House had seemed just; but, with reference to the possibility of a change of circumstances, he thought proper to remind the House, that those for whom he appeared had been compelled to that election, and that the election so made ought not to be captiously held as binding upon them against any change of measures which a change of circumstances might induce. There was another point, too, upon which Her Majesty's counsel had been put to their election, and upon which he doubted if they had exercised a wise discretion on the part of their client. Upon other occasions of a similar nature both common lawyers and civilians had been heard; but upon the present important question, a question involving those principles which formed the very basis of the common law, and compromising equally those rules of ecclesiastical polity, and those principles which governed the nearest relations of social life, only one common lawyer and one civilian, or two common lawyers, were permitted to address the House. The effect of that order had been to deprive him of the assistance of a learned friend who would have done justice to many points upon which he (Mr. Denman) was almost wholly uninformed; but, under all disadvantages, he appeared before their lordships—he appeared in the execution of that important duty which was cast upon him by his office—an office which, in the present hour of trial and of difficulty, he prized far more highly than the proudest favours which royalty could confer in the moment of prosperity. He appeared before the House in the performance of that duty; and if he failed, the failure would be owing to his want of talent, and not to any want of zeal for the cause which he was pleading.
The proceedings of the secret committee, the learned counsel continued, who had occupied themselves in the examination of certain written papers, un-vouched, he believed, by any living witness, had been compared to the proceedings of a grand jury. He would not travel over the ground so often trodden in contrasting the difference between the two jurisdictions; but this secret com-
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mittee, compared to a grand jury, deputed to find bills, was not the body from which the present bill had emanated. The bill had been set up in consequence of the recommendation of the secret committee; but that body had not found that the facts stated were in proof before them, or that the present was the proper mode of bringing those facts to investigation and to punishment. The secret committee had merely recommended a solemn inquiry; they had merely declared that, upon examining the documents laid before them, they found, upon the concurrent testimony of various persons residing in different parts of Europe, charges deeply affecting the honour of the Queen—charges so deeply concerning, not only the dignity of the Crown, but the moral feeling of the country, as to call for a solemn inquiry: and that it was their opinion that such an inquiry would be most conveniently effected through the medium of a legislative proceeding. The secret committee had not declared that the evidence of those various persons was true, or even that the documents were authentic. They had recommended a solemn inquiry, not a bill of divorce and degradation. That bill had been laid before the House, not by the committee, but by an individual peer—filling, no doubt, a situation of high responsibility in the government, but, in the present case, simply preferring the bill as any other peer in that House might have preferred it. He took it for granted that the bill had not been drawn by the noble earl who had presented it: he did not inquire whether it had been drawn by the learned attorney-general; but he was certain that he need make no apology for declaring that he should examine it as narrowly and with as much fearlessness as if it were a common indictment preferred at the lowest tribunal to which a subject of the country could be summoned. When he looked at the terms of the bill (for he could find no abstract principle belonging to it) he saw no state necessity mentioned, no public inconvenience pressed, as a cause why it should pass. But, to look for a moment at the recital of this bill—this ebullition, as it seemed to be, of moral feeling on the part of the party who drew it—this bill which was to express the deep feeling which the House entertained of the "scandalous, vicious, and immoral" conduct of the Queen. In 1814, Her Majesty, then Princess of Wales, being at

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Milan, engaged in her service one Bartholomew Bergami, a foreigner of low station, who had before served in a similar capacity. Well, there was nothing very scandalous or vicious in that. And after the said B. Bergami had so entered the service of the Princess of Wales, a most unbecoming and degrading intimacy commenced between them. Whether any given intimacy was unbecoming or degrading must be very much a matter of opinion; and that which one of their lordships might deem derogatory, might by another be held perfectly fitting for Her Majesty's rank and station. The learned counsel then read through a variety of the charges against Her Majesty, among which it was impossible, he contended, to discover any thing cither scandalous, unbecoming, or disgraceful—any thing which one human being had a right to censure in the conduct of another, or any thing which could honestly be imputed as a crime, either in a court of justice or in a legislative assembly.
But this proceeding had been likened to an ordinary bill of indictment. "What," said Mr. Denman, "is it common, in bills of indictment, to state the evidence against the party?—to state the facts which perhaps have governed the decision of the grand jury upon their ex-parte examination?—to place upon the record, not a plain, honest, intelligible charge, but the evidence, the very evidence, upon which they have brought their own minds to a conclusion, perhaps most uncharitable and unjust? Is there any thing in bills of indictment insidious, ensnaring, and jesuitical?—any thing that leaves the party accused, in doubt and darkness as to the crime he is accused of? No; the law of England, that law which may be truly called the perfection of reason, of justice, and of humanity, is most careful that no individual shall ever be charged with an offence, the nature of which he shall not understand, and to which he shall not be prepared, if innocent, with an immediate answer. If I were to indict a man for murder, should I, upon the face of the indictment, state more than that he, with malice aforethought, &c. struck the blow? Should I say, that John Thomas had been for ten years an enemy of the deceased?—that he had threatened him, and that he was seen to watch and to waylay him? Then why, for Heaven's sake, in this most solemn proceeding, where, from the nature of the offence charged—
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from the nature of the circumstances attending it—from the nature of the evidence by which it is to be established, it becomes most peculiarly just, most absolutely necessary, if justice is intended, that the defendant should have the most clear and distinct notice, the most precise advertisement and warning of the facts with which she is charged—why are circumstances, which are at best but evidence from which the fact may be inferred, why are those circumstances to be blazoned upon the face of the indictment?"
[Here the learned gentleman's argument was interrupted by the entrance of the Queen. The House rose to receive Her Majesty, who, attended by lady Ann Hamilton, took her seat within the bar, and immediately in front of her counsel.]
Mr. Denmancontinued.—It was for these reasons that he protested against the principle of the bill, which he could only view as an enumeration of doubtful circumstances proceeding upon an ex-parte statement, capable probably of a complete and satisfactory answer, but certain to excite prejudice against the party accused, and supposed to be put fairly and impartially upon trial. But he would proceed for a moment with the language of the bill. It stated, "that Her Majesty the Queen, wholly regardless of her honour and of her character, and unmindful of her duty to her husband, conducted herself to the said Bartholomew Bergami, and in other respects, both in public and private, in various places and countries which she visited, with indecency, and with offensive familiarity and freedom." What, the learned counsel would ask, was conveyed by such language? How was such a charge to be met? What was to be understood by "in other respects?" There were circumstances stated, which, at law, would be considered as most unjustly and most iniquitously stated; but not a word, not a fact, which proved the Queen to have been unmindful of her duty to her husband: and then, in order to meet her with a charge of which she could have no notice, and could not possibly be prepared to answer, they provided themselves with arguments and witnesses as to indecent familiarities "in other respects." And then, as a climax, to which the author of the bill seemed to have worked himself, came the charge which he had not dared to make point-blank, the charge which would of itself have been sufficient

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to support his bill, and without which it never could stand for a moment; then, as though he had worked himself up to the desperate and unnatural resolution of taking the chance that some suborned wretch from among the perjured, abject pack, dragged by bribes from among the dregs of society in those countries which the Queen had visited, might come up to the mark, then came the "intercourse." He had never known until now that it was necessary to qualify the word adultery. He should have thought the simple word sufficient without any other epithet. But the deviser of the bill had worked himself up step by step, and, after reaching the points "licentious and disgraceful," he had contrived to go one step further, in hopes of inducing the jury to infer adultery from the circumstances which might appear in evidence before them. The beau movement, however, was to come. First was manifested the deep sense of her majesty's scandalous and vicious conduct; next, the determination that she had rendered herself unworthy of her station and prerogative; then the resolution to deprive her of those advantages; and last, as though it had just occurred to the mind of the ingenious writer, came that remarkable clause, which, as a postscript sometimes contains the whole meaning of a letter, seemed to contain the whole force of the bill—the sentence of divorce against her majesty the Queen; thereby permitting her royal consort to contract a second marriage.
He had already, the learned counsel continued, alluded to the indefinite nature of the charges in the bill—to their frequent dependence upon individual feeling and opinion. And upon what feelings or opinions was her majesty charged with indecent and improper freedoms? For, after all, there was nothing for it but opinion. We had opinions distilled to the third and fourth degree; presented by some one to the committee; by the committee to the secretary of state; and by the secretary of state to the attorney-general; opinions given by the House knew not whom, and coming through channels equally unknown. He would defy any human being to point out a question upon which such variety of opinion might exist as upon that question of improper familiarity; and upon that very point he would refer the House to one of the finest compositions which had ever been produced by the pen of man—the
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letter addressed by the Princess of Wales to his late majesty upon the subject of the inquiry in 1806. In the course of that inquiry, Mrs. Lisle, a lady of the highest character, was examined as to the conduct of the Princess of Wales, and she declared that she thought the conduct of the Princess was only "flirting conduct," which was the strongest term remaining against the Princess upon that inquiry. The letter to which he would refer their lordships contained these observations:—"What Mrs. Lisle exactly means by only flirting conduct, what degree of impropriety of conduct she would describe by it, it is extremely difficult, with any precision, to ascertain. How many women are there, most virtuous, most truly modest, incapable of any thing impure, vicious, or immoral, in deed or thought, who, from greater vivacity of spirits, from less natural reserve, from that want of caution which the very consciousness of innocence betrays them into, conduct themselves in a manner, which a woman of a graver character, of more reserved disposition, but not with one particle of superior virtue, thinks too incautious, too unreserved, too familiar, and which, if forced upon oath to give her opinion upon it, she might feel herself, as an honest woman, bound to say, in that opinion, was flirting!" Mrs. Lisle, it should also be observed, was, at the time of her examination, under the severe oppression of having, but a few days before, heard of the death of her daughter; a daughter who had been happily married, and who had lived happily with her husband in mutual attachment till her death. The very circumstance of her then situation would naturally give a graver and severer cast to her opinions."—If such, my lords, (continued Mr. Denman) are the able and incontrovertible remarks made upon the evidence of that most respectable and honourable individual to whose testimony they apply—if it must be admitted that in such a case great allowance ought to be made, not only for peculiar notions with respect to propriety of manners, but for the existing state of spirits of the person by whom such notions may be entertained, what weight shall we ascribe to the opinion that her majesty has indulged in "indecent and offensive familiarity and freedom"—-an opinion proceeding from nobody knows whom, and which must have been founded on information passing through a variety of chan-

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nels? My lords, the passage which I have just read, seems to have a classical allusion to a sentence in which Hume describes the character of the unhappy Anne Boleyn. That sentence is as follows:—"Anne, though she appears to have been entirely innocent, and even virtuous in her conduct, had a certain gaiety, if not levity of character, which threw her off her guard, and made her less circumspect than her situation required. Her education in France rendered her the more prone to those freedoms; and it was with difficulty she conformed herself to that strict ceremonial practised in the Court of England." And let it be recollected, my lords, that on the subject of "familiarity," there is something in royalty which dispenses to the possessors with the necessity of being so alert with reference to it, as may be requisite on the part of persons of less elevated condition. They cannot lose any rank by whatever condescension they may show. If they give way to generous kindness and sensibility—if, in moments of confidence and absence from suspicion, they indulge in their native joyousness of character, they thereby diminish nothing of the true dignity which belongs to them. It is for persons of inferior station to feel a jealousy on this subject, to keep at a distance from what might be termed undue condescension, and to avoid that amiable familiarity which is inherent in all good minds, when at liberty to act from native impulse. Such, my lords, is the character which was formerly attributed to an illustrious person whom I must not here name. I may, however, be permitted to mention an anecdote of that illustrious person, which I believe rests on the authority of the late lord Guilford. It is said, that that illustrious person, some years ago, so far forgot himself as to indulge in habits of familiar kindness even with persons of a rank so inferior to himself as waiters at taverns.—From one of those individuals a note was addressed to that illustrious person as follows:—Sam Spring, of the Cocoa-tree, presents his compliments to his Royal Highness, & c. &c." To this his Royal Highness returned an answer couched in these terms:—"This may do very well between you and me, Sam, but it will not do with your people of high dignity. For God's sake, do not speak so to Norfolk or Arundell" [a laugh].
My lords, I beg leave also to remind
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your lordships, that, but a short time since, it was by no means improbable that a proposition would have been laid before your lordships, of a description very different from the present bill; a proposition which, instead of enacting that her majesty should be dethroned, and her marriage declared null and void, would have recognized her majesty as queen consort, would have continued her in the legal enjoyment of all her rights and privileges, would have secured to her an annuity for life of fifty thousand pounds, would have undertaken to convey her in a royal yacht to any part of the continent, and would have entreated her to accept, in conjunction with her royal husband, the grateful acknowledgments of parliament, for the facilities afforded to such an arrangement. If in any argument the conclusion shall appear to be false, and if that conclusion has been fairly drawn from the premises, then the premises themselves must have been false.—If, therefore, your lordships were within a hair's breadth of having the proposition which I have just described submitted for your sanction, it follows that the charges against her majesty are false, and that the premises on which those charges are founded cannot be true. Or, my lords, take it the other way. How comes it that we are here? The whole of this unfortunate affair originated in his majesty's message to Parliament. What was the gist of that message? That the Queen's arrival in this country rendered some parliamentary proceeding necessary. The honour and dignity of the Crown, the welfare of the state, were in no degree implicated, it seems, until her majesty's arrival in this country. Why, then, my lords, the preamble of the bill ought to have run thus:—"Whereas in spite of the offer of 50,000 l. a year made to her majesty to stay away, and whereas, although her majesty knew of the charges that were to be exhibited against her, and whereas, although a long negociation was carried on, of a nature the most favourable and flattering to her majesty, she refused to become a party to her own degradation by silently acquiescing in her exclusion from the Liturgy, & c; therefore be it enacted, that her majesty shall be degraded and divorced, and that her royal consort shall be at liberty to marry again." If your lordships wish the preamble of this bill to speak the truth, it must assume one of the forms which I have described. At

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any rate, It must not retain that in which it is at present moulded. My lords, I do not like the introduction of levity on a subject of this grave nature; but I declare, that when I first heard this bill read I thought myself in a theatre, and fancied that the various parts were got up by different performers. One seemed to me to say, "her majesty engaged in her service a foreigner of low station;" another, "A most unbecoming and degrading intimacy commenced between her Royal Highness and Bartolomo Bergami;" a third, "Her Royal Highness placed him in high and confidential situations about her Royal Highness's person;" a fourth, "Her Royal Highness conducted herself in a manner that proved she was wholly unmindful of her exalted rank and station;" and then came Mrs. Candour, implying, in the phrase, "and in other respects," a something which even her kindness could not extenuate. Really, my lords, it appears to me that we are acting the "School for Scandal;" and that this solemn inquiry in which we are engaged, is nothing more than a solemn farce. It appears to me that there has been a kind of Malvolio, expelled from his stewardship by the combination of the servants, with whom he has quarrelled, and who have determined to wreak their vengeance on him, although the most distinguished person in their mistress's household.
What we complain of, my lords, is, the absence of a distinct and definite charge, and the multiplication of circumstances, from which an inference is intended to be drawn; but against which no defence can be made. What we complain of, ray lords, is, that a motive is held out to your lordships for passing this bill, which would be inoperative in a court of justice or on an impeachment. In a court of justice a jury would be sworn to determine whether the distinct fact alleged had been actually committed or not. In the case of an impeachment distinct articles would have been exhibited, and every one of your lordships would have been severally called on to declare, upon his personal honour, whether or not he believed that the specific charges were true. But, my lords, under the present circumstances it is difficult—nay, it is impossible to say on what principle your lordships will individually be guided in your decision. Some noble lords, who may be satisfied that no "adulterous intercourse" has taken place,
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may nevertheless entertain such high opinions with respect to "familiarities," as to be induced to convict her majesty, and to think it therefore necessary to pass this bill. My lords, I know that all the noble persons present who are lawyers will declare, "We must have the adultery distinctly and unequivocally proved;" but there may be other noble lords who may be of opinion that a strong surmise will be sufficient. What security, therefore, can I possess of a just and legal decision? The law lords from their professional habits, I may be sure of; but how can I tell on what other noble lords may be pleased to found their verdict? In an action for crim. con., or in a criminal court, the judge would say, "I must have the fact of the adultery distinctly proved," and if it were not distinctly proved he would direct the jury to acquit the defendant. But the question is how we, her majesty's counsel, are so to guage and measure your lordships opinions as to be able to do away with the various impressions which this bill is calculated to make on your lordships' minds? Some of the allegations in this bill may appear to your lordships to be true. There may have been frequent "familiarities" as they are called. There may have been frequent sittings at table together. There may have been frequent appearances of intimacy during the continuance of mutual hardships and difficulties, which under other circumstances would be improper. But how are we to know what evidence on such subjects will be satisfactory to all your lordships? Some of your lordships may be disposed to convict our illustrious client, on the ground of "unbecoming and degrading intimacy:" others on her having advanced the individual implicated with her "to a high situation in her Royal Highness's household;" others on her having "conferred upon him a pretended order of knighthood;" others on her having "received into her service many of his near relations." Every noble lord may discover some particular basis on which to justify his vote; and no two peers may pronounce on the same grounds. There may even be some of your lordships tempted by views of expediency alone to pass the measure. We all know that when great interests clash—when the highest characters of the realm are opposed to one another, this language will be held—this language has been held—that as one of the parties must be dis-

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placed, right or wrong, the one less important to the general weal must give way. One print has even dared to say, that if your lordships do not feet justified in treating her majesty as a criminal, the public interest requires that she should be made a martyr! Far am I, my lords, from insinuating that such an argument can have any weight on your lordships' minds; but the doctrine has been avowed, and we can therefore have no security with respect to the extent of its influence.
If I am asked, what course of proceeding would be preferable to the present, I reply, that it is in the power of the House of Commons to call on your lordships by an impeachment to enter into an inquiry into this subject. Certainly a grand jury could not investigate the nature of any acts alleged to have been committed at Milan. But your lordships are not precluded from such an investigation. An impeachment would be a trial. A bill of pains and penalties is no trial. It is calculated to defame the accused. It is calculated to excite suspicion against your lordships—unjust, I allow, but certainly not unnatural;—suspicion, which, if the present proceeding be persevered in, the public will think they have a right to entertain. My lords, in the most solemn manner I disclaim any, the slightest imputation, on this high tribunal. I revere it from the depth of my heart. If on any occasion it should happen to appear to be influenced by a sinister motive, I would rather submit to that inconvenience than throw any odium on its general administration of justice. But if the public see the legislature of the country, on a great and important occasion, depart from the principles of justice, and volunteer the support of charges, such as those which this bill exhibits, the time will come when it will be difficult for the warmest advocates of our constitution to justify your lordships' conduct. I will not repeat the remarks offered to your lordships yesterday on this bill by my learned friend. The proceeding is, as my learned friend justly observed, a proceeding in which the accusers, the jury, and the legislature, are combined in one. In reference to the measure of former times, to which my learned friend alluded (and against which so able a protest is entered on your lordships' Journals), I will say, that I should consider the honour of the peerage dearly bought, were it to be on the condition of finding my ancestor's name in the ma-
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jority by which that measure was carried. Let your lordships consider the evil consequences with reference to your own dignity, which must be the result of persevering in a departure from the principle which I am advocating. In a judicial proceeding this House ought alone to pronounce. What will be the consequence of your lordships sharing your high functions with others? Your lordships examine evidence on oath, and you pronounce your opinions upon your honour. If, after passing sentence on her majesty, by acquiescing in the present bill, you send it down to the Lower House, it will there be exposed to all the indignity of popular clamour. In that House witnesses are not examined on oath, and yet they may be subjected to all the scrutiny to which six hundred and fifty-eight gentlemen of various habits and tempers, may choose to expose them. I have certainly no inclination to disparage that House of Parliament; but I cannot forget, that it has been said by one of their most distinguished members, that they never entered into any inquiry, but they disgraced themselves. Instead of expressing their own unbiassed judgment, every petty corporation will be entitled to instruct its representatives on the subject of this bill.
But, my lords, there is yet a third estate. The King must become a party to this proceeding; the King and the House of Commons will share with your lordships that which has hitherto been considered the brightest and most valuable of your privileges. The King, in all cases a formidable auxiliary to a cause which he espouses, must, in the present instance, be an overpowering one. Let us examine, my lords, the part which the King has hitherto taken in this affair. Has the King complained, or has he held his peace? If his majesty has held his peace, will your lordships set the first precedent since the canon law, of a dissolution of marriage without any complaint from the parties to it? If his majesty has been the complainant—if he has set all the machinery going which is now in such terrible operation—with what face can your lordships call on the King, who, by that complaint has already as emphatically pronounced upon the subject as if he had spoken from the throne to decide on a question in which his dearest wishes are so deeply involved? How can your lordships call on this third estate to pronounce on that on which it has pronounced already? My

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lords, permit me again to say, in the presence of my royal client, that in now attempting to avert what is miscalled the trial of her majesty, there is no departure whatever from consistency. We ask for a trial—but we ask for a fair trial. We do not wish for a trial founded on scandalous imputations sealed up in a bag, and hinted at for the purpose of poisoning the public mind. We do not wish for a trial in which the judges are not warranted in examining witnesses on oath. We do not wish for a trial in which the ultimate sentence is to be pronounced by him whose interest it is to condemn us. Not only is there no inconsistency on the part of her majesty in endeavouring to avert this disgusting inquiry, but the effort is due from her to a state in which she is now the first subject, and of which she may one day be the Sovereign. She owes it to the country—she owes it to morality—she owes it to justice—she owes it to all those principles on which society is founded, and by which it coheres and is maintained.
But, my lords, is this bill a bill of Divorce? Is it any thing else? The last four lines of the bill would be perfectly adequate to the description of its object. That object is but too obvious. No man can be so blind as not to perceive that the whole purpose of the bill is to release his majesty from those ties which bind him to his present wife. If, however, this bill were an ordinary bill of Divorce, the husband must be here to be examined upon oath, if your lordships should think fit as to the manner in which he has conducted himself towards his wife; in order to ascertain whether she had lived apart from him, or abroad with his consent, and other circumstances of that nature. In the system of divorce, which has unfortunately increased so much of late, there is this security—that no husband can successfully appear at your lordships' bar, without showing that his own conduct has been free from reproach. If a bill of Divorce were preferred before your lordships, in which it should appear that the wife at the time of her marriage was young and inexperienced—that she came from a foreign country with prospects of splendour and happiness as great as any female ever contemplated—that she was suddenly assailed by every circumstance of irritation and injury—that she found her husband surrounded by mistresses—that the birth of a child, instead of being
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the pledge of affection between herself and her consort, seemed to be the signal for their total separation—that in a few years she was banished from the conjugal roof—that she was vigilantly watched by hosts of spies and informers—that a report was called for on her conduct—that after a full but ex parte inquiry she experienced a full acquittal, and was again received into the embraces of the father of her husband, by whom she had never been deserted—that at a further period she was induced to leave the country—that an experiment was then made, whether that which had not succeeded in England might succeed in Italy—that the charges against her in this country, where the witnesses were known, having been blown to atoms, it was tried what could be done by means of unknown witnesses in a strange land, who, if they could not convict her of guilt, might at least asperse and blacken her character—that she had been five-and-twenty years separated from her husband, leaving the just inference that he had abdicated his rights by neglecting that care and protection, to which, as his wife, she was entitled; I ask your lordships, whether, under all those circumstances, you would hear such a case at your bar? I will not ask with what feelings such a husband as I have described could come to your lordships' bar—here I stop. But this I am bound to state—that if this proceeding is to go on, I claim for my illustrious client, her full and ample right to every species of recrimination. To deprive a wife against whom a divorce is sued, of her right of recrimination, is to give an undue advantage to a husband who may be unjustly alienated from her. If such a husband has, by unkindness, driven his wife from her home, into a situation in which she is necessarily subjected to suspicion, he ought not to be allowed to take advantage of his wrong, by being protected from all inquiry into his own conduct.—I therefore feel that I have a right to state, shortly, what I conceive her majesty's rights to be on the present occasion. I think that the right of recrimination is the most important right that a Queen Consort can possess on such a proceeding as the present. And I think further, that if any doubts exist on this point, the more they are sifted the more surely and speedily will they be removed. Unless, indeed, your lordships are prepared to say, that those rules of morality, which are sup-

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posed binding in humble life, are to be removed altogether from the higher classes of society—unless your lordships are prepared to say, that where the situation of the party is most elevated the example is to be the least—and that where cruelty has been most inflicted the greatest correctness and propriety of conduct is to be observed. In all the previous cases of bills of pains and penalties they have been defended on the ground of state necessity; and it is curious to observe, that in some of these cases the very contrary of the charge has been proved. In the year 1700 a bill of pains and penalties was introduced into the House of Commons against a person named Knight for having forged a certain instrument. This bill passed the House of Commons almost by acclamation. In the House of Lords the feelings were different. In that House the votes were equal—the duke of Leeds gave the casting vote against the bill, and it was of course lost. The individual was afterwards tried for the same offence in Guildhall and acquitted! Thus by the vote of the duke of Leeds the Parliament was saved from the disgrace of having passed an unjust sentence on an innocent person,—from having given a vote in direct contradiction to the verdict of a court of justice. The same House of Lords, though they refused to find the earl of Strafford guilty when that nobleman was impeached, subsequently passed a bill of attainder against him, under which he forfeited his life. Is it possible, my lords, to quote a stronger case than this? The language in which history speaks of that nobleman's execution furnishes a solemn warning in future ages of the necessity of adhering to strict rules in the administration of public justice. The case of sir John Fenwick was, I acknowledge, a peculiar one; it was one attended with many criminal circumstances, and there was at least the appearance of necessity to justify it. But, with regard to the instances of Plunket, Kelly, and the bishop of Rochester, I must observe that, until I examined your lordships' Journals, I was not aware that injustice had been carried to such an extent. The bill against bishop Atterbury was passed on the written evidence of a dead person; and the bishop was not allowed to disprove the facts contained in the written statement. Thus evidence not admissible in a court of criminal law was received, and all opportunity of rebutting it withheld,
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If this bill is to be supported on the ground of state necessity, then I suppose the party accused must be got rid of, whether guilty or innocent. No regard must be paid to the justice or injustice of the case. But if this exigent state necessity exists, your lordships have a right to have it clearly demonstrated to you. You surely have a right also to consider the danger which is likely to attend such a proceeding. In speaking of danger, I beg your lordships to consider that I do not, even in the most distant manner, allude to what is at this moment passing, or to what may hereafter pass, out of doors. I know that your lordships are actuated by that great maxim—fiat justitia, ruat cœlum. I know that happen what may your lordships are determined to do what you conceive to be your duty. But the danger to which I allude is of a different nature. I allude to the imminent danger in which such a measure as that now before your lordships will place the monarchy of this country. Suppose for a moment that this bill were passed, and that her majesty were to be divorced from the king, and degraded to any extent. In such an event, if the king were to marry again, and have a male child, are there not many, very many in this country who would entertain doubts of the validity of such second marriage, and who consequently would question the right of that child to succeed to the throne? I know that it would be ridiculous in me, as a lawyer, to dispute the power of an act of parliament. I am aware that the lineal descent has been regulated by acts of parliament, on various occasions; but I allude to public opinion, by which parliament itself has been sometimes controlled, and I ask what is there not to be feared to this country from a disputed succession? The title of Henry 4th to the Crown was recognised by act of parliament, as was also the title of Henry 6th. In the same year, the title of Edward 4th was recognised, and nine years after, Henry 6th was again recalled. I next come to Henry 8th. That monarch's marriage with Catharine was declared illegal; and Mary was, in 1534, excluded by act of parliament from the succession. After this came his marriage with Anne Boleyn. But, as it generally happened that the king, some how or other, got tired of his wives in a short time, that marriage was also set aside by act of parliament, in 1536; and both Mary, the fruit of the last, and Elizabeth, the fruit of the present one, were declared

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illegitimate. Next came the marriage with lady Jane Seymour, which in four years after was annulled. But it appears that king Henry never got rid of one wife until he had got another in view. On the 28th of July, 1540, he divorced Anne of Cleves, and married queen Catherine Howard. Here we have in one reign a succession of acts of parliament palpably in contradiction to each other. I need not add, that both the children of Henry reigned successively, though the succession had been previously changed in favour of lady Jane Grey. But supposing that there was to be no fear of a disputed succession, still I would refer your lordships to what took place in 1809. I do not wish to revive unpleasant recollections, but I feel it due to my illustrious client to revert to that period. If vicious and licentious conduct be sufficient to remove her majesty from the throne, then I say that is an equally strong argument for removing a prince also. Then we have only to send for the evidence and letter which were delivered in 1809, and it might be said that others were guilty of all the crimes charged against her majesty—nay, much more. If then, this precedent were once established, the question would be, not, whether this or that prince was the next heir to the Crown, but whether any one could be found to whom it could not be said, "you have been guilty of gross and licentious conduct within the last six years." If a measure of this kind can reach a queen consort, why not a queen in her own right? There is no clause in the bill which would prevent her majesty from reigning over these realms. She was nearly allied to the royal family in blood, and there was no strong improbability of her coming one day to the throne. There are at this moment the same number of persons (fourteen) between her majesty and the throne, as there was between William and George the 1st. If, then, a proceeding like the present is to be sanctioned, we shall have nothing but a succession of green bags, containing similar charges against the Crown or its next heirs. I should have thought, that instead of using the authority under which this measure has been introduced to give a sanction to these slanders, your lordships would have manifested a disposition to put down those calumnies the more especially such as are levelled against persons in high authority), the dissemination of which has been for such a length of time
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the crying disgrace of this country.—The hon. and learned gentleman went on to say, that if a proceeding of this nature could be entertained in that House against the Queen, it was equally competent for it to entertain another one of the same description against the heir apparent, or the heir-presumptive; and he would add, justly so. If, again, by the introduction of a measure like that before their lordships, one peer could uncrown the queen, another peer might uncrown the king; and he would say further, that public opinion, which, after all, must dispose of crowns—and sceptres—and kingdoms, would receive the same bias with equal facility. He did not say that, in the further progress of the present proceeding, no justice would be done; but he did affirm this—that its principle was one calculated to operate, and fatally, upon the monarchy of the country. He well knew that there were numbers who maintained that the queen should have equal justice done to her with any other person, being a subject of the realm. It was contended by others, that were she a subject, she would have had such steps taken against her out of doors, as should in principle be the same with the pending measure: but he must say, that in regard to this particular proceeding, the case of the Queen was not parallel to that of any subject of the realm. [At this part of his speech the tone and manner of the hon. and learned gentleman seemed to indicate much exhaustion; and it was with some difficulty that we were enabled to collect the remainder of his observations.] This was a proceeding' against the Queen alone; but he was quite sure that for that reason their lordships would not think her majesty the less entitled to that protection which every honourable mind must be ready to award her. That which was true with respect to subjects at large, was not true as of princes of the blood royal: for the situation which they held in the country necessarily made them objects of greater envy and detraction than individuals in a different sphere; and he did not know but that the example of the 6th of June last might be the cause of the creation and diffusion of a variety of slanders, originating at St. Omer's, and other parts of France, affecting many individuals, but principally that royal personage to whom 50,000 l. per annum had been offered as the compensation for those rights which she demanded, and by whom that offer

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had been refused. If their lordships would suppose for a moment, that upon this unfortunate occasion, any degraded person had, by some secret means, found admission into the palace of the queen, and it should appear that he had entered there with some treasonable intention of undermining her state and dignity, he would ask their lordships whether, even in that case, any surer or more effectual means could have been resorted to for such a purpose? He would ask, also, whether the case of the queen might not be made the example for the deposition of the throne also? He would ask another question—whether the experience of all former times did not bear upon the possibility of such a fact? It was very remarkable, but their lordships would well remember, that the origin of the French revolution was marked by calumnies and libels against the French queen—imputations against that unfortunate woman, which were coupled with slanders and insinuations against all that was pure, and noble, and honourable, in France. Their lordships would recollect that eventful and gloomy period, when the unhallowed hands of desperate men were raised against insulted royalty—a period which, as had been well observed by an elegant writer (Mr. Burke), all the beautiful delicacy of the female character was violated and despised—a period at which that modest sensitiveness, that sacred purity, which impose upon man "all those moral obligations which the heart owns and which the understanding ratifies," were lost in the licentious profligacy of the day; when it had become a common observation, that "a king was but a man—a queen was but a woman—a woman was but an animal, and that an animal not of the highest order." But their lordships would readily recall the glowing picture which that great writer had drawn of the illustrious family to which he had alluded; and they would deplore the unhappy consequences which must at all times be entailed, even upon the most moral, the most strict, the most virtuous persons that could ever sit on thrones, if these libels and calumnies were to be propagated, and inquiries instituted into the privacies of royal life, which were revolting to commanding understanding, united to correct feeling. The learned gentleman then went on to eulogize those distinguishing ornaments of female character to which he had before adverted; and to ask their lordships, what would be
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the consequence of encouraging a species of inquiry calculated to harm or destroy their delicate texture; and particularly as regarded their existence in this country, in the persons of those whom the constitution had vested with rank and authority? What, but the stripping of the throne itself of these, its most beautiful, most honourable ornaments, and the replacing it by that sort of pharisaical republic, which would then be erected upon the ruins of the English monarchy? But he knew that the greatness of the female character consisted in throwing from it, to an immeasurable distance, that species of impertinence and intrusion which would presume to violate, by unwarranted inquiries, the sanctity of domestic privacy; and upon these grounds alone he might rest his only and general defence, if it were necessary, of the Queen, against a measure intended to exclude from the throne her who ought to adorn it—who came here with every expectation, with every reasonable hope, of sharing it—and who, it was now attempted to be argued, had forfeited—not forfeited, indeed, but had lost—her just claim to it.
There was another subject of great importance to which he would allude, and that was, to the argument which had been advanced by his learned friend on a former occasion, founded upon decisions not only of the common law, but of the ecclesiastical courts, to the effect—that marriage was a contract, not merely of a religious, but of a civil nature. He did trust that their lordships would reconsider this point, involving, as it did, so important and sacred a consideration. He did hope that their lordships would be induced to-morrow to hear, upon this subject, his learned friend (Dr. Lushington), who would be much better able to explain to them the ecclesiastical law upon the matter than himself: but, if this indulgence should be refused, he should then ask the assistance of the noble and learned and reverend prelates, who sat in that House, to explain the subject more fully to their lordships. He had particularly to request that their lordships would consider the balance of evil upon this occasion; and that they would inquire what state necessity existed for the adoption of the present measure. In any result, he trusted, and he was sure that there would be, upon their lordships' part, nothing like a disregard or undervaluing of the sacred obligations and the civil and religious character of the marriage

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tie; but that this inquiry being one founded in justice to the moral feeling of the country, that contract, and its grave and important nature, would never be lost sight of. Comparatively speaking, such an inquiry could do no possible good; but, as their lordships would perceive, in its termination might do much positive harm. And here he must repeat, that he did protest and object in the most solemn manner against bills of pains and penalties; and especially against a bill of pains and penalties, in which the scene was laid in foreign states, at a great distance from this country, and carried through a term of six years; and upon which the illustrious party had been denied a list of the witnesses against her—a privilege which the usage of inferior courts sanctioned and established in every other case. In point of fact, the application to their lordships, originally, was, that the substantial benefit might be given, and the inconvenience avoided; and this great principle might be recognised, it was submitted, but modified in any manner that to their lordships might appear most suitable and convenient, Now he said, that before a grand jury the witnesses publicly presented themselves to be sworn, and the indictment was founded upon their evidence. No man was left in the dark about the charge brought against him, or deprived of the opportunity of knowing what was the character of those who appeared against him. He felt justified in saying, therefore, that so far from having received any thing like favour at their lordships' hands, her majesty had every reason to complain of the course which had been taken. He again protested, in her majesty's name, against all bills of pains and penalties; but most solemnly against a bill of pains and penalties in a case which admitted of impeachment. He protested against their lordships declining those duties which the constitution had imposed upon them, and undertaking one which it was not competent for them, and which they were never deemed likely to perform; from which no good consequence was likely to result, and in the discharge of which they must subject themselves to the probability of receiving a check from the other branch of the legislature. While he urged these considerations to their lordships, however, he must also strongly protest against any imputation that either himself, or those with whom he was acting, were declining the combat upon which
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they had entered. They pleaded against the manner, but they did not shrink from the trial. On the part of her majesty he might be allowed to observe, that it was painful for him to be compelled to allude to unpleasant circumstances affecting royal and illustrious individuals, or to revive the recollection of many past events; but he trusted that he should stand acquitted to their lordships for the faithful discharge of his duty to the best of his means and powers. He felt, also, that he owed to her majesty some apology, because, in the course of his argument, he had been necessarily, though hypothetically, led to suppose something like a possibility of guilt under circumstances which he was sure never could have existed, and from which her majesty's high honour would have revolted.—In conclusion the hon. and learned gentleman addressed their lordships in these words:—I beg to say, my lords, that whatever may be enacted—whatever may be done, by the exertions of any individual, by the perversion of truth, or through the perjury of witnesses—whatever be the consequences which may follow, and whatever she may suffer—I will, for one, never withdraw from her those sentiments of dutiful homage and respect which I owe to her rank, to her situation, to her superior mind, to her great and royal heart; nor, my lords, will I ever pay to any one who may usurp her majesty's station, that respect and duty which belong alone to her whom the laws of God and man have made the consort of his present majesty, and the queen of these kingdoms.
The Attorney Generalthen addressed their lordships. He could not, he said, refrain from observing, after his learned friends had addressed their lordships with so much ability in this stage of the proceeding, that he thought they could have he reason to regret the election they had made subsequently to the objection which was taken yesterday; because (undoubtedly, in consequence of the license with which their lordships bad indulged them upon the present occasion) they had had all the advantage which they possibly could have obtained in this stage of the proceeding, by statements of facts, which, although they were all introduced into this part of the case as facts, he must contend were not yet founded on the evidence before their lordships; by assumptions, gratuitously made; and by calumnies—(an expression by which he

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meant not the slightest disrespect to his learned friends, but he must repeat it)—by calumnies, unsupported, at present, by any thing but their own assertion. He found himself, therefore, placed in this most difficult of all situations, prepared as he was, and had come there, to argue the only question which he understood to be before their lordships—namely, the principle of this bill. He was now driven, by the course which his learned friends had taken, to consider the facts of the case as they had chosen to represent them. He stood, therefore, under this disadvantage, that while their assertions would go forth to their lordships and to the world as having been made by them from their own knowledge of the facts, he was not, in this stage, at liberty to contradict them. The matter of that statement, however, was not before their lordships in evidence; but it had been reasoned upon, as if the whole of it were true and indisputable. Their lordships' passions had been worked upon, and their feelings led away by the eloquence which had been exhausted upon subjects foreign to the question before them. That simple dry question he understood to be this—"whether or not, assuming the preamble of this bill to be proved on evidence (because even his learned friends in their argument were obliged to assume that)—whether or not the bill was sustainable upon principle?" Such, as he supposed, was the only question for their lordships' consideration. He did, therefore, most solemnly implore, and most earnestly entreat their lordships, before he came to meet that part of the argument, to banish from their minds those impressions which could not fail to have been made upon them by the most eloquent addresses of his learned friends, and, in particular, by that which they had just heard. But giving that learned friend all due credit, and every due tribute of respect for the great eloquence and talents which he had displayed, yet he would say, that nine-tenths of his statement were wholly foreign to the subject before their lordships; and upon a calm and dispassionate consideration, he trusted that it could not have the least effect upon their lordships' minds in coming to a decision upon the only question which was now in truth before them—whether or no they would proceed in the inquiry? And then.—supposing it to be proceeded in, and that they should think the evidence satisfactorily made out the serious, grave, and
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at the same time disgusting charge against her majesty—whether their lordships would be prepared to say, that this bill should not pass; or that it had something so horrible in its principle, that it should not proceed, or be followed up by the enactments which were contained in it?
But now he came to argue this question, perhaps their lordships would allow him to recur to the manner in which it had been argued by her majesty's counsel. It had been stated, and to-day his learned friend had expressly admitted, that in arguing this case, the preamble of the bill must be considered as established by testimony; and yet their lordships were told of suborned evidence, perjured witnesses, calumniators, spies, and traducers. If all this were so, even—which he denied—it did not come before them at the proper time. This was not dealing with the question plainly or openly. It was tampering with their lordships' feelings, and treating the subject quite unfairly; because the question simply was—and briefly—whether this bill should not be proceeded in to all its subsequent stages, provided the preamble should be proved? But here he was in another difficulty. Another objection had been started by his learned friend to-day, who had gone through the preamble, and had attacked not only the manner in which it was worded, but had gone into the whole history of the manner (and he supposed it was competent for his learned friend to do so, by their lordships having permitted him) in which the bill had been framed and introduced; and then had proceeded to argue, that her majesty laboured under a disadvantage, from the proceeding which had been adopted, to which she would not have been liable in the case of a proceeding before a grand jury, afterwards referred to another jury. But he (the attorney-general) imagined that their lordships must have been satisfied, that no such proceeding, in this instance, could take place. If the acts in question had been committed in this country, they would have subjected her majesty to a charge of high treason, and to the consequences of such a crime. But by reason of their being alleged to have been committed with a foreigner, and in a foreign state, her majesty escaped from the charge and from the punishment of the offence: she became, on that account, not amenable to the law of high treason. His learned friends had dwelt at great

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length—and, no doubt, with effect—on the circumstance of their lordships having referred the papers to a secret committee, and having introduced a measure upon the recommendation of that committee. His learned friend had stated, that a secret committee had been assimilated to a grand jury; but that, in the present case, they had proceeded upon evidence which no grand jury would go upon, and found on it a charge which no grand jury would find. But their lordships would allow him to ask, whether the secret committee had found any thing against the Queen, as a finding by them? According to the words of their report, they considered that there was a serious ground of accusation against the Queen from what they had seen; and, that, in their opinion, that accusation did so much affect, not only the character of her majesty, but the honour and dignity of the Crown, as to render some legislative enactment necessary. Then, with respect to the proceedings of this secret committee, the learned gentleman said, that the secret committee had not recommended this bill Why, they recommended some legislative proceeding, and that must be a bill. Such being the case, he would ask, whether any objection could be taken to their recommendation? He would affirm, moreover, that this was not only the most regular, but the only proceeding which could be adopted upon the occasion. But, whether it was or was not, at any rate that was not the question now before their lordships. They had already decided upon that point, by agreeing that it should be read a first time; and the question now was, whether it should proceed? It had been said, that the secret committee had proceeded upon unvouched documents, and on such alone. He had no reason for knowing what those documents were more than his learned friend; but he firmly believed, that to many of the depositions the witnesses had been sworn. But why was all this matter addressed to their lordships? It was not at all in point; they had already decided upon the matter: the bill was founded upon the recommendation of a legislative proceeding, recommended by the secret committee. One observation had been made by his learned friend, which he thought a very extraordinary one, coming from a lawyer as he was. He complained that the preamble of this bill contained that which indictments at common law did not contain; namely, the evidence on
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which the indictment was founded—that the evidence intended to be brought forward against her majesty was recited in the preamble. But had his learned friend forgotten that even the common law, foreseeing the hardships which might arise in some cases—in cases of the highest crime known to the state, high treason—had enacted, that not only should the charge be stated in the proceedings, but the evidence also upon which that charge was brought? But who ever heard of a person so accused complain of this? So far from being a hardship, it was a benefit to the accused. Again, he was charged with not daring to call things by their right names, of substituting the words "adulterous intercourse" for the word "adultery." Now, in nine cases out of ten, it occurred in actions for adultery that the terms "illicit intercourse," "criminal conversation," "adulterous intercourse," & c. were substituted for the word "adultery" itself. Why then, he said, that with respect to the preamble of the bill, it stated what it was proper to state, namely, the facts that were to be proved. His learned friend who spoke last, had, on this part of the subject, enlivened his audience, with many comments on the nature and character of the indecent and offensive familiarity and freedom which the preamble presumed, and of the titles of honour which the queen had conferred. He had talked much of the different interpretations which would occur to different minds in judging of these terms. What might be thought an indecent familiarity with a menial in her majesty's service by one person, might be viewed more indulgently by another. All he should say in answer to these arguments, if arguments they could be called, was, that they were wholly out of their place. Let the time come when these facts were to be proved in evidence and their character exhibited, and their lordships would then have to judge whether the evidence justified the acts stated in the preamble, and of course the preamble itself. When his learned friend arraigned that preamble on the ground that it stated facts that were to be proved, and not a distinct charge, he in answer, should call the attention of his learned friend to all the bills of pains and penalties, and bills of attainder, which were to be traced in our history. If he were correct in stating that it was the uniform practice, what other course of proceeding, he asked, could be pursued

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in the present case where the Queen wa6 proceeded against by bill on a charge of an adultery?—an adultery not of an ordinary nature, but carried on under circumstances of peculiar aggravation, provided the facts stated in the preamble were substantiated by evidence. It was upon such grounds that the preamble of the present bill recited the deep sense their lordships felt "at such scandalous, disgraceful, and vicious conduct on the part of her said majesty." Let his learned friend look again even at the case of Dr. Atterbury, and he will find the same course was followed; he will find the motives stated which induced its enactment, viz. the existence of a traitorous conspiracy within the kingdom, and the fears that were entertained for the security of the Protestant succession. The grounds alleged in the preamble of the present bill were of the same public nature and import as those stated in the bill against the bishop of Rochester.
Thus much he had felt it right to state in answer to the arguments which his learned friend who spoke last had urged against the preamble. When the facts recited were proved in evidence, the great question which their lordships would have to decide, would be, whether such a substantiation of the truth of the facts should be followed by the enactment of the bill? It had been endeavoured by his learned friends to raise an objection to the bill, on the ground that the charges which it alleged against her majesty had flowed from slander and perjury. In the present stage of the proceeding, what right, he would ask, had they to argue upon such a gratuitous and unproved assumption? Where were the proofs to justify it? Their lordships knew nothing of them—they could not know any thing of them; and for what purpose such a line of observation was introduced, he would leave to their lordships to decide. In the same spirit, it was objected by his learned friend, that the present bill originated in a committee of that House, where no decisive opinion had been formed. He could not see the least strength in such an objection. The decisive opinion of their lordships had yet to be formed. It would be doing a great injustice to her majesty had their lordships, in that previous part of the proceeding, ventured to pronounce a decisive opinion; it would then be imputed to them that they had forestalled and prejudged the question. Their lordships had
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wisely abstained from such a course. All that they had done was, to express their opinion that there existed grounds for a serious charge against her majesty.
His learned friend who spoke last, had with an air of levity recalled the attention of their lordships to all the steps taken to prevent the discussion of the present distressing question, and to prevent those evils, which, whatever may be its issue, must result from it; and as a natural deduction flowing from such exertions, he had been pleased to state to their lordships, what, in his judgment, ought to be the enactments of the present bill. With what justice could his learned friend draw such an inference? Was any charge distinctly made against the Queen, at the period when those exertions were made, and the negociation for a compromise commenced? Was it not the wish and object of that negociation to prevent the very evidence on which the bill originated, from being perused by any person in the country, even by their lordships? Where, then, was the ground for that air of triumph, with which his learned friend talked of what ought to have been the enactments of the present bill? The circumstances were altered—the facts before wished to be withheld, were communicated, they were recited in the preamble of the bill; and it was, therefore, for their lordships now to decide whether, if such facts were supported by evidence, such an enactment ought not to follow. To confound circumstances, applying to two different states of the question, and to endeavour to establish an inconsistency therefrom, could be for no other purpose but to mislead the judgment of those the orator was addressing, to lead their minds astray from the great question on which they had to decide.
Throughout the whole of the argument of his learned friends that had been assumed, which, at least, was extremely doubtful, namely, that in proceeding against her majesty an impeachment could have been founded. The whole of the argument against proceeding by bill of pains and penalties, rested on the ground of their lordships acting in that case in their legislative, and not in their judicial capacity. When, therefore, his learned friends deprecated such a course, and contended for an impeachment, they were bound to have shown, that in the present case an impeachment could have been maintained. That proof they had de-

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clined; and their lordships, he trusted, would agree with him, that the wisest course which could have been pursued, was the one which was the least subject to doubt and uncertainty. Besides, he would confidently say, notwithstanding all those airs of triumph with which those objections were introduced—notwithstanding all the inflammatory language which accompanied their statement—that a very different character would have been given to the measure of proceeding by a bill of pains and penalties, had not that been the very measure, which in the present case had been adopted. It was adopted because it adverted to certain charges against her majesty, which, though of the gravest import, were not a violation of any law, while the best authorities supported the doctrine that an impeachment could not be maintained but for a breach of a law. Sure, then, he was, that notwithstanding all the challenges now so heroically thrown out, notwithstanding all those allusions to the morality of the country, and all those various topics so liberally brought into view, had impeachment been the proceeding adopted, his learned friend would have deprecated it, and have said, that the proceeding in the case of an adultery should have been by bill, and not by impeachment, because by the adoption of the latter course, the accused party was deprived of the power of recrimination. They complained of the proceeding by bill, because they were now shut out from recrimination, and strange to say, regret that the impeachment was not adopted; a course of proceeding which no lawyer would venture to assert, allowed the accused to recriminate! All this contradiction had its purposes; it was to terrify and to alarm, and to withdraw the minds of their lordships from the real question on which they had to decide. His learned friends had, it was to be recollected, taken this course, not in the exercise of a duty compulsory with them, but acting under an indulgence so very rarely allowed by that House, so rarely indeed, that the divorce case of the duke of Norfolk was the only one to be found where the counsel accused was allowed to interfere before the evidence was produced. Adverting to the manner in which the queen's counsel had characterized the tainted evidence, and, as they called them, the false charges, he remarked that it was not competent for them to make such allusions to the evidence before
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it had been heard, and, as far as he knew, he would venture to say that it was of as fair a description as had ever been uttered before that tribunal. It was as unjust as illiberal to attempt to traduce the character of those whose depositions were not yet known even to counsel themselves. His learned friends on the other side had introduced a variety of topics before the proper time, and by decrying the evidence ere the character of it was known, they had acted in a manner as unjust and as partial as could be conceived. The indulgence which the House had granted them of being heard against the principle of the measure in the present stage, had, in his opinion, been much abused; for, instead of limiting their arguments to the principle of the bill, they had launched into innuendo, insinuations, and assertions which ought not to have been made. Whatever respect he might entertain personally for his learned friends, it was his duty to observe that they did not stand there in the character of witnesses, and that therefore their lordships could pay no regard to their sweeping statements of facts, or to topics introduced with the view of influencing the House in its decision, though irrelevant to the question under consideration.
His learned friends had called their lordships attention to the protest which had been entered against this mode of proceeding in the case of bishop Atterbury, and which had been drawn up by the then lord chancellor Cowper. [Mr. Brougham whispered to the attorney-general, that lord Cowper was not chancellor at the time he protested against that bill.] True, he was afterwards lord-chancellor; but he wished their lordships to observe, that one of the principal objections recorded in that protest was, that proceedings of this kind were in their nature, though not in form, judicial. In a case such as this their lordships were sitting to receive evidence, and though their functions might not be so purely judicial as in a case of impeachment, still they were bound to look at the evidence as scrupulously as if the present were a trial by impeachment. Did his learned friends suppose that their lordships were on this occasion to abandon that high principle of judicial impartiality—that they were not to regulate their decision by the evidence, but that their minds were to be swayed by some base motives different from those which operated on

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them in cases of impeachment? When his learned friends addressed their lordships on such topics, he was confident that their arguments would have no influence; for this, though not in form, was in substance a judicial proceeding.—Another principal objection urged by the professors in the case of the bishop of Rochester was the proceeding by bill, instead of articles of impeachment, which necessarily brought the question under the decision of two tribunals, and thus in fact allowed two trials instead of one. They thought that the greatest mischief of the course pursued consisted in their lordships giving up the judgment which belonged to them, and transferring it to another tribunal not so competent to conduct a judicial investigation, and where popular feelings and passions were likely to have greater influence. But this, looking at what was passing out of doors, was not on objection which the Queen was likely to take to the present mode of proceeding. Indeed, he should have thought that this protest would have been the last thing that his learned friends would have referred to; for it proceeded on the nice sense entertained by the protesters of the dignity of the House, and their unwillingness to have its judicial functions transferred to the other House of Parliament. What was the other objection to the proceeding by a bill of pains and penalties? It was this, that the bishop of Rochester was amenable to the common law tribunals of the country. Why, said the opposers of the bill in that case, adopt an extra ordinary mode of proceeding when the ordinary judicature of the land was open to you? What was the fact in the present case? It was this, that no proceeding in the criminal judicature was open. This opinion, before contended for, was now confirmed by the first authority, that of the judges of the land. Had such not been his opinion, bad it not been upheld by the decision of the judges, had there existed a power of bringing these charges before any of the branches of the criminal judicature of the country, he (the attorney-general) would never have presented himself to exercise that duty, in the discharge of which he appeared that day at their lordships bar. He would say further, that under such a supposition, in language as strong as that employed in the protest on the Atterbury bill, he would have deprecated such a procedure. Do not, he would have said, bring in a bill of pains
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and penalties, if it be open to you to submit these charges to the decision of a jury of the country. That question however, was now set at rest, and he rejoiced it was so; because he well knew that there were many conscientious and honourable persons who had doubts on the subject, and who had a right to demand that those doubts should be satisfied. That uncertainty was now removed; and he boldly challenged his learned friends to the argument, and defied them to produce a single case in support of their assertion, that the facts alleged in the preamble of this bill would bear out an impeachment, and that, consequently, an impeachment was the course that ought to have been adopted. Though he was not prepared to say that an impeachment could not be resorted to in even a doubtful case, yet, if there was a doubt as to the competency of that mode of proceeding, he contended that that was a sufficient reason for pursuing another course.
Thus, he conceived, an answer was furnished to the only point he had heard advanced against the principle of the bill, excepting those declamatory topics which his learned friends had thought proper to introduce, but which he should not presume to follow up. How should he be arraigned if he so far forgot himself as to expatiate on the enormities of the charge contained in the preamble of this bill against a person of the high rank of queen, then indeed a princess, but niece to the late king of Prussia, and next in rank to the queen of England? How should he be arraigned by his learned friends, if he in the present stage were to enlarge on the evidence about to be produced! The pain of the task would be great enough, God knew, when the necessity arrived! From all reference to those declamatory topics which so well belonged to them, and which with their splendid talents they knew so well to enforce, he was bound, by a commanding sense of duty, to abstain. How, he would ask, would his conduct have been arraigned had he ventured to expatiate on the enormous criminality of the charges which the preamble of the bill set forth, committed by a princess destined to be elevated to the splendid station of the queen of these realms, or had he even alluded to the variety of evidence by which such charges would be substantiated? That course no inducement should have influenced him unnecessarily to take. When the proper time arrived that duty

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may devolve on him, and as a duty nothing should deter him from its faithful discharge, although he felt sensibly how he must suffer under the disgusting, licentious, and vicious disclosure which then would be exhibited. His learned friends might prejudge; they might prejudice; they might assail the characters of the most eminent and illustrious in rank and station; they might rake from the shades of oblivion all those prejudices or failings over which the healing spirit of time and more correct feeling had, in consideration of his many virtues, thrown a veil—they might select the moment when an illustrious individual (the duke of York) was next in succession to the throne, when the remains of his illustrious partner had been just consigned to the grave, to wound his feelings, and revive recollections which a better feeling had never disturbed; all these things his learned friends might do with impunity; to him it was only open to state the facts which he should call upon evidence to sustain. They might declaim on the bribes by which that evidence was obtained, and animadvert on the nature of the motives which they presumed to operate on the minds of some of their lordships. All that remained for him was to conjure their lordships, and he knew he did so not in vain—to dismiss all such inapplicable statements from their minds, and to apply themselves to the great and important question, on which, in fact, they were called in their judicial character to pronounce.
He next came to the only argument, for he might say one solitary argument comprised the whole speech of his learned friend yesterday, on the principle of the bill. It was this, that the present proceeding was the adoption of an ex post facto law. He did not deny it. What was the case? An offence marked by our ancestors as the highest that could be committed against the state, had been committed by her majesty. When he said committed, the words were to be understood as used for the sake of argument. If the offence had been committed in this country it would have subjected her to the sentence and punishment of death. Committed abroad with a foreigner, it came not within the penalty of the law. From an accidental circumstance, therefore, it fell not within the provisions of the statute enacted to guard the succession, although such statute was not confined to the mere effect of security
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to the succession. From the preamble of the bill, it appeared that such adulterous intercourse was carried on with a menial in a very low station in her majesty's service, and continued under the most indecent, licentious, and disgraceful circumstances. Was this not an offence to be looked to by their lordships? Was it because it was not high treason within the law, that it should pass by unchecked and unpunished by the state? It was thought not in law high treason; yet in the moral sense it amounted to that crime. To say that because it was thus committed, and in a foreign country, and therefore ought not to be punished, merely because the proceeding would be an ex post facto proceeding, would go to destroy the principles on which all divorce cases were sustained. All such proceedings were a deviation from the principles of the common law, and were adopted on specific grounds. The law of the land said, that the marriage contract was indissoluble, but the complaining party said it was violated, and came to their lordships to pass an ex post facto law, to annul the marriage, and degrade the offending party. The consequence of a divorce was, to degrade the party from the rank formerly enjoyed; and thus, though it was not a bill of pains and penalties, its effect was the same. But it had been argued by his learned friend, Mr. Brougham, that the Queen should not be made responsible for her conduct, because she had no notice that she was doing wrong. Her majesty was therefore to say, "True, I have been this abandoned being; I have committed this scandalous crime; but I have come to England, and you must not punish me." In reply to this, he would say, "Because the crime has been committed with a foreigner, by which it is only rendered the more scandalous and degrading to the country, we cannot punish it by the existing laws; but we cannot allow it to pass with impunity, and therefore we will annul the marriage with the monarch."
This he conceived to be a sufficient answer on that point, and he should therefore proceed to the next argument advanced on the other side, which was, that the charges in the preamble of this bill will support an impeachment. Some persons thought it doubtful whether an impeachment could not be sustained for an offence not known to the law of the land; and in support of the opinion that it could, the case of lord Somers had been

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referred to, who was impeached on account of the partition treaty. He apprehended, however, that high official persons were guilty of a misdemeanor if they neglected or violated their duty: if any public functionary abused the power with which he was invested, he was guilty of a crime against the state. [One of the Queen's counsel repeated the word "crime!"] He was not to be thrown out of his argument by the repetition of this word; and he would again assert, that a public functionary misconducting himself as he had supposed, would be guilty of a crime, and might be impeached. The learned gentleman then quoted the authority of judge Blackstone to show that an impeachment might lie for any offence known to the law of the land. But the guilt of the Queen being committed abroad, was not known to the law, and therefore could not be reached by impeachment, according to the doctrine of Blackstone. A public functionary like lord Somers, might be impeached for a breach of his official duties; but that case was not analogous to the present. He defied the other side to produce any instance of an impeachment for an offence not known to the law of the land; and if they could not produce such a case their argument must fall to the ground. But even if the point were doubtful, their lordships were right in adopting the present course, which, among its other advantages, gave the accused the benefit of an additional tribunal,
The house had been addressed on the expediency of the measure, but that was not the question for their lordships consideration at present. What, he would ask had her majesty just now to do with that question? Her guilt or her innocence would not be affected by the expediency of the measure; she courted inquiry, and this bill was the same to her in that respect as an impeachment. Again, it had been said, that their lordships were now visiting on her majesty what she had done as Princess of Wales. This topic seemed also to have been introduced more for the sake of effect than of argument; but, like many other points dwelt on by his learned friends, it was wholly destitute of solidity; for, as Queen, her situation, in point of responsibility, was the same as when Princess of Wales. If the alleged crime had been committed in this country, she would have been equally amenable to the laws in both cases; and by being com-
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mitted abroad, it rendered her situation the same in either station. She was deprived of no advantage on the present occasion to which she would have been entitled as Princess of Wales, and therefore on this ground she did not experience that inconvenience which had been represented. Again, it had been said that tin's bill was introduced with a view to the private interests of the king. What! In a case which would have been one of high treason if the offence had been committed in this country, was not the crime, in the eye of reason equally to be visited as a public offence, although committed abroad? If our ancestors thought that adultery in such cases ought to be visited with the highest penalties of the law, did they not consider it a public offence? Had they guarded it in such a manner by the statute of Edward 3rd, and yet were their lordships and the country to say, that a Queen who had committed the crimes charged in the preamble of this bill was fit and worthy to sit on the throne of these realms? Be it as his learned friends had said, that their lordships were not to pass this bill unless such evidence of the adultery was produced as would satisfy a jury, he should say, that if the charge of adultery was not proved, the question would arise, whether any of the enactments of the bill should remain on the proof of the other parts of the preamble, if the other parts were substantiated by evidence. His learned friends said, "You are to retain your enactment even if the adultery is not proved;" and to this he would reply, that the present was not the proper stage for the consideration of that question, for counsel were not to anticipate what their lordships in their wisdom might think proper to do in that event.
He was aware that in going over the arguments of the learned counsel to whom he was opposed, he might have omitted many points on which they had dwelt. He knew he had passed over the declamation in which they had indulged, and he conceived that there was an imperative call on him not to follow them in that course. He felt that he was addressing a grave assembly, composed of persons of the highest rank, attainments, and honour, in the country; and he knew that on such an occasion appeals to the passions, however they might excite admiration for the advocate at the bar, would ultimately be of no effect. Their lordships were not to

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be made either by intreaty, by hints, or by menaces, to swerve from the straight forward path of duty. He was aware that tin's, as it had been called by his learned friend who spoke last, was a tremendous inquiry: he knew that the peace of the country might be affected by it; but he knew also that clamour would have no effect on their lordships minds, he was not appalled, he did not fear for the future; he had such confidence in the good sense of the country, that he felt assured when the facts were before them which had hitherto been concealed, and in ignorance of which their minds had artfully been wrought on, they would see the necessity and the propriety of the course that had been resorted to. The question was a momentous one, affecting not only the parties immediately concerned, but the dignity and honour of the country itself. If innocent, however (concluded the learned gentleman), the party accused need not fear your lordships' judgment. If guilty, I am sure that nothing can be stated which will induce you to swerve from the path of duty; but that, fearless of popular clamour, you will put your hand to your hearts, and decide conscientiously and justly. By your lordships' decision you will satisfy the public, that while the meanest subject in the realm is protected by innocence, the highest subject cannot offend with impunity.
The Solicitor Generalfollowed on the same side. He began by saying, that he had also to trouble their lordships on that which had been properly characterised as a most important and most momentous question. He confessed that he participated in the feelings which had been expressed by the attorney-general respecting the conduct pursued by the learned gentlemen on the other side. He had understood that they came to their lordships bar calmly and temperately to discuss a grave, dry, legal, constitutional question: such he conceived to have been the question proposed by the House to the counsel on both sides. But his learned friends, deviating from this course and indulging in personal invective, had accused the individuals who had instituted this proceeding of the most corrupt conduct, and had charged the persons who assisted in collecting the evidence, with subornation of perjury, and the most horrible violation of justice, in attempting to make out a case against the high personage accused. The learned gentlemen, by
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the foul and unfounded aspersions which they had cast out, had put themselves out of the situation of defendants of this case. The charges which they had advanced were wholly unfounded: he dared them to the proof, and he well knew what would be the result of the trial as to the conduct of the individuals directing the proceedings. He had said, that the question in his view of it, was of the roost simple description. The Queen consort, committing adultery with a person owing allegiance to the Crown, was guilty of high treason, whether the crime was committed within the realm or abroad; that was the law of the land. But by a refined and technical distinction, which had given occasion for much debate and serious consideration, and on which the opinion of the judges had been taken, it turned out that this offence, if committed with a foreigner abroad, however vicious, abandoned, and scandalous it might be, was not only no treason, but was not even cognizable by the law of the land. But did it therefore follow that it was to pass unpunished? In arguing the question, he was forced to assume the truth of the allegations contained in the preamble of the bill: for the learned gentlemen on the other side contended that if any thing charged were proved, the bill ought not to pass into a law. On the issue of that question he would meet them, and he should assume, for the sake of argument, that all the facts were made out to the satisfaction of that tribunal. Well, if the Queen consort was guilty of a crime but one shade removed from the highest crime known to the law—of the deepest dye either in a religious, a moral, or a civil point of view—was a person so regardless of what she owed to the country, to the Crown, and to her rank, to sit on the throne by the side of the monarch of these realms? It had been argued by his learned friend, who spoke yesterday, that because this was no crime known to the law of the land, no penalty or punishment should attach to it, and no inquiry should be instituted respecting it; and then both he and his other learned friend had gone on to say, that if any proceeding were resorted to, it should not have been by a bill of pains and penalties, but by articles of impeachment. Now, as to the first of these positions, he was confident that barely stating the facts would be sufficient to ensure their lordships decision in favour of the view he took of the question; for could he address an assembly of men of

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honour, stating that such scandalous con- duct had taken place, and at the same time affirm, that the person who had been guilty of it was worthy to remain upon the throne of England? There were two courses that might be adopted—the one the bill now upon the table, and the other an impeachment. What was the nature of that bill? In the preamble the offence was charged, an offence committed with a foreigner abroad, and therefore not cognizable by the ordinary tribunals of the country. What did the bill enact? A dissolution of marriage, and a deprivation of rank and dignity. Was this, or was it not, an enactment that ought to follow on the proof of the facts of the preamble? For the sake of his argument, he assumed that they could be proved: and was the sovereign in this respect to be placed in a worse situation than any subject in his realm? If a case of adultery were established before the House in the case of the meanest individual, divorce followed of course: and 'had not the king the same privilege? This was a bill of pains and penalties; but in every common bill of divorce the same consequence followed, the same penalties attached. The Queen was to be deprived of her station and dignity; and if the wife of a peer committed adultery, she suffered the same degradation. A bill of divorce, therefore, was a bill of the same nature and character as that now before the House.
With great gravity, and with a power of eloquence seldom equalled, the counsel on the other side had endeavoured to impress their lordships with a notion that this was a new case, that it was out of the ordinary course of proceeding, when, in fact, it was only what happened every day. Next, it was said to be an ex post facto law; but, trying it again by the same test, every bill of divorce was an ex post facto law. These observations dispensed with the necessity of answering that part of the argument where the supporters of the bill were called upon to make out some strong case of necessity, and he appealed to the House whether there ever was a bill of pains and penalties more called for, assuming that the evidence established the preamble. Was it to be tolerated in this kingdom, that such an offence, and such a series of conduct, should be passed over with impunity? Was it to be tolerated that an individual so demeaning herself should fill the highest station in the country, and should
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continue to set an example of such pernicious and extensive operation? Looking at the case of the bishop of Rochester, sir John Fenwick, and others, he should say that if this were to turn on the point of necessity, the necessity dictating those measures sank into nothing compared with the paramount compulsion for the present bill. He agreed in what had been urged on the other side, though suggested in the shape of a charge, with respect to the possibility of avoiding these discussions. Silence upon this subject could hardly be purchased at too dear a price; but the moment the Queen challenged inquiry, the moment she asserted her innocence, the moment she sat her foot in the country and claimed her rank and privileges as Queen consort, it became impossible to shun this dreadful proceeding. Let them insist that great concessions and sacrifices were offered as the means of arresting it; but her majesty, relying; it was to be presumed, on her innocence, had put an end to the possibility of trifling with the subject, and made it absolutely necessary to proceed. The Queen's attorney-general had referred to most atrocious instances of violence. He had quoted the attainder of Mortimer and its subsequent reversion, but it had no connexion with this case. The precedent of lord Strafford wag equally irrelevant. When the popular party failed to make out a case of treason against Strafford, he became the victim of a bill of attainder, and the reasons for its reversion were stated with equal eloquence, from the beginning to the end of the preamble. When the bill of attainder was brought into the House of Commons, it was known that it passed in consequence of the immense multitudes assembling day after day to overawe and intimidate its members. A similar cause had forced it through the Lords, and the manner in which a reluctant assent had at last been extorted from the unfortunate Charles was well remembered. Was it extraordinary that such a bill should have been repealed, or did it form any objection to the principle of bills of pains and penalties? Were they not as old as the law and constitution of the country, and were they not an essential part of that law and constitution? Was there any well-wisher to the popular and free part of our constitution who would wish that portion of it to be rescinded and abolished? The measures now on the

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table followed as nearly as possible those bills of divorce which every session were brought in and passed without a murmur. The Queen's attorney-general, with a kind of candour for which he could not, thank him consented to pass over the reign of Henry 8th, though in a subsequent part of his speech he again dragged it forward. If any precedent existed of that time applicable either to the law or the facts of this case, let them be boldly and fairly stated, and they should be as boldly and fairly met. He was not afraid of charges openly made; but for dark insinuations, for distant and oblique hints, in which the Queen's attorney-general so abundantly indulged, and in which he was so eminently successful he had no great predilection. He repeated, if instances were to be brought from any period of our history, however bad the time, or however arbitrary the monarch, let them be boldly and manfully stated, and the supporters of the bill had nothing to fear.
It was asked, as this was a bill of pains and penalties enacting divorce, who was the complaining party? In ordinary cases, said they, bills of divorce are not passed unless the husband appears and gives his consent to the rescinding of the matrimonial contract. True it was, that the king was not here the complaining party: it was inconsistent with his high character and station to come before this court as the complaining party; but, knowing the facts of the case, he pursued the course befitting his dignified and princely capacity; he ordered the papers to be laid before the parliament, that it might deal with the case as to its wisdom might seem meet. Thus he became a consenting, though not a complaining party. When the Queen's attorney-general had stated that he would not enter into the question of recrimination, he had acted with perfect propriety, recollecting the question before the House: recrimination had nothing to do with that question; it had nothing to do with the principle of the bill, though it might hereafter remain to be decided, when the case on one side was closed, how far recrimination should be allowed. But the Queen's solicitor-general had not followed in the steps of his leader, he had gone at large into the question of recrimination. His mind and habits of reasoning must have revolted at the course, because he knew that it was inapplicable. It had been the misfortune of these proceedings, from the
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commencement, and throughout every stage, that collateral topics, calculated to excite prejudice, and to inflame the passions of the multitude—to create distraction in the country, and to shake the very foundations of the monarchy, had been introduced by the professional and unprofessional advisers of the Queen. He deeply lamented the fact: whether the same course were still to be pursued he knew not, but judging from the past, he had little to hope for the future.
He took it for granted, then, that it would not be denied that some remedy was necessary, and the great majority of their lordships, he trusted, would be of opinion that the remedy before the House was that which ought to be afforded. It was, however, urged on the other side, that the Queen ought to have been impeached; but he relied on the authority of Mr. Justice Blackstone, cited by his learned friend, to show that there existed no case of impeachment not founded on some crime known to the common law, or on some malversation or misconduct in a public officer. On this point he begged to be understood as not expressing a confident opinion, but as 6tating at least a strong doubt whether impeachment in this case could have been maintained. Giving the other side the benefit of this doubt, would it be contended that a remedy ought to have been sought in a mode that on all hands admitted so much argument as to its legality. Had impeachment been resorted to; the counsel for the Queen would have been the loudest to arraign that course—they would have insisted that it was inconsistent with the law and constitution of the country, that it was inadequate to its end, and that it was attended by a multitude of hardships to the accused. Besides, what sort of remedy would it afford to the injured party? Was it appropriate to this case? Could any punishment be inflicted under it but those which went to the life, liberty, or property of the offender? An impeachment could not divorce—it could not degrade from rank and dignity, though it might inflict capital punishment, and direct imprisonment. If what he now stated were not universally assented to, he wished those who dissented to point out any case of impeachment which did not range itself within the class he had mentioned. When, however, the oilier side talked of the benefits resulting to the accused from

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impeachment, he confidently asked, what advantage she could have then enjoyed which her majesty would not now possess in a superior degree? First, the accusation must have proceeded from the House of Commons, and it must have been built on previous inquiry. It would then come before their lordships, where the inquiry must be renewed. In a proceeding by bill, on the other hand, the witnesses on both sides having been examined here, it would be sent down to the other House; nor did it follow as a necessary consequence that it would pass there: at least the examinations must there be renewed, and every means would be afforded to her majesty of meeting the case. Nor in an impeachment would the charge be of a more specific and more distinct nature than in this bill. It was said, that in an impeachment, time and place must he stated; but here all that could be specified had been specified. The name of the adulterer was inserted, but the adultery was extended over a period of years, and was not confined to one, two, or three kingdoms: it embraced a considerable portion of the globe, and how then could it be more accurately defined? The learned counsel on the other side had also run away with a notion that it was unnecessary to be as precise in an impeachment as in an indictment; but if they looked only at the precedent of Sacheverell, they would find themselves mistaken.
He had thus endeavoured to show that the proceeding by bill was distinctly applicable to this case, and that it was analogous to the proceedings of parliament, while an impeachment was inconvenient to the parties, inadequate to the remedy, and productive of no advantage to counterbalance the doubts and difficulties attending it. If, then, a choice roust be made, why was this bill to be rejected? Having said thus much, it appeared to him that he had argued the whole question without going out of the way to call the attention of the house to collateral matters. Another objection had then been taken, and it was said that the law did not apply to the state of her majesty as Princess of Wales, and her attorney-general had contended, that she was entitled now to all those advantages to which two or three years ago she would have had a right, nunc pro tunc. But the situation of the wife of the Prince of Wales was precisely the same as that of the wife
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of the King, as far as related to the imputations in the bill: and if the offence had been committed at the time when her majesty was the wife of the Prince Regent, the same reasons of policy governing the present proceeding would then have applied. Next it was said that marriage was a religious contract, and that the house ought to be careful how it severed the holy knot; but the same argument applied to every bill of divorce: adultery dissolved the tie, and set the parties free, so that it had no application to the present proceeding. The language of the preamble had been criticised; this was no offence, that was no offence, and a third charge was no offence. Taking them separately, he agreed that it was so: one, two, or three facts in the preamble might not amount to any offence; but taking them collectively as parts of a whole, they constituted an offence of an enormous character. What did the preamble state? That the Queen of England, then wife of the Prince Regent, went to Italy; that she engaged a menial servant, long in a similar situation, as an attendant; that great familiarity and improper intimacy very shortly afterwards took place between them, and that she loaded him with favours and honours of every description; that she fenced herself round almost exclusively with his relations; that in the eyes of the whole world a degrading and disgusting intercourse was held between them; and that this licentious and adulterous conduct was pursued for a great length of time. Would any man contend that this charge was not stated in language so precise and distinct that it could not be misunderstood? No man who did not wilfully shut his eyes could mistake it. Then the terms "adulterous intercourse" were cavilled at, for there was nothing however small that escaped observation, or however great that was not forced into the discussion. But as to this, his learned friend the attorney-general had given a satisfactory answer, which showed how lax and sluggish the other side were to discover any thing militating against them. The great majority of bills of divorce stated, not that adultery had been committed, but that an adulterous intercourse had been carried on, and a succession of adulterous acts were charged in the preamble of the bill. The counsel for the Queen seemed to think that there was no difference between adultery committed by a man and by a woman. This

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was a most extraordinary proposition, whether considered legally or with reference to its effects upon society. Adultery in a man was in no way punishable, and it could not be made the subject of a bill of divorce. But why was this tonic introduced? For a most strange and unjustifiable purpose. He should have thought that the common feeling of delicacy and humanity which he knew pervaded the bosoms of his learned friends, would have compelled abstinence at least on this point. It was an unwarrantable, because an unnecessary, attack upon an illustrious personage, whose conduct had been twice dragged before the house. His great talents and popularity throughout the country might at all times, but more particularly at the present moment of domestic affliction, have shielded him from so cruel and so wanton an assault. Knowing from what quarter it proceeded, it filled him with surprize and amazement.
The attorney-general for the Queen had asserted that there were some individuals who encouraged her majesty to go abroad; and both her counsel had intimated in terms too distinct to be misunderstood, that there were those who wished that she should leave the kingdom, that she might fall a victim to one of the most foul conspiracies that had ever entered into the heart of man. He mentioned this as an indication of the spirit and temper with which this discussion had been conducted, and of the strange infatuation that seemed to prevail in some quarters. Was it meant as a charge against ministers? Was it possible to suppose that such detestable wickedness could enter into the minds of the basest in society, much less into the minds of men refined by education, polished by intercourse with the highest classes, and raised by their talents to the highest functions of the state? Could they invent such a plot and concert such a diabolical conspiracy? But it was of a piece with the rest; it was of a piece with the spirit which had censured the great anxiety felt, that the Queen should continue on the continent, and for which such a sacrifice would have been made. If that proceeding deserved condemnation, all the parties who were actors in it were equally to blame. The man who received, the man who bore, and the man who assented to the proposal, were to the full as bad as the man who made it. But he believed that no blame was to be imputed to any person; he be-
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lieved it was the best advice that could be given, and he wished to Heaven that it had been followed. He would not trouble the House further; he was sensible that in his observations for the last ten minutes he had been deviating from the course he had prescribed to himself; he had been following the wandering course of his learned friends into collateral matters unconnected with the real question before the House. First, it was to be decided whether any proceeding should be instituted: if any, two modes presented themselves—by bill, and by impeachment; and he was persuaded that the House would not abandon the measure it had adopted for one liable to so many and to such important objections.
Mr. Broughamproceeded to reply.—I confess, my lords, that after having given the utmost attention to the arguments which have been urged by my learned friends who appear as counsel against her majesty, I feel myself hardly called upon in the discharge of my duty to my royal client to avail myself of the usual privilege of reply. At all events I purpose to confine myself to a very few topics among those which have been urged by my learned friends. With this view, and with the full intention of keeping a promise which is more frequently made than observed, I purpose, without further preface, to solicit your lordships' attention to several of those topics. First of all, suffer me to observe, that a general and somewhat vague charge has been adduced of our having deviated from the point stated to be in issue before the House, namely, the principle of the bill. It has been said that I have gone into arguments which belong to another stage of the proceedings, and that I have entered into a great mass of collateral matter in no way relevant to the matter in issue. I think my learned friend would not have brought forward this charge, if he had adverted to the manner in which I submitted my arguments to your lordships' notice. Suffer me to remind your lordships, that I set out with stating that this was a legislative proceeding. The question was, whether a new law should be made by parliament, and in making objections to that new law, every argument was relevant which had a tendency to arrest the course of the legislature? We stand in a very different situation from that in which we should have been placed, if we had had to meet articles of impeachment, or to defend in a proceeding by

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indictment. In either of these proceedings we should have been strictly and rigidly confined to the charges without the possibility of entering into any collateral arguments, until the question should arise, whether punishment should be awarded. Here, on the contrary, we are placed in a different, or rather an opposite predicament, in which we are called upon to argue whether this bill shall or shall not proceed; and this broad distinction lets in every argument of expediency, every view of the necessity which does or does not exist for making this law at all. It lets in by a just inference, every one of those topics, which were not vaguely and irrelevantly, but strictly and technically urged by myself and my learned coadjutor before your lordships.
In recalling your lordships' attention to the arguments which have been urged on the other side, I cannot omit the eloquent and elaborate eulogy which my learned friend the solicitor-general thought fit to pass upon bills of Pains and Penalties in the abstract. They are, it seems, an integral part of our constitution. These are an ancient branch of that happy form of government, intimately mixed up and interwoven with the whole frame of our civil and judicial polity. They are a sacred branch of the happy constitution of England; and God forbid, says he, that any man who values the popular branch of that constitution, should wish to see them abolished! Without subscribing, as a lover of the popular branch of our constitution, to the solicitor-general's praises of bills of Pains and Penalties—for the constitution includes, I conceive, the just and pure administration of the laws, and embraces all that is valuable, and loved, and respected for securing them—I do not mean to deny what is admitted in the language of lord chancellor Cowper, that cases may by possibility occur, which would not only justify, but enjoin the enactment of a bill of Pains and Penalties. But it lies upon my learned friend, or his employers who bring forward such a bill, to descend from his general eulogy, and draw from thence an eulogy of this particular measure—to demonstrate the necessity which almost justifies, and, when it justifies, may be allowed to exact the enactment of so extraordinary a measure. The solicitor-general has addressed your lordships in the language and tone of an advocate, who forgets every thing that does not make for his cause, and who
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is not over scrupulous in substituting matter that does make for it; but your lordships, who are not influenced by such prejudiced views, and who do not labour under this professional obliquity of vision, cannot but recollect, that if the absolute necessity for this proceeding be not shown, the bill ought not to proceed farther. But I am told that it is too late to argue this question, that your lordships have decided the matter, that the bill has been received and read a first time, and that there is now an order upon your lordships' table for proceeding to the second reading. If this be so, my lords, we are indeed mistaken; for we have ventured to apprehend, that though the bill has been received and read a first time, we were not shut out from being heard against the principle of the bill. On the contrary, my lords, we conceive, that for these very reasons—because your lordships had received the bill, and read it a first time in the absence of the parties affected, and without hearing arguments either from or within the bar, without listening to the reasons which might have convinced your lordships that no necessity existed for such a proceeding—for these very reasons, my lords, we felt persuaded that your lordships would not now refuse to hear us. Conceiving this to be the situation in which we were placed, we reminded your lordships yesterday and to-day of those reasons, and it now only remains to make a few farther observations, passing over a multitude, which I think I could successfully urge to your lordships, and confining myself to those points, upon which my learned friends on the other side seem more especially to rely.
Now, my learned friend the attorney-general has thought proper to make a general and somewhat sweeping criticism upon the argument, which have been urged to your lordships against the bill. After all the attention which he could give them, it seems, that amidst a great mass of matter, he could only find one thing which bore the semblance of an argument. In leaving me this one poor, unhappy argument, amidst a large mass of declamation, my learned friend has at least dealt with me more fairly than the man in Nathan's parable. The reason for proceeding by impeachment, is what my learned friend considers an argument. An impeachment, however, says the attorney-general, does not lie. The attorney-general and myself are at issue upon the

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law, for I contend that an impeachment does lie, and that this bill ought not to be proceeded in. We contended before your lordships, that this proceeding should not be had, because impeachment was the constitutional course, and that this measure should not be gone into, because, under all the circumstances of the case, it was most unnecessary and inexpedient. Now, to grapple with the argument as to impeachment. My learned friend did not show any remarkable degree of confidence, for no sooner had he said that our law was wrong, then he added, if it was not wrong, it was at least extremely doubtful. He first begins by asserting that impeachment does not lie, and then my learned friend turns round, and says impeachment is a very doubtful proceeding. My learned friend appears to be but little read in constitutional law; and if a scattered passage is all he can bring forward against whole pages and volumes which may be opposed to him under the title of the law of impeachment, his experience in matters of constitutional law is indeed but of yesterday. What! no impeachment competent where no law has been violated? Why, the whole jurisdiction of the House, a jurisdiction which, in the words of lord Coke, was so large, ample, and capacious, that it acknowledged neither bounds of time or space, rested upon the general principle, that impeachment lay in such cases. If there is one maxim in our constitutional law more fixed and irrefragable than another, it is this—that where mischief has been done, and no remedy is otherwise to be obtained, impeachment is the competent redress. My learned friend has taken upon himself to say, that impeachment is not competent, except against persons in a public and official capacity. Now, what is the reason that impeachment lies in the case of misdemeanors committed by public functionaries? It is because no remedy is to be obtained elsewhere, and the distinction applies only to cases in which no indictment can lie. It is because a wrong has been done, and the interest of the state requires that it should be punished, that parliament has the power of seeing right done, of taking care that justice is administered and punishment awarded.
But does not the principle admitted by the attorney-general apply to this very case? Is the Queen consort a private person? Is the Queen consort a person endued with no rights, privileges, and im-
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munities? Let the attorney-general look at his books, which he appears to have only half read, and a quarter quoted, and he will find that no person, under the officer who wears the diadem, is more recognized in a public capacity than the Queen consort of England. I will proceed to some cases of impeachment in which neither public functionaries were concerned, nor crimes charged, which were indictable in the ordinary courts of judicature. Towards the end of the reign of Edward 3rd, Richard Lyons, filling the high public station of one of the merchants of the city of London, committed the indictable offence of removing the staple of wool and other merchandize. Another offence for which this Richard Lyons was impeached, was lending money to the king upon usurious contracts, and offering to pay the king's creditors for a small advance. This charge of compounding the king's debts upon a small per centage would in these days, I apprehend, be so far from being deemed an offence, that if the king's creditors could only be made accomplices by consenting to receive a small proportion of their debts, it would be regarded as a great benefit to the country. [Here the attorney-general called upon Mr. Brougham to go on with the list of charges against Richard Lyons.]—I have not the slightest objection to go on. The charge proceeds to state other extortions, deceits, and oppressions, committed by the said Richard Lyons, as farmer of the king's subsidies and customs. It appears therefore that this individual was charged with offences both of a public and private nature. But your lordships will observe, and I pray your lordships' attention to the fact, that there are four several matters alleged against him, each of these allegations being a substantive charge. Now it must be recollected, that our ancestors did not draw up articles of impeachment in the slovenly manner in which some of their descendants now draw bills of Pains and Penalties; therefore any one of the three impeachable offences first charged afford as strong an authority that impeachment lies for offences committed in a private capacity, and not indictable at common law, as if the offence which winds up the charge had been entirely left out.
I will not fatigue your lordships by detailing other cases, but content myself with referring to one in 1620, which is the more remarkable, because sir Edward

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Coke was at that time in the House of Commons, and chairman of the committee appointed to search for precedents. In the 4; inst, folio 36 and 42, he alludes to the case of sir Giles Mompesson, who was impeached for no more flagrant or indictable an offence than that of procuring illegal patents. I should like to see the attorney general, with the aid of his special pleaders below the bar, set about drawing an indictment for procuring illegal patents. Since the Revolution there are instances of the same kind. I deny the narrow principle that the moment an offence is made liable to a pecuniary penalty, it comes within the pale of parliamentary impeachment. My learned friend applies to me as a lover of the constitution. In that character I require the privilege of impeachment upon higher grounds than because a penalty of five pounds is annexed to an offence. I require it wherever a wrong or injury is done for which there is no other constitutional remedy, and which is not cognizable at common law. This is the sound constitutional principle on which the law of impeachment rests since the very beginning of parliaments. In Glanville a case of impeachment is mentioned for smuggling French silks, and I mention this to show how long and wide-stretching is the arm of impeachment. So extensive is the power of the House of Commons that it can descend even to the minutest offences. Nothing is so elevated as to over-awe its control—nothing so minute as to elude its vigilance. It applies, in short, to all cases which are otherwise irremediable. I will pass over the impeachments arising out of the barrier treaty, and come at once to the case of Mr. Hastings. Some of the charges against him might perhaps have been brought against him at common law, but I will venture to say, that four out of five of the articles of impeachment were not cognizable in an ordinary court of judicature.
The attorney-general has asked whether if an act committed out of the realm would have been high treason if committed within it, it was fit that such an act should go unpunished? The attorney general has assumed that those acts would amount to high treason if committed within the realm. The opinion given by the judges, as it has gone abroad, has been much misstated. The question proposed to the judges, was, whether or not certain offences charged in the preamble of the bill
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to have been committed abroad with a person who owed no allegiance to this country amounted to high treason; but they were not asked, whether the same offences was punishable by impeachment. It is the more necessary to state this, because this question has never yet been decided by the judges, I am aware that we have the opinion of text writers upon the point, but had this question come before the judges, it would have been a case prima impressionis.
The next argument upon which reliance is placed is one which, I confess, does not a little astonish me, and to this part of my learned friend's speech I cannot help soliciting the attention of the House. That my learned friend should have brought forward any argument so hostile to himself, and so favourable to us, I could not possibly have anticipated. My learned friend treats this bill as a bill of divorce. He urged this argument over and over again—he pressed it, I cannot say usque ad nauseam, for the oftener he repeated it, it was the more grateful to my ears—but my learned friend appeared never tired of repeating that this bill was a bill of divorce. If this be so, the matter is at an end,—the question is closed—and my learned friend and his bill, clauses, preamble, provisos and all, are fairly out of court. If it be a bill of divorce in which the sovereign claims the remedy, why are not all the analogies of an ordinary bill of divorce followed up? We have been tauntingly and jeeringly asked, where we could find a bill of divorce in which the word adultery was specified and charged eo nomine? Why, for this very obvious reason—because there is no necessity for it. There can be no common bill of divorce, unless the ecclesiastical courts have first pronounced a sentence of divorce upon a charge of adultery. Are we not entitled to turn round upon our learned friends, aided as they are by their learned coadjutor from Doctors'-commons, and to ask when the ecclesiastical courts ever pronounced a sentence of divorce, where the libel contained nothing but the words "adulterous intercourse." The libel must impute the foul crime of adultery. It is very possible that the words "adulterous intercourse" may also be used, because the learned persons who draw these proceedings, delight in prolixity for the sake of accuracy, of course, as the purses of those who employ them can testify. The "foul crime of adul-

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tery," however, must be charged in the libel, and without such a libel, no common bill of divorce ever passed your lordships' House.
It is said, however, that his majesty does not complain; so that here is the anomalous case of a bill of divorce without a party applying for it. It is a bill of divorce to all purposes, save only that trifling particular, that there is no party professing to be injured! It is upon this particular, however, upon the complaint of some individual, that all your lordships jurisdiction in cases of divorce rests—without it you have no right to dissolve the sacred tie of marriage. There is not a single instance from the beginning of the world, not even excepting the reign of Henry 8th, in which parliament has proceeded to legislate away the marriage tie, without an application from the party complaining of injury. Though the king, however, does not complain, my learned friends seem to me to place this illustrious person in a very strange predicament, by their admission of the capacity in which his majesty here stands. The king does not complain, but he sends a sealed bag of charges; he desires parliament to consider them; and he pledges himself that if they shall be of opinion that a divorce is advisable, he will cheerfully abide by their recommendation. And this course is taken, because it would be inconsistent with the royal dignity to complain! To my mind, I confess that the royal dignity appears to have been little consulted in this proceeding; and, in point of fact, where is the difference between making a complaint and demand of redress, and sending down a message to parliament recommending them to institute proceedings, with an implied assurance that his majesty would be the first person to be satisfied with their decision, and to accept joyfully the proffered redress? This proceeding is so like a complaint, that it is difficult to apprehend the distinction; unless, indeed, his majesty is to be considered as a complainant in any other sense, that may suit his majesty's supposed purposes, or the arguments of my learned friends, and not in that sense which the bill requires, and which the purposes of justice require. In that case, indeed, his majesty may be supposed to come here as a complainant not liable to those rules which affect such complaints, and which in ordinary cases would afford us those facilities for defence, which it is pretended are not
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competent to us, because this is not a private, but a public proceeding.
My learned friend who spoke last made some observations upon the conduct of the persons who wished her majesty to remain abroad—of those who facilitated a foreign residence, and of those who were desirous of prolonging it. My learned friend, however, misunderstood the manner in which those charges had been made. We did not launch a vague, random charge against them for having treated with her majesty; but as necessity alone could justify this proceeding, we thought there were no better means of ascertaining that necessity than by sifting the conduct of those persons who proposed the measure, and who alone knew the facts. We thought it our duty to show your lordships that their conduct was such, that no man of the common measure of honesty, or of the ordinary degree of intellect, could doubt not only that there was no necessity for the measure, but that it was absolutely inexpedient. My learned friend, under that convenient figure of speech in which an orator says he will not do what at the moment he actually does, has enumerated all those disgraceful, degrading, offensive particulars, to use his own words, that adulterous intercourse, which is alleged to have subsisted between her majesty and a foreigner, disgraceful alike to the character of the nation, and degrading to the dignity of the royal family. If information were received in this country of conduct so disgraceful and degrading, and so especially injurious to the character of the nation in the eyes of foreigners, is it not a logical inference that it would have been followed up by an order requiring her return to England, that if guilty she might no longer retain her illustrious rank and privileges? Was any proceeding of this nature resorted to? No such thing—reward was held out instead of punishment, and instead of an order to return to this country, it was a prohibition to return. Instead of attempting to retrieve the sullied honour of the country, every facility was afforded her of adding to the national dishonour. The real opinion of the framers and supporters of this bill must be collected from their actions. So far from thinking such a bill essential to the morality of the country, or that the conduct of my illustrious client was deserving of reprobation, they went down upon their knees to her majesty with the same homage that they had paid

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to their sovereign, her consort; they were ready to consent that her majesty should have a large income, and that she should be acknowledged at foreign courts as Queen of Great Britain, without any hint that she had committed offences degrading to the character of the country, still less that any measure had become necessary to degrade her majesty from her high rank and station. Whatever may be thought by different individuals of these offers made to her majesty, they stand the avowed and recorded opinion of the framers and supporters of this hill, that they did not think the conduct of my illustrious client at all injurious to the morals of the country.
But (continued Mr. Brougham) it appeared to be thought that he and his colleagues had been guilty of great injustice to the claims of a certain respectable class of the community, whom he should, describe as witnesses. This was a charge he could not admit. For his own part, he could not think himself justified in whispering a single syllable to the disadvantage of this worthy order of persons. When he thought of them, his idea of them was too high to allow him to look upon them with any other eyes than those of respect! His impression was, that they must be persons of exalted station, above the ordinary ranks of life, or at least looking in their exterior like those persons with whom their lordships were accustomed to associate. This respectable external appearance they had, he doubted not, proprio marte. They must be seized in fee-simple of those decent habiliments in which it would be fitting for them to appear before their lordships; and those, too, purchased out of their own ample revenues. He supposed they must be persons who could regale themselves at their own expense—who could live in separate apartments, and could fare sumptuously every day, They could not, he was sure, be persons who were called together by the ringing of a bell, or the beating of a drum, to a common meal provided at the expense of others. At least he was sure they must have full liberty of locomotion, and might be expected to be met by their lordships in the corners of the streets; and that when they went abroad, no other individuals would be seen attending them, or watching; their motions, but lacqueys de place. Wherever they were seen he was sure they would be respected: they must be known
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to Europe, and if less known in this country, it was our misfortune not theirs. He might surely anticipate that they would appear before their lordships decently attired, at their own charge, and deliver their testimony—he could not say in proper English,—but in their own native language, with dignity and propriety. Such was the description of testimony he had to expect in support of the preamble and clauses of the bill. To meet a cloud of such witnesses was enough to appal any man. But, besides these, there would be, he was equally confident, a number of home-bred witnesses, of equal respectability. They must be officers of distinction in the army or navy, or ladies and gentlemen who had enjoyed the society or been about the person of his illustrious client. These persons, being well known in this country, would be regarded as even more worthy of credit by their lordships than the former. In this situation, what would become of him and his learned colleague, if their lordships should see no weight in their arguments against the principle of the bill, and should determine to receive this overwhelming evidence?
Having taken the liberty of making this digression, he must now notice a charge which had been made against him by his learned friend on the other side. He had been accused of a wish to inflict pain on an illustrious individual wantonly and unnecessarily, and of choosing a time for that purpose that was calculated rather to close every mouth on the subject. Their lordships, he was certain, would do him the justice to recollect that he did not allude to this subject unnecessarily. He had touched on it in replying to the arguments urged in support of the necessity of the bill. His answer was, that if such a measure was necessary for the sake of morals, on account of the supposed conduct of his client, it could not have been unnecessary to take some steps in the case of another illustrious person. He had not gone out of his way to state this: it arose in the course of his argument. He had heard it stated that it was ludicrous to compare the case of a prince and-a princess. He had not, as it seemed to be supposed, considered the cases as similar; but he thought it very extraordinary that any man should regard the one case as inflicting a stain on the moral character of the country, and the other as having, no tendency that way. He had to appeal from the new to the old law of morality,

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and was not raking up past transactions for the purpose of exciting odium or inflicting pain, as had been alleged. What he meant to contend was, that there was no consistency in saying that the present case, if made out, was one which ought to be visited with severity, while others were entirely overlooked. Here there had been no public ground for the proceeding. There had been no public inquiry till their lordships acted on the recommendation of ministers, and the whole proceedings had for their foundation nothing but rumour. He should deeply feel the pain of being Jed into any thing like recrimination; but, with every regret at being compelled to take that course, his feelings would at least be alleviated by the consideration that he acted in the discharge of his professional duty. Relying with confidence on the justice of their lordships' decision, he felt that it was unnecessary for him to take up any more of their time.
Lord Kingsaid it was his intention to propose a resolution to their lordships to this effect, viz., "that it is not necessary either for the public safety, or the security of the government, that the bill intituled, "An Act to deprive Her Majesty of the Title, Prerogatives, Rights, & c. of Queen Consort, should pass into a law."
Earl Greysaid, that the impression made upon his mind by the arguments used by the learned counsel was very strong against proceeding with the bill. He therefore wished that time should be given to their lordships to consider what ought to be done upon this proposition, and hoped his noble friend would postpone his motion till to-morrow, when their lordships would all Come better prepared for the discussion. If he were now forced to come to a decision, he so strongly felt the inconvenience of the course in which they were engaged, that he should certainly be disposed to adopt some other mode than a bill of Pains and Penalties.
Lord King intimated his willingness to postpone his motion till to-morrow. The Earl of Liverpool was willing to consent to the delay proposed, but thought that the debate ought now to be commenced, by, at least, placing the proposition before their lordships: they might then adjourn the debate until to-morrow. Lord King, in compliance with this recommendation, moved his resolution; after which, the debate upon it was adjourned until to-morrow.