wards a reform. In the year 1777, when the king's civil list debts. came last to be paid, he explained very fully the success of his undertaking. He told the House of Lords that he had attempted to reduce the charges of the king's tables, and his kitchen. The thing, Sir, was not below him. He knew, that there is nothing interesting in the concerns of men, whom we love and honour, that is beneath our attention." Love," says one of our old poets, esteems no office mean;" and with still more spirit, "entire affection scorneth nicer hands." Frugality, Sir, is founded on the principle, that all riches have limits. A royal household, grown enormous, even in the meanest departments, may weaken and perhaps destroy all energy in the highest offices of the state. The gorging a royal kitchen may stint and famish the negociations of a kingdom. Therefore the object was worthy of his, was worthy of any man's attention.

In consequence of this noble lord's resolution, (as he told the other house) he reduced several tables, and put the persons entitled to them upon board wages, much to their own satisfaction. But uuluckily subsequent duties requiring constant attendance, it was not possible to prevent their being fed where they were employed—and thus this first step towards economy doubled the expense.

There was another disaster far more doleful than this. I shall state it, as the cause of that misfortune lies at the bottom of almost all our prodigality. Lord Talbot attempted to reform the kitchen; but such, as he well observed, is the consequence of having duty done by one person, whilst another enjoys the emoluments, that he found himself frustrated in all his designs. On that rock his whole adventure split.-His whole scheme of economy was dashed to pieces; his department became more expensive than ever;-the civil list debt accumulated-Why? It was truly from a cause, which, through perfectly adequate to the effect, one would have not instantly guessed;-It was because the turnspit in the king's kitchen was a meraber of parliament. The king's domestic servants were all undone; his tradesmen remained unpaid, and became bankrupt-because the turnspit of the king's kitchen was a member of parliament. His majesty's slumbers were interrupted, his pillow was stuffed with thorns, and his peace of mind entirely broken,-because the king's turnspit was a member of parliament. The judges were unpaid; the justice of the kingdom bent and gave way; the foreign ministers remained inactive and unprovided; the system of Europe was dissolved; the chain of our alliances was broken; all the wheels of government at home and abroad were stopped-because the king's turnspit was a member of parliament.

Such, Sir, was the situation of affairs, and such the cause of that situation, when his majesty came a second time to parliament, to desire the payment of those debts which the employment of its members in various offices, visible and invisible, had occasioned. I believe that a like fate will attend every attempt at economy by detail, under similar circumstances, and in every department. A complex operose office of account and control, is in itself, and even if members of parliament had nothing to do with it, the most prodigal of all things. The most audacious robberies, or the most subtle frauds, would never venture upon such a waste, as an over-careful, detailed guard against them will infallibly produce. In our establishments we frequently see an office of account, of an hundred pound a-year expense, and another office of an equal expense, to control that office, and the whole upon a matter that is not worth twenty shillings.

To avoid, therefore, this minute care which produces the consequences of the most extensive neglect, and to oblige members of parliament to attend to public cares, and not to the servile offices of domestic management, I propose, Sir, to economise by principle; that is, I propose to put affairs into that train which experience points out as the most effectual, from the nature of things, and from the constitution of the human mind. In all dealings where it is possible, the principles of radical economy prescribe three things; first, undertaking by the great; secondly, engaging with persons of skill in the subject-matter; thirdly, engaging with those who shall have an immediate and direct interest in the proper execution of the business.

To avoid frittering and crumbling down the attention by a blind unsystematic observance of every trifle, it has ever been found the best way to do all things, which are great in the total amount, and minute in the component parts, by a general contract. The principles of trade have so pervaded every species of dealing, from the highest to the lowest objects; all transactions are got so much into system, that we may, at a moment's warning, and to a farthing value, be informed at what rate any service may be supplied. No dealing is exempt from the possibility of fraud. But by a contract on a matter certain you have this advantage: you are sure to know the utmost extent of the fraud to which you are subject. By a contract with a person in his own trade you are sure you shall not suffer by want of skill. By a short contract you are sure of making it the interest of the contractor to exert that skill for the satisfaction of his employers.

I mean to derogate nothing from the diligence or integrity of the present, or of any former board of green-cloth. But what skill can members of parliament obtain in that low kind of province? What pleasure can they have in the execution of that kind of duty? And if they should neglect it, how does it affect their interest, when we know that it is their vote in parliament, and not their diligence in cookery or catering, that recommends them to their office or keeps them in it?

I therefore propose, that the king's tables (to whatever number of tables, or covers to each, he shall think proper to command) should be classed by the steward of the household, and should be contracted for, according to their rank, by the head or cover; that the estimate and circumstance of the contract should be carried to the treasury to be approved; and that its faithful and satisfactory performance should be reported there previous to any payment; that there, and there only, should the payment be made. I propose, that men should be contracted with only in their proper trade; and that no member of parliament should be capable of such contract. By this plan almost all the infinite offices under the lord steward may be spared, to the extreme simplification and to the far better execution of every one of his functions. The king of Prussia is so served. He is a great and eminent (though, indeed, a very rare) instance of the possibility of uniting, in a mind of vigour and compass, an attention to minute objects with the largest views, and the most complicated plans. His tables are served by contract, and by the head. Let me say, that no prince can be ashamed to imitate the king of Prussia; and particularly to learn in his school when the problem is-"The best manner of reconciling the state of a court with the support of war." Other courts, I understand, have followed him with effect, and to their satisfaction.

The same clue of principle leads us through the labyrinth of the other departments. What, Sir, is there in the office of the great wardrobe (which has the care of the king's furniture) that may not be executed by the lord chamberlain himself? He has an honourable appointment; he has time sufficient to attend to the duty; and he has the vice-chamberlain to assist him. Why should not he deal also by contract for all things belonging to this office, and carry his estimates first, and his report of the execution in its proper time, for payment, directly to the board of treasury itself? By a simple operation (containing in it a treble controul) the expenses of a department, which for naked walls, or walls hung with cobwebs, has in a few years cost the crown £150,000, may at length hope for regula

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tion. But, Sir, the office and its business are at variance. stands it serves not to furnish the palace with its hanging, but the parliament with its dependent members.

To what end, Sir, does the office of removing wardrobe serve at all? Why should a jewel office exist for the sole purpose of taxing the king's gifts of plate? Its object falls naturally within the chamberlain's province, and ought to be under his care and inspection without any fee. Why should an office of the robes exist when that of groom of the stole is a sinecure, and that this is a proper object of his department?

All these incumbrances, which are themselves nuisances, produce other incumbrances, and other nuisances. For the payment of these useless establishments, there are no less than three useless treasurers; two to hold a purse, and one to play with a stick. The treasurer of the household is a mere name. The cofferer and the treasurer of the chamber receive and pay great sums, which it is not at all necessary they should either receive or pay. All the proper officers, servants, and tradesmen, may be enrolled in their several departments, and paid in proper classes and times with great simplicity and order at the exchequer, and by direction from the treasury.

The board of works, which in the seven years preceding 1777, has cost towards £400,000; and (if I recollect rightly) has not cost less in proportion from the beginning of the reign, is under the very same description of all the other ill-contrived establishments; and calls for the very same reform. We are to seek for the visible signs of all this expense. For all this expense we do not see a building of the size and importance of a pigeon-house. Buckingham-house was reprised by a bargain with the public for one hundred thousand pounds;-and the small house at Windsor has been, if I mistake not, undertaken since that account was brought before The good works of that board of works are as carefully concealed as other good works ought to be; they are perfectly invisible. But though it is the perfection of charity to be concealed, it is, Sir, the property and glory of magnificence, to appear, and stand forward to the eye.

us.

That board, which ought to be a concern of builders, and such like, and of none else, is turned into a junto of members of parliament. That office too has a treasury, and a paymaster of its own; and least the arduous affairs of that important exchequer should be too fatiguing, that paymaster had a deputy to partake his profits, and relieve his cares. I do not believe, that either now or in former times, the chief managers of that board have made any profit of its

abuse. It is, however, no good reason that an abusive establishment should subsist, because it is of as little private, as of public advantage. But this establishment has the grand radical fault, the original sin, that pervades and perverts all our establishments ;the apparatus is not fitted to the object, nor the workmen to the work. Expenses are incurred on the private opinion of an inferior establishment, without consulting the principal; who can alone determine the proportion which it ought to bear to the other establishments of the state, in the order of their relative importance.

I propose, therefore, along with the rest, to pull down this whole ill-contrived scaffolding, which obstructs, rather than forwards our public works; to take away its treasury; to put the whole into the hands of a real builder, who shall not be a member of parliament; and to oblige him by a previous estimate and final payment, to appear twice at the treasury before the public can be loaded. The king's gardens are to come under a similar regulation.

The mint, though not a department of the household, has the same vices. It is a great expense to the nation, chiefly for the sake of members of parliament. It has its officers of parade and dignity. It has its treasury too. It is a sort of corporate body; and formerly was a body of great importance; as much so on the then scale of things, and the then order of business, as the bank is at this day. It was the great centre of money transactions and remittances for our own, and for other nations; until king Charles the First, among other arbitrary projects, dictated by despotic necessity, made it withhold the money that lay there for remittance. That blow (and happily too) the mint never recovered. Now it is no bank; no remittance-shop. The mint, Sir, is a manufacture, and it is nothing else; and it ought to be undertaken upon the principles of a manufacture; that is, for the best and cheapest execution, by a contract upon proper securities, and under proper regulations.

The artillery is a far greater object; it is a military concern; but having an affinity and kindred in its defects with the establishments I am now speaking of, I think it best to speak of it along with them. It is, I conceive, an establishment not well suited to its martial, though exceedingly well calculated for its parliamentary purposes. Here there is a treasury, as in all the other inferior departments of government. Here the military is subordinate to the civil, and the naval confounded with the land service. The object, indeed, is much the same in both. But when the detail is examined, it will be found that they had better be separated. For a reform of this office, I propose to restore things, to what (all considerations taken