The measures of ministers throughout the session, stigmatised by their new opponents, and failing from want of innate vigour and popular confidence, gave fresh pretexts for tumults and demonstrations of jacobitism. Oaken boughs were publicly displayed on the 29th of May, and white roses worn on the 10th of June, the birthday of the Pretender. Oxford was rampant with disaffection, while Cambridge was busy in getting up addresses of congratulation and allegiance. The two universities, always opposed in politics, never exhibited their antagonism with such outrageous fervour; and the king did not fail in proportion to mark his sense of their contrasted principles. Preferments were showered upon his supporters in the latter, and expulsions and disgrace followed his enemies in the former; and while the loyalty of Cambridge was rewarded by a munificent present of books, the disorders of Oxford were visited with a strong military force.* The collisions and outrages that followed were productive of extended horrors. The cry of "The Church and Sacheverell" was revived; the meeting-houses of the sectaries were attacked, and in many instances demolished; and the confusion which prevailed throughout the country afforded an apology for arming the executive with fresh powers of coercion. The Riot Act was the result; and by this famous bill it was declared to be felony for more than twelve persons to remain assembled more than one hour after it had been publicly read by a magistrate. These circumstances were not lost upon Oxford, who, after pining in the Tower for nearly two years, believed * The following epigram was written on this occasion by Dr. Trapp :"Our royal master saw with heedful eyes The wants of his two universities; Troops he to Oxford sent, as knowing why The learned body wanted loyalty; But books to Cambridge gave, as well discerning How that right loyal body wanted learning." To this piece of wit, sir William Browne is said to have replied in an im promtu to the following effect: "The king to Oxford sent a troop of horse, With equal care to Cambridge books he sent, 1717. TRIAL OF OXFORD. 65 that the time was come when he might venture to throw himself fearlessly upon the humnanity of the legislature. Walpole, his most formidable enemy, was out of office; the whigs were divided amongst themselves; and the government were not in a condition to peril their popularity by any measures of unnecessary severity. He accordingly petitioned the lords to take his case into consideration, giving an outline of the various hinderances and delays that had from time to time prevented par. liament from proceeding with the impeachment, and concluding with an expression of his reliance on their justice, as it could not be "their intention that his confinement should be indefinite." After some discussion, a day was appointed for the trial in Westminster Hall; the earl Cowper, as before, presiding in the capacity of high steward. The case was opened by Mr. Hampden, one of the managers for the commons; and when the articles were read, sir Joseph Jekyll, on the part of the commons, rose to make good the first article of the impeachment; but was interrupted by lord Harcourt, who stated that he had a motion to submit before the proceedings went any farther, whereupon their lordships adjourned to their own house. The substance of lord Harcourt's motion was, that it was needless to go through the whole impeachment; for if the commons could make good the two articles of high treason, the earl of Oxford would forfeit both life and estate, and there would be an end of the matter. This motion was defended on the ground that the investigation of all the articles would prolong the trial to a great length, which would be a hardship on a peer who had already suffered so long an imprisonment. Lord Parker opposed it, because "in all courts of judicature it is the usual and constant method to go through all the evidence before judgment be given upon any part of the accusation; and that, although the house of peers was the supreme court of the kingdom, it had ever a regard to the supreme court of equity, and even to the forms observed in the courts below." The motion, however, was carried by a majority of eighty-eight voices against fifty-six ; and a message was transmitted to the commons announcing the result. The commons refused to proceed in the order prescribed by the lords, and demanded a free conference. The lords refused the conference, proceeded to trial without the commons, and acquitted the prisoner. This indignity was resented by the lower house in an address to the crown, praying that the earl of Oxford should be excepted from the Act of Grace, which was easily granted to save appearances, but no further measures were ever taken against his lordship. The Act of Grace, which passed this session, liberated all the remaining prisoners; after the lords Derwentwater and Kenmure had suffered the extreme penalty of the law, and others had been sent as slaves to the plantations, or had expired in their dungeons, for the very same offences which were thus liberally pardoned in the survivors. But there was this difference in their cases, that those who suffered had been brought to trial while the royal vengeance was hot, while the rest had been allowed to lie in prison until it cooled. Justice had nothing to do with these dispensations of punishment and pardon. It was necessary to make an example, and examples, at all times, are sacrifices to expediency in the forms of law. The Act of Grace, however, unhallowed by a solitary attribute of real magnanimity, enabled the king, in his speech from the throne at the close of the session, to boast of his clemency and indulgence. But the people were still dissatisfied. The session had been unproductive of a single solid benefit to the country; foreign influences prevailed at court, the whigs were divided, disaffection had again made itself manifest, -a plot had been detected, which left its bitterness, like dregs, behind, and it was universally felt that the industry of England was unduly taxed to support the anti-national schemes of the monarch. 1717. THE PRINCE OF WALES. 67 CHAP. IV. 1717-1719. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE KING AND THE PRINCE OF WALES. -THE PRINCE BANISHED FROM THE PALACE. STANDING ARMY REDUCED. WALPOLE IN VAIN ENDEAVOURS TO OBTAIN - DEATH OF CHARLES XII. INTRIGUES OF CARDINAL ALBE- Ir was the peculiar misfortune of this reign to exhibit, in the domestic life of the court, the same wilfulness and injustice by which its public policy, foreign and domestic, was so unhappily distinguished. His majesty regarded the prince of Wales with aversion, partly on account of his attachment to his mother, and partly on account of his English popularity. The accouchement of the princess of Wales, at the palace of St. James's, in the November of this year, afforded the king a fresh opportunity of inflicting an indignity upon his son. The prince, it appeared, was desirous that the duke of York should be one of the godfathers of the infant; but the king overruled his wish, and appointed the duke of Newcastle to officiate at the ceremony. This arbitrary interference in a matter that so nearly concerned his feelings, provoked his royal highness into a sudden expression of resentment against the duke ; and his words being conveyed to the king, his majesty, in a spirit of tyranny better becoming a German than a British sovereign, ordered the prince to keep his own apartments until his further pleasure should be made known. His " further pleasure" banished him from the palace altogether; and his royal highness, accompanied by the princess, took up his residence at the house of the earl of Grantham ; while his children, by the king's order, were kept in St. James's. Shortly afterwards a royal intimation was given to all peers, privy councillors, and their families, that such persons as should think proper to visit the prince and princess of Wales should be prohibited from coming into his majesty's presence, while every individual who held appointments in both households were commanded to relinquish one service or the other.* This species of despotism was new in England abhorrent to the spirit of a free constitution, and admirably adapted, accordingly, to render his majesty more obnoxious than ever to his subjects. Nor did the acts of the administration help to diminish this sentiment. The parliament was opened on the 21st of November, with a speech in which the reduction of the army by one half was exultingly announced, and closed by another speech, in which an addition to the navy was demanded for the preservation of "the peace of Europe." Walpole said that "this pacific address had violently the air of a declaration of war." The session was remarkable for the assertion of popular principles on the part of those who had no power to carry them into practice, and for unpopular measures on the part of those who had. Notwithstanding the reduction that had been effected in the army, a standing force of 16,347 men was forced upon the house of commons. Walpole attempted to reduce the number to * Tindal. |