so, when I have not allowed the same indulgence to the prosecution. The case has sometimes occurred. There is an instance of it where arms have been called for. It is a part of the offence, that arms shall be denied to a person that is authorised to ask for them, and that authority must be in writing. It has sometimes happened, and in more than one case, that the party did not bring his written warrant, thinking that he might state the contents of it. In a case of that kind, persons, against whom the of fence was made out in all other respects, have been acquitted.

Have you ever had a case before you, where the absence has been for so short a time, that it could not be for a seditious purpose?—I cannot say that I have; but I have had cases very closely bordering upon it: for I have had a case before me, where the person was out, and where the defence made was, that he was out, two or three fields off, looking after some cattle or horses, or after sheep that were straying. I have had a case of that kind sometimes before me. But it is a very short time that is sufficient for insurrectionary purposes; for one of the greatest and most frequent outrages we have, is burning the houses of persons who are not their friends; and a person can very quickly run out of a house with a half-burnt turf in a kettle, run across two or three fields, put it into the thatch, and run back again.

To what circumstance do you attribute the large disproportion between the number of commitments and the number of convictions?— That is, I think, easily answered, from the nature of the clause under which the great majority of all the convictions have been made; that is, the clause which is made for the purpose of keeping persons within their houses at night. The crime there, is being

out of the house at night without a proper occasion; and it is prima facie evidence of that crime, that the man is found out of his house on its being examined at night. It lies then upon the person who will not stay within his house, according to the proclamation calling upon him to stay within his house, to furnish to the Court a proof of innocence. Now, it is impossible, when persons are found out at night, to vest the power of the Court in the person who takes him up; and, therefore, the person who does rashly, when the act requires him to stay within, go out, is brought in for trial, and in many cases he establishes a lawful and proper excuse. I should mention, that in order to obviate the inconvenience arising from the rashness of persons going out at night, in fact without what may be strictly called a proper excuse, it has been found necessary to adopt two measures:-one of them was, to admit a man to bail whenever it appeared to the magistrates that there was reason to expect he would be acquitted; and that was done with more safety afterwards to the public when petty sessions were established, and they were brought before petty sessions. The case was there inquired into, and the circumstances; and the petty sessions sometimes discharged the man altogether when it appeared to be quite a plain case; and, unless there was strong appearance of guilt, they generally admitted him to bail.

Has it not come to your knowledge, that persons of the worst description in the county, of notoriously bad character, have been found out of their dwellings, and therefore violated the law; and upon that ground, and that ground alone, been tried?-Instances of that description have happened, no doubt of it. By the Insurrection Act, persons absent from their houses at an hour prohibit

ed by the Act, are bound to shew that they were absent on their lawful occasions. The great majority of the people who were tried before me, merely upon the charge of being absent from their houses, either shewed the innocent occasion of such absence, or else they shewed it by fair inference, that is, by evidence of good character, which rendered it nearly impossible that they should have been engaged in an insurrectionary pursuit, and, in consequence of such evidence, were acquitted by the magistrates.

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At the moment when sentence of transportation is passed, must not the feeling among the people be, that so severe a punishment ought not to be inflicted for so trivial an offence as absence from a dwelling, perhaps through inadvertence; must not that be extremely injurious to the country? I think it must make a very serious impression upon the country, if the magistrates were to convict persons for mere absence from their houses, occasioned by inadvertence; and if a conviction of that description had taken place, I should certainly have applied to the government of the country for the pardon of the convict.

Did you never hear a burst of peculiar dissatisfaction arise from the crowd, upon sentence being passed on a man who was absent from his home only; it not being proved that he was guilty of any insurrectionary crime? I recollect, on one occasion, upon a trial at Mallow of six or seven prisoners for being absent from their dwelling-houses, situate in a neighbourhood in which some flagrant of fences were committed, that a considerable murmur took place on their conviction; though the absence of the prisoners from their houses was on the same night in which private property had been consumed by fire, and no satisfactory account was given

of such absence. But I do not recollect any other instance of such an effect being produced by a conviction under the Insurrection Act for the offence alluded to.

Do the provisions of the act, which confine persons to their own habitations, press with greater severity upon the industrious and well-disposed, or upon the turbulent part of society? -The peaceable part of society are protected against the turbulent by the operation of the Insurrection Act; but, in order to secure that protection, they must submit to the inconvenience of remaining within their houses within the hours prohibited by the Insurrection Act. And I think it is quite essential to the protection of the peaceable and well-disposed, that the government should be entrusted with the power of putting the Insurrection Act in force, or not, according to the state and exigences of the country.

REPORT OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS ON MARINE INSURANCE.

In a country where commerce, in all its various branches, has been carried to such an unexampled extentwhere we have so much of the produce of our soil, and of our industry, to exchange for that of the rest of the world-and, from our insular situa tion, so much to exchange among ourselves, by the navigation of the seas and where the most perfect and improved mode of this circulation is so much connected, not only with the comforts of individuals, but, through the revenue, with the safety of the state-no subject can be of more real and extensive importance than that which has been referred to your Committee.

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Duly impressed with this opinion, they have collected such evidence as they thought best calculated to inform them of the present state of Marine Insurance in the country, and to guide their judgments as to any measures which it might be expedient to recommend to the House. The minutes of this evidence accompany this Report; and your Committee, in submitting to the House the opinions which, after the most diligent investigation, they have formed, and the resolutions to which these opinions have led them, proceed to consider the subject in the following natural order :

I. The nature of the exclusive privilege conferred upon the Royal Exchange Assurance and the London Assurance Companies, and the manner and extent of its exercise by those Companies.

II. Its effects upon Marine Insurance, and the state of, and means of effecting, Marine Insurance in this country.

III. The importance of a better system to the commerce and revenues of the empire, and to all parties concerned.

I. The Nature of the Exclusive Privilege, and the Manner and Extent of its Exercise.

The act of the 6th George I. c. 18, provides for the incorporation of the Royal Exchange and London Assurance Companies, for the purpose of effecting marine insurances, to the total exclusion of all other corporations or bodies politic, and all societies and partnerships whatsoever; who are "restrained from granting, signing, or underwriting, any policy or policies of insurance, or making any contract for insurance of or upon any ship or ships, goods or merchandises, at sea, or going to sea," sect. 12.

The legislature, however, even of those times, when political economy was imperfectly understood, apparently distrusting the policy of the extraordinary privileges thus granted, provides for their termination at any period within the thirty-one years next ensuing, on giving three years' previous notice, and repayment of the moneys which each of the companies advanced to government; and, after the expiration of the said thirtyone years, a power is reserved to repeal those rights, without any previous notice or any repayment, if they should be judged hurtful or inconvenient to the public; but with this declaration, "That the same corporations, or any corporation or corporations with the like powers, privileges, benefits, and advantages, shall not be grantable again to any persons or corporations whatsoever, but shall remain suppressed for ever, as having been found inconvenient and prejudicial to the public."

The sum which each company engaged to pay government was L.300,000; but they were severally excused the payment of one half thereof by another act of Parliament, (7th Geo. I. c. 27, sect. 26); from which it appears, that each of them had obtained a separate charter for the assurance of houses and goods from fire, but without an exclusive privilege.

Thus neither company paid more than L.150,000 to the public, of which sum L.38,750 was the consideration of their fire assurance charter; so that, in truth, neither paid for their exclusive privilege more than L.111,250.

The exclusive privilege of the two companies rests, therefore, altogether upon the 6th Geo. I. c. 18, which provides for its determination in the manner which has been stated.

It appears indisputable, that the

companies having possessed their exclusive privileges more than twice the period of time for which they paid any valuable consideration, no claim can be set up for their continuation, should the House be of opinion that the existence of such privileges are, according to the words of the act, "hurtful or inconvenient to the public."

From the sequel of this Report it will appear, that this is decidedly the opinion of your Committee; and should the House adopt their recommendation, to repeal the exclusive privilege of the two companies, but to preserve to them unimpaired all their other chartered rights, there is every reason to believe, that this necessary sacrifice for the general good can be attended with little, if any, injury to the companies themselves, as it is not probable that their marine insurance business will be diminished below that very limited extent to which they confine themselves.

It is not necessary for the present purpose of your Committee to animadvert upon the several inconsistencies of the act by which the two companies were incorporated, nor to discuss the question, whether the House should hold itself bound, by the very singular restriction of the rights of future Parliaments, to grant such powers and privileges to any companies hereafter as might be abrogated from those now existing, because your Committee could not recommend to the House to grant the same exclusive privileges to any company.

The motives which induced the legislature to grant these privileges in 1719 are set forth in the preamble of the act; which, among other things, recites, "That it is found by experience, that many particular persons, after they have insured large premiums, or consideration moneys, for or towards the insuring ships, goods,

and merchandise at sea, have be come bankrupts, or otherwise failed in answering or complying with their policies of assurance, whereby they were particularly engaged to make good or contribute towards the losses which merchants or traders have sustained, to the ruin or impoverishment of many merchants and traders, and to the discouragement of adventurers at sea, and to the diminution of the trade, wealth, strength, and public revenues of this kingdom.

"And whereas it is conceived, that if two several and distinct corporations, with a competent joint stock to each of them belonging, and under proper conditions, restrictions, and regulations, were erected and esta blished, for assurance of ships, goods, or merchandises, at sea, or going to sea, exclusive of all or any other corporations or bodies politic already created, or hereafter to be created, and likewise exclusive of such societies or partnerships as now are, or may hereafter be, entered into for that purpose, several merchants or traders, who adventure their estates in such ships, goods, or merchandises, at sea, or going to sea, (especially in remote or hazardous voyages,) would think it much safer for them to depend on the policies or assurances of either of these two corporations, so to be created and established, than on the policies or assurances of private or particular persons."

On inquiring into the manner and extent of the exercise of these rights by the companies, it appears evident that the intentions of the legislature have been wholly disappointed. Whe ther these companies have, as companies are very apt to do, degenerated from their original principles, it is cer tain that at present, instead of reliev ing the merchants, as the act supposes they would, from the insolvency of individual underwriters, the whole of

their transactions are insignificant, when compared to the general insurance business of the country; and that, instead of affording that relief, as the act again supposes they would, " especially in remote and hazardous voyages," it appears that both companies seldom insure risks of this description. The chartered companies do not insure quite four parts out of one hundred of the insurances of Great Britain; so that, for the remaining ninety-six parts, the merchants continue exposed to all the consequences from which the act of Parliament would relieve them.

From the return made to your Com. mittee of the gross amount of value insured on sea risks by the two companies for the last five years, it appears, that the average for those years amounts, for the Royal Exchange As surance Company, to L.3,720,000; and for the London to L.1,452,000.

The amount insured by the London Company would be hardly more than a single mercantile house might require; and both added together would not exceed what two of the most considerable individual underwriters would write in one year.

That the extent of the insurances done by the companies does not amount to four parts in one hundred of the total insurances effected in Great Britain, is apparent from an account which has been laid before your Committee, of the gross amount of the stamp duties paid upon policies of marine insurance for the last nine years. In the year 1800, the gross amount of those duties was L.113,442, 188.; of which L.4,076, 7s. 6d. was paid by the Royal Exchange Assurance Company; L.1,279, 7s. 6d. by the London Assurance Company; and L.9,216, 5s. 8d. by Scotland. In the last year, the gross amount of these stamp duties, for the metropolis and

for Scotland, was L.348,592, 1s. 10 d.; of which L.8,209, 1s. 3d. was paid by the Royal Exchange Assurance Company, L.4,729, 15s. by the London Assurance Company, and L.17,136, 8s. 9d. by Scotland.

It is evident, that the commerce of the country has very much outgrown the capital, and the whole system upon which these companies were originally founded. But, to clear up this part of the subject, it may be proper to submit some estimate of the insured and insurable property at the present time, compared with the period of the establishment of the chartered companies.

From an account laid before your Committee, it appears that the total tonnage of British registered vessels in the year 1778, (being the earliest period at which the same can be made up,) was 1,363,488; but the tonnage of such vessels in the last year amounted to 2,368,468.

The exports and imports in the year ending 1719 amounted only to L.12,202,215; but, in the last year, they amounted to L.80,708,823 of official value, exclusive of the imports from the East Indies and China.

The extent of the trade and commerce of the empire at the present period will further appear, from the number of ships and vessels cleared outwards and inwards for the last three years. The total number was no fewer than 37,607.

The total amount of the sums insured by the Royal Exchange Assurance Company, in the last year mentioned, is L.3,905,755; and the total insurance effected by the London Assurance Company in the last year amounted to L. 2,250,000.

But the total sum insured in Great Britain in the last year amounted to L.162,538,905, as will appear from the following statement: