the war. ought to know, to which alone it peculiarly behoves us that he, the armed man, should be accustomed,-I tell him, "You have distinguished yourself,-all that the noble Lord says of you is true-nay, under the truth-you have crowned yourself with the glories of But chiefly you, the Guards, you have outshone all others, and won for yourselves a deathless fame. Now, then, advance and receive your reward. Partake of the benefits you have secured for your grateful country. None are better than you entitled to share in the blessings, the inestimable blessings of peace-than you whose valour has conquered it for us. Go back then to the rank of citizens, which, for a season, you quitted at the call of your country. Exalt her glory in peace whom you served in war; and enjoy the rich recompense of all your toils in the tranquil retreat from dangers which her gratitude bestows upon you."-I know this to be the language of the Constitution, and time was when none other could be spoken, or would have been understood in this House. I still hope that no one will dare use any other in the country; and least of all can any other be endured as addressed to the soldiery in arms, treating them as if they were the hired partizans of the Prince, a caste set apart for his service, and distinguished from all the rest of their countrymen; not a class of the people devoting themselves for a season to carry arms in defence of the nation, and when their services are wanted no more, retiring naturally to mix with and be lost in the mass of their fellow-citizens. But it has been said that there is injustice and ingratitude in the country turning adrift her defenders as soon as the war is ended, and we are tauntingly asked, "Is this the return you make to the men who have fought your battles? When the peace comes which they have conquered, do you wish to starve them or send them off to sweep the streets?" I wish no such thing; I do not desire that they should go unrequited for their services. But I cannot allow that the only, or the best, or even a lawful mode of recompensing them, is to keep on foot during peace the army which they compose, still less that it is any hardship whatever for a soldier to return into the rank of citizens when the necessity is at end, which alone justified his leaving those ranks. Nor can I believe that it is a rational way of showing our gratitude towards the army, whose only valuable service has been gaining us an honourable peace, to maintain an establishment for their behoof, which must deprive the peace of all its value, and neutralize the very benefits which they have conferred upon us. See, too, the gross inconsistency of this argument with your whole conduct. How do you treat the common sailors who compose our invincible navy? All are at once dismissed. The Victory, which carried Nelson's flag to his invariable and undying triumphs, is actually laid up in ordinary, and her crew disbanded to seek a precarious subsistence where some hard fortune may drive them. Who will have the front to contend that the followers of Nelson are less the glory and the saviours of their country than the soldiers of the Guards? Yet who is there candid enough to say one word in their behalf, when we hear so much of the injustice of disbanding our army after its victories? Who has ever complained of that being done to the seamen, which is said to be impossible in the soldier's case? But where is the difference? Simply this: That the maintenance of the navy in time of peace, never can be dangerous to the liberties of the country, like the keeping up a standing army; and that a naval force gives no gratification to the miserable, paltry love of show which rages in some quarters, and is to be consulted in all the arrangements of our affairs, to the exclusion of every higher and worthier consideration. After the great constitutional question to which I have been directing your attention, you will hardly bear with me while I examine these estimates in any detail. This, however, I must say, that nothing can be more scandalous than the extravagance of maintaining the establishment of the Guards at the expense of troops of the line, which cost the country so much less. Compare the charge of 2,000 Guards with an equal number of the line, and you will find the difference of the two amounts to above £10,000 a-year. It is true that this sum is not very large, and, compared with our whole expenditure, it is as nothing. But in a state burthened like ours, there can be no such thing as a small saving; the people had far rather see millions spent upon necessary objects, than thousands squandered unnecessarily, and upon matters of mere superfluity; nor can anything be more insulting to their feelings, and less bearable by them, than to see us here underrating the importance even of the most inconsiderable sum that can be added to, or taken from the intolerable burthens under which they labour. As for the pretext set up to-night, that the question is concluded by the vote of last Friday, nothing can be more ridiculous. This House can never be so bound. If it could, then may it any hour be made the victim of surprise, and the utmost encouragement is held out to tricks and manœuvres. If you voted too many men before, you can now make that vote harmless and inoperative, by withholding the supplies necessary for keeping those men on foot. As well may it be contended that the House is precluded from throwing out a bill on the third reading, because it affirmed the principle by its vote on the second, and sanctioned the details, by receiving the committee's report. The Estimate before you is £385,000, for the support of 8,100 Guards. Adopt my honourable friend's amendment, and you reduce them to about 4,000, which is still somewhat above their number in the last peace. * Sir, I have done. I have discharged my duty to the *Mr. Calcraft. country-I have accepted the challenge of the Ministers to discuss the question-I have met them fairly, and grappled with the body of their argument. I may very possibly have failed to convince the House that this establishment is enormous and unjustifiable, whether we regard the burthened condition of the country, or the tranquil state of its affairs at home, or the universal repose in which the world is lulled, or the experience of former times, or the mischievous tendency of large standing armies in a constitutional point of view, or the dangerous nature of the arguments urged in their support upon the present occasion. All this I feel very deeply; and I am also very sensible how likely it is that on taking another view you should come to an opposite determination. Be it so I have done my duty-I have entered my protest. It cannot be laid to my charge that a force is to be maintained in profound and general peace, twice as great as was formerly deemed sufficient when all Europe was involved in domestic troubles, and war raged in some parts and was about to spread over the whole. It is not my fault that peace will have returned without its accustomed blessings-that our burthens are to remain undiminished that our liberties are to be menaced by a standing army, without the pretence of necessity in any quarter to justify its continuance. The blame is not mine that a brilliant and costly army of household troops, of unprecedented numbers, is allowed to the Crown, without the shadow of use, unless it be to pamper a vicious appetite for military show, to gratify a passion for parade, childish and contemptible, unless, indeed, that nothing can be an object of contempt which is at once dangerous to the Constitution of the country, and burthensome to the resources of the people. I shall further record my resistance to this system by my vote; and never did I give my voice to any proposition with more hearty satisfaction than I now do to the amendment of my honourable friend. |