On the question, was £400 a year a compensation? He had been told that the Grand Junction Canal had to go through lord Essex's Park, and he would be contented with onefourth of the compensation from government that lord Essex received from private individuals. The noble lord over the way (lord Howick) had hinted, that he was unfit to sit on the Committee of Finance, on account of the facts that were stated in the Report. This was certainly premature decision. The Military Commissioners themselves had said that no imputation rested on him. They only said that the Barrack Board had made a negligent bargain for the public; at all events, he would not be a moment longer in possession of this lease, and he intreated of his majesty's ministers to have a fresh jury impannelled. He wished to justify himself, and would answer any questions that should be put to him, either at the Bar of the House, in his place, or in a Court of Justice. As he had spoken from memory, some subordinate points might not be accurately stated, but the substance was correct. He concluded by moving for the production of a Memorial which he had that day given in to the Commissioners of Military Inquiry. for repairs and £400 a year for rent. the 24th of June, 1804, the bargain was made, but the lease was not sighed as general Delancey left the board. The rent was, however, due from that period. As to the letters from one department to another, he had nothing to do with them, and never saw them till they appeared in the report. By the general's residing in it, the government would save money. For their repairs he was not obliged to them, as he wished to have the house pulled down. But he had received no atom of compensation for being turned out of doors. On the 18th of August a jury was impannelled-one would think from the report that it was in 1803; but it was in 1804, which made a very material difference. On that occasion he em ployed the agent that generally acted for the gentlemen in that part of the country. The agent employed counsel; but he had given him no instructions to do so, and knew nothing of it. The jury was one of the most respectable that ever sat, and did not give a rash or hasty verdict, for they were locked up three hours before they agreed upon it. They gave a verdict of £1300 for thirty acres one rood, &c. on which the military works stood. But he would ask, if there was a single word in the verdict that prevented him from living in the house or pulling it down, if he thought proper: and a surveyor had valued the materials of the house at £10,000, which would produce £500 a year. Was there any thing that prevented him from letting the house to the Speaker of the House of Commons, to government, or to any one else? The thirty acres for the military works, had nothing whatever to do with the Barrack Office agreement as to the house and 20 acres. The furniture for such a house was worth a good round sum. This estate was worth above £11,000, and had a suitable house. For this £400 a year was no adequate compensation. He wished that the value of the furniture of the house could be ascertained, or to what sum the fair annual valuation would have amounted; and he also wished to know, what gentleman who heard him, having such a house, so furnished, would have considered £400 a year an equivalent. He appealed to those who had known in for many years, whether, in his conduct, he had evinced any thing which could induce them to believe him capable of a transaction, such as this had been described to be. His estate in Essex had been granted to his ancestors by Henry VIII. He repeated Mr. Sturges Bourne seconded the motion. He rose, he said, in consequence of the calumnies that had been circulated against him, which he regarded less on his own account than on account of his hon. friend, Indeed, they would have been unworthy of notice if they had not been echoed by the noble lord over the way (lord Howick). He seemed to have looked at the newspaper report rather than at the Report of the commissioners. His name had not occurred in the Report, except where it was found at the bottom of one letter on this subject. He had been told that the age of insinuation was past, but if it was so, he was very unfortunate, for no que had met with more insinuations. He hoped the practice of making insinuations on account of private friendships, would be done away. He had no concern with the origin of the business, and yet he was accused of giving 630l. for repairs instead of the estimated 250l. and that because he had not chosen to deny a charge in the newspaper, but had waited for the meeting of that house. The business came to his notice officially in 1905, and the reason was, that by a late regulation no issue could be made for the Barrack-Board above 500l. without a communication to the Treasury; and the application was not mis men in that house, and was sure they had understood, nor passed over without atterrtion, as had been said. The object at that time was not the policy of the agreement, for that had been determined and acted on, and the repairs had been done. The Treasury, therefore, gave its authority, though sensible of the disadvantage of the terms. In every instance of this sort a jury gave a large compensation, and so it ought to do, where the one party had no choice. It fell to his lot as secretary to the treasury, to communicate the determination to the BarrackBoard; but the object was not to execute the lease, for that had been done already. Some of the gentlemen on the other side must know the course of the Treasury. He Mr. Secretary Canning approved in warm was answerable for any mistake in the letter, terms of the candid statement made by his but when he had to sign so many, it was hon. friend. He did think it an ingenunot surprising that a mistake should have ous statement, and he hoped that the genoccurred in one, which it was not thought tlemen who were so ready to charge would required any very minute attention. The prove equally ingenuous in their own defence letter ought not to have alluded to repairs at when called upon under any circumstances all, and the gentlemen must have known that might hereafter arise to vindicate themthat the letter admitted of a different con-selves. He censured the manner in which struction from what they had put upon it. Having stated this, he left it to the house to judge of the fairness of their proceedings. He would ask the noble lord (H. Petty), whether he had found that he had ever been apt to make use of his official situation to serve his friends particularly? The charge against him was false, foul, and scandalous, and he had only to say that he had much rather be the object of it than the author. the calumnies of the daily publications had been sanctioned by the authority of the noble lord (Howick), and contended that such calumnies would have sunk into their merited oblivion, had they not received a sort of stamp and currency from what had recently passed within that house. Lord Howick said, that in the very few words he should feel it necessary to say upon the present subject, he should cautiously Mr. H. Martin considered the bargain as abstain from following the example of the highly advantageous to the hon. baronet, and right hon. secretary, by trying to divert the ruinous to the public, and therefore con- attention of the house from a serious charge tended that the matter should be inquired affecting one of its members, by a vague re into. It appeared to him also objectiona- crimination, equally inapplicable and groundble, that the hon. baronet, it justifying less. He did not blame, he rather approved himself, seemed to impute blame to the of the hon. baronet's refusing to answer the Military Commissioners. He did not mean newspaper attacks that had been made upon to say that the hon. baronet intended to do him; and though the right hon. secretary so; but the consequence that would follow had accused him (lord Howick) of sanctionfrom his statement was, that the commission- ing newspaper calumnies, he had been so ers did not understand the transaction. The much more the object than the procompensation of 1300l. awarded by the jury moter of such attacks, that he did not think for the first year for thirty acres, amounted such insinuation in any respect just towards to the fee simple of the land. The hon. and him. He would not retort the charge upon learned gent. made some further observa- the right hon. secretary, though, at the same tions on the terms of the bargain, and con- time, he could not forget the keen and poigtended that the matter should be enquired nant wit that in other times had distinguishinto. It was desirable, particularly at this ed the papers of the Anti-jacobin. As to the moment, to show that the reports of these other hon. gent. (Mr. S. Bourne) he had commissioners were deserving of credit, never imputed to him any thing more than when they had made so small a progress in the negligence, which might naturally be the subjects they had to investigate. He knew the consequence of a great inultiplicity of busicommissioners to be men of as much hones-ness; but he had satisfaction in saying, that ty, integrity, and principle, as any gentle- so far as that gentleman was concerned, he was totally exculpated. He felt it a painful, the dissolution, should be to take into conduty to state, that he was not satisfied with sideration the Standing Orders. He therethe explanation given by the hon. baronet.fore moved that the Standing Orders relaHe censured any blustering attempt upon tive to Private Bills, should be taken into the part of his majesty's ministers, to influ- consideration on Thursday, on which day he ence that house in its decision on the present intended to move with respect to such bills, case; if the cause of the hon. baronet was four propositions; first, That with respect a bad one, the injudiciousness of the defence to petitions for bills, upon which reports had might tend to aggravate the crime, and if it been made last session, such reports should was a good one, it was certainly most impo- be taken as of this session, without a new litico attempt to controul, when it could reference, provided the renewed petitions so easily convince. This was not a time to were in substance the same as those present> resist inquiry by menacing challenges; the ed last session. Secondly, that instead of a country expected inquiry, and recrimination fortnight being required to elapse previous would prove but a bad method to evade it. to the commitment of a bill of this descripIf there was calumny in this attack upon the tion, a week only should be necessary. hon. baronet, that calumny was to be found Thirdly, that the evidence taken last session in the Fourth Report of the Commissioners in committees on Private Bills, should be of Military Inquiry, and surely no member referred to the committees on the renewed in that house was to be censured for not at bills, with a proviso that such new committee once discrediting and denouncing that Re- should not be concluded by such evidence, port, though not one title had been yet offer- but should be at liberty to call such further ed by the hon. baronet or his friends in deni- evidence as they might deem necessary; and al of its statements. As to what had fallen fourthly, that the Standing Orders in other from him (lord Howick) upon a former respects should be strictly complied with. night, with respect to the reappointment of the hon. baronet on the Finance Committee, he was willing to repeat, that till this transaction was fully explained to the satisfaction of parliament, and the public, he did think it most inadviseable to allow that gentleman's name to appear on the list of a committee appointed for looking with a jealous caution to the expenditure of the public money. He had said that the hon. baronet's explanation had not satisfied him; and why? because that explanation did not in any way go to disprove what had been stated, that the public had paid twice for the same thing. This had not been cleared up, and until it was, he could not, consistently with his duty to that house and the public, totally acquit the hon. baronet. Lord Grenville acquiesced generally in the mode proposed by the noble and learned lord, and thought that whatever difference of opinion there might be with respect to the late dissolution of parliament, there should be a general disposition to give relief to the parties interested in private bills as far as snch relief was consistent with the dignity of the house, and with justice to all parties.-The Standing Orders, together with the propositions of the lord chancellor, were ordered to be taken into consideration on Thursday. [AMERICAN TRADE BILL.] Lord Hawkesbury, in consequence of the wish expressed by a noble lord (Grenville) on the preceding evening, for further information respecting the Order of Council, stated, that the only proceeding had was the usual circular letter from the Treasury to the Officers of Customs and Excise, to conform to the regulations contained in the act. Lord Grenville moved for the production. of this circular letter; and also an account of the rates of duties levied under the act; adding to the latter motion, on the suggestion of lord Hawkesbury, an account of the rates of duties payable by law after the expiration of the act alluded to.-Agreed to. same time in any former war, notwithstanding the diminution that must naturally arise out of the high rates of insurance during a continuance of hostilities. He concluded with moving, That there be laid before the House an Account of British and Foreign Shipping employed in the British trade for the last three years, ending 5th of January, 1807; shewing the number of vessels, tons, and men, entered inwards and cleared outwards, in each year. Mr. Rose said, he had no objection to the motion, but could not see what object it could answer. As to the number of British vessels in the British Trade, it was not possible for the late ministers, during their short stay in office, to have diminished it in any considerable proportion. As to the American Intercourse bill, he had no hesitation in repeating what he had when out of office stated to the house, that he thought it an act big with the worst consequences to our West India trade. A right hon. friend of his had been asked yesterday, whether it was intended to propose the repeal of this act? Did it follow, that because the measure might be objected to on its being proposed, that after its adoption it ought to be repealed? It was a different thing to oppose a law before it was made, and to repeal it when made. While the bill alluded to was pending, he thought it would be highly mischievous; in that opinion he was confirmed. It gave the Ame he had been induced to make such a motion,, as he thought, if it could be complied with, the house would be enabled to judge how far the shipping interest had been affected by the measures of the late administration. He was sure the house would be convinced, as he was, that notwithstanding the contrary as sertions of his majesty's ministers, the British ships had increased 1-6th in the course of the last year, while the foreign vessels had diminished in nearly the same proportion. Of the serious accusations advanced against the late ministers, the chief source (as alledged by those who made them) was the American Intercourse act, which, to use the very words of the right hon. gent.opposite (Mr. Rose)" did for our enemies what they could not do for themselves"; if that was the case, he wondered that ministers had not before now availed themselves of the opportunity their present situations gave them, of repealing an act of such dangerous consequences, and restoring the British navy to its original footing, or as Robespierre was known to have said, "to starve the colonies, rather than give up an iota of their principles." The late ministers had been charged with having made fatal concessions to the neutral flags; he trusted, however, that those who had succeeded them would not, by any rash or precipitate measures, hurry us into those evils such concessions were so well calculated to prevent; he trusted their rashness would not end in a rupture with Ameri-ricans such advantages, that the British ship- ca. In 1801, the Russian Convention was concluded upon, by which Russia gave up the treaty of 1756. Did the right hon. the chancellor of the exchequer intend to carry into office with him those sentiments which in opposition made him despise all commercial advantages however extensive or important, which were to be held through neutral flags? He hoped he did not, and from the silence of the right.hon. gentleman and his colleagues, upon the American Intercourse act, he was in clined to believe that in this respect that right hon. gent. fortunately for the country, had abandoned those principles, which while out of power directed his opposition to this measure. He wished the house to examine attentively these accounts, which he now moved for; they would enable the house to form a just estimate of the accusation which had been thrown upon the late ministry, for neglect of the shipping interest; so far from having suffered from the measures adopted by the late ministers, he would take upon him to assert, that for the last year the number of British ships had increased in a proportion unexampled for the ping were almost driven out of the trade. He had been lately applied to, by an agent of Jamaica, for a convoy to secure the little trade carrying on there in British bottoms, but he thought the advantages on the side of the Americans, as to cheapness of insurance, number of vessels, and shortness of distance, too great for the British vessels to rival them in that trade. He had however, no objection to the motion of the hon. gent. though he felt it difficult to discover what object could be attained by it, and thought it by no means justifiable to throw out any hint or disrespectful insinuations against such a weighty and respectable body as the shipping interest of this country. Lord Howick thought the observations made by the right hon. gent. who had just sat down, the most extraordinary he had ever heard; was it to be believed, that there was a man in that house who could so far have mistaken his hon. friend who had made this motion, as to infer from what had fallen from him in support of it, any thing like contempt towards the shipping interest? His hon. friend, in the speech he had made, Sir C. Price vindicated the shipping inte rest. had evinced a knowledge of the subject alarmingly greater! Why then not substi now before the house, utterly irreconcila- tute for that order of council, which had ble with any sentiment towards the shipping been thought so weak and futile, another interest, but that of respect. At the same of more vigour, and able to effect all that time he professed to entertain the same sen- the present ministers, when in opposition, timents for that body, it certainly did ap-had said that it ought to effect? pear, that they were induced, under the in- | The Chancellor of the Exchequer said, he Hluence of erroneous apprehensions, to pe- rose merely to observe upon the candour tition that house against measures which with which the hon. mover had charged him were not of the nature that respectable body with rashness and precipitancy, in adopting were led to believe; they were not produc- measures which had not yet been adopted. tive of the consequences that certain persons He repeated what he had before said upon were desirous of attributing to them; in the order in council, and thought that if the this respect they were certainly misled by va- decree of the 21st of Nov. had been then rious reports, insidiously set on foot and in- more firmly met by his majesty's then minidustriously propagated, and the house knew sters, such firmness would have been producwell how great bodies might for a time be tive of the best possible results; but it did misled by insinuations disseminated in that not at all follow, though he then conway. But what particularly induced him demned that order, that now, under differnow to trespass on the indulgence of the house ent circumstances, and at such a distance of was, what had fallen from the right hon. time, he should be bound to advise its begent. That right hon. gent, had been bolding entirely abandoned; he should, howenough to declare that he believed the Ame- ever, assent to the motion. rican Intercourse act had been productive of the most injurious consequences to the British trade in the West Indies, and after so stating, the right hon. gent, avowed that he had no intention of moving for the repeal of an act he thought so injurious; but there was even a shorter process-the repeal might not be necessary. If he understood the act, it was this, a bill to empower the king in council to permit an Intercourse, &c. which, therefore, implied the right of withholding that permission; consequently all that ministers had to do, if they really thought this measure attended with such danger, was to suspend the intercourse: but if they should hesitate to do that, he did not know how to reconcile their professions with their practice. The right hon. gent, complained of the evils which have caused the decline of our trade, compared with that of the Americans in that quarter; would the right hon. gent. take upon him to say, that all those evils have sprung up within the last 12 months, or had they not existed for the last 14 years? and if they had been accumulating within that period, was it fair or candid to attribute them to a cause so foreign from them, for the mere pretence of justifying his friends by attempting to criminate their predecessors? All the reasons that existed then, for a more vigorous Order of Council, existed still; the famous decree of the 21st of Nov. was now, as then, in full force against our commerce, and the power of the French government to enforce it, was as strong as Lord H. Petty said, that the hon. baronet must have totally misconceived his hon. friend, if he understood him to have said any thing disrespectful of the shipping interest; as to the petitions that had been, day after day, presented to that house, in the course of the late parliament, he should not say by what misrepresentations that body had been induced to present them, but this he would say, that that body had but partially acted, for certain he was that a great part of the shipping interest had nothing to do in presenting such petitions: but what he rose to notice, was the extraordinary ground taken by the right hon. chancellor of the exchequer; that gentleman would now abstain, forsooth, from more vigorous measures, in order that he might not incur the charges of rashness and precipitancy; and what had been the answer of the same right hon. gent. to the statements of his hon. friend? it was contended, that all the benefits resulting within the last year to the shipping interest, by which the number of British ships in the British trade had been increased in so considerable a proportion, that all those benefits could not within the short space of a year be attributed to the late ministers, because in so short a time they could have done no considerable harm, while it had been at the same time contended, that all the evils alledged to have arisen out of the intercourse act, were to be attributed to the late ministers within the same short year. With what candour |