Charles Garrton - The Gallery - A Sketch of The History of Parliamentary Reporting and Reporters - 1860

THE GALLERY.
A SKETCH OF

THE HISTORY OF PARLIAMENTARY REPORTING AND REPORTERS.

BY

CHARLES J. GRATTON.

The Gallery in whioh the Reportera lit has DOli' become a Fourth Estate of the Realm.-Macarday.

LONDON: PITMAN, PATERNOSTER ROW.

1860.

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Printed by Isaac Pitman, Phonetic Institute, Bath.

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PREFACE.

The following pages have been written partly with the hope that they might induce some one to collect the facts and auecdotes relating to the inhabitants of the Gallery, which, for the most part, at present only live in the recollections of persons now in existence. Although Parliamentary Reporting is comparatively speaking but the creation of yesterday, yet many volumes might be written concerning it, which wonld form a store-house of instruction and amusement for the benefit of this and future generations. Indeed many anecdotes of interest might have been inserted in this book were it not for the reticence demanded by society with regard to living men. Some of the magnates of the Gallery, were they to disclose the secrets of their prison house, could no doubt furnish us with much useful and valuable information. A few scattered notices are to be found in the late Mr Knight Hunt's" Fourth Estate," and Mr Andrew's" History of British Journalism," and the Magazines and Reviews of this and the preceeding centuries; but even in these not a tithe is preserved in black and white. That such is the case is to be deeply regretted.

London, 1860.

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CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

Parliamentary reports a nne qutJ non of modern life, 1-3. Sir Simon D'Ewes the first reporter, 3. Commons' Journal, 3. Rushworth's collection, 3. Parliament favors authorized reports, 3. But not unauthorized ones, 4. First resolution of House of Commons as to reports, 4. Sir E. Dering sent to the Tower for printing his own speeches, 4. Another resolution made, 4. Locke writes an abstract of a bill, 5. Earl of Shaftesbury, 5. Andrew Marvel a model member, 5. Gray's reports, 6. Boyer's" Political State," 6. Sir J. Knight's speech burned by the hangman, 6. Dyer reprimanded, 7. Another resolution, 7. Dyer and Lord Mohun,7. Dyer again iu hot water, 7. Sir Robert Walpole's "History of the last Parliament," 7. Printers of some Exeter Journals before the HOII~e for a breach of privilege, 8. Cave imprisoucd by the House, 9. Another resolution passed, 9.

CHAPTER II.

Cave and the Gentleman's Magazine, 10. Monthly reports introdueed, 10. Reports published duriug sitting of Parliament, 11. Speaker Onslow's opinion concerning reports, 12. Sir Wm. Yonge an enemy to reporters, 12. Sir Robert Walpole on incorrectness of reports, 13. Mr Pulteney, 14. Another resolution, 14. Reporting a lucrative business, 15. Debates in the Senate of" Magna Lilliputia," 15. Debates of the Representatives of Utopia, 16. Jour-oalof ~he proceedings and debates in the Political club, 16. Exclusion of strangers, 16, 17, 18.

CHAPTER III.

Cave's method of obtaining the reports, 19. Guthrie edits Cave's reports, 20. Dr Johnson a report mauufacturer, 20. Extract from Croker's Boswell's Life of Johnson, 20. Sir John Hawkins on Johuson's debates, 21. Mr Murphy's anecdote of Johnson's" confessiou," 21. Smollett deems Johuson's debates authentic, 23. 1I1r Wright, editor of the" Parliamentary History," on tbe authenticity of Jobnson's debates, 23. Arcbbisbop Seeker's MS., 24. Extract from Birch's MSS., 24. Johnson performed his task skilfully, 25. The London Magazine gives early reports, 25. Johnson supposed to have derived assietance from them, 26.


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CHAPTER IV.

Cave and Astle before the House for breach of privilege, 27. Cave explains his manner of taking notes, 27. Cave and Astle reprimanded and discharged, 28. Cave's revival, 28. Another dark era, 28. Honorable Philip Yorke's Parliamentary Journal, 29. Almon a second Cave, 29. Lord Marchmont and his prey, 29. The printer of the" Gnzetcer " in trouble, 29. Members report their own speech. es for the Magazines, 30. Mengreness of first newspaper reports, 30.

CHAPTER V.

Wilkes, 31. "London Evening Post," 82. .. St James' Chronicle," 32. Extract from Annual Register, 32. Colonel Onslow v. the reporters, 33. Thompson and Whehle ordered to attend at the bar, 34. They don't attend, 35. They dodge the Serjeant at ArlOs, ::15. Royal proclamation issued for their apprehension, 35. The two Onslows, 37. Specimen of newspaper language in 1771, 88.

CHAPTER VI.

Colonel Onslow fl. six newspapers, 40. Sir Joseph Mawbey's suggestion, 41. The printers ordered to attend, 41. Alderman Townsend's persuasive, 42. The printers before the House, 42. Wheble arrested but discharged by Wilkes, 43. Thompson arrested but discharged by Alderman Oliver, 44. Miller, one of the six printers, arrested but discharged by the Lord Mayor, 45. M essenger of the House committed for assault, 46. Lord Mayor ordered to attend in his place, 47. Sir Wm. Meredith's speech on the subject, 47. A legal question arises, 47. Edmund Bnrke's opinion on the House of Commons fl. City of London, 48. Colonel Onslow again, 49. Extract from a letter of Lord Chatham, 50.

CHAPTER VII.

The battle renewed, 51. The Lord Mayor attends the Honse, 51.

Wilkes ordered to attend, 62. Lord Mayor's defence, 62. Alder· man Oliver ordered to attend in his" place," 53. Wilkes's letter to the Speaker, 53. An unprecedented act of violence, 54. The Lord Mayor and Alderman Oliver attend in their "places," 66. Wilkes abandoned as " too dangerous to meddle with," 65. A grand debate, 66. Mr Edmund Burke's speech, 56. Mr Wellbore Ellis, 67. A riot outside, 67. The Lord Mavor and Alderman Oliver receive an ovation, 58. The House comes to a decision, 68. Oliver sent to the Tower, 59. Lord Mayor again attends the Hoose, 60. Another riot, 60. Lord Mayor'S defence, 61. He is committed to the Tower, 62. Receives another ovation, 62. Preseot opinion on pro. priety of publishine the parliamentary debates, 62. Macaolay's opinion thereon, 63.


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CHAPTER VIII.

The debates eagerly sought after, 64. Memory reporters, 60.

William Radcliffe, 65. "Memory" Woodfall, 65. Perry, 66. Irish brigade, 67. Anecdote of Supple, 67. Jerdau's account of Proby, 69. Heron, one of the last "memory" reporters, 70. Coleridge in the Gallery, 70.

CHAPTER IX.

Lord Waisingham". Moruing Herald, 72. Brevityofreports, 72.

Hon. Mr Yorke and the press, 73. Sheridan's speech, 73. "The British Forum," 74. Sir F, Burdett's affair with the Honse, 74. Sir Franeis ordered to be committed to the Tower, 74. He evades the Serjeant at Arms, 75; At last is arrested and sent to the Tower' 75. Brings three actions for false imprisonment, 76. Lord Brougham and the Gallery in 1812, 76. Reporters obtain some accommodation in the House, 76. Their refreshment room, 77. Finnerty an offender, 78. The House of Lords and the reporters, 78. J. P. Collier in custody, 79. Reporter's mistakes, 81. Lord Erskine on shorthand writers, 81. Lord Loughborough on the same, 81. House of Lords" tiled" by Lord Mansfield, 82. Colonel Sibthorp and the" Times," 82. Another complaint against the Thnnderer, 82.

CHAPTER X.

Mr Daniel O'Connell and the press, 83. The" Times" sends him to Coventry, 84. Messrs. Lawson, the printer of the "'rimes" ordered to attend at the bar, 85. Sir Robert Peel on the Fourth Estate, 85. Mr Daniel O'Connell clears the Gallery, 86. The Morning Post thereon, 87. Mr Nugent and Mr O'Connell, 88. Anecdote of O'Connell, 90. Anecdote of an Irish member, 91. Parliamentary summaries, 91. Re John O'Connell, 92. He clears the Gallery, 92. The" Times" thereon, 93. Punch's remarks on the

oecasion, 94. •

CHA£TER XI.

In the Gallery, 96. How the" turns" are arranged, 98. ~fodus operandi of reporting, 100. Charles Dickens a quick reporter, 100. Bad writing unpardonable, 100. Modern reports expeditiously made, 101. Quick reports in the" Sun " and" Daily News," 102. Instance of marvellously quick reporting, 102.

CHAPTER XII.

French method of reporting, 104. Reporting in the American Congress, 105. Impossibility of verbatim reports, 105. Punch 011 verbatim reports, 106. They would ruin the newspapers, 107. Speeches intended for the public, not the House, 108. Angus Reach's account of the Gallery, 109.


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CHAPTER XIII.

Reporters improve, 112. The legal profession often in the gallery,

112. Sheridan on the fourth estate, 113. Shiel's tribnte to them,

113. Celebrated men who have been reporters, 113-115. Jerdan on a reporter's life, 1 Hi. James Grant on debating with elosed doors, 116. Daniel O'Connell and official reporters, 117. Sir Robert Peel and Jeremy Bentham thereon, 117. Colonel Thomr,son ou power of members to exclude strangers, 117. The" Times ' on the subject, 118.

CHAPTER XIV.

Qualifications of a good reporter, 119. Shorthand a necessary aecomplishment, 119. Extraet from David Copperfield on learning shorthand, 120. Dr Johnson on sborthand, 123. Why don't we all write it? 123. Its prineiples, 124. Shorthand of great service to parsons, 125. Archbishop Sharp used it, 125. Also Dr Chalmers, 126. Reporters should be well educated, 126. Anecdote of Barnes aud a reporter for the" Times," 127. "Euglish Review" on writing, 127. Phonographic shorthand, 128. How to learn it, 129. A Gallery view of the oratory of Lord Palmerston, 129; of Lord Stanley, Lord Derby, Gladstone, Sir George Grey, Vice-Chancellor Page Wood, Lord John Russell, 130, of Macaulay, 131. Anecdote of Macaulay, 131. Disraeli, and Sir G. Cornewall Lewis from the Gallery, 131. "Saturday Review" 011 the oratory ofthe latter, 181. The consequences of the cheap press, 132. The" Daily Telegraph," 132, the" StandarJ," aud the" Morning Star," 133. "Manchester Examiner and Times," and "Manchester Guardian," 133. Lord Palmerston on modern parliamentary reporting, 133 .. Contrast betweeu past and present opinions on newspaper reporting, 186. Sir E. B. Lytton on the newspapers of to-day, 185.

APPENDIX.

Australian reporting, 136.


CHAPTER 1.

" It 80 faUs ont,

That what we have, we prize not at the worth While we enjoy it; bnt being lack'd and lost, Why, then we rack the valne."

Just suppose such a thing as a sudden stoppage in the snpply of parliamentary intelligence. What a dire calamity it would be for the public in general, and Cor the newspapers in particular I the tit. bits of their contents would be gone, a gloom would be thrown over the remaining columns, and a darkness like the darkness of Egypt would be on the face of all. Editors would be sorely puzzled for the where· wit bal to fill up the vacant space, though we hope they would not be 80 badly fixed as the editor of a Leicester journal was in former times; for that gentleman was so desperately hard-pushed for matter, that he began to favor his readers with a verbatim copy of the Bible, and had actually proceeded as far as the book of Exodus, when matters temporal came timely to his assistance. What could we do unless we could read in a morning the proceedings of last night's sitting P If you take away our parliamentary food you take away the means

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whereby we live. We verily believe, if we had it not, the beautiful rasher would go away untonched from our breakfast table, the egg unchipped, the pure uncolored tea unsipped.

" Bullen we ponder o' er a dull rep .. t,

Nor f ..... t the body while the mind mnst foot."

We should come down in a morning complaining of indigestion and the" blues," and vent our anger on the Lares and Penates of our establishment; our country cousins would be no better off than ourselves; my lord at his" place," and the squire at "The Hall," would growl and grumble to their hearts' content, if their usual pabulum of parliamentary intelligence were not to be had when wanted: they would truly be in a pitiable state of temper.

" No welcome post appears, But the dull morn a sullen aspect wears.

We meet, but ah I without our wonted emile, To talk of head-aches and complain of bile."

Soon after the eommeucement of the reign of George the Third the House of Commons was in a eontiuual warfare with the newspapers. From the bare statement of such a fact oue might be led to imagine that the newspapers had been trying to bribe the members, or annihilate the whole lot of them, upset the constitution, the kiug and the court, or introduce the Pope as sovereign pontiff, or at the very least that they had been advocating the cause of the Pretender; but it was not about a matter of such vital importance 88 any of these. The House objected to the public knowing anything of what they said or did. Until newspapers began to give a little information on the subject, constituents knew as much about the proceediugs of their members, as we know at the preseot day of what took place at the last Cabiuet Council. The House was "tiled" as close as any freemason's lodge. It was considered a most monstrons breach of privilege for anyone to take notice of its proceedings; our legislators did not like


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to see their speeches in print, and the public did; and consequently there was a continual skirmishing between the two for many years. Until about the close of the last century the reports of parliamentary proceedings were so meagre and general, that they hardly deserved the name. There are certainly some few bright exceptions which tend in a considerable measure to impress ns with a more lively sense of our loss.

The earliest reports we have are those taken by Sir Simon D'Ewes, who, with the aid of shorthand, took notes of the debates in Queen Elizabeth's reign. Most of these were afterwards transcribed into longhand, and furnish ns with some rather curious specimens of par. liamentary oratory at that time. They are now in the British Museum.

The first volume of the Commons' Journal gives us reports of some of the debates from the accession of James the First to the cessstion of parliament under Charles the First. The publication in] 766 of a memo ber's notes also furnishes us with authentic debates of the session in 1621. Rushworth in his voluminous collections gives us many of the debates during the civil wars; after him Gray supplies us with a more regular series of reports. In the year 1641 Parliament did not content itself with abolishing the Star Chamber, but also brought the judicial conduct of that court before the people for their scrutiny, by allowing the publication of its proceedings. These parliamentary reports were first issued in a paper called "The Diurnal of Occurrences or Daily Proceedings of Both Houses in this Great aud Happy Parliament, from 3 November 1640 to 3 November 1641. London; Printed for William Cooke, and are to be sold at his shop at Furnivale's lnne Gate in Holbourn, 1641." These diuruals soon began to come out weekly, and it most be remarked that they were published by authority, and consequently under different circumstances from the reports of the present day, lind that they consisted priu-

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cipally of weekly reports of the votes or of intelligence commnnicated to Parliament.

In 1641 was also published " The Passages in Parliament from the 3rd January to the 10th; more fully and exactly than the ordinary one hath been, as yon will find npon comparing, and although the week past doth yield many remarkable passages, yet yon will expect no more expression either 1I0W or hereafter in the Title than the Passages in Parliament, etc. London; printed {or Nath. Bntter, St Austin's Gate, in Paul's churchyard, at the sign of tbe Pyde Bull, 1641."

The pnblication, however, of the proceedings in nnanthorized pnblications did not meet with the approval of Parliament, but was regarded by them as a most dangerous and impudent breach of privilege and full of danger to the constitntion. On 13th July, 1641, we have the first resolution of the House of Commons on this subject. It arose more immediately out of a. speech of Lord Digby's having been pnblished withont the authority of the House. It was ordered, "That no member shall either give a copy of or publish in print anything that he shall speak here without the leave of the Honse;" and about ten days afterwards a second resolution was passed, "That all members of the Honse are enjoined to deliver out no copy or notes of anything that is brought into the Honse or propounded or agitated in the House."

This resolution was soon broken, for we find that on 2nd February, 1642, the Commons resolved, "That a book by Sir Edward Dering, • A collection of Speeches, etc,' is against the honor and privilege of this Honse, scandalous to the House, shall he burnt by the common hangman, himself he disabled from sitting, and a new writ issue." By a vote of 85 against 61, sentence was pronounced against him by the Speaker, and he was committed to the Tower.

011 2211d March,1642,it was resolved, "That what person soever shall

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print or sell any account or passage of this Honse, under the name of diurnal or otherwise, without the particular license of this honse, shall be reputed a high contemner and a breaker of tbe privilege of Parliament, and so punished accordingly." The spirit of this resolution, passed in the Long Parliament, was npbeld in all the irregular Parliaments of the Protectorate, whicb always contained a large nnmber of members as jealous of Cromwell, and afterwards of his son, as the Long Parliament had been of Charles the 1st. Mr Borton mentions, ill his Diary, an attempt made on one occasion by a republican member named Lnke Robinson to stop the taking of notes; and after the Restoration tbere is an early instance of two persons being punished for printing some of tbe proceedings of the Honse. But the King and Parliament were now entirely in accord, and the spirit of this proceeding was no longer that which had directed the resolution of the Long Parliament.

Locke wrote an abstract in 1675 of the Bill to prevent the dangers which may arise from persons disaffected with the Government, at the suggestion of, and on information supplied by, the Earl of Shaftcsbury. It was published in the form of " A letter from a person of quality to his friend in the country," and was widely circulated, to the vexation of the Privy Council, which evinced its wrath by ordering it to be burned by the common hangman. The Earl of Shaftesbury himself snbseqnently wrote what may he called notices of parliamentary proceedings; one of these, for instance, was issued under the title of " A letter from a parliament man to his friend concerning the proceedings in the House of Commons this last Session, begun ]3 October, 1676." Andrew Marvel was one of those who described the daily proceedings of Parliament when Government would 110t permit newspaper reports. During the 18 years between 1660 and 1678 that patriotic member regularly transmitted to his constituents at


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Hull 8 faitbful account of each day's proceedings. The Honorable Aochitell Gray, who for thirty years was the representative for Derby, also contributed to the" stock of parliamentary information by a number of reports made between 1688 and 1694, and his record of what was done in Parliament during those years now forms a most important addition for judging the history of that period.

The Revolution was not immediately followed by a liberal diffusion of parliamentary intelligence; for the newspapers of William's reign only gave occasionally a detached speech. The Sovereign scarcely allowed liberty of speech to the members of Parliament themselves, and was fully as tyrannical in his disposition as his predecessor on the throne. The stormy period that ensued on William's death is partially illustrated by Boyer's" Political State."

It was not however nntil the middle of the reign of William and Mary that a series of systematic attempts was commenced in order that those resolutions which were originally passed to protect the House of Commons against the crown in the performance of its duty to the people, might be employed to screen that very House from public scrutiny.

In 1694 Sir John Knight's speech in Parliament against the Bill for naturalizing protestant foreigners having been priuted and circulated by the Tory party, it was resolved that the speech contained false, scandalous and seditious expressions and retlections, and the Honse ordered it to be burned by tbe hangman. The Seljeant-at-Arms attended in Palace Yard to see this order executed. Towards the end of the same year (21st December, ] 694) a complaint was made to the House that a newswriter named Dyer had presnmed to take notice of its proceedings in one of his publieations, An order was issued that this offender against the privileges of Parliament should be summoned by the Serjeant-at-Arms to attend at the next sitting of the Honse.


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This command Dyer obeyed, and on his knees acknowledged his offence; wherenpon he WBB ordered to the bar, where the Speaker reprimanded him for his " great presnmption." On the following day the Honse passed a resolution, "That no news-writers do, in their letters or other papers that they disperse, presnme to meddle with the debates or any other proeeedings of this Honse." This was renewed in] 695, 1697, and 1703, and with a slight alteration in 1722.

" One Dyer," says Kennet, "was justly reprimanded by the Speaker for presnming to represent the proeeedings of the Honse. But such a gentle rebuke conld not reform a fellow who wrote for two very neeessitous causes, for the Jacobite party and for bread. But the Lord Mohnn rebuked him more effectually some time after; for finding him at one of his factious coffee-houses, sud showing him a letter, wherein his lordship was aamed, Dyer owned it, not knowing my Lord, who immediately laid on him with a cudgel he had provided for that purpose, and made him swear to have no more to 8IIy of the Lord Mohnn."

On 28th February, 1702, Dyer again got into hot water, and was for a second time peremptorily ordered to attend at the bar of the House for" misrepresenting its proceedings" on a certain occasion. Next day, on his not attending, the Attorney General was ordered to find him out and prosecnte him.

In 1711 the Earl of Nottingham complained in the House of Lords of a speech printed and published contrary to the standing order of the Honse. This speech was written by Swift, and the unfortunate printer who put it into type was taken into custody and kept prisoner for some time.

In 1713 Sir Robert Walpole published II pamphlet called a " Short History of the last Parliament," with a dedication written by his then friend, Mr Pulteney. Many years afterward he defended his


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right to publish it on the ground that the House of Commons whose debates he had reported was one of the worst this nation ever saw, that they had a desire to introdnce the Pretender, that they had ap· proved of a scandalous peace after the most glorious war ever carried on, and that the Parliament which had been descrihed in that History had been dissolved before the History itself was published. He stated also that he was so apprehensive of the consequenee of printing it, that the press was carried to his house.and the copies printed off there.

In 1718 the printers of two Exeter journals got into trouble for printing and misrepresenting speeches. One of them attended aecording to order, and was forthwith put into" quod" by the Serjeant •

• at·Arms. He said he had copied the report as it had appeared in his paper from two written news-letters, which were circulated among the coffee-houses of the city: these letters he produced. The other printer did not think proper to enter an appearance pursuant to order, and was accordingly ordered into custody for contempt. The messenger could not find him. The printer kept out of his way, but seeing his arrest was certain, and a mere matter of time, he addressed a letter to the Speaker, acknowledging his offence, begging pardon of the House, and promising not to offend in like manner again, "and as upon his knees at the bar of the House, humbly prayed the House wonld not proceed any further against him, which if they did it wonld end in the ruin of himself and his children, he being wholly void of friends or money, and iu no condition to make satisfaction for any part of his fees." This letter took well with the House, and its lucky writer remained unmolested. In the following year another newspaper printer of Exeter was " hawked up " before the Honse for misrepresentation of the proceedings, and summarily ordered into custody. In March, 1727, Edward Cave, a gentleman of whom we shall have to speak more at length hereafter, was imprisoued for writing news-


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• letters containing an account of the proceedings of the House of Commons.

On the 28th Feb., 1728, a resolution of a more stringent character was passed by the House of Commons, "That it is an indignity to, and a breach of the privilege of, this Honse, for any person to presume to give, in written or printed newspapers, any account or minute of the debates or other proceedings. That upon discovery of the authors, printers, or publishers of any such newspaper, this House will proceed against the offenders with the utmost severity."


CHAPTER II.

"Onolow! the Muse, ambitious or thy name To grace, inaplre, and dignity her Bong, Would from the Public Voice thy gentle ear A while engage."

-TAofltp.on', SelDom.

Cave, the fonnder and proprietor of the Gentleman's Magazine, had for some time been in the habit of sending to his friends in different parts of the conntry written memoranda of debates, which in those days circnlated through the coffee-houses and taverns, as also iu private society. A great deal of interest was excited by these meagre reports, and no doubt this suggested to Cave, who was a man of great industry and enterprise, the value that might be attached in many respects to printed and more accurate reports. The Gentleman's Magazine for April, 1734, gave a short view of the principal transactions in the preceding Session of Parliament. It gave merely the heads of the bills, and the reasons for which some of them had been passed or opposed; but in the next number (for May), the principal speeches were given, though the names of the speakers were not put down at length. They appeared in this fashion,-" The speech of Sir J-n A-gn, Bart, one of the Knights of the Shire, for the county of C-nwall."

A monthly pnblication of the parliamentary proceedings was soon afterwards attempted; the first instance of which is to be fonnd in an extraordinary nnmber of the Gentleman's Magazine for Augnst 1735, which consists of a not very elaborate report of a debate, that had


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taken place in the Honse ~f Lords on the 23rd January of the same year. The Gentleman's Magazine had only recently come into existence, and the publication of the debates was found to add so much to its circulation, that the practice of giving a report of the proceedings of both HoUBe8 was continued with great BUCOOBB. It seemed to have been the prevailing idea at that time that it was perfectly lawful, and no breach of parliamentary privilege, to publish the debates after the expiration of the session in which they had taken place. The Gentleman's Magazine had the good sense to keep within the proper bounds for a short time. Although the reports were published after the session they were exceedingly tame and general. The names of the di1l'erent speakers were never put at full length ; they were curtailed and disguised in someway or other. Sir Robert Walpole would often be described BBSir R-tW-Ip-e, MrWyndham as MrW-nd-m, and in some instances the name of the speaker was entirely suppressed, This mode of publication, having escaped the avenging hand of the HoUBe8 of Parliament, made the publisher bolder, and by.degrees the speakers' names were inserted in the Magazine at full length, a proceeding about as hazardous at that time as that of walking into a lion's den. To put the coping-stone to their impudence some of the debates were published during the sitting of Parliament I - The London Magazine followed Cave's example and gave similar reports.

Such a piece of andacity soon attracted the attention of the House of Commons, and a rod was in pickle for these priuters and publishers,-" these unprincipled men,-thesc scoundre1s." The reports did not suit the House. Sometimes, perhaps, they were inaccurate; and sometimes, although in every respect faithful. they were not very aatisfactory to the members and their constituents, who thought tbat there were many cases in "hich it was as well the truth should not be published.


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On the ] 3th of A pril, 1738, Mr Speaker Onslow took the matter in hand. He went down to the House of Commons in a rage, and informed its members that it was with some concern he saw a practice prevailing, which a little reflected on tbe dignity of that Honse. What he meant, he said, was the inserting an account of their deliberations in the newspapers, by which means the proceedings of the House were liable to very great misrepresentation. That he had in his hands a printed newspaper, which contained his Majesty's answer to their last address before the same had been reported from the Chair, the only way of communicating it to the public. That he had thought it his duty to inform the House of these practices, the rather because he had observed them of late to have ron into very great abuses, and therefore he hoped that gentlemen would propose a method of stopping them. We shall make some qnotatious from the report of the debate which ensued npon this announcement from the Chair, as it is full of interest, and shows the opinion of the Honse at that time on the propriety of reporting the proceedings of Parliament.

Sir Wm. Yonge said," Sir, I am very glad you have mentioned this affair; I have looked upon it as a practice very inconsistent with the forms and dignity which this House ought always to support; but since you have been pleased to mention this from the Chair, I must beg leave to carry my ohservations a little further. I have observed, Sir, that an account, not ouly of what yon do, but of what you say, is regularly printed and circulated throughout all parts both of the town and country. At the same time, Sir, there are very often gross misrepresentations both of the sense and the langnage; this is very liable to give the public false impressions both of gentlemen's conduct and abilities. Therefore, Sir, in my opinion, it is high time to put a stop to it; not that I should be, Sir, for attacking the liberty of the


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press,-that is a point on which I would be as tender as any gentleman in this house."

"Perhaps some gentlemen may think it indeed a hardship not to be able to find their names in print at the head of a great many fine things in the Monthly Magazines, but this, Sir, 68n never prevent gentlemen from sending their speeches if they please; it only prevents other people from being misrepresented as to what they say, which I am sure is what every gentleman in this House will wish for; therefore I hope gentlemen will consider of some method of pntting a stop to abuses more effectual than we have fallen upon yet. There is indeed a resolution in our Jonrnals against printing or publishing any of the proceedings of this House but by the authority of the Chair; but people have run away with the notion, this prohibition is in force only during the time we are sitting, and that as soon 88 the session ends they are at liberty to print and publish what they please. Therefore I hope gentlemen will come to 8 resolution for explaining that matter; and if they do, I am very sure that, if it is broken through, I myself will move the House at the very first opportunity next session. But the printers of the papers, Sir, which you have in your hands, cannot even plead the excuse of the recess of Parliament, and therefore deserve to be punished, and if you do not either punish them or take some effectual metbod of checking them, you may soon expect to sec your votes, your proceedings and your speeches, printed and hawked about the streets while we lire sitting in this House."

Sir Robert Walpole, in the course of a speech during this debate, said, " I have read some of the debates in this House, in which I have been made to speak the reverse of what I meant. I have read others of them, wherein all the wit, and learning, and argument had been thrown into one side, and on the other nothing but what was low, mean, and ridiculous; and yet when it comes to the question, the

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division has gone against the side which upon the face of the debate had reason and justice to support it. So that, Sir, had I been a stranger to the proceedings of this House, and the nature of the arguments themselves, I must have thought this to have been one of the most contemptible assemblies on the face of the earth. What notion then, Sir, can the pnblic, who have no other means of being informed of the debates of this House than what they have from these papers, entertain of the wisdom and abilities of gentlemen who are represented therein to carry almost every point against the strongest and plaines, arguments and appearances P "

The chief ground of objection agaiust the publication of speeches was that they were nearly always inaccurately reported. One of the members, however, Mr Pulteney, went so far as to deny the right of the public to know auything at all of what passed in the House, and declared that to print and publish the speeches of gentlemen of the House, even though they were not misrepresented, looked very like making them accountable without doors for what they said within I There can be no doubt that there was great inaccuracy in the reports, and some misrepresentations often wilfully made for party purposes. When some one, a few years before the above debate took place, proposed some method of preventing the publication of the debates in the newspapers, a member said, "Let them alone; they make better speeches for us than we can make for ourselves."

The result of the above debate was the following resolution :-

" That it is a high indignity to, and a notorious breach of the privilege of this House, for any news-writers in letters or other papers (as minutes, or under any other denomination,) or for any printer or publisher of any newspaper of any denomination, to presume to insert in the said letters and newspapers, or to give auy acconntofthe debates or other proceedings of this House, or any Committee thereof, as well


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duriug the recess as the sitting of Parliament, and that this House will proceed with the utmost severity against such offenders."

To the people of this age, who enjoy the freedom ofthe press to its fullest extent, it certainly seems very extraordinary that this resolution should have passed without a single member standing lip against it. It was totally futile as regards stopping the pnblication of the debates. It still further excited the public curiosity, and the reporting of the debates was too lucrative a practice to be given up. The Gentleman's Magazine, and one or two others, had obtained a largely increased circulation solely on account of the iusertion of parliameutary proceed. ings. IndeedrCave was so much benefited by it in a pecuniary sense, that he set up a carriage, BOd had on the door for his crest a sketch of St John's Gate, in Clerkenwell, the place where he published his Magazine.

Bnt what was to be done P They conld not openly disobey the order of the Honse. So the object of the publishers of the Magazines was accomplished by the use of a little stratagem. The debates were henceforth given under fictitious names. Cave opened his Magazine in Jnne, 1738, with an article eutitled "The Debates in the Senate of 'Magua Lilliputia,''' in which he artfully deplored the prohibition which forbade him to present his readers with the consultations of their owu representatives, and expressed a hope that they would accept 88 a substitute those of that country which Captain Lemuel Gulliver had then so lately rendered illustrious, and which untimely death had prevented that illustrious traveller from publishing himself. The Dukes were styled" Nardacs," the Lords" Hurgoes," the Commons" Clinabs,' BOd the letters in their respective names were transposed or slightly disarranged. Thus the Duke of Bedford ap. peared under the transparent disguise of "The Nardac Befdort," Lord Talbot "The Hurgos Toblat," Walpole "Sir Rubs Waleup,"


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Lyttleton " Lettyltno," Bathurst "Brustath," Fox" Feauks," Wynn " Ooyn." Under this fictitm he eontlnned to publish the debates of the British Parliament. The above terms Cave explained to his readers by annexing to his volume for 1738 feigned proposals for printing a work called "Anagrammata Rediviva." The St James's Chronicle published" The Debates of the Representatives of Utopia," and the London Magazine favored the public with a " J onrnal of the proceedings and debates in the Political Club," and gave Roman names to the speakers. So it was not an uncommon thing to read an elaborate account of the speech which Octavins Angustus delivered on such a day on the increase of the income-tax question, or be informed how Julius Cresar bored the House with a three hours' speech on Church Rates. Even with this mode of publication Cave thongbt he was running so great a risk of incurring the displeasure of the House, that he dared not put his own name in the work, but pnt that of his nepbew E. Cave Junior instead. It should also be remarked, that Cave had before that time on two or three occasions received a gent le intimation that he had sorely displeased tbe Speaker by his publication; so he was naturally fearful of the consequences of another and a more serious cause of annoyance to the House.

Now it may be fairly asked why the House did not prevent this publication of their proceedings by the exercise of their standing order for the exclusion of strangers. We suppose the Members thought such a proceeding unconstitntional and unparliamentary, but as strangers wcre afterwards often excluded from the House to prevent the public knowing anything of the debates, we will just give a few words on the subject. The first order for their erclnsion was passed in tbe year 1662, and had no other object than to prevent strangers from going into the body of the House, and mixing with the members and obstructing business. It was simply an order to shut the back door


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of the Speaker's Chamber, when the House began to sit. Long after the Speaker's Chamber was done away with, this order was sessionally renewed; in faet it was not until the year 1833 that it was dropped, from being considered anomalous, and from a general conviction of its absurdity.

An order for the exclusion of strangers very similar to the one now made, was first passed on the 31st October, 1705. At the commencement of tbe reign of George the Third, when the Tories were in power, this order was first used for a purpose very different from that for which it was intended. The Tories did not like the people to know anything of tbeir proceedings in Parliament; so night after night the Gallery was closed against strangers-fruitlessly indeed, for the members themselves sent reports to the magazines and newspapers. We find in tile Commons' Journals that in 1768 it was ordered that the Sergeant-et-arms shonld take into custody any strangers that ventured into the House whilst it was sitting, Lord Barrington declaring that it had always been his opinion that strangers should not on any occasion be allowed to hear the debates. Want of room in the House was generally the alleged reasou for thus exclnding the public, as we may judge from the report of a debate whicb took place on the 7th February, 1771. A CIIIl of the House had then recently been made, and, as is the ease at the present day, it was very crowded. Sir John Turner, who was a Lord of the Treasury under Lord North, moved the enforcement of the standing order for the exclusion of strangers, alleging that on account of the recent call of the House, he presumed the members were still in towu, and that cousequently the House would be crowded. The continual misrepresentation of the speeches was, however, the real grouud of this movement. They thought that such gross caricatures could come only from strangers, but if they were kept out of the gallery it wonld lead to a still greater

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mierepreseataticn, It would have been better to have kept the gallery open, because, if they were not permitted freely to report the speeches, they woold immediately set about inventing them, and of two evils the lesaer should be choaen. As a specimen of newspaper reporting of that day, we will give an account of what took place during the debate of the 7th February, copied from one of the newspapers.

" On Thursday, before Sir G. S. moved in a certain club on an eleetion matter, Sir J. F., one of Lord B's lords of tbe Treasury, got up, and proposed that, as there had been so lately a call oC the club, and tbey were likely to be crowded, the room should be cleared. The standing vote of the room was accordingly read, and the Serjeant-at Arms bad autbority to seize all strangers, and not to dismiss them without the leave of the club. Before the gallery was quite vacated, some Irish members of a club on the other side of the water were'lexcepted, but very few remained behind; though the Hon, T. T., like a true Euglishman, beckoned them to resume their seats. The S. and the door-keepers were afterwards obliged to go several times, and drag out a fcw persons who were unwilling to leave the gallery. After the room was cleared Sir Joseph M. begged Sir J. T., if he was too hot, to pull off his great coat. SirJ. answered that be felt no inconvemence from it, but when he did he would take his advice. George 0., wbo showed himself such a dear old friend to Mr Wilkes, got up, and discovered the same friendship for the press. He said, that as long as the newspapers published the debates he would always move the club to take this step,-tbat none but the club had a right to print them, and that this would show whether any flentlemen of the club were concerned in writing them. Several members got up aud said, they were astonisbed to hear him support this motion-that the writer, whoever he was, h~d greatly improved Ai, speeches and made them aenae and grammar."

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CHAPTER III.

" 0 what 1& goodly outside falsehood hath! "-8ha1up .....

The way in which Cave obtained his reports shows the industry of the man. He held the situation of inspector of franks in the Postoffice, which of conrse brought him into contact with the officers of both Houses of Parliament. It was also the means of enabling him to converse with and have frequent access to the members. Availing himaelf of these advantages he generally went down to the House when anything of importance was expected to come on, and took a friend with him for whom he also gained admission. These two would march np into the gallery of the Honae of Commons, or to some dark and out-of-the-way place in the Honae of Lords, and there they would remain for hours, taking stealthily, unknown to. the Sergeant-at-arms or the Usher of the Black Rod, or any of their aateIlites, notes of the aeveral speeches, snfficient to form the gronndwork of a more extended report at some future day. After the adjournment of thc House, where they had perhaps been sitting for nine or ten hours in succession, Cave and his friend wonld adjourn til some coffee-house or tavern in the neighbourhood of Palace Yard, and compare and adjust the memoranda they had made of the speeches they had so recently heard, the very sounds of which were still ringing in their ears. Cave had sufficient ability to see his own want of talent to edit the debates published in his magazine. That post,he thooght,shoold be entrusted to a man more learned than himself. He cliose for this task a man" bo

2*


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turned out to be by no means an incompetentone, William Guthrie, author of the continuation of Smollett's History of England, and who was at that true. occasionally employed in other matters by Cave, who it must be remembered, was a bookseller at St John's Gate, Clerkenwell. Sometimes Guthrie himself attended the Houses of Parliament, and wrote ont his report from memory and with the slight assistance, occasionally, of Cave's notes.

The animated attempt made to remove Sir Robert Walpole from office seemed in Cave's opinion to require a still more able reporter than Guthrie, andhehnd the particular good fortnne to select Dr. Johnson for the purpose. It is undoubtedly through Johnson's connection with the Gentleman's Magazine that Cave's name has been immortalized.

The Doctor was at that time a young man of 32, and, compara. tively speaking, very inexperienced in everything relating to political affairs. From the 19th November, 1740, to the 23rd February, 1743, the debates of both Houses were" compiled" by Dr Johnson from such slender materials that great doubts of their authenticity have been entertained and still exist.(l)

It appears from the evidence of Boswell that on the appointment of Dr Johnson as editor of the Debates, the services of Gnthrie were not

1. "Boswell must mean the 'O~ and • .rclrui •• composition at this date; because we have aeen he had been employed on these debates as early 88 1738. I, however, see abundant reason to believe that he wrote them from the time (Jnne 1738) that they 888umed the LiUipunan title; and even the introduction to this new form is evidently his ; and when Mr Boswell limita Johnson's share to the 23rd of February, 1743, he refe rs to the date of the debate itself, and not to that of tbe r.port, for the debates on the Gin Act (certainly reported by Johnson,) ... bicb took place in February 1743, were . not concluded in tbe Magazine till 1744 ; 80 that instead of two years and

nine months, according to Air Boswell's reckoning, we have, I think, John ... son's own evidence that he W88 employed in this way for nearly six ye ...... , from 1738 to 1744."-Croker.


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dispensed with, and it was not nntil that gentleman had obtained a greater variety and a better paying kind of employment that he severed his connection with the great debate manufactnrer. On the appointment of Johnson, however, Guthrie only played second-fiddle. He still continned to attend the debates of the Houses of Parliament; and took notes which were afterwards sent to the Doctor, by whom they were revised and rendered more elaborate in diction. When Guthrie gave np his post, it was resolved by Cave that Johnson should report the debates with such slight assistance as might be rendered by the notes of a few persons whom Cave employed to attend the debates for that purpose.

It is asserted by one of Johnson's biographers, Sir John Hawkins, that all the reports in the Gentleman's Magazine from 1740 to 1743 were without exception the fruit of Johnson's imagination and genius, and wholly fictitious, and that Johnson disapproved the deceit he was

• compelled to practise , . his notions of morality were so strict, that he wonld scarcely allow the violation oftrnth in the most trivial instances, and saw in falsehood of all kinds a turpitude that he could never be thoroughly reconciled to; and though the fraud was perhaps not greater than the fictitious relation in Sir Thomas More's Utopia, Lord Bacon's Nova Atlantis, and Bishop Hall's Mundus Alter et Idem, Johnson was not very easy until he had disclosed the deception. On his death-bed he professed that the recollection of having becn engaged in an imposition was painful to him, bnt that at the time be wrote the debates he did not think he was imposing upon the world. One confession was made at a dinner-party, at which a lot of celebrities were present. Mr Murphy is responsible for the truth of the following anecdote, so we give his own words. "Dr Johnson, Mr Wedderborn, (afterwards Lord Longhborough,) Dr Francis, the translator of Horace, Mr Murphy, Mr Chetwyn, and several other gentlemen,


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dined with Foote. After dinner an important debate towards the end of Sir Robert Walpole's administration being mentioned, Dr Francis observed that Mr Pitt's speech on that oecasion was the best he had ever read. He had been employed, he added, dnring several years, in the study of Demoethenes, and had finished a translation of that celebrated orator, with all the decorations of style and language within his capacity. Many of the company remembered the debate, and mauy passages were cited from the speech with the approbatiou and applause of all present. During the ardor of the conversation Johnson remained silent. When the warmth of praise snbsided he opened with these words, .. That speech I wrote in a garret in Exeter Street." The company was struck with astonishment. After staring at each other for some time in silent amaze, Dr }'rancis asked him how that speech could be writ.ten by him ... Sir," said Johnson, "Iwrote it in Exeter street. I never was in the gallery of the Honse of Commons but once. Cave had an interest with the doorkeepers. He and the persons nnder him got admittance. They bronght away the subject of discussion, the names of the speakers, the side they took, and the order in which they rose, together with notes of the various argumenta adduced in the conrse of the debate. The whole was afterwards communicated to me, and I composed the speeches in the form they now have in the Parliamentary Debates; for the speeches of that period are all taken from Cave's Magazine." To this discovery Dr Francis made anawer: .. Then, Sir, yon have exceeded Demeethenes himself; for to 88yyon have exceeded Francis's Demoathenes would be nothing." The rest of the company were lavish in their complimenta to Johnson. one in particular praised his impartiality, observing that he had dealt ont reason and eloquence with an equal hand to both parties. "That is not quite true, Sir," said Johnson ... I saved appearances well enongh; but I took care that the Whig dogs should not have the best of it."

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The truth of this anecdote is extremely doubtful. SirJohn Hawk. ins tells us, that when Dr Johnson heard that SmoUet was writing his History of England, he eautioned him not to rely on the debates as given in the Gentleman's Magazine, for they ~ere not autheatie, and excepting 88 to their general import, the work of his own imagination; but whether Johnson did give this intimation or not is uncertain. One thing however is quite out of the range of all doubt, namely, that if he did, Smollett took no notice of it, but treated all Johnson's debates 88 genuine, for he not only quoted largely from these" works of imagination," but spoke of them in terms of the highest praise.

On the motion for au address in 1740, "the Duke of Argyle," he tells us, "spoke with an astonishing impetuosity of eloquence that lIowed like a river, which had overftowed its banks and deluged the wllOle adjaceut country;" and in speaking of Lord Carteret's motion for an address, beseeching His Majesty to remove Sir Robert Walpole from his presence and councils for ever. he says" the speech which ushered in this remarkable motion, would not have disgraced a Cicero. It was embellished with all the ornaments of rhetoric, and warmed with a noble spirit of patriot indignation. The Dnke of Argyle, Lord Bathurst, and his other colleagues, seemed inspired with uncommon fervor, and even inspired by the subject itself. A man of imaginatien in reading these speeches will think himself transported into the R0- man Senate before the ruin of that Repnblic."

Mr Wright, the Editor of the" Parliamentary History," supports the opinion that the debates prepared by Johnson, (which are now known as" Johnson's Debates,") were not wholly fictitious, but on the contrary were more than usually authentic, and exhibit not only the sentimeuts delivered by the various speakers, but the very language in whicb they were expressed, in so far as that laoguage was not offeusive to the correctness of Johnson's judgment and the elassical elegance


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of his taste. This fact the editor ascertained by comparing Johnson's debates with a most valuable MS. volume of debates in the House of Lords in the handwriting of Dr Seeker, Archbishop of Canterbury, who appears from his own representation in the MS. to have first faken down notes of the debates in shorthand, and afterwards written them out at large. 'fhis MS. is now in the British Museum.(2.}

The Editor of the "Parliamentary History" furthermore proves from several MS. letters (among the Birch MSS. in the British Museum) in the handwriting of Cave, and addressed to Dr Birch, that Johnson was aided to a great extent in making out his reports by Cave's endeavors to obtain authentic information concerning the debates, more than has been generally supposed, and that Cave was indefatigable in getting them made as perfect as he could.

The following letters will show how industrions the proprietor of the Gentleman's }Iagazine was, even before he employed Johnson.

21 July, 1735. "I trouble yon with the enclosed, because you said yon could easily correct what is herein given for Lord C-ld's speech. I beg you will do so as soon as you can for me, because the month is far advanced."

15 July, 1737. "As you remember the debates so far as to perceive the speeches already printed are not exact, I beg the favor that you will peruse the enclosed, and, in the best manner your memory will serve, correct the mistaken passages or add anything that is omitted. I should be glad to have something of the Duke ofN--tle's speech,

z. It begin. with a report of two short debates in the House of Lords in 1735, then breaks off, but recommences with the debate of the 2nd of May, 1738. conceming the right of navigating the American seas, and continues with little intermission down to the year 1743. It is rather a singular coincidence, that these manuscript reports end at abont the same time as those of Dr Johnaon.


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which would be particularly of service. A gentleman has Lord Bathurst's speeeh to add something to."

It. is therefore more than probable that Johnson was assisted to a great extent, and no doubt some of the speeches were corrected by the speakers themselves. He performed his task so well that the people of his time could not perceive the imposition. He so well and skilfully assumed, not ouly the sedate and stately dignity of the Lords and the undaunted freedom of the Commons, but also the tone and style of the di1ferent parties, that the public imagined they recognized the individnal manner of the different speakers. Mr Murphy said, .. It must be acknowledged that Johnson did not give so much what the speakers respectively said, as what they ought to have said." And we are told that when Voltaire read the debates he laid down the book with the exclamation, that the eloquence of Greece and Rome was revived in the British senate.

It is asserted by Sir John Hawkins, that the London Magazine also gave the debates, but did not think it necessary to take such extraordinary means and tronble about them lIS Cave did. The editor of the " Parliamentary History" points out many errors into which Sir John has fallen. Among others it is mentioned in the latter gentleman's Life of Johnson, that Cave and his friend first put into practice the mode of obtaining notes of important debates, (which we hav~ mentioned above,) in July 1736; and that the proprietors of the London Magazine gave the debates Crom a less anthentic source than the Gentleman's Magazine. Now it so happened, that Parliament WIIS not sitting in July, 1736, and by referring to the volumes themselves it will be seen that the debates of the session which opened on the 10th February, 1737, as they stand in the Gentleman's Magazine of that year, are copied verbatim, down to the very errors of the press, from the London Magazine,from that very Magazine, the proprietor of which,


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as Sir John woold have os believe, " gave the debatea from docomenta less authentic than Cave." The editor forther mentions, that it is deserving ofremark that tbe debates between 1739 and 1741 were given in the London Magazine, and were published in most instances two months earlier than those in the Gentleman's Magazine. Nay, one debate in the Hoose of Commons was given in the London Mag. azioe eleven months before the one compiled by Johnson was printed, and this being the case, it woold be folly to suppose that the Doctor did not avail himself of the assistanee to be derived therefrom.


CHAPTER IV.

"A plague o' both your housee .. ·-&abp ......

Cave proceeded in this way quietly and unmolested until the year 1747. On 30th April in that year the House of Lords awoke from its long sleep, and ordered Cave and Thomas Astle into the custody of the Usher of the Black Rod, for having published in the Gentleman's and London Magazines a report of the trial of Lord Lovatt, contrary to the privileges of the House. On Cave's examination before a committee, which had been appointed to inquire into the matter, he said, "he printed the report inadvertently; he was sorry for having offended; he published the said account from a printed paper which was left at his house, but he did not know from whom it came!" On being qnestioued as to whether he had not been in the habit of publishing the proceedings of the House, he said, .. he had left oft' the debates; he had not published auy debates of the Honse of Lords for above these twelve months; that there was a speech Of two of the other Honse put in at the latter end of last year." He then gave a very lame excuse for his condnct. He said, .. he was extremely sorry for it; it WRS a greet presumption, but he was led into it by custom and the practice of other people." On being further examined as to his modU8 operandi in obtaining his reports, he said, "He got into the House, and heard them, lind made use of a black-lead pencil, aud only took notes of some remarkable passages, and from his memory he put them together himself. Sometimes he had speeches sent him by the members themselves, and had had assistance from some members who


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had taken notes of other member's speeches. He never had any person whom he kept in pay to make speeches for him." How far the latter assertion was true we leave onr readers to decide. These two gentlemen were afterwards discharged from custody on paying the. fees, and on their knees begging pardon of the House, and promising never to offend in like manner again.

For a few years Cave's ardor was cooled, and he did not choose to offend the Honses of Parliament. Bnt his old spirit soon revived again; for in the year 1752 we find he resnmed his pnblication of the debates, although in a more concise form, of which the following may he taken as a specimen. " The following heads of speeches in the H-of C-- were given by a gentleman, who is of opinion that members of parliament are accountable to their constituents for what they say, as well !IS what they do in their legislative capacity,-that no honest man who is entrusted with the liberties of the people will ever be unwilling to have his whole conduct laid before those who 80 ent~sted him withont disguise,-that if every gentleman acted on this just-this honorable-this constitutional priuciple-the electors themselves oo1y woo1d he to blame, if they re-elected a perilOn guilty of a breach of 80 important a trust." The outside letters only of the speaker's names were given; the places of the middle ones being supplied by asterisks, thns Mr p·"t stood for Mr Pitt.

From the year 1743, when Dr Johnson ceased to compose the speeches, to the year 1766, there existed another dark period in the history of parliamentary reportiug. No one appears to have been bold enough to collect and publish an authentic and rego1ar series of reports. The doors of the House were closed to all but members, and the only time strangers were allowed to enter at all, was when they weut in the capacity of prisoners called to the bar of the House.

The oo1y information we possess of 11" hat oecurred during this inter-


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val is obtained from the writings of men of tbe period, and a few MS. reports, the principal of which is a Parliamentary Journal written by the Honorable Philip Yorke, eldest son of Lord Chancellor Hard. wicke, containing an acconnt of the debates from December,1743, to April, 1.745. However in 1766, after an interval of twenty-three years, Mr Almon undertook to join the broken thread, but in his eontinuation there is no mention of the debates in the House of Lords; and the reports of the House of Commons are scanty, meagre, and imperfect to a degree that can hardly be conceived; .but of which some idea may be fonned when it is mentioned that the collective reports of the debates and proceedings dnring the important period between 1751 and the accession of George the Third in October, 1760, are comprised in less than three hundred loosely printed octavo pages I

At the time we are speaking of, to mention any peer's name in eonnection with parliamentary proceedings was a breach of privilege pun. ishable with a fine of a hundred pounds. Lord Marchmont, Almon tells ns, was in the habit of" esaminiug the newspapers every day with the ardor that a hawk prowls for prey, and whenever he found any Lord's name printed in any paper he immediately made a motion in the Honse of Peers agaiust the printer for a breach of privilel(e."(3)

In November, 1759, the printer of the" Gazetteer" published in his paper a paragraph stating that the thanks of the Honse of Lords had been given to Sir Edward Hawke for his victory. He was brought to the bar for such a high offence, and obliged to make an apology on his knees!

About the commencement of the reign of George the Third, when the Tory party, after a long exclusion, had been re.established in power; the order for the exclusion of strangers was strictly enforeed. But

3. Almon's Biographical, Lite~ and Political Anecdotee.


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this did not at all answer the purpose intended. Any member, by merely calling the attention of the Speaker to the fact that strangers were in the House, could certaiDly tum out every one who was not a member, reporters included. Still, when members found that their eloquenee ran to seed unheeded and nncared for beyond the moment of actual delivery, and its sweetness was wasted on the desert-air, they themselves in some measure remedied the evil, from vanity or otherwise, by sending reports of their speeches to the Magazines, which were at that time extensively circulated throughout the country.

It was abont this time that newspapers first began to give short acconnts of the parliamentary proceedings, some of them indeed were so short that they contained nothing more than an intimation snch as that on such a day His Most gracious Majesty opened Parliament in person, and was pleased to deliver a most gracious speech,-or that after a lengthy debate, a certain obnoxious act was repealed.


CHAPTER V .

.. Bouud on a voyage of awful length, And dangers little known."

We now come to 8 most eventful period in onr history. In the year 1770 the notorious Wilkes had been returned as one of the mem bers for the county of Middlesex. The return was disputed by the unsuccessful parties, and after a leugthy investigation of the affair the Honse of Commons declared Wilkes to have beeu falsely returned, and Colonel Lnttrell to be the sitting member, uotwithstanding the immense majority of votes in favor of the "blasphemous little cock-eyed = demagogue," as Thackeray calls him. The discussions on the question which took place in the House eaused a great deal of excitement among the people, who looked with a jealous eye on the apparently arbitrary eonduct of the Commons. It is said by J unius in one of his celebrated letters, that the legality of the assumed privileges of the House of Commons was severely scrutinized and doubted, aud the right of the House to interdict the publication of its proceedings was the ground on which it was determined to try the question. It made the mouths of the proprietors of the Magazines and newspapers water to think of the 1I01i me tangere debates; they had kept their fingers out of the fire 80 far, and thought it too serious a matter to bring upon their heads the displeasure of the Houses of Parliament. John Almon was the Cave of his day; he, it is said, went abont and collected from members of parliament particulars relating to the debates that occurred on the subject of the :Middlesex election ;


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these he revised, put iuto type, and printed regularly three times a week in the" London Evening Post," of which he was proprietor. For two sessions this practice was continued with great success. The St. James's Chronicle, stimulated aud encouraged by Almon's success, followed his example. Nay more, it employed a reporter to attend the House, and another gentleman was engaged to collect any gossip or information relative to the debates, that was to be picked in tbe lobby, or in the coffee-honses and taverns, or at the clubs. The example was also immediately followed by the " Gazetteer" and other metropolitan papers, and by the" Dublin Mercury" and a large number of the country publications.

We find in the Annual Register for the year 1771, that" though this session had been uncommonly fruitful either in production of events or the furnishing of subjects for discnssion of the most interesting nature, it had however still in reserve II matter which excited the public attention, and was attended with more extraordinary circumstances tban any other which had taken place for some years. This was the affair of the printers, which, though a matter, in its first outset, that carried nothing new or extraordinary in its appearance, yet was capable in consequence, by calling the privileges of the House of Commons into question, and committiug the legal right upon which those privileges were founded to the public discussion, whilst it was also productive of the uew and extraordiuary spectacle of the Lord Mayor of the city of London, and another of its principal magistrates being committed to the Tower."

"In the latitude now taken," coutinues the Annual Register, " tbe publishers had for some time inserted certain performances as speeches of the members of parliament, which in the House had been deemed by some of them in many essential points to be genuine, but if they had been the truest representation of the sentiments and expressions


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of the speakers, snch pnblications were yet contrary to the standing order of the Honse of Commons." On the 8th February, 1771, the battle began in earnest. After the standing order Cor the exclusion of strangers had been read and enforced, Colonel Onslow opened fire in a manner so solemn, that as was afterwards said, the whole French Court, with their gandy coaches and jack-boots, going to hunt a little hare, was nothing in comparison to it. Haviug complained to the Honse that "The Gazetteer:' printed for R. Thompson, and" The Middlesex Journal," printed by R. Wheble, had misrepresented speeches and re1leeted on several members of the Honse, he moved that the printers be ordered to attend the following Monday. One of the above papers had inserted the following paragraph in the preceding day's impresaion.

" It was reported, that a scheme was at last hit upon by the ministry to prevent the public from being informed of their iniqnity; aecordingly, on Tnesday last, little cockin!l George Ouslow made a motion tbat an order against printing the debates should be read, and entered on the minntes of that day. Mr Charles Turner opposed the motion with great spirit; he said that not only the debates ought to be printed, but a list of the divisions likewise; aud be affirmed that no man would object to it, nnless he was ashamed of the vote he gave. Mr Edmund Burke supported Mr Turner's opinion: he said that so far from its being proper to conceal their debates, he wished they would follow the ancient rule, which was to record them in the Journals."

Poor Colonel Onslow said he was indeed a little tender upon the subject, for one of these obnoxious papers had also called him "slittle scoundrel." Those members who were advocates of secret debating declared that reporting their speeches was "highly prejudicial to gentlemen in their boronghs, that it had never been practised before •

3

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during the sitting of parliament, and when done in the intervals had always been done with decency, but that it had become absolntely necessary either to punish the offeuders severely or to reverse the standing order, which had not only been uuobeyed, but had been violently and outrageously insulted." The newspapers were, on a division, (Ayes 90, Noes 50,) ordered to be delivered in and read, and the printers were ordered to attend the House on the following Thnr&day.

On that day the last order having been read, and the printers not having attended at the House, the messenger to whom the ordera were given was bronght to the bar, and declared that he conld not effect personal service on the printers, as they had pnrposely kept ont of the way. After a short discussion on the policy of establishing such a precedent, and also as to its legality, it was ordered that service at the places of abode of Thompson and Wheble should be deemed a good service, and that the two printers should be ordered to attend the House on Tuesday. One side of the House said, "It was highly impolitic to provoke the people by a needless display of authority, at the time when they were too much heated and alarmed, and watched every exercise of power with the ntmost jealousy, especially in the House of Commons, which since the business of the Middlesex election the people were too apt to consider rather as an instrument of the Court than ~ the representative of the people." On the other hand it was alleged "that, notwithstanding the unjust and groundless suspicions of the vulgar the dignity of the House must be supported, and that as the order had beeu made, it mnst now vindicate its own conduct by enforcing obedience to it." On a division the newspapers were by a majority of 35 ordered to be delivered in and read, and the printers were ordered to attend the Honse on Tueaday.

On Tuesday, 26th February, the order of the day for the attendance


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35

of the printers having been read, and neither of them being in attendance, a motion was made and carried by a very large majority, that they sbould be taken into the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms. Some members violeutly opposed this mode of proceeding, as the printers had not been personally sersed with the order for their attendance.(4)

Well, Mr Deputy Sergeant-at-Arms called several times at the respective houses of Wheble and Thompson, but tbose gentlemen did not think proper to appear, and their servants laughed at and" chaffed" the poor Deputy, who spoke and behaved to them with all the insolence of office and with a full sense of the dignity of his station. On this being reported to the House, tbe insatiable Colonel Onslow moved, that an address be presented to his Majesty, that he would be graciously pleased to issue his royal proclamation for apprehending the two offending printers. This motion was agreed to, and on the 8th of March a proclamation was issued, of which the following is a copy.

"George R.- Whereas, on the 8th day of February last, complaint haviug been made to the House of Commons of tbe printed newspaper intituled the Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser, Friday, February 8th, 1771, printed for R. Thompson, and also of the printed newspaper intituled tbe Middlesex Journal, or Chronicle of Liberty, from Tuesday, February 5th, to Thursday, February 7th, 1771, printed

4. It "as mentioned doring this debate that, in the case of one Hoskins, who had been ordered to be taken into custody-on the messenger taking the warrant, and inqoiring whether he was at home, be was aeked, U What have yon got there i' " tI The warrant of the Speaker to take you into ous .. tody," he answered. CI The Speaker! U replied the other, u upon my word I do not knoW' any such gentleman-it cannot be for me:' "Yea, it is, and I am to take yon into cuetody.' Upon which both the meoaeogerand the order were turned ont of the honae.

8*


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for J. Wheble, as misrepresenting the speeches and reflecting on several of the members of the said House, in contempt of the order and in breach of the privilege of the said House, it was ordered that the said J. Wheble and R.Thompson should attend the said Honse of Commons, and they not having obeyed the said order, it was thereupon ordered by the said House of Commons, that the said John Wheble and R. Thompson should be taken into the custody of the Sergeant. at- Arms attending the said House or his Deputy. And whereas the said Deputy Sergeant having informed the House, that he had not been able to meet with the said John Wheble and R. Thompson or either of them, though he had been several times at their respective houses, and had made diligent search after them to take them into cnstody, an humble address hath heen presented to ns by the knights and burgesses and the commissioners for shires aud burghs in Parliament assembled, that we would be gracionsly pleased to issue our Royal proclamation for apprehending the said John Wheble and R. Thompson with a promise of reward for the same,-we have thought fit, by aud with the advice of our Privy Council, to issue this our Royal proclamation, hereby requiring and commauding all our beloved subjects whatsoever to discover and apprehend or cause the said John Wheble and R. Thompsou or either of them to be discovered and apprehended, and to carry them, or either of them, before some of our Justices of the Peace or chief magistrates of the county, town or place, where he or they shall be apprehended, who are respectively required to secure the said John Wheble and R. Thompson, and thereof to give speedy notice to one of our principal Secretaries of State, to the end he or they may be forthcoming to be dealt with and proceeded against according to law; and for the prevention of the escape of the said John Wheble and R. Thompson or either of them into parts beyond the sess, we do require and command all our officers of the customs and other our officers and


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subjects of and in our respective porta and maritime towns and places within the Kingdom of Great Britain, that they and every of them in their respective places and stations be careful and diligent iu the examination of all persons that shall P88S or endeavor to P88S beyond the seas, and if they shall discover the said John Wheble and Robert Thompson or either of them, theu to cause them or either of them to be apprehended and secured, and to give notice thereof as aforesaid, and we do hereby strictly charge and command all our loving subjects, 88 they will answer the contrary at their peril, that they do not anyways conceal, but do discover him or them, the said John Wheble 'and R. Thompson, to the end he or they may be secured, and for the encouragement of all persons to be diligent and careful in endeavoring to discover and apprehend the said John Wheble and R, Thompson, we do hereby further declare, that whosoever shall discover and appreheud the said John Wheble and R. Thompson or either of them within three weeks from the date hereof, and shall bring him or them, the said John Wheble and R. Thompson, before some Justice of the Peace or chief Magistrate, shall have and receive as a reward for the discovery, apprehending and bringing the said John Wheble and R. Thompson or either of them before such Justice of the Peace or chief Magistrate as aforesaid, the sum of Fifty pounds for each, which our commissioners of the Treasury are hereby required and directed to pay accordingly.

"Given at our Court at 8t James's, the eighth day of March, 1771, in the eleventh year of our reign."

The members who took the most active part in excluding strangers from the gallery of the Honse of Commons, and in calling the printers and publishers of newspapers to the bar of the House for publishing the speeches of members, were Colonel George Onslow (the gentleman we have above alluded to) and the Right Honourable George Onslow,


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M. P. for Surrey and son of Speaker Onslow. These two Onslow. were the targets at which all the shafts of public ridicule and indignation were thrown. We give the following as a specimen, not only of the odium with which they were looked upon, hut also as showing, the style oflanguage used by the newspaper writers of that day. "That little insignificant insect, George Onslow, was the first mover of all this mighty disturbance. To style 80 great a personage by the contemptuous epithet of 'cocking George.' was enough to bring down the thnnder itself from Jove's high seat at St James's."

" As great events often proceed from little causes, who knows bnt that from so little and insignificant a being as the little revenge of little cocking George against the printers, the great event so long petitioned for in vain may happen,-a certain dissolution? And thus this little hero's little revenge, though sweet at first, may ere long' bitter on himself recoil.'

" Oh thou sorry motion maker] if thy father's heart, enclosed in a marble nrn in thy dressing-room, to which thon daily offerest up thy hypocritical prayers, could speak, how would it upbraid thee and spurn thee]

" The late worthy Arthur Onslow, Speaker of the House of Commons, rigid as he was respecting rules, orders and privileges, suffered the speeches of members to be printed in the magazines for thirty years together, yet are his son George and his nephew George ever and anon repeating, 'What would my father the Speaker: and 'What would my uncle the Speaker have said, had he lived to see the proceedings of the Honse published to the world? '

" Couoty George and Cocking George are at present distinguished by the printers as astronomers distinguish the constellations of the two bears in the heavens, one being called the great, and the other tbe little scoundrel.

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" The friends of the premier assert that he has no objeetion to the speeches of members being printed, 80 that the late fracas must be looked upon as the work of the two Onslows. It were much to be wished that the little gentlemen would attend to their motto, '/elti"a lente, ON-SLOW:"


CHAPTER VI.

" 0 Gods celestial! 0 Gods infernal!

o powers of mischief dark and sempiternal! Demons above and deities below,

I ask ya sternly, Is'nt this a go?"

On Friday, March 12th, Colonel Onslow, "the little scoundrel," incensed by the personal language used in the newspapers, got up in his place, sweating aud fuming, and complained against his inveterate enemies the printers, who, he thought, were very "devils indeed." He said he would only bring before the House three brace of them. Oh I what a lenient, tender, kind-hearted man, only to pick out six from the hydra-headed monsters, who were nothing in his opinion, but a low, tilthy, blackguard lot of libel-mongers, but whose name was Legion. The members thus specially chosen to receive the thrusts of the gallant and ferocious Colonel were W oodfall of the Morning Chronicle, Baldwin of the 8t James's Chronicle, Evans of the London Packet, Wright of the Whitehall Evening Post, Bladon of the General Evening Post, and Miller of the London Evening Post. The ground of complaint against this army of martyrs was the old one; they were still playing on one string, " still harping on my daughter," the publication of the debates, and misrepresenting the speeches of the members. The gallant gentleman was tremendously excited, declared he would never suffer any geutlemen to say that what he had done was foolish and ridiculous. He opened the engagement by moving, that the Morning Chronicle of the 4th March, 1771, be delivered in at the table and read. 'In the course of the debate which ensued upon


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this motion, Sir Joseph Mawbey suggested to the gallaut Colonel that it was Dot usual to follow a fresh covey before the oue already started had been hunted down, and Wheble and Thompson had not then been apprehended. Another member coolly asked who would for the future rise up to speak, it his sentiments were to be made public I The House divided, and by a majority of 97, (Ayes 140, Noes 43,) the paper was ordered to be delivered in and read, which was accordingly done, and W oodfall W88 also ordered to attend the House on Thursday. Colonel Ouslowthen moved that the St James's Chronicle from Thursday, March 9th, 1771, printed by Henry Baldwin, be delivered in and read by the clerk at the table, saying at the same time" So help me God; I have no motive but the honour of tbe House." One member proposed an amendment by the addition of the words" together with all his compositors, pressmen, correctors, blackers and devils;" otherwise the order would be imperfect. It would be as irregnlar for the printer to go to the bar without them 88 it would be for the Speaker to go to the House without his mace, or a first Lord of the Treasury without a majority. Another member moving the omission of the "devils," Mr Bnrke said they were the most material personages in the whole business. There were 80 many divisions, and such strong and personally olfensive expressions used during the course of this debate, that the Speaker said, " This motion will go into the J oumals-what will posterity say ? "

There were 80 many delays, and so many motions for adjournment and for amendment were made, and the debate extended over so long a time, that many of the members were actually wearied, exhausted, "nsed up." So often indeed did they go ont for refreshment, and in such nnmbers, that once during their absence a division for adjournment took place when the minority consisted only of seven. AldermanTownsend tried rather a curious persuasion to make theHonse

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adjourn. He said, the Clerks sent minutes of their debates to the King and the two principal secretaries or State, and out of compassion to his Majesty they ought to go to bed. In the courts below a juror might be withdrawn. If gentlemen opposite, he said, would reduce the House under forty, they would be regularly adjourned. This however was not done, and another motion for adjournment was rejected by a majority of sixty (Ayes 13, Noes 73). Another division then took place, and T. Evans was ordered to attend the Honse by a majority of sixty.four. It was now hall past two o'clock. Af· ter seven more divisions, which ended in ordering the other three printers to attend the House on Thursday, the House left off sitting at five 0' clock in the morning, the unnsually large number of twenty. three divisions having taken place during this debate.

On Thursday, the 14th March, the order of the day for the attend. anee of the printers was read. Four of these gentlemen had thought proper " to come in the most respectful manner in obedience to the order of the House." Woodfall, another of them, would have done the like, only it was not in his power; for he was at the time in the custody of the Black Rod of the other house, After a debate which has, perhaps, never been surpassed in the annals of parliamentary history for scurrility and personality, and after speaking about thiogs 80 little relating to the subject- matter in hand that the Speaker was obliged to get up and say, " For God's sake let us go 00 with the de. bate," the question was put, that the order be postponed, and lost on a division hy a large majority (Ayes 24, Noes 117). This was at nine o'clock in the evening, and the House did not adjourn until the clock struck five in the following morning. or what occurred betweeu those hours we only know, (5) that of the six printers Baldwin, Wright and

6. Sir Henry Cavendish, who is the only reporter of this debate, aays he left the Houae at !'ine o' clock.


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Bladon were heard in their defence, and the House resolved, that in having printed the debates, and misrepresenting the epeeches of several of the members, they had been guilty of a breach of privilege. After this they kuelt down on tbeir knces at the bar of the House, and were severely reprimanded by the Speaker, and cautioned not to otT end in like manner again. Woodfall, as we have seen, could not attend, as he was in the custody of the Honse of Lords. Evaus from an accidental circumstance could not attend, and Miller could have done so if he chose, bnt would not; so that gentleman, having wilfully disobeyed the order of the House, was ordered to be taken into the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms.

A few days after this proceeding Wheble, one of the two printers mentioned in the proclamation, and who was a citizen of London, was apprehended by a man named Edward Twine Carpenter, who was neither a constable nor a peace-officer of the city of London, and carried before Alderman Wilkes at Guildhall. l'he Alderman demanded of what crime Wheble was accused, and if oath had been made of hi, haviug committed any felooy or breach of the peace, or if he lay under suspicion stroog enough to justify his apprehension and detention, Carpenter answered "that he did not accuse Wheble of any crime, but had apprehended him in consequence of His Majesty's proelamation, for which he claimed tbe reward of fiCty pounds." Wilkes gave his judicial opinion, that he had been apprehended in the city illegally, in direct violation of his rights ft8 an Englishman aod of the ehertered privileges of a citizen of London, and consequently discharged him. Wheble then made a formal complaint of the ft88Bult committed by Carpenter, and was bound over in a recognizance of £40 to prosecute, and Carpenter was at the same time also bonnd over to appear IlId auswer tbe complaint at tbe quarter-sesaions in a recognizance of forty pounds himselI, with two sureties in recognizances of twenty

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pounds each.(6) At the same time Wilkes wrote a letter to the Secretary of State, his old enemy the Earl of Halifax, acquainting him with the transactiou and the motives of his conduct.

Thompson, the other of the two printers mentioned in the proelamation, was apprehended in a similar manner, earried before Alderman Oliver, and by him discharged; the incidents in both cases were nearly the same. The persons who apprehended them were of their own business, and probably acted under their directions; they both avowed the rewards to be the motives of their conduct, and obtained certificates from the Aldermen to entitle them to receive the money at the Trea· sury, which however it was thought proper not to pay.(7)

Tn pnrsuance of the order of the House, a warrant was issued by the Speaker for the apprehension of Miller. The messenger appointed to execute it proceeded to his shop. Unlnckily for him this insubordinate gentleman was there. The messenger saw him, laid his hand on his shoulder, told him that he was his prisoner, that tbe arrest had been made by virtue of a warrant from the Speaker of the House of Commons, at the same time offering to show it to him. Miller said he had committed no offence that he knew of, and that if he had, the House of Commons had no authority to make him prisoner, and eonsequently he would not quietly submit to be thus illegally deprived of his liberty. Whereupon a trilling attempt at compulsion was made by the messenger, and a scuffle took place. Miller immediately sent out for a constable, and, mirabile diet», one was soon found, who, attended by three men, marched into Miller's shop; upon this Miller charged the messenger with having assaulted him iu his honse, and directed the constable to take him into custody, which that functionary

6. Carpenter ..... afterwards tried for the &Bsault, fonnd guilty, lined one .hilling, and imprisoned for t .. o monthl.

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promptly did without any more ado. They all then proceeded, together with several other persons who were witnesses of the transaction, to the Gnildhall, bnt the sitting magistrate, Alderman Wilkes, having despatched the business of the day, had gone to the Mansion Honse. They accordingly went there, and made application to the Lord Mayor, who was in his bedchamber, ill of the gout. The messenger desired that he might have leave to send to the Deputy Sergeaut-at-Arms, a request which was granted, and the Lord Mayor adjourned the Court for a few hours for that purpose. On the Deputy Sergeant-at-Arma being informed of the circumstance,he commuuicated with the Speaker, who ordered him to go immediately, and in the name of the Speaker of the Honse of Commons, wherever he found the messenger, to demand his release, and to require the restoration of Miller. As the messenger was then about to be tried at the Mansion House, the Deputy of course proeeeded to that place and delivered his message. The Lord Mayor asked the messenger whether his warrant had been backed by a City magistrate. Such not being the case, the bench, consisting besides the Lord Mayor, of Aldermen Oliver and Wilkes, decided, upon that ground alone, that the arrest of Miller was illegal, and declared that no citizeu could be taken up in the city for any crime by any authority whatever, unless authorized by a city magistrate 80 to do. Miller's counsel made several objections; first, it was objected that the vote or order of the Honse of Commons did not contain a sufficient description of the power which had pasaed the vote; "for," he Aid, " the House of Commons-what is the Honse of Commons P It is not known, it is not described, it is an appellation to which no legal meaning can be affixed." Tbe second objection was that, as the power upon which this order had passed was not sufficiently described, so neither was the object against which it was directed-a warrant to apprebend such a one was not a sufficient description, it might be applied


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to anybody, it pointed to nobody; therefore the warrant was bad. Another objeetion W88 that it did not describe the offence, and also that" Fletcher Norton, Speaker," did not sufficiently indicate that he was Sir Fletcher Norton, Speaker of the House of Commons.

When all this sharp practice and special pleading was at an end, and Miller discharged from the custody of the messenger, the court proceeded to hear the complaint for the assault and false imprisonment, which W88 clearly proved by the evidence of witnesses. The messenger called no witness, and the Deputy Serjeant-at-Arms admitted tbe facts. The Lord Mayor then asked the messenger for bail to answer the complaint, but he said he had none, and the Deputy Serjeant-at-Arms declared that he should not give bail; whereupon a warrant of commitment. was signed by the Lord Mayor. The counsel for the prisoner desired that the two aldermen might sign it 88 well, else it might be supposed that they did not concnr in opinion with his lordship. The lord mayor said he did not want anyone else to sign it. The Aldermen however declared themselves ready to do so, which they did accordingly, the lord mayor at the same time observing to Mr Wilkes, " I think you have enough upon your hands already." The Deputy Serjeant-at-Arms then said, "I waited for this, and now I see the warrant of commitment actually signed, will offer bail." The messenger was therefore duly bonnd over in a recognizance for his appearance, and the printer to prosecute for the assault and false imprisonment. The popular feeling W88 so excited that nearly every one in the room offered to be bail for the messenger.

On Monday, March 18th, the Speaker reported these proceedings to the House. It was then, and is now the practice, when any roID: plaint was before the House at all eoneerning any of the memhers, to make an order for that member to attend in his place. Now Brass Crasby, the Lord Mayor, W88 also a member of the House of Commons.


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Upon the gronnd, therefore, of the report which the Speaker had made to the Honse, a member moved for the attendance of the Lord Mayor in his place on the following morning. Sir William lIeredith, fully conceiving the dangers which would result from snch a motion, said, " I recommend you to make a pause before yon take one step in a matter which may involve this House, this kingdom, the king npon the throne and his posterity, in conseqnences which I trust in God were little foreseen by the persons who brought this wretched business before you. I thank God, who has enabled me to put my negative upon it in every stage of it ; I wish to God those who are involved in the labyrinths of this fatal proposition, had consulted their jndgments and then made a pause. I desire to make my panse now. As a member of parliament anxions for the peace and safety of the eonntry, I have bnt one wish, one prayer to God, that he will suggest means to extricate ns ont of the difficulties in which we are so fatally involved." It was argued that, nnless the speaker's warrant was a command, which could not be disobeyed with impunity, Parliament wonld not be able to exist; orders withont the anthority to enforce them wonld never be complied with. It was a maxim, a law common to all societies regularly established in a state, that all the powers indispensably necessary to the exercise of their dnty for the benefit of the commonwealth, for which they were established, are deemed to be vested in them. The greatest anthors who have written upon the jnrisdiction of the courts of this country attribute to parliament the sole cognizance of its own privileges. The conrts of jnstice and in Westminster Hall have npon repeated occasions renonnced all authority relative to them. In the reign of Henry the Sixth the jndges of England were called upon by the Honse of Lords to give their opinion npon a question of privilege. Sir John Fortescne in the name of his brethren said, "it was a ques. tion they ought not to answer, for it hath not been nsed aforetime,


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that the justices should in any of the courts determine the privileges of the High Court of Parliament." The Bill of Rights contained a clause(S) declaring that none of the privileges and proceedings of Parliament ought to be adjudicated upon or questioned by aoy other court, On the question as to whether the Speaker's warrant required to be backed by a city magistrate, it was shown that the Courts of Common Law and the Court of Chancery did not allow their warrants to be backed by any city magistrate ... Must then the high court of Par. liament do it P How can our privileges be subservient to the char •

• ters of the city of London,-charters derived from the prerogative of the Crown P" Mr Edmnnd Burke said, there was a way out of the mess they had got into ... What," he exclaimed, .. what is the present ques· tion P :No less than a dispute between you and the greatest part of the constituent body of the kingdom. Gentlemen speak lightly of the city of London, and talk of standing up against the lord mayor and a couple of aldermen. Certainly if the city of London do not support them they will be trivial and contemptible. Bnt what if it should happen-and I Cear it will,-that the city of London should eonsider the cause of their magistrates as their own P If they should, you say you will take up your mace; they will take.up theirs. You will take up your mace as a ram to batter down. (Cries of hear! hear!) Very weIll I am glad before the trumpet sounds to see such alacrity. With your mace you are to go against the city of London, you are to attack that body, which has been the most zealous supporter of the House of Commons. • Oh,' say gentlemen,' but our diguity calls npou us to proceed.' Three and twenty times consider what you are about to do. By long fasting and watching the twenty-three adjourn. menta suspended the deliberations of that day. When I saw the hen-

8. Ninth Article.


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orable gentleman who in his zeal had taken np this question, supported by the Treasury, when I saw grave privy councillors, sitting up till four in the morning, when I saw a gallant officer brought down npon the oceasion,(9) I was convinced it was determined to carry this matter through to its extreme consequences. You must prepare either to evade the conllict or conquer. First evade, next conquer, with as little bloodshed as you can; next make your authority reconcilable with the opiniou of the people. Without that opinion in vain would be your authority. When you have exercised your authority by committing the first magistrat.e to the Tower, will not that open objections to it, constitutional objections, objections as strong as that Middlesex Election P No sooner do you get rid of one controversy than you excite a thousand fresh ones. You act as wisely as Charles the Twelfth of Sweden, who threw a barrel of brandy on the fire to put it out. Like that hero you do not stop to ask how you came into the difficulty • • Let ns,' you exclaim, • go on boldly and fight out the battle.' There are, I say, several ways of getting out of this difficulty, but no way of violence which shall make the first magistrate of London the direct object of affront, can succeed. You cannot fight such a battle without destruction to the city of London, without destruction to yourselves."

This debate took place in a motion for adjournment, a rather underhand dodge for gettiug rid of the affair altogether. The inveterate enemy of the printera, the gallant Colonel Onslow, again opened his mouth and brayed. He said he had, been traduced in a most scandaIons manner. He had been called a firebrand. .. I had no private motive, so help me God 1 I may be mistaken. It may have been the prejudice of education (I) If J have erred, I have erred with my

. 9. Admiral Holboum, muter of Greenwich HOlpital. He died in the July following.


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ancestors. Conld I have supposed that the lord mayor would have acted as he has done P " He said he had often drunk a bottle of wine with that gentleman, and if he had foreseen what had happened, he- believed that he should not have done so I The original qnestion 11'88 then pnt, amended in conseqnence of the illness of the Lord Mayor, and afterwards agreed to. It W88 then ordered, "That Brass Crosby, lord mayor of the city of London, do attend in his place to. morrow morning, if his health shall permit," not even mentioning a word abont the two aldermen, it being thonght preferable to examine the princi pal first, and then proceed to the acceasaries.

Lord Chatham, in a letter dated the 26th, says, " The seene is moat interesting. To me it seems that the only clue throngh the labyrinth is, that the B ouse becomes lIagrantly nnjust and tyrannical, the moment it proceeds criminally against magistrates standing for a jurisdiction they are bonnd to maintain in a conllict of respectable rights. Nothing appears to me more distinct than declaring their right to jurisdiction with regard to printers of their proeeedinga and debate, and punishing their member, and in him his constituents, for what he baa done in diaebarge of his oatb and conaeience as a magis. trate. If the ministry proceed to punish the Lord Mayor, the stand against aueh injustice and oppression cannot be made with too much vigor and firmness by the friends of liberty in the Honae."(10)

10. Correspondence, Vol. iT., p. 138.

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CHAPTER VTI .

.. When Greek meets Greek, then comes the tug of war." .. I burn to Bet the impriBoued wrauglers free,

And give them voice and utterance ouee agaiu."

On Tuesday, March 19th, the battle 11'85 renewed. At two o'clock the lord mayor, who W85 very ill and weak, accompanied by his chaplain and Alderman Oliver, set out from the Mansion House to the Honse of Commons, through the city. In the morning the following handbill was dispersed about the city .

.. To tbe liverymen, freedmen, and eitisens of London-Altbough our Lord Mayor has been confined to his room for sixteen days with a severe fit of the gout, and is still much indisposed, he is determined to be this day in his seat in the House of Commons, to support your rights and privileges, even though he should be obliged to be carried on a litter. He leaves the Mansion House at one of the clock."

In tbe aftemoon the two following were also distributed .

.. The citizens of London, and all the friends of freedom in this metropolis are expected to bring the Lord Mayor back in triumph from the House of Commons and attend him to the Mansion House." .. The freedmen of London are requested to attend at the House

of Commons in order to conduct the Lord Mayor back again to his own mansion."

In eonsequence of these invitations a prodigions crowd of the better IOrt had collected at the Mansion House and in the streets near it, 4*

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who testified their approbation by repeated h1JZZU, which were continued all the way from the Mansion Honse to the Honse of Commons. On his lordship arriving there, one nniveraal shont was heard for nearly three minutes, and the people during the whole pasaage to the Honse called out to the Lord Mayor as the people'S friend, the guardian of the city's rights and the nation's liberties.(IOa)

The Honse began its proceedings by orderiog Mr Wilkes to attend the House on the following day, but this was the mere overture to the opera that was about to be performed. liB soon as the Lord ~Iayor was in his place the real proceedings of the day commenced. On account of his ill health the Honse allowed him to be seated while he spoke, au indulgence very rarely granted. By the charters of the city of London it appears that no warrant, command, process or attachment could at that time be executed within the city, but by a magistrate of the same city. These charters were confirmed by an act of parliameot made in the reign of William and Mary. The Lord Mayor argued, therefore, that as the warrant of the Speaker had not been endorsed by a city magistrate, it was of no avail for the arrest of Miller, aod that if he had not discharged that gentleman from custody, he would have broken the oath which he had taken when made an a1derman,-to protect the citizens in their franchises and in their rip;hts, aod that if be had gone no further than discharging Miller, aod had not proceeded to commit the messenger for an asaault, he apprehended he should have been liable to be called upon by the court of King's Bench for not executing his duty as a magistrate.

After a lengthy debate as to whether the Lord Mayor should be heard by Counselor not, Lord North moved that the Lord Mayor's clerk attend the Honse, with the minutes takeo before that magistrate relative to the messenger giving security for his appearance at

lOa. Gentleman'. M.,.aiDe.


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the quarter-sessions to answer such indictments as might be preferred against him for tbe supposed assault and imprisonment of Miller. This motion was carried on a division by a very large majority, (Ayes 185, Noes 56.) After that Alderman Oliver was ordered to attend in bis place on Friday.

Wednesday, 20th March. Tbe order of tbe day for tbe attendance of Alderman Wilkes having been read, Sir Jobn Mawbey presented a letter to the Speaker from tbe alderman, but the Honse refused to bave it read. (11) It was howeverread by tbe Speaker to several members after the House bad broken np.(12) Mr Wilkes said, "I tbis morning received an order commanding my attendance this day in the House of Commons. I observe that no notice of me is taken in your order as a member of the House, and tbat I am not reqnir:d to attend in my place. Both these circumstances according to the settled form onght to have been mentioned in my case, and I hold tbem to be absolutely indispensable. In tbe name of tbe freeholders of Middlesex, I again demand my seat in parliament, having the honour of being freely chosen, by a very great majority, one of tbe representatives of the said county. I am ready to take the oaths and give in my qualifications as Knigbt of the Shire.

"When I bave been admitted to my seat,I will immediately give the House the most elact detail, which will necessarily eomprebend a full justification of my conduct relative to the illegal proclamation, equally injnrions to tbe hononr of tbe crown, tbe rights of tbe subject and likewise tbe whole business of the printers. I bave acted entirely from a sense of duty to this great city, whose franchises I am sworn to maintain, and to my country whose noble constitution I reverence, and

11. Annual Register.

12. Sir Henry Cavendish', M. S. Debates.


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wbose liberties at the price of my blood I will defend and snpport.(l S) Wilkes was then ordered to atteud tbe Honse on Monday. Of this he took no notice whatever, and a few days afterwards he was again ordered to attend on the 8th of April. The House soon repented of tbis rash step, and declined to have another encounter with the alderman; so they adjourned the Honse from the 7th to tbe 9th of April, thusmakiug the day on which Wilkes was ordered to attend a dies non.

The Lord Mayor's clerk having attended with the minute-book, he, by the order of the House, expunged the offensive entry.

" Most of the gentlemen in opposition," BByS the Annual Register, "quitted the House during this transaction, declaring that they wonld not be witnesses to such an unprecedented act of violence-it was assumiug and exercising a power of the most dangerous nature, with which the constitution had not entrusted any part of tbe legislature, and then the effacing a record,-stopping the course of justice, and suspending the law of the land, were among the heaviest charges that could be brought against the most arbitrary despot. A member said in a stage whisper, 'Who knows but that they may indict 'he Speaker for forgery P , "

On Friday, March 22nd, the order of the day for the attendance of the Lord Mayor haviug been read, the Speaker iutimated to the House that he had received a letter from his lordship, desiring him to inform the Honse, tbat his late attendance in his place had increased and aggravated his disorder, and tbat he was then unable to move out of his room, but that he would attend the House a8 soon as his health would permit. In conseqnence of this the further consideration of the matter was adjourned. Alderman Oliver, however, attended in

13. Parliamentary History, Vol. 17. (1771·1774), pages 113 and ll~}


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his place according to order, but on account of the absence of the Lord Mayor, it was not thought advisable to go into his case, but

• it was postponed likewise until Monday. On Monday, March 25th, about two o'clock, the Lord Mayor and Mr Alderman Oliver went from the Mansion House to the House of Commons to attend in their respective places, pursuant to the orders issued to them on Friday last. There was a prodigious quantity of people about the Mansion House to see them come ont, and the crowd continued to increase the whole way to Westminster HaII.(14) An immense contest was anticipated, and matters of great moment were abont to be decided. Members came up from all parts of the country. Serjeant Glynn, who was upon the circnit at the time, actually travelled upward oC one hundred and seventy miles for the purpose of being present at the debate. A letter was issued from the Treasury most earnestly requesting the attendance of the supporters of the government" on an affair of the last importance to the constitution and the rights and privileges of the people of England." It was determined not to proceed

with the case against Wilkes. Colonel Barre in a letter to Lord

Chatham says, "the ministers avow Wilkes too dangerons to meddle with. He is to do what he pleases; we are to snbmit. So his Majesty orders; he says he will bave nothing more to do with that devil Wilkes." The order of the day for the attendance of the Lord Mayor having been caIled for and read by the Clerk at the table, the oath, which the Lord Mayor had taken when appointed an Alderman were then read. After this the Lord Mayor was called on for his defence. He said he could not have acted otherwise than he did without having violated his oath and his duty-that he had acted in the defence of the laws of his country, which were manifestly invaded,

14. (Hnt1eman'. X.guine.


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and that he should always glory in having done so, let the consequences be as they wonld. It was then said that the privileges and practice of Parliament had at all times been invariably the same, and. that the only question now was an exception claimed by the city of London through a charter derived from the Crown; that the Crown could convey no powers througb that charter, which were not inherent in itself, and that it had no power over the privileges of that Honse; that their privileges were a check upon the other branches of the legislature; that consequently their cause was the cause of liberty and of the people at large, and if the power of the Commons wree weakened, the security to liberty would be equally so. It was therefore moved, that the discharging J. Miller from the cnstody of the messenger was a breach of privilege. To this the minority objected, lamenting the condition into which the Honse was brought by listeniug to every insidious motion on every trifling cause, purposely designed to make them instruments of the Court, and to reuder them odious by continual contests with the people. Many of the majority seemed sensible of the importsnce of the first complaint, yet wben it was in their power to retract decently, they chose to renew the attack and to bring six more printers before the House when one had proved two many for them.(15)

A great number of speeches were made both pro and con. Mr Edmund Burke, who had always ~tuck up manfully for the press, said, " When I consider the powers and duties belonging to the Honse, it shocks me to see it shrunk from a great inquisitorial court to a paltry quest, sitting over a set of printers and printers' devils. Is it fit that we should thus be occupied? Nee dlJU8 inter8it nisi dignIU fJindice nodlU. The language of some gentlemen is ' Proceed I don't consider

15. (Allllual Register.)


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the consequences.' I will consider all the consequences. ' Yon are alHicted with some dangerous disease, you want some remedy,' says the physician. 'What! more physic? Why, you are the man who gave me the last dose.' 'Yes, but you are now very ill indeed.' ' I know:it; what have yon got in that cup?' 'Only a little brandy.' 'Sir, I am in a raging fever already, and will not take your brandy.' This is the precise situation in which we stand." After these resolutions the Lord Mayor was ordered to attend in his place in the House on the Monday following, if his health would then permit. Mr AMerman Oliver being then called upon for his defence, said he knew the punishment he was to receive had been determined upon, and this no justification could avert. He owned and gloried in the fact laid to his charge; he was conscious of having done his dutywas indifferent as to the consequences, aud as he thought it vain to appeal to justice, they might do what they pleased; he defied their powers. This defiance of the House brought Lord North to prompt Mr Welbore Ellis to move; "I would have gone to the first Lord, and said, 'Will you be so good as to tell me what you expect to do next in this business P You desire me to support the authority and dignity of Parliament-show me how I am to do it. I will not go a step further, till I know what will be the consequence of proceeding.' "

When Mr Burke finished his speech the noise outside the Honse began to be so great and so deafeniug, that two or three members had to sit down for a short time, until it subsided sufficiently to allow them to be heard. One member happening to go out of the House could not get back. The mob said, they would not let him go in again, unless he promised to vote for the Lord Mayor, which he stoutly refused to do; 80 he was shoved iuto a corner, aud kept there for some time. Auother gentleman was two hours in getting into the House, and that at the risk of his life. There were filty out of the

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eighty constables of Westminster on duty. There were also six magistrates about, two of them being stationed in the lobby. After the lapse of an hour or two, the magistratea were called in, and informed the Honse that they had in B great measure dispersed the crowd, and cleared the passage for the members entering the House, but that there was still a great crowd in the Court of Requests.(16)

The night was getting far advanced, and at half past ten the Lord Mayor, being overcome with fatigue with his long attendnnce, obtained the leave of the House to withdraw. On his return home he was enthusiastically received by the mob in the streets, who with shouts and cheers of the most uproarions and deafening deacription, took out the horses from his carriage, and drew him through the streets to his residence.

Notwithstanding the absence of the prineipal culprit, the debate was resumed, and at twenty minutes to twelve o'clock the House divided, when it was resolved by a large majority,

1. That the diseharging out of the custody of one of the messengers of this House J. Miller, for whom the newspaper entitled" The London Evening Post" from Thursday, March 7th, to Saturday, March 9th, 1771, purported to be printed, of which a complaint was made in the House of Commons on the twelfth day of this instant March, and who for his contempt ill not obeying the order of this House for his attendance on the Honse upon 'l'hursday the fourteenth of this instant March, was ordered to be taken into the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms or his deputy attending this House, and who by virtue of the Speaker's warrant issued under the said order, had been taken into

16. "There was a numerous mob about the House, and many of them of the better class, They affronted some of the Court members, but were soon dispersed by the magistrates of We3tminster. who received the order of the House." Eztract fro". e-tt ... qf Mr Calcrqft t. Lord CMltAam.


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the clJ8tody of the said messenger, is a breach of the privilege of this House.

2. That the signing a warrant against the aaid messenger for haviug executed the said warrant of the Speaker is a breach of the privilege of this House.

S. That the holding of the messenger to bail for having exeeuted tbe aaid warrant of the Speaker is a breach of the privilege of this Honse.

4. That the Alderman be committed to the Tower.(17)

Great heat arose upon this question; several censures, not without threats, were thrown out, aud above thirty members quitted the Honse in a body with deelaratious of the utmost asperity.

Several attempts were made to bring Mr Oliver to a submissiou or at least au ackuowledgement of error, thereby to give an opportuuity of mitigating the punishment; bnt he continued intlexible, declaring that he acted from law and principle, and therefore would never submit to au imputation of guilt.(18) The motion for his commitment was on a division carried by a majority ofl32.(19) The Speaker's warrant was then issued for his commitment to the Tower. He was immediately taken iuto custody, but was permitted to sleep at bis own house in Fenchurch Street, where the Sergeant-at-Arms attended at eight o'clock in the morning, and took him in a coach to the Tower. Ou the same day a Court of Oommon Council resolved that tbe expense of the Aldermau's table during his imprisonment should be defrayed by the city.(20) The city of London bad taken the most active part in favor of its magistrate: "during these transactions," says the

17. Letter from Mr C,.)craft to Lord Chatham.

18. Annual Register,

19. Ayea 170, Noes 38.

110. Gentleman', MagaaiDe.


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Annual Register, .. a Conrt of Common Council had beeu held by a locum tenen« at Guildhall, by which public thanks in writing were presented to the Lord Mayor and the two Aldermen for having supported the privileges and franchise of the city. A committee of four aldermen and eight commoners was also appointed to assist in making their defence, with instrnctions to employ such counsel at they should think proper, on such an important occasion, and for that purpose to draw npon the Chamber of London for any amonnt not exceeding five hundred pounds.

At one o'clock on Wednesday, March 27th, the Lord Mayor left the Mansion House, accompanied by his committee and a vast number of merchauts, tradesmen, and other citizens, and proceeded to the House of Commons amidst tbe acclamations of the populace. The crowd was so great in Palace Yard and Westminster Hall, tbat it was with the utmost difficulty that many of the members made their way into tbe House. As often as a carriage appeared tbe mob stopped it, and compelled the coachman to give the name of his master, wbo was treated according to the estimation in which he was held by them. The glasses of Lord North's carriage were broken, and shortly after the chariot itself, by which his lordship received a slight wound. His hat was taken off and cut in pieces; the mob threw dirt at him, and dragged him on to the footway, where be struggled with some of them for a few minutes, and would certainly have been killed bad it not been for the ti mely assistance rendered him by one of the Lords of the Treasury and Sir William Meredith, for which be afterwards publicly thanked tbem in the House.(21) The carriages of Cbarles Fox and:ofhis brother Stephen were also broken open.tbeir clothes torn and their persons bespattered with mnd. One of the Justices attempted to

21. Letter from Mr Calcraft to Lord Chatham.


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read the riot act, but was eo pelted that he was obliged to desist. The staves of the eouatables too were wrested from them and brokeu in pieees.(22)

When these tumultuous proceedings were reported to the Ho~se, it direeted the magistrates of London and Westminster who were in attendance to go out immediately and give the proper orders for preserving the peace. The Sheriffs of London and Middlesex, who were members of the Honse, were also requested to go themselves to disperse the crowd. They accordingly went, and accompanied by several of the most popular members of the House, interfered personally in the crowd, remonstrating with the people upon the impropriety and danger of their conduct, and adjured them by everything that was dear and sacred to them to disperse and return to their respective homes. Accordingly by dint of persuasion, and eonvincing many what it was their duty to do, they cleared the Palace Yard of at least four-fifths of the mob.

lt was evening before the Honse could proceed to business. The order of the day for the attendance of the Lord Mayor was then read, and he was called upon for his defence. He said he looked upon his case as already prejudged, and would therefore add nothing to what he had before said. In consequence of the ill state of health from which his lordship was then suffering, it was proposed that he should only be committed to the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms. " The intended favor," says the Annual Register, "was utterly disclaimed by the Lord Mayor, who said he wished for none, and that whatever state his health might be in, he gloried in undergoing the same fate with his friend. The motion was accordingly amended, and the question for his commitment to the Tower esrried by 202 agaiust SII.

112. Wright'. Cavencliah Debateo.


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The popnlace took his horses Cram the coach, and drew it to Temple Bar, though it was then midnight, aud having conceived some suspicion of the Deputy Sergeant. at-Arms, who attended him, when they got there, they shut the gate, and informed his lordship that his company had been drawn to the utmost extent of their boundaries, and that they must now immediately get out. The Chief Magistrate comprehended the full extent of the danger they were in, and pledged his honor that the gentlemen with him were his particular friends, who were to accompany him home; upon which they proceeded to the Mansion House with loud huzzas. His lordship was then taken to the Tower.(22a) At the instigation of the Common Council writs of Habeas Corpus were issued. Crosby and Oliver were brought before Lord Mansfield and Lord Chief Justice De Grey. Serjeant Glynn and Mr Lee appeared as their counsel. But after a full hearing the judges declared themselves bound to acknowledge under such circumstances the power of commitment by the House of Commons, and consequently the prisoners were sent back to the Tower(22b), where they were kept prisoners until, on the prorogation of Parliament, on the 23rd of July, the House was no longer able to restrain them of their liberty, and they marched out of their prison, and were honored by an ovation Cram the multitude that had collected to witness the scene. The result of this battle between the city of Londou and the House of Commons was that the right of the public to know everything about tbe proceedings of Parliament was silently acknowledged, and has never since beeu questioned.

Suppose some great revolutionist, such as Lord Geo~ Gordon, to

lI2a ... When he (the Lord Mayor) entered the Tower he 10 .. half-drank, .wore, and behaved with a jollity ill-becoming the gravity of hie olBce or cauae."-Lord Orford's Memoirs, vol. iv., page 3M.

221>. Lord Mahon'. Hiotory ot England, vol. 6, page 289, a.d edition.


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be busy preaching up a riot, the mob to have actually risen, opened all the prisons in the metropolis and put the town in flames. Suppose the Fleet at the Nore to have mutinied, a captain or two to have been run np at the yard-arm, and a suspicion abroad that the infection might spread to Portsmouth, then there might possibly be some grounds for excludiug the public from a knowledge of what passed in either House of Parliament. But it seems now to be a settled question, it is admitted on all sides, by all parties, by the stoutest champion of parliamentary privilege, that the two Honsea mnst debate with open doors; that the public have a claim almost amounting to a right to be present, and that those who cannot hear are entitled as soon as possible to read all that passes.

"If the Commons," says Macaulay, "were to suffer the Lords to amend money Bills, we do not believe the people would care one straw about the matter. If they were to snffer the Lords even to originate money Bills, we donbt whether snch a surrender of their constitutional right would excite half so mnch dissatisfaction 88 the exclusion of strangers from a single diseussion. The gallery in which the reporters sit has now become a fourth estate of the realm. The publication of debates, a practice which seemed to the most liberal statesman of the old school full of danger to the safeguards of pnblic liberty, is now regarded by many persons as a safeguard tantamonnt and more than tantamount to all the rest together."(23)

23. EI8&1 on Hallam'. Conatitutiollll1 Histo'7.


CHAPTER VIII .

.. The grand debate, The papillar harangue, the tart reply, The logic and the wisdom and the wit,

And the loud Iaugh-I loog to know them all."

-COlli"""

The debates were now eagerly sought after, but the House of Oommons did nothing to facilitste the grati1lcation of the public palate; although it allowed the publication of its proceediugs, it still ignored, or preteuded to ignore, the preseuce of reporters at its sittiugs. When anything of importauce was anticipated, the gentlemen of the press used to march down to the House at an early hour, several hours in fact before the Honse begsn, and there they would have to wait with the crowd on the Gallery steps, until the appointed time when the door was opened. Already ennuye'd and exhausted, they would then rush through into the Gallery and scramble for a seat at the bsck, as that part was not only the best place for hearing and seeing, but also for tsking notes, as they had then no one to annoy them with inquiries as to who was who, or by gentle pushes with their elbows or knees to expedite the motion of their pencils. Well, when after all this labor they had gained a tolerably comfortable seat, they could not, like our modem reporters, go out and recruit the inner man with a chop or a glaBS of wine, and find their hard-won seat ready for them when they got back again. No, it was goue , their's was a mere title during oceupancy, and when they once quitted the actual possession, the seat was immediately filled op by someone else, and the unfortunate reporter had to look for auother. Crowded up


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like herrings in a tub, and with sensations very similar to those of barrelled oysters, there they would remain for hours, in fact until they had heard tbe debates. We say heard, for at that time note-books were only used by stealth or sub roaa, for when perceived by the attendants in the gallery, they were forthwith seized as contraband of war. Consequently reporters were obliged to have pretty good memories, as it was principally through merely listening to the speeches that they could make out their reports. Sometimes, however, they were fortnnate enough to have the assistance of a few notes from some member who happened to be present at the debate, and favored the re porters.

One of the most celebrated of these "memory" reporters was William Radcliffe, the husband of the eminent novelist of tbat name. It is said tbat this gentleman would carry the substance of the debates in his head straight to tbe compositors' room, and without referring to any notes, or committing any portion of his materials to paper, would there dictate to them two distinct articles embracing the principal points of wbat he had heard. Another of these" memorable " gentlemen was William Woodfall-not Junius's Woodfall, but his brother-who had so quick and tenacious a memory that it obtained for him the name of "Memory Woodfall;" and his renown was so great and so widely spread, that when strangers came np from the country to hear the debates, they asked in a breath "Which is the Speaker, aud which is Mr Woodfall? " He would sit in the gallery, from the time the door was opened until the rising of the House, without any other refreshment than a hard-boiled egg or two, which he would carefully take out of his coat-pocket, take off the shell in his hat, and devour with great gnsto the iadigestible dainty; stooping down all the while for fear the Sergeant-at-Arms should see him, and march him off for Inch an infraction of the rilles of the House against

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strangers. An anecdote is told of these hard-boiled eggs. Some of his fellow-reporters, who had a torn for practical joking, and from whom W oodfall always kept at a respeetfol distance, one evening took them out of his eoat-poeket, and replaced them with unboiled ones; no doubt to the admiration aud satisfaction of "Mr Memory .. when he took off the shell in his hat. When he had come away from the gallery, he woold immediately set to work, and from the mental memoranda he ,had taken, write ont his report, which was printed and published on the following evening in the " Diary," of which he was proprietor and editor, as well as reporter. He suffered a great dcal of persecution in his time ou account of his connection with the Press. He used jocosely to remark, that" he had been fined by the House of Lords, confined by the HoWIe of Commons, fined and confined by the Court of KiDg'S Bench, and indicted at the Old Bailey."

This mode of reporting certainly increased the sale of Wood Call's paper, but although it was very good in its way, it was not satisfac. tory; for by the time his version of the debates was read by the pub. lie they were rather stale-the bloom was off. This defect was soon perceived by Perry, the proprietor of the "Morning Chronicle," Woodfall's rival, and he thereupon devised a better plan. He introduced the system of having several reporters instead of one; and thus by a division of labor he was enabled to print and publish in the morning a report of the previous evening's debate. So by the time W oodfall had finished writing out his report, Perry's peper had been circulated allover London for hours. The conseqnence was, Wood. fall's paper fell off iu circulation, aDd Perry made a fortune. Perry was himself a very remarkably quick and good reporter. Dnring the trials of Admirals Palliser and Keppel he daily, for several weeks together, sent up seveu or eight columns of" copy" as his report, with· out assistance from anyone whatever, and the reports themselves


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were 80 well made tbat tbey increased the sale of the paper on wbich Perry was engaged by several thousands daily.(24)

Perry had tbe good Inck to pick out men of first-rate ability to fill np the ranks of his parliamentary corps, but notwitbstanding there were many men of genius in the Gallery, at the time we are speaking of reporters were very different from what they are now-a-days. They consisted, with some brilliant exceptions, of a low lot of Irish blackguards, who, it used to be said, came over to England to be porters or reporters as luck might have it. Tbey possessed neither good breeding nor any gentlemanly qualities; they had no idea of the laws of morality. They were a gang of drnnken rascals, who preferred Bellamy's coffee-room to the Gallery; who went np to the top of their ambition's ladder, or to the dogs; for notwithstanding all their vices they were men of ability and occasionally of genius; they were to. day frolicking in the snnshine of prosperity and good fortune, and tomorrow had not, perhaps, the wherewithal to bny a dinner, but mnst needs go sponging on their friends or such of their companions as happened to be better off than themselves. Mr Wyndham described them as a class of disreputable persons consisting of a collection of bankrnpts, lottery-oflice-keepers, footmen and decayed tradesmen.

We have a very lively and interesting sketch of one of this Irish brigade from the pen of Peter Finnerty, wbo was connected with the editorial department of the" Morning Chronicle." "Mark Supple was a big-boned Irishman and loud-voiced, and had as mucb wit and fun as an Irish porter could carry, often more than he himself could carry or know what to do with. He took his wine frequently at Bellamy's, (a great place for reporters in those days as well as l\I.P's), and theu went into the gallery and reported like a gentleman and a man of

240. Andrews'. British Journalism.


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genius. The members hardly knew tbeir own speeches again, but they admired his free and bold manner of dressing them np; none of them ever went to the printing-office of the 'Morning Chronicle,' to complain that the tall J rishman had given a lame sneaking version of their sentiments ; they pocketed the affront of their metamorphosis, and fathered speeches they had never made. Supple's way may be said to have been the hyperbole, a strange vein of Orientalism with a dash of the bog-trotter. His manner seemed to please, and he presnmed npon it. One evening as he sat at his post in the gallery waiting the issne of things, and a hint to hang tropes and figures upon, a dead silence happened to prevail in the House. It was when Mr Addington was Speaker. The bold leader of the" press gang" was never much on serions business bent; and at this time he was particularly full oC meat and wine: delighted therefore with the pause, but thinking something might as well be going forward, he called out lustily , A song from Mr Speaker.' Imagine Addington's long, prim, upright figure; his cousternation and utter want of preparation for, or a clue to repel such an interruption of the rules and orders of Parliament. The House was in a roar. Pitt, it is said, could hardly keep his seat for laughing. When the bustle aud confusion were abated, the Sergeant-at-Arms went up into the gallery, to take the audacious culprit into custody, and indignantly desired to kuow who it was, but nobody would tell; Mark Supple sat like a tower, on the hindermost bench of the gallery, imperturbable in his own gravity, and saCe in the faith of the brotherhood of reporters -who alone were in the secret; at length as the mace-bearer was making fruitless inquiries, and getting impatient, Mark poiuted to a fat Quaker, who sat in the middle of the crowd, and nodded assent, that he was the man. The Quaker was to his great surprise taken into immediate cnstody, but after a short altercation, and some fur-


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ther ex planation, he was released, and the hero of onr story put in his place for an hour or two, but let oft' on an assurance of his contrition, and a promise of showing less wit and more discretion for the futnre."(25) Mark was thoroughly an original, "he was indeed the licensed wag of the Gallery, and to my apprehension and recollection, possessed more of the humor of a Dean Swift, without acerbity or illnature, than any individual, perhaps, that has lived since his date. His drollery was truly Swiftish, and the muddling, snuffling, quaint way with which he drawled it ant, imparted au extra-laughable originality all his own. Decorous people ought not to laugh at funerals, or the anecdotes of Supple, related in the mourning-coaches which followed his hearse would, much as he was really regretted, have convulsed , Niobe all tears.' "(26)

Another of the old-fashioned reporters was Proby, who had never been out of London; never in a boat; never on the back of a horse. "To the end of the bag wigs he wore a bag; he was the last man that walked with a cane as long as himself, ultimately erehauged for an umbrella, which he was never seeu withont in wet weather or dry; yet he usually reported the debates in the Peers from memory without a note for the" Morning Chronicle," and wrote out two or three novels, depicting the social manners of the times! He was a strange feeder, and ruined himself in eating pastry at the confectioners' shops; he was always in a perspiration, whence George Colman christened him "King Porus," and he was always so punctual to a minute, that when he arrived in sight of the office-window, the cry used to be, "There's Proby-it is half-past two," and yet he ncver set his watch. If ever it came to right time I cannot tell; but if you asked him what o'clock it was, he would look at it, and calculate something

25. Hunt'. Fourth Estate.

26. Jerd .... •• Autobiography, vol, 1, p.-87.

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of this sort, 'I am twenty-six minutes past seven-four-twenty-one from twelve-forty-it is just tbree minntes past three I' "(27)

One of tbe last oftbe memory reporters was Robert Heron, who died in 1807, wben be was" released by tbe friendly hand of fever from that abject degraded state of the extremest poverty, which we only read of in the lives of the greatest geniuses, who were also great prodigals; having exhausted every means of relief, baving ruined mind and body, having worn ont and disgusted every friend , shipwrecked in the streets of London and carried into the haven of a hospital only to die a pauper's death, nnknown, unwept."(28)

About the commencement of the present century Coleridge was for a short time a parliamentary reporter, but he was not a good hand at it-he was not sufficiently active. On one .oeeasion, as we are told by his biographer, Mr Gillman, he went down to the House very

early, and waited with the mob on the gallery steps.

There was a

great crowd, and he got much knocked about, and was so tired when he at last got a seat, that he directly dropped off asleep, in which state he remained pretty nearly all the time the House was addressed by Mr Pitt, whose speech Coleridge bad come down specially to report. But from the little he had heard, and from what he could pick up from others, he went home and wrote out a most brilliant speech for the miuister. But Me Stuart says, "I remember the occurrence perfectly, though I do not recollect all the circumstances. In considering the overtures for peace by Bonaparte in Jllnuary 1800, Parliament had by large majorities voted money to support a continuance of the war, and some time after this, on the 17th February, M r Pitt moved for half a million to be sent to Guernsey to assist our different allies. In two spirited speeches he said, that after the stroag

27. Jerdan·. Autobiography, vol. 1, p. 167. 26. ADdrew·. History of Briti.h Journalism.


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votes to support the war, he did not suppose there would be any opposition to this vote of money, and hence, I think, there was no crowd at the gallery at an early hour Cor seats, as no debate was expected, but Mr Tierney rose, and made a speech in opposition to the vote, to which Mr Pitt made a powerful and brilliaut reply quite unerpeetedly. Coleridge, who was sitting' with me in the gallery, certainly reported a part of, it not all that speech, which was not a very long one."


CHAPTER IX.

" Still harping on my danghter."

-Hamid.

On the 21st of March, 1801, a complaint was made in the House of Lords, by Lord Walsingham, that some of the speeches and proceedings of the House had been published and misrepresented by the " Morning Herald." Lord Loughborough, who then occupied the Woolsack, said it was a great breach of privilege even to make comments in the newspapers about the speeches in Parliament. The printer and publisher underwent the same process which many of their predeeessors had suffered: they were brought to the bar, where they apologized, were reprimanded by the Speaker and discharged on payment of the fees. On the 17th April, the editor and printer of the" Albion Daily Newspaper" werp committed to prison for a like offence, but the House shortly afterwards released the printer on his petition. In 1809 and 1810 complaints of misrepresentation were made, but the cases were not proceeded wit.h, and the matter dropped.

It was not always that the newspapers gave lengthy accounts of the debates, for very often, in fact generally, they satisfied themselves with a concise account of aome of the principal speeches.

How the mouths of their readers must have watered at such intelligence as that" Mr Sheridan rose, and during the space of five hours and forty minutes, commanded the admiration and attention of the House by an oration of almost nnexampled excellence, uniting the most convincing closeness and accnracy of argument with the most

0;9""ed by Google

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luminous precision and perspicuity of language, and alternately giving force and energy to truth by solid and substantial reasoning-c-en, lightening the most extensive and involved subjects with the purest clearness of logic and the brightest splendor of rhetoric!" Snch a report

" Often more enhanced The thirst than slaked it."

In 1810, during the investigation into the conduct of the Government in sending the disastrous expedition to the Scheldt, the honorable l\Ir Yorke moved the enforccment of the standing order for the exclusion of strangers with thc view, as he himself freely acknowledged, of preventing the public knowing anything of the debates. A few days afterwards Sheridan moved for the appointment of a committee to enquire iuto the propriety of this step, which he described as beiug as unconstitutitional as nncalled for. He stnck up manfully for the Press and the impartiality of the reporters. It was then that he delivered that famons speech in which he exclaimed, "Give me but the liberty of the Press, and I will give to the minister a venal House of Peers, I will give him a corrupt and servile House of Commons, I will give him the full sway of the patronage of office, I will give him the whole host of ministerial influence, I will give him all the power that place can confer upon him to purchase up submission and overawe resistance; yet, armed with the dignity of the press, I will go forth to meet him undismayed. I will attack the mighty fabric he has reared with that mightier engine, I will shake down corruption from its height, and bury it amid the ruins and abuses it was meant to shelter."

His motion was certainly rejected by a majority of 166 over 80, bnt the language of the House against the Press was such, that the indignation of constituents was raised against their represcntatives.(29)

29. Hanaard'. Debates, vol. 16, (1810), p.323, 846.


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A few days afterwards Mr Yorke rose to complain of a plaClll'd stnck npon the walls of the metropolis, challenging the eye of the passenger and defying all consequences. It announced itself as the journal of the " British Fornm," and stated to the public that' " Last Monday, after an interesting discussion, it was nnanimously decided that the enforcement of the standing orders by shutting out strangers from the gallery of the House of Commons ought to be censored, as an insidious and ill-timed attack opon the liberty of the Press, as tending to aggravate the discontents of the people, and to render th.eir representstives objects of jealous suspicion." The paper was then delivered in and read, and the printer of it was taken into the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms, and brought to the bar. On confessing his fault, and divulging the name of John Gale Jones as the person by whom he was employed to print the offensive matter, he was discharged with a severe reprimand from the Speaker, and mirabile diet" without payment of the fees. Jones was ordered to attend the Hoose; he complied, and was immediately committed to Newgate.

The poblic were highly exasperated at this proceeding 00 the part of the Honse. Sir Fraocis Burdett took the matter op, and poblished a letter in Cobbett's" Political Register," entitled" Sir Francis Burdett to his constitnents, denying the power of the Honse of Commons to imprison the people of England." A debate on the sobject took place in the Honse, which lasted three days, and resulted in Sir Francis being ordered to be committed to the Tower. The Speaker's warrant for his apprehension was issned: Sir Francis shnt himself np in his hoose in Piccadilly, barred his doors and gates, and boldly declared he would not go to prison, and sent a letter to the Speaker to that effect, and of his contempt for the House and the illegality of the warrant. His residence was surrounded by tbousands crying oot " Burdett for ever," and they compelled all persons, rich or poor,to join


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them. The windows of unpopular statesmen were broken, and stones lIew about in nll directions. Constables' staftB were of no avail in qnelling the riotous conduct of the mob. The military were called out, and quickly cleared the streets; not however before wounds had been given and heads smashed. On the following day the Sergeant-at-Arms got by some means or other into Sir Francis's house, and gave him the Speaker's warrant, wbich he put into his pocket, and then turned the Sergeant into the street. In consequence oC the continued excitement among the people, a couple of troops of horse and foot-guards were stationed in Piccadilly, The mob collected, and was as unruly as before; they bombarded the carriages of tbose who would not join in their outragcons and disorderly proceedings. The cavalry drove away the mob, but quickly to return. The riot act was read, and confusion without end ensued. The metropolis was in a turmoil. Bonaparte thought it a revolution. It was determined by the Honse of Commons to break opeu the Baronet's mansion, and execute the Speaker'S warraut by the aid of Coree and the military.

The time chosen for the attack was the morning; Sir Francis, with several of his relatives and friends, were at breakfast in the drawing-room on the top lloor. A ladder was reared ,up outside, and presently a constable's head appeared in sight looking through one of the windows; shortly afterwards that functionary threw up the 8B8h, and entered the room. But O'Connor, a friend of Burdett's, pushed the constable out again, and fastened the window. The police being thus balRed in their attempts to get into the house throngh the drawing-room weut into the area, and thence into the kitchen, through which they proceeded up stairs; and with their assistauee the Sergeant-at-Arms arrested Sir Francis, "ho under the escort of a troop of cavalry, was forthwith marched oft' to the Tower, where he was kept a prisoner until the seasion of Parlisment was at an end. Sir


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Francis brought au action in the King's Bench against the Speaker for false imprisonment, which was tried before Lord Ellenboro ugh, when thejury returned a verdict against the Baronet. He also bronght an action against the Sergeant-at-Arms for the same cause, and with the like result, and one against Lord Moira, the Governor of the Tower, which was dismissed for want of a jury. Sir Samuel Romilly tried hard to get Jones discharged, but he was outvoted by 160 against 112; 80 that gentleman was confined in Newgate until the end of the session, when the power of Parliament to imprison was at an end.

Matters went on very quietly for a short time, for newspapers were gradually improving, and not so many 'complaints as usual were made against them. In 1812, when it was moved to bring a newspaper printer to the bar for misreporting the proceedings, Brougham, who always stuck up for the Gallery, said, " Gentlemen should consider the disadvantages nuder which the reports of their debates were taken," and this being a saying 80 very unparliamentary, he was immediately called to order.

Notebooks were now introduced into the House, aud suffered to be used with impunity, but still no accommodation was afforded to the reporter beyond that which was grauted to strangers in general. The Press complained loudly of this ill-usage, but the Honse would not listen to any of their petitions; 80 there was no other way but to take the law into their own hands. A short time before the death of Mr Pitt, that celebrated minister was about to make a speech on a question of more than usual interest to the public; and directly the gallery was opeued it was filled to the very door, and the reporters could neither by persuasion nor force obtain a seat; many could not even obtain standing-room. This was not to be endured. They all met in solemn conclave to discuss the matter, and the result was a strike. And wh~n the morning papers appeared on the following


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day not one single word or tittle of the minister's flowery oration was to be seen. The blank was filled np with an account of the grievances which the reporters had to submit to when at their labors.

This dodge turned out well, and the Press gained its point. The House confessed its negligence, and the back bench of the strangers' gallery was immediately appropriated to the exclnsive use of tbe reporters, and those gentlemen were also further accommodated witb a door in the middle through which they alone had a right to enter whenever they wished. This was a great boon and saving of time and patience to the gentlemen of the Press; and shortly afterwards the Honse, perceiving the good results of this concession, provided a small room just outside the gallery with the words" Reporters' Room" written on the glass panels of the door. Here the reporters could leave their hats and coats, and retire during the divisions, or wait nntil their" turn " came on. When olf dnty they might also recruit the pbysical man by going upstairs into the coffee-room allotted to the use of strangers, which was just outside the room set apart for members. "And here I may note," says Mr Jerdan of" Literary Gazette" fame, and a quondam parliamentary reporter, " that on the landing on the top of the stairs on a small table they (the reporters and strangers) could have excellent cold beef and beetroot salad for three shillings and six pence, while the luxurious legislators withiu might indulge in veal-pies, and have the most admirable miniature steaks and chops brought to them hot from the gridiron before their eyes; there was an oddity and piquancy about this 'If hich made a dinner here exceedingly popular. I might also add tbat on one evening of my early reporting career, when tbe outer bole happened to be full, (individnals known to the servants being sometimes permitted to pass inside as if by accident,) I sat at the same small table with the Marquis of Wellesley, then gloriana from India, the


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Dnke of Wellington, then (I think) an indifferent orator and Secretary for Ireland, and Mr Canning, in after life my idolized friend, who were paying their devoirs to the tiny chops aforesaid." (30)

Although the reporters had obtained the back-row in the gallery for their exclusive use, this concession was strictly limited to that part. In 1819 Peter Finnerty, whose name we have mentioned a few pages back, got into a slight mess. On the 15th June he was observed by the messenger in the gallery sitting in the front row, taking notes of what was passing in the House, and when desired to desist, refnsed with an oath to do so, and advanced his note-book higher than before. On thia being reported to the Speaker, the colprit was taken into the custody of the Sergeant-et-Arma, brought to the bar, reprimanded and discharged" on the payment of the fees." Poor Peter gave a very poor excuse for his conduct; for although he had been a reporter for the preceding twenty years, he pleaded ig. norance of the rule, that the reporters were to confine themselves to the back row.

But our readers will be asking what the Honse of Lords has been doing all this while; we have merely as yet paid attention to the Lower Honse. The noble Lords were as bad as, if not worse than the Commons. About forty yeBl"ll ago note-books were not allowed in their Lordships' House. A reporter not wishing to trust entirely to his memory had to keep his pencil and paper below the level of the bar; for if anything in the shape of writing materials appeared in sight of their Lordships, they were qnickly struck down by one of the messengers in attendance. Their Lordships, however, in a while perceived the advautages of the course which the Commons had adopted, and they slightly relaxed their strict regulations, and winked

30. Autobiocrapb1 of Willi:- Jerdan. H&Il, Virtue and Co., 1852.


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at note-books when they appeared in sight. One reporter had sullicient impudence and courage to rest his book on their lordships' bar, and this, remaining unnoticed by any of the ollicials of the House, inspired with similar courage the other reporters, who quickly followed the example of their leader. On one occasion, shortly after the above experiment, one of the gentlemen of tbe Press was leaning over the bar with his note-book in hand, wheu Lord Eldon, the " doubting" Chancellor, proceeding to the bar to receive a deputation from His Majesty's faithful Commons, caught the note-book with his robe and knocked it down. One would have imagined that the reporter was immediately pounced upon by the Usher of the Black Rod or some of his attendants and taken into custody for so unlucky a mishap. It was just the reverse, however; for the noble lord stopped, picked np the leaves npon which were written the notes of the passing debate, and presented tbem ';0 their owner with an engaging smile and a courteous apology. This settled the question at once; the presence of the reporters had been virtually recognised, and there was quickly a manifest improvement in the reports, Not long afterwards, during the agitation of the Catholic Emancipation Question, when, from the crowds that nightly attended the debates, reporters could only with great dilliculty work at their vocation, a complaint having been made to the House, a portion of the space below the bar was railed off and allotted to their exclusive use. Moreover, when a strangers' gallery was added to the House, seats were set apart for them similar to those in the Commons .

.In 1819 John Payne Collier was, on the complaint of Mr Canning, brought to the bar for having misrepresented a speech of Mr Hume's in the" Times." In his defence at the bar,:Mr Collier pleaded in excuse, that from the number of persons passing and repassing the scat which he occupied, it was utterly impossible to follow the honor-


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able gentleman through his observations. So, being anxious to learn what had occurred during the confusion to which we have alluded, he had asked a stranger who was sitting before him, and from him received, if not the exact words, at least the substance of the report complained of. It was the first time during the ten years he had been engaged in reporting, that any objection had been made against a report that had come from his pen. He was ordered nem, con. ioto the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms, but was next day discharged with a reprimand, in which the Speaker said, " Grave and serious as your offence is, the manner in which yon conducted yourself whilst under examination at the bar, and the explanation you then offered, led this House to the conviction that your conduct was not intentional, and induced them consequently to treat you with a lenity, which under no other circumstances could such au offence have either suggested or justified. Your petition of this day has been received and fully considered, and the terms in which it is conceived, and the sorrow and regret expressed in it, coupled with your conduct at the bar, to which I have before adverted, induces this House in the further extension of mercy now to order that you be reprimanded and discharged. Let not, however, that lenity be misunderstood; let it not be forgotten that it is alone from the indulgence of this House that there is room for the commission of any such offence, and that the abuse of such indulgence aggravates the offence. Let this be a public warning, that the repetition of this offence after the notice that has now been taken of it, canuot but be considered as wilful, and, by whomsoever it may be committed, will assuredly be visited with the utmost rigor and the severest punishment."(31) Considering the difficulties under which the reporters labored, the distance

31. Parliamentary Debates, Vol. 40 (1819), pages 1138-50, 1163-1177.


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they were from the speakers, and the noise of members chatting in a hundred different conversations and going in and out of the House, the general seenracy of the reports of those days is a circumstance greatly to be wondered at.

Many tremendous and ludicrous mistakes have been made by reporters in by-gone times. Burke's famous sentiment "Virtue does not depend on climates or degrees," first came to the world as " Virtue does not depend on climaxes and trees." Wilberforce was once reported as having said in the House of Commons, "Potatoes make men healthy, vigorous and active, but what is still more in their favour they make men tall I more especially was he led to say so, liS being himself rather under the common size; and he must lament that his guardians had not fostered him upon that genial vegetable."

Shorthand had not fifty years ago attained to a great deal of excellence, and those who wrote it were not over skilful at their calling. Lord Erskine said to Mr Howell, the anthor of" State Trials," that he was nsed to the systematic bad grammar of the shorthand writers. " None of them, except Gurney, ever use any tense but the present. If the speaker is speaking of any transaction as ancient as the Flood, it is still the present tense-' Noah enters into the ark:" Lord Longhborough, who was by no means a friend to reporters, said,(32) "Of all people shorthand-writers are farthest from correctness; no men's words that they hear ever again return. They are in general ignorant as acting mechanically; by not considering the antecedent,

82. He once said, " I do BSBnre the noble Duke, I have not contaminated my hando with any connection with a newspaper; I disdain to taint my hando with ouch a connection." On being once asked whether he really delivered in thc Honse of Commons a speech which the newspaper .. cribed to him, he replied, "Why, to be snre, there are many things in that speech which I did oay, and there are more I wish I had said."-Lord Campbell's Lives of the Lord Chancellora.

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and catching the sound and not the seuse, they pervert the meaning of speakers and make them appear as ignorant as themselves."(33)

In 1831 the House of Lords was one evening closed against strangers, on the motion of the Earl of Mansfield, on acconnt of the Times having caned the Earl of Limerick a "thing with human pretensions."

In the same year the eccentric and witty Colonel Sibthorpe made a complaint abont the "Times" giving incorrect versions of his speeches, which were always reported in that Journal as having been continnally interspersed with exclamations of ridicule, etc., such as a "laugh," "laughter," "continued laughter," "bursts of laughter," " oh, oh I" "question, question," "order, order."

Iu 1832 a complaint was made that the "Times" had published a report of the proceedings of the House of Commons which took place while the doors were closed against strangers; but when it was discovered that two of the members, oue of wbom was Joseph Hume, had furnished the report, the matter dropped. Many complaints were made at this time about the misrepresentstion and suppression of speeches, but after being just mentioned to the House the matter generally dropped.

33. Lord Campbell's Livea of the Lord Chancellors.


CHAPTER X,

" The man who deems himseit so great, And his importance of such weight,

Th .. t ..n sround, in .. 11 th&t'. done, Hust move and act for him aloneWillle&rn in school of tribulation

The folly ofthis expectation."

Mr Daniel O'Connell had several encounters with the newspapers.

In 1833 he had a slight affair with the Gallery, and crossed his lance with the reporters. In that year, when he WIIS pouring forth orations by the score, both in the House and out of it, fuming and sweating, he got up in his place, and complained that the morning papers had misbehaved themselves. They had not reported the learned gentleman's speeches at sufficient length, they had not given in their newspapers a report of all that it had pleased him to express, which WIIS an injustice to the conntry; for the public were entitled to the full benefit of every word he nttered; and what they did enshrine in printer's ink wore by no means sueh a favorable aspect as he wished. Nay, he went so far lIS to say, that they had not only non-reported him, but had on many occasions misrepresented him, and that, too, maliciously and wilfnlly. Now he never WIIS a favorite in the Gallery, and this fierce dennnciation still further increased the dislike for him. It was rather a strong expression to use against the reporters, who were for the most part gentlemen by birth and education. Such offensive language was not to be tolerated. They immediately flew to arms. Thcy had been given the lie ill their face,

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and they forth with raised their voices in vindication of their characters. As the accnsation had been made generally, the whole body of the parliamentary reporters met in solemn conclave to discuss the course they ought to pursue under the circumstances. They unauimously agreed to put the fiery orator, the member for all Ireland, into Coventry for a short time, nntil his offence should have been expiated by passing throngh the fire of silence. This certainly was the best thing they could have done; in fact, it was about the only means of retaliation in their power.

The reporters on "the Times" sent a letter to the editor of that Journal,informing him that withont any desire to prejudice the interests of the establishment by which they were employed,and with which manyof them had been long connected, and to which all of them were sincerely attached, they had deliberately come to a determiuation, not to report any of Mr O'Connell's speeches, until he should have retracted, as publicly as he had made it, the calumnious assertion that their reports were designedly false. When this letter appeared in print, Mr O'Connell was, as may be easily imagined, in a greater rage than ever. The reporters wanted an apology for what he had said. He hadn't one to offer. A lengthy speech of the learned gentleman's on the interminable Irish poor-law question had, a short time previous to this skirmish, been compressed into the compass of eigbteen lines and a half. He alleged that the greatest degree of partiality, as regarded him and other members who acted with him, was shown by the "Times" and other papers; while the more impartial reports were those of the " Morning Post," the reason, he alleged, being that on the" Times" the reporters were all Irishmen, while on the "Post" they were all Scotchmen. This, however, was very far from being true; for at that time there was not a single Scotchman connected with the reporting department of the latter paper. He ascribed the inferiority


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of the reports to incapacity in the reporters as the most charitable view of the subject he could take, and attributed that incapacity to the falling off in their wages.

It must be confessed that for two or three years previously, the reo ports had been far below the average both as to ability and impnrtiality. Many newspapers sometimes wilfully omitted to report some of the speeches at all,for the purpose of retaliating on members against whom they had conceived some dislike. When Lord Brougham was a member of the Honse of Commons, ~e happened to say something displeasing to the reporters; the consequence of which was that for some time his speeches were not reported or noticed in the newspapers in any way whatever. Well, the honorable gentleman procured from the stamp-office a list of the Journal proprietary of the metropolis, and vowed he would wage war with them until he had defeated them, and would move day by day for their appearance at the bar of the House for breach of privilege. On Friday, the 26th July, he laid on the table of the House a copy of the" Times," in which was printed the above letter from the reporters, and moved that Messrs and Mrs Lawson, the proprietors and printers of the paper, be ordered to attend at the bar on the following Monday; but on an appeal to his gallantry he withdrew the name of Mrs Lawson. He said, the reporters had boasted that they succeeded in putting down some of the greatest men th is country had produced, including the names of Tierney and Wyndham, the latter of whom had conciliated them with a dinner.

Sir Robert Peel stood up manfully for the fonrth estate. He said he had never held any commnnication with any reporter, he had never correeted a speech of his during his life, and beyond, perhaps, at the request of some member of the Press, sending details of figures, he knew nothing whatever beyond the knowledge which was to be gained by a perusal of the papers. Such being the case, he could have no object in


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stating more than was his opinion regarding the general aecnracy and. impartiality of the reports which appeared in the newspapers, and he had no hesitation in saying that, though occasionally speeches were much curtailed-the interest of the newspaper proprietor being to supply his readers with a transcript, and not a literal report of what passed in Parliament; that was not too mnch to be wondered atthe reports of the proceedings of the House were made with great fidelity, impartiality, and aecuraey. During many years of his life, as minister of the Crown, he had occasion to deliver speeches involving II variety of calculations and details of figures, yet on no occasion did he remember an instance in which an individual connected with a newspaper had applied to him for any assistance beyond, perhaps, a statement of his figures, or in any way with a view of obtaining personal advantage, lest their character for impartiality and disinteresteduess should be doubted. Well, then, was it to be imagined, when. forty or fifty of those gentlemen, mBny of whom had held commissions in the army and navy, lUany of whom had received an aeademical education, many of whom were entered at the Inns of Court, and a portion of whom were actually in practice at the bar, that they, as gentlemen, possessed of gentlemanly feelings, could tamely suffer the base imputations, which the honorable member for Dnblin had cast on them, knowing as they did, that such imputations were unfounded, and that there existed not a single instance in which their character, as a body, could be arraigned?

Messrs Lawson were ordered to attend at the bar, bnt when. the day for their appearanee arrived, the order was discharged, on a division, by the majority of 105.(34) On business again proceeding, after the division, the" big beggar-man" called out, " Mr Speaker,

34. Ayes 153, Noes 48.


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J think J see strangers in the gallery," and the reporters were excluded for the remainder of the evening. He thought he conld win over the Morning Post to report him, but in that respect he reckoned withont his host, and must have been awfully surprised when he found that, in the next morning's impression, that Journal had a flaming leader against him, speaking ont in vindication of the Press. Speaking of the honorable gentleman, it said, "And accordingly, not being able to draw down the resentment of the House of Commons upon those who were the first and principal objects of his displeasure, he bethought himself of the resource of clearing the gallery, that is, of relieving the whole body of reporters in attendance upon the Honse of their arduous labors for that evening, of disencumbering the columns of the morning papers of this day of a mass of matter, which might have been good reading, and might jnst as likely have been very bad reading, of depriving the people of all means of knowing, for one night at least, what their representatives have been about, and of disappointing varions well-meaning and simple-minded gentlemen from the country, who had manifested so mnch bad taste as to appropriate one of these fine summer nights, which may be spent so much better in a thousand other plaees, to the gallery of the House of Commons. So vigilant was O'Connell to prevent any evasion of this stern decree, that he exercised his authority over the door-keeper, to debar the gentlemen connected with the press from access to the room adjacent to the gallery, which by the favor of the speaker had been appropriated to their accommodation, and we are told, that he even visited the apartment in the roof from which ladies are sometimes permitted to hear the debates, lest some wicked reporter should have intruded himself into this political bondoir in feminine disguise."

He on one occasion complained of the publication in the" Times " of two speeches which had been ascribed to him, but which in reality


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he had never made. That Jonrnal inquired into the matter, and having found that the reports could not be verified, discharged the reporter, till he should satisfy Mr O'Connell and enable him to make a statement to the House, acquitting him of any design to misrepresent him. The editor wrote a letter to that effect to M r O'Connell, which the reporter, Mr Nugent, carried to the honorable member for Dublin, and confessed that the speeches complained of were of his own invention. He could not deny it, but excused himself on the ground of there being a great noise in the Gallery, at the time Mr O'Connell was speaking. This was not true, and Mr O'Connell was aware of it: and he made at once the observation, "Why, a noise might prevent you from hearing oue speech that was made, but I eertainly cannot understand how it conld enable you to hear two speeches that were not made at all." Nugent pleaded guilty, and threw him. self on the mercy of his enemy, as he had no other means of snbsistence but as a reporter; and be it said to the honor of Mr O'Connell, he not only forgave him, but through his humanity and interceaaion Nugent was again taken into the service of the" Times," and was in the Gallery when Mr O'Connell made the terrific onslaught we have previously mentioned, and was one of those who signed the ronnd roo bin before alluded to. It would perhaps have been better had he abo stained from doing BO.

N ugeut afterwards denied his offence in a letter which he addressed to the members of. the House of Commons. He said "I will not condescend to notice the 'maasa' tone expressive of the arrogant disposition of the man and his long habits of power, nor the 'Sirs' with which this statement is so artfully. studded, in order to conver the impression that I was some menial-minded houndling that felt awed by the presence of a member of parliament. Bring me to your bar, and judge for youraelvea if mine is a cringing


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temperament. Cringe to mortal man I-Cringe to Mr O'Connell of all men I-Cringe I I know not what it means. If, indeed, I had cringed a little earlier in life, I should not now be open to Mr O'Connell's abuse, and my existence would not perhaps be a barren blank. At the very time that Mr O'Connell represents me as thus throwing myself on his mercy, and begging for my bread, T was a contributor to two periodicals, not to say anything of my contributions to Lerdner's Cyclopredia, to which the first names in literature were and are contributors. Mr O'Connell's very first assertiou in this statement is an error, indeed the whole of it is so directly contrary to my own distinct recollections of the circnmstances of our iuterview, that I can ooly account for it by the supposition that he is confounding me in his own recollection with some other person. In addition to my own solemn assertion that he has totally misstated tbe facts, I can bring as strong circumstantial evidence as the case can well admit of, to show that, so far from my throwiug myself on his mercy, I actually set him at defiance, so far as I was myself personally concerned.

" I deny, in the first place, that I took any letter from the editor of the Times on that occasion, or any other occasiou (and if any such has been written I can only say that it was without my knowledge, as it would most assuredly be contrary to my inclination). I solemnly affirm that I told him that the sole object I had in seeking an interview with him was, that he might saddle the blame (whatever it was) on the- right horse,-that lowed it as II duty to the management of the Times, which might be a1I'ected by my indiscretions, however unintentional, to state that it was not to blame, -that I alone was the offender, and that' me, me, adlwmtplifeci,'on me alone should fall his resentment. I will go further, and post-

Alvely affirm that not a single expression in referenee to the probable


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effects of the transaction on my means of livelihood passed between us. Does Mr O'Connell remember my telling him that I was glad of an opportunity of showing him up as plagiary of the Westminster Review P Does he remember that, while I maintained, as I do still, that the spirit of his own speech was correctly given, I unfeignedly regretted being instrumental in giving what was then, and still is, the conviction of my mind, was the purport of Mr Hunt's observetions? Does he recollect that my regret, as I then expressed, and as still I feel it, was founded on higher considerations than the mere accidents of reporting; and I told him that, whether the insinuation was founded in truth or 'not, the occurrences of private life should never be mixed up with political discussions? Does Mr O'Connell remember the night in which he made his eight-column speech, as it appeared afterwards in the Times, on the Irish Coercion Bill P Does he remember that on that occasion, on giving me some documents important to the illustration of his speech, he warmly clasped my hand, and in his most impressive manner told me, all angry recollections connected with the transaction of the preceding year had long since been dismissed from his mind-that he was convinced I was a gentleman of high feelings, who would be incapable of wilfully misrepresenting him, and that, though we differed on the subject of the poor-laws, he trusted we ever should be friends P "

One might presume from these proceedings that Daniel O'Connell was always glad to have his speeches reported. So he was, when they were delivered in the Honse, but when outside, his likings changed. He was once making a " speechifying" tour in his native country, and was delivering orations of a most revolutionary character. Intelligence of these proceedings having reached the ears of the Government, some English shorthand-writers belonging to the reporting staff of Mr Gurney were sent over to take down the harangues of


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the fiery orator. Their first appearance was at a meeting at Kantuck. They went on to the platform raised for the oeession, and introduced themselves to Mr O'Connell; he shook hands with them, and said to those around him, "Nothing can be done until these gentlemen are afforded every requisite accommodation." This was at once provided, and having previously assured Mr O'Connell that they were "perfectly ready" and well provided, the learned gentleman came forward to address the people, and commenced his speech, to the great dismay of the Englishmen, in the Irish langnage. Having explained to the assembly who they were, and how he had humbugged them, he continued to address the meeting in the same language. The people laughed all tbe while at the English reporters, who joined very good-humoredly in the laugh raised against them.(S5)

An Irish member once ealled a reporter to task for misrepresenting 8 speech, with which he had favored the Honse. The reporter had drawn his pen nnder some passages which he wished to be emphasized. When brought to the bar, he said in his defence that the report was entirely correct. "That may be," said the Hibernian orator, "but did I spake them in Italics? "

After O'Connell's row with the newspapers the reports began to increase iu bulk and heaviness, so much so that a more readable form was introduced iu addition for those who had neither time nor inclination to wade through the olosely-printed columns. This was to give a summary of the debates, such as we have now in nearly all the morning papers. The first person employed on the "Times" for this purpose was Horace Twiss, the biographer of Lord Eldon, and the originator of the system. When he died in 1848, he was succeeded by Mr Tyas, who was in turn succeeded by Mr Dodd, the

SII. The Fourth Estate, by Fred. Xnight Hunt, Bogue, 1800.


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author of the Parliamentary Companion and a Captain of Yeomanry Cavalry.

Enmity against the reporters seems to have been hereditary in the O'Connell family. In this respect the cloak of the father had fallen on the son. In 1849 John O'Connell, who possessed the weaknesees without the genius of his father, had a tilt with the Gallery. It appears that on the 8th Juue a debate took place on the Irish poorJaw question. A diviaion being called for, strangers were ordered to withdraw, and in those days strangers, including the reporters, had really to quit the gallery. Just. after the reporters had left the House in the nanal way, John O'Connell made a speech, but too late, of course, to bave it reported. Somehow or other the honorable gentleman fancied the reporters had seen him get np to speak, and had left the House (or the purpose of vexing him. So when they returned to the gallery, he immediately rose, and said, ~r the specimeu of fairness which he had experienced, when he was going to express his opinion on the poor-Jaw, immediately before the diviaion we have mentioned, there was but one course left him, either to insist on the House enforciug jnstiee to its members iu the matter of their privileges, or that they did away with an absurd practice, .. and therefore, Sir," waving his hand towards the reporters' gallery, " I see strangers present." Loud eries of "Oh, oh," and groans followed this announcement from all parts of the Honse. The gallery was accordingly cleared, and when the reporters had been excluded for about half-an-hour, a division took place on some question before the House, and the gallery. door having been again thrown open, after the announcement of the numbers the reporters again marcbed to their posts, but were quickly ordered to withdraw amidst loud laughter; and for the space of more than two hours, owing to the intervention or John O'Connell, the reporters were excluded from


THE GALLERY. 93

the House, and the dehates proceeded with closed doors. Mr Tre. lawney, a member of the House, however, sent a report to the morning papers of what took place in their absence.

As might be expected, this arbitrary mode of procedure caused a great deal of wrathful indignation throughont the country. The Times took the matter np, and favored its readers with one of those slashing articles for which the Thunderer was and is still 80 justly celebrated. Speaking of John O'Connell, it aaid, " Unfortnnately for the country (since he is a member of the House of Commons,) and still more nnfortunately for himself, he is extremely conceited and not very apt to ealculate consequences. The leading Journals and we ourselves must freely plead guilty to the charge, will not eneumber our space with two or three columna per night of the senseless declamation he is in the habit of pouring forth. Hence this immortal passion I He is endeavoring to starve us into compliance. If we will not report his own tedious orations, we are not admitted into the gallery at all. We care not. We will stand between the public and this in1Iiction. So long as we can lay our handa on any marvellous A merican incidents, any account oC wonderful Scotch salmon, any reports of the proceedings oC turn. pike meetings in Walea or of protection gatheringa in Essex, while a single fanatic raves on Kennington common, or a single German professor perorates in the assembly at Frankfort, we are sure of being able to lay before the public more entertaining and useful matter than will ever iasne from the lips of Mr John O'Connell.-Mr John O'Connell is an exaggeration and a caricature of the national defects of his countrymen. We find him ever in extremes. He is all for what he would call • sthoppin the supploys' or • exeluthin sthraugers' upon the slightest provocation. He has but one wespon and that a shillelagh. which he handles, npon all occasions, like a ten •

• tumbler at Dounybrook Fair in the palmy days of that Irish festival.


Charles Garrton - The Gallery - A Sketch of The History of Parliamentary Reporting and Reporters - 1860

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