four millions of the public money, and to have perpetrated frauds of thirty per cent. in his contract for soldiers' blankets, bedding, coals, &c. What was most horrible was, that while this unbounded waste was going on, everything was grudged to the soldiers and sailors. So poor was the pay to the surgeons, that few were to be had, and the men bled to death in battle in consequence. So poor was the pay of the sailors, never having been raised since the time of Charles II., though the nation now paid a hundred million a-year to the army and navy, that it led to the famous mutiny of the fleet in 1797. The same evil of peculation and fraudulent contracts had been destroying the sailors as well as the soldiers. The food was deficient in quantity, and of a quality, says the historian, "that a decent dog would hardly touch." They complained of the prize-money being nearly all absorbed by the admirals and superior officers; and of the haughty and tyrannical conduct of these officers. "The men," says Knight, "had been ill-fed, ill-paid, shamefully neglected by the country which depended upon them for its all; and in many cases, harshly and cruelly treated by their officers, and belly-pinched and plundered by their pursers." By a conduct as temperate as it was brave, they triumphed, and obtained the wages they demanded-the modest sum of one shilling per day! How truly in this history are the words of the poet verified!— "Self-love, stealthily at first, And then in its own usurpation armed, Bold and more bold and proudly confident, More than its hand, or present use could turn To its own profit ;-so discovenanting Its neighbour's right, and God's most earnest law, Thus in the veins, Exhausted most by toil, and where most needs Bounteous supply, starving the weakly blood Almost to water; and what penury Had so diminished from stern daily use, And from desert of patient industry, Heaping it all into the listless cup CHAPTER XX. PROGRESS OF POLITICAL CORRUPTION CONTINUED. HAVING sketched thus briefly the revolting picture of aristocratic greed, which not only, while gorging itself to repletion, grudged the slightest portion of even common pay, food, or clothing to the nation's brave defenders, but had extended its corruption into every department of the state,-for the postoffice, the customs, the excise, every institution displayed the same abandoned character-we come now to the important question: How was it that this body had thus contrived to enrich themselves, enslave the country, and riot on its treasures? It was by that art of diving-that burrowing and undermining system which introduced and characterised the third and and present epoch of aristocracy. We have shown how they had secured the crown lands, and made captive the crown. The two sections of whig and tory then rivalled each other, both at the commencement of each reign, and also during its continuance, in heaping the most lavish allowance on the monarch, to immerse him in pleasures, and turn his eyes from their proceedings; so that the civil list of William III. was at once fixed at 700,000l., a vast sum at the then value of money. This went on till George IV.'s income was 850,000l., besides the revenues of Scotland, and those of the Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster, amounting altogether to a million and half. Having secured the crown, it remained only to secure the grand engine_of real government in this country-the House of Commons. For this they now discovered a means. It was to employ the money of the people to destroy the people's political rights. The counties were already under their own influence, the boroughs were the things to be made prize of, and these were ready for their hands. They were no longer the abodes of the bulk of the people; trade and manufactures had revolutionised the whole status of population. The people were existing in new towns, to which the franchise had never been extended, and the old boroughs, the old places of popular abode, were inhabited by a few who were ready to be bought, or were wholly decayed, and were the property of aristocrats or others who were eager for purchase. By this means the ministry for the time found nothing easier than to procure an overwhelming majority of purchased members, bearing the name of the people's representatives, but being, in fact, so many impostors and traitors; and these tools were kept in the people's house to vote away the people's money and their liberties. The commencement of this plan is discernible beyond the Revolution, but it acquired new life at that period, the aristocracy having learned that though the people could not be conquered, it could be deceived. This scheme has, for its supporters, “worked well.” So well did it work, as early as 1733, when Walpole brought in his famous scheme for extending the excise, that Pulteney, in Parliament, made this declaration:-"It is well known that every one of the public officers have already many boroughs or corporations which they look on as their property: there are some boroughs which may be called Treasury Boroughs; there are others which may be called Admiralty Boroughs; in short, it may be said that nearly all the towns upon the sea coast are already seized on, and in a manner taken prisoners by the officers of the crown. In most of them they have so great an influence that none can be chosen members of parliament but such as they are pleased to recommend. But as the customs are confined to our sea-ports, as they cannot travel far from the coast, therefore this scheme seems contrived to extend the laws of excise, and thereby the influence of the Crown, over all the inland towns and corporations of England." Nor were the fatal consequences of this insidious invasion of the popular share of the constitution less clearly seen then than a century later. Wyndham the very next year said, "Suppose a minister possessed of immense wealth, the plunder of the nation, with a parliament chiefly composed of men whose seats are purchased, and whose votes are bought at the expense of the public treasure." In this he described Walpole and his purchased majority as plain as he could venture to speak, and the consequences, which he went on to describe, are exactly what we, at the present day, see and feel. The purchase of these rotten boroughs, and the practice of bribery begun by the government, were soon adopted by the Opposition. It is stated that in 1741 the Opposition, aided by the promises of the wealthy old Duchess of Marlborough, of Pulteney, and the Prince of Wales, incurred considerable debts (which the nation, of course, had afterwards to pay) in the purchase of boroughs, and in practising bribery and corruption to an unprecedented degree.* The following year, when Walpole was * Smollet; Knight. forced to retire from the ministry, a great clamour was raised against him, and an eager inquiry instituted into his corrupt practices. The king himself did all he could to swamp this inquiry; and to shield one of the most notorious objects of it, Mr. Edgcombe, who had managed the Cornish boroughs for Walpole, and who might have told many a Treasury tale, he withdrew him from the reach of the Commons by raising him to the peerage. Many a strange display, however, took place. The secret committee's report stated that, during an election at Weymouth, a place had been promised to the Mayor for his influence, and a church living to his brother-in-law: some revenue officers, who refused to vote against their conscience, were dismissed. A fraudulent contract had been given for like ends to two members of the Commons, Peter Burrell and John Bristow, for furnishing money towards the payment of the troops in the West Indies, by which they pocketed upwards of fourteen per cent.; and that whereas the secret-service money from 1707 to 1717 was altogether only 337,9607., Walpole's amount, for the like number of years, was 1,453,0007; a large part of which had been spent in bribing and corrupting electors. The celebrated Bubb Doddington, in the reign of George II., returned five or six members himself, and was a noted hand at canvassing, bribing, and otherwise influencing boroughs for the ministry; for which services he was rewarded with a peerage, under the title of Lord Melcombe. During this period that species of bribery at elections, called "treating," that is, bribing the poor electors with drink and food, began to make a prominent figure in our political annals. In 1766, Chatham prophesied that this rotten part of our constitution, as he termed it, could not last a century; which had a sort of verification. This extraordinary man who, as well as his extraordinary son, William Pitt, commenced as a zealous reformer, and could always play the part right vigorously when kept out of office, declared further, that "if this rotten limb did not drop off, it must be amputated.' "In the commencement of George III.'s reign," says the historian, "owing to the success of this rotten borough system, the circumstance which must strike the eye in all arrangements, is the omnipotence of family connection-the juggling and selfishness of an oligarchy which could forget principles and everything but self.' In 1770, Chatham, in a fit of virtuous indignation, exclaimed, "The minister who is bold enough to spend the people's money before it is granted, even though it be not for the purpose of corrupting their representatives, * Knight. deserves death!" And on finding opposition to inquiry into government profusion, he made this remarkable declaration. "Does the king of England want to build a palace equal to his rank and dignity? Does he want to encourage the polite and useful arts? Does he mean to reward the hardy veteran who has defended his quarrel in many a rough campaign, whose salary does not equal that of some of your servants? or does he mean, by drawing the purse-strings of his subjects, to spread corruption through the people, to procure a parliament, like a packed jury, ready to acquit his ministers at all adventures? I do not say, my lords, that corruption lies here, or that corruption lies there, but if any gentleman in England were to ask me whether I thought both houses of parliament were bribed, I should laugh in his face, and say, "Sir, is it not so ?" The very next year compelled the House of Commons to make an example of one of the rotten boroughs-New Shoreham,-by disfranchising eighty of its freemen, and extending the franchise to the freemen of the neighbouring district, called the Rape of Bramber. The bribery, venality, and hypocrisy of this place, as disclosed, were of the most atrocious nature. The freemen had, it appeared, formed themselves into an association entitled "THE CHRISTIAN CLUB," professing to be solely established for the advancement of piety and evangelical charity: under this mask, however, they had disposed of the borough to the highest bidder. They returned General Smith for a sum of 3000l., on engagement to build a church at Shoreham, and to benefit the place with 600 tons of shipping. Having done this in preference to another offer, and having quarrelled amongst themselves, this came out. In 1782, the very rotten borough of Cricklade was disfranchised, and Lord Rockingham declared that in several boroughs the elections depended chiefly on revenue-officers, and that nearly 12,000 of that class of persons, created by the late ministry, possessed votes in other places. The frightful extent to which the public money was turned against every patriotic person and movement, was placed in a striking light by the disputed election of Charles Fox for Westminster, in 1785. He demanded a scrutiny, but this was protracted by the arts and money of government, so that in eight months only two out of the seven parishes of Westminster were scrutinised; by which it appeared that the whole would occupy, at the shortest, three years. Fox declared that it would cost both parties 30,000l. a-year, or a total of nearly 100,000l.; an expense obviously ruinous to any private person. The wealth of the national treasury was, in fact, employed to crush all liberal opponents. A more terrific tyranny is inconceivable. |