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In 1772 these

was little real confidence between them even now. two powers, together with Russia, had stripped anarchical Poland of some of her provinces. In 1793 Russia and Prussia were proceeding to a second partition of her territory; whilst Austria was seeking compensation for being left without a share in this new partition of Poland by the acquisition of territory in France. Now that her armies had been driven back, her chance of getting such a compensation was at an end, and her rulers, throwing the blame on Prussia for her lukewarmness in the war with France, began to detest Prussia even more than they detested the French Republic.

15. Progress of the Reign of Terror. 1793—1794.-Pitt's mistake had been in thinking that he could take part in a great struggle of principles as though it were merely a struggle for the proper delimitation of States. The French had on their side enthusiasm, not only for their country, but for their own conception of the welfare of humanity. The Governments of Prussia and Austria had no enthusiasm for the old order of things which they professed to support. Even Pitt himself was an example of the impossibility of treating the danger from France as merely territorial. Seeing clearly the evil of the French aggression and the cruelty of the Reign of Terror, he grew to hate the French revolutionary spirit almost as strongly as Burke. It is hardly to be wondered at that it was so. The tyranny of the Reign of Terror became worse and worse. The Convention was dominated by a few bloodthirsty men who sent hundreds to the guillotine, not because they were even suspected of being traitors, but often merely because they did not sympathise with the revolution, or because their condemnation would be followed by the confiscation of their goods. The dominant parties turned upon one another. One party led by Hébert announced itself Atheist, and dressing up women to represent the Goddess of Reason, placed them on the altars of desecrated churches, and danced round them in honour of the principle which they represented. Another party, led by Robespierre, declared itself Deist, and early in 1794 Robespierre sent Hébert and his followers to the guillotine.

16. Reaction in England. 1792 1793.-In his growing detestation of these horrors, Pitt was supported by the great mass of Englishmen. In 1792 he refused to accept a proposal for Parliamentary reform, urged in the House of Commons by a young member, Mr. Grey, on the ground that it was not a fitting time to alter the Constitution. In 1793 he was frightened lest the French revolutionary spirit should find its way into England, because a certain number

of persons, regretting their exclusion from all part in parliamentary elections, joined clubs which loudly expressed their sympathy with the French innovations. The danger from such clubs was excessively small, but Pitt and well nigh the whole of the propertied classes dreaded the establishment of á reign of violence in England. In the beginning of 1793, an Act was passed authorising the Government to remove suspected foreigners, and late in the year a Treasonable Correspondence Act was passed to throw obstacles in the way of persons seeking to give assistance to the French, with whom England was by that time at war. No exception can be taken to these measures. It was, however, unjustifiable that the Government, fully supported by judges and juries, should authorise not only the prosecution, but the harshest punishment of persons guilty merely of using strong language against the king or the institutions of the realm. Amongst the sufferers was a billsticker who was imprisoned for six months for posting up an address asking for Parliamentary reform, and a man named Hudson who was sentenced to a fine of 2007. and two years' imprisonment for proposing a toast to 'The French Republic.' In Scotland Thomas Muir was sent to transportation for fourteen years for exciting to sedition and joining an association for obtaining universal suffrage and annual parliaments. "The landed interest," said the judge who tried the case, "alone has a right to be represented; the rabble has nothing but personal property; and what hold has the nation on them?"

17. End of the Reign of Terror. 1794.—On July 28 the Reign of Terror in France came suddenly to an end by the execution of Robespierre. The course of the war in the spring of 1794 had been wholly in favour of France on land, and on June 26 a great French victory over the Austrians at Fleurus was followed by the complete evacuation of the Austrian Netherlands by the allies. It was little to counterbalance this that Lord Howe gained a victory, usually known as the Battle of the First of June, over a French fleet near the mouth of the Channel. France was no longer in danger, and France being safe, it was impossible for the Terrorists again to acquire control over the Government.

18. Coalition between Pitt and the majority of the Whigs. 1794. --In England one effect of the Reign of Terror had been to sweep away the differences between l'itt and the majority of the Whigs. Following Burke, the latter had for some time been voting with Pitt, and in 1794 their leaders, the Duke of Portland, Lord Fitzwilliam, and Mr. Windham entered Pitt's Cabinet. Fox and Grey with a

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scanty following continued in opposition, partly because, though they loathed the bloody scenes in France, they thought that England ought to remain at peace; partly because they held that the best way to meet French revolutionary ideas in England was to push on internal reforms. Before the end of the year the violent proceedings in the English law-courts received a check by the refusal of juries to convict Horne Tooke, Hardy, and Thelwall, who were accused of seditious practices. They were no doubt acquitted because

ordinary Englishmen resumed their usual habit of distrusting government interference, as soon as the irritation caused by the Reign of Terror was at an end.

19. The Treaties of Basel. 1795.-French conquests did not come to an end with the Reign of Terror. In January 1795 a French army under Pichegru overran the Dutch Netherlands and established a Batavian republic on a democratic basis. About the same time there was a third and final partition of Poland, in which Austria, Prussia, and Russia all shared. Prussia had no more to gain in Poland, and on April 5, being unwilling to help Austria to make conquests in France, she concluded peace at Basel with the French Convention. On July 12 Spain, following the example of Prussia, also signed a treaty of peace at Basel.

20. The Establishment of the Directory in France. 1795.-Pitt

failed to appreciate the real difficulties of the war on which he had embarked. In spite of all the atrocities of the Terror, the feeling in France was so strong against any reaction in favour of the old nobility, that there was not the slightest chance of overthrowing the Republican government by giving aid to the French emigrants. The Count of Puisaye, an emigrant royalist, persuaded Pitt to disembark him and a number of other emigrants in Quiberon Bay, in the belief that the country round would take up the royalist cause. The expedition ended in entire failure. In October a new constitution was established by the Convention. The legislature consisted of two councils, and the executive of a body of five Directors. The violent stage of the French Revolution had come to an end, and there were many in England who thought that it would be desirable to make peace with a government which gave some hopes of moderation and stability, especially as the burden of the war had given rise to grave discontent in England. When George III. drove through the streets on October 29 to open Parliament, he was surrounded by a hooting mob. A bullet pierced one of his carriage windows.

21. The Treason Act and the Sedition Act. 1795.-Pitt could see nothing but revolutionary violence in this outburst. He carried through Parliament two Bills, one declaring the mere writing, preaching, or speaking words against the king's authority to be treason, and the stirring up hatred against the king's person or the established government and constitution to be a punishable misdemeanour; the other forbidding all political meetings unless advertised beforehand, and permitting any two justices to disperse them if they thought them dangerous. Against these Bills Fox spoke with extreme vehemence; but Pitt's supporters did him more harm than his opponents. "The people," said Bishop Horsley, "had nothing to do with the laws but to obey them." The two Bills became law, but public feeling was so set against them that they were never put into operation.

1785-1791. In

1. The Irish Government and Parliament. 1785, when Pitt was aiming at a commercial union with Ireland, he had expressed a desire to make · England and Ireland one country in effect, though for local concerns under distinct legislatures.' The difficulty, however, lay in the unfitness of the Parliament at Dublin to play the part of a legislature for local concerns.' It was in no true sense representative. Three-fourths of the population were excluded as Catholics from sitting in Parliament and from voting at elections. Nor was the Irish House of Commons in any sense representative of the remaining Protestant fourth. The number of its members was three hundred, and of these, two hundred were chosen by less than one hundred persons, who controlled the elections of petty boroughs. Moreover, as the ministers in Ireland were responsible, not to Parliament, but to the Lord Lieutenant, the Lord Lieutenant could, except in times of great excitement, govern without reference to the wishes of the House of Commons, and whenever it seemed desirable to him to have the House of Commons on his side he could, by a lavish distribution of places and pensions, buy up the votes of the members or of their patrons, as neither had any constituents to fear. Usually, however, the Lord Lieutenant who wished