den, feveral other Lords and bifhops, went in proceffion from the House of Peers to St. James's. As foon as his Majefty was feated in the chair of ftate, their Lordships. were fummoned to attend, when Lord Mansfield, as Speaker, read the Address, which was as follows:

"Moft Gracious Sovereign,

"We, your Majefty's moft dutiful and loyal fubjects, the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, in Parliament affembled, beg leave to return your Majefty our moft humble thanks for your most gracious fpeech from the throne.

"With the most respectful affection to your Royal Perfon and family, we beg leave to offer our fincere congratulations on the birth of another Princefs, and the happy recovery of the Queen. Truly fenfible of the bleffings we enjoy under your Majefty's moft aufpicious government, we rejoice at every event that can add to your Majefty's domeftic happiness.

"We congratulate your Majefty on the fuccefs of your endeavours to restore the public tranquillity. We return your Majefty our most humble thanks for having ordered the Definitive Treaties with the courts of France and Spain, and with the United States of America, and the Preliminary Articles ratified with the States General of the United Provinces, to be laid before us; and we affure your Majesty, that we learn with the greatest fatisfaction, that all thofe powers agree with your Majefty in your fincere inclinations to keep the calamities of war at a great distance.

"We humbly and thankfully acknowledge your Majefty's royal regard to the general welfare of all your Majefty's dominions, in having called your Parliament together at this early feafon; and we beg leave to affure your Majefty that the most diligent attention fhal! be given by us to those objects, which wait our deliberation. The fituation of the Eatt-India Company will require our immediate confideration; and we beg your Majefty to be affured, that we will use our utmoft endeavours, to maintain and improve the valuable advantages derived from our Indian poffeffions, and to fecure the happiness of the native inhabitants of thofe provinces.

66

Animated by your Majefty's example, and by the love of our country,e fhall take the earlieft advantage of the feason of peace to direct our counfels to every thing that

2

can

can recruit the ftrength of the nation after fo long and fo expenfive a war; and while we exprefs the grateful fenfe we entertain of your Majefty's paternal care in recommending the fecurity and increase of the revenue in the manner the leaft burthenfome to your people; we shall be happy to co-operate in whatever may be found expedient for those falutary purposes, or may tend to counteract those frauds, and to reprefs that fpirit of outrage which has been fo alarmingly prevalent.

"We humbly intreat your Majefty to be perfuaded that our utmost affiduity fhall be employed in providing what is called for by the prefent fituation of this country, and that in our labours for that purpose, we fhall not only use the utmoft caution in regard to whatever the experience of paft times has fhewn to be beneficial, but fhall endeavour, to the extent of our abilities, to make all fuch benefits permanent.

"It be will our duty to preferve that temper and moderation in our deliberations which your Majesty has been pleased to recommend, and which the importance of their objects will demand; and we fhall be anxious not to neglect any opportunity of meriting the good opinion your Majefty has graciously expreffed of our unanimous defire to fecure and promote the honour of your Majefty's crown, the fafety of your dominions, and the profperity of your people."

After which his Majefty was pleased to say,

"My Lords,

"I thank you for this dutiful and loyal Addrefs. I receive with pleafure your congratulations on the birth of a Princess, and the recovery of the Queen, as renewed proofs of your affection to my perfon and family. The affurances you give me of your attention to the objects recommended for the welfare of my fubjects, are highly acceptable; and I regard the unanimity with which they are offered, as an earneft of the fuccefs which, I truft, will attend your endeavours to eftablish the honour of my crown, and the profperity of my people,"

Lord Fer.

rers.

The Earl of
Abingdon.

November 14.

The Earl of Powis, reported to the Houfe, that her Majefty had been waited upon with the Congratulatory Meffage of that Houfe, to which her Majefty had been pleafed to return the following moft gracious answer:

66 My Lords,

"I return my fincereft thanks to the Houfe of Peers. Their duty to the King, and attention to me, calls forth my warmeft acknowledgements."

Adjourned.

December 2.

Lord Ferrers rofe up yefterday in the House of Peers, and wifhed to be informed, whether the confideration of the Definitive Treaties were to come on in that House before the recefs at Christmas ?

This brought up the Earl of Abingdon; who faid,

"My Lords,

"Having before expreffed my entire fatisfaction with the terms of the peace, and already given to the House my ideas upon that fubject, it were unneceffary for me again to trou ble your Lordships upon the fame occafion, and the more efpecially fo, as I have been made to find, that that which, in preliminary articles, was matter of condemnation and cenfure to fome of your Lordships, now meets, in definitive treaties, by the veil of a profligate and abandoned faction being thrown afide, the unanimous fuffrage and confent of all, Nor, my Lords, fhould I have rifen on this day, had it not been for a speech which, not being prefent at the time it was fpoken, I have feen and read in the public papers; a fpeech, my Lords, which whilft it would approve the peace, would attempt to villify and calumniate the author of it; but which, in my opinion, proving, by its own invective, and the mode of reafoning adopted therein, the best of eulogies, and the highest panegyric upon both the author and the peace; it is to convince your Lordships of this, that I rite to trefpafs for a few words on the time and patience of the House.

*It is faid, my Lords, in the fpeech I allude to, that the preliminary articles of peace were difgraceful, pufillanimous, and difhonourable; and yet, my Lords, thefe very preliminary articles of peace, difgraceful, pufillanimous, and

difhonour

difhonourable, as they are reprefented to be, are nevertheless made only because through the spirit and good conduct of the prefent Miniftry, they are not quite fo difgraceful in the ratification as they are in preliminary articles,' no less the fubject of adulation to Minifters than they are, because peace, long wifhed for peace, is at last established,' of declamatory joy and congratulation to the public,

"But, my Lords, this being faid of the confiftency of this exordium in overture of Minifters, let us a little fee how the affertion, that the preliminary articles of peace were difgraceful, pufillanimous, and dishonourable,' stand in point of reafoning, argument, and of fact,

"It is faid, in a kind of logical procefs, though unaccompanied by any other fymptom of logic, that the preliminary articles were difgraceful,' and that they were dif graceful, because they took away from the dignity of this kingdom.' That they were difhonourable, because better terms might have been obtained.' That they were pufillanimous, because we made conceffions, when we should have had humiliations.' Affertions, my Lords, without proofs, reasoning without reafons, and arguments without a fingle fact to fupport them: for what is this but to fay, that the preliminary articles were difgraceful,' because they were dif graceful; that they were difhonourable,' because they were difhonourable; and that they were pufillanimous,' because they were pufillanimous; and yet, my Lords, such is the fupport of Miniftry, and fuch the way that calumny would afperfe, and flander ufe its tongue.

"But now, my Lords, to admit the truth of all, to admit that these articles were as they are stated to be, and that their ratification were an act not of choice but of neceffity in the prefent Minifters: why not fay fo then? And why make that which is difgraceful, that which is difhonourable, and that which is pufillanimous, the fubject matter not only of unanimous parliamentary approbation, as it has been made, but of merit, boafted merit to Minifters, as well as of general acclamation and joy to the nation? For peace, long wifhed for peace, fays the fpeech, is at laft cftablished! Can there be then, my Lords, as I have faid, a higher proof of panegyric and eulogy more ftrongly expreffed than this affords? And what is this, but as in the fable, to steal the lion's Įkia, in order that the afs might wear it?

"But it is faid, my Lords, that this country food indebted to the prefent Adminiftration for amending the ratifi

ed

ed articles,' thofe fhameful and difgraceful terms that were in the preliminaries. What fhameful and difgraceful terms, my Lords? Does the fpeech know, and could it explain itfelf even at this hour? Or is this one of those hardy and bold affertions, which much credulity and little knowledge are apt fo readily to conceive and utter? But, my Lords, here again too I will admit the fact; I will admit that they were fhameful and difgraceful terms in the preliminaries; and admitting this, let me afk your Lordships, is it not fair, is it not liberal, is not honeft to fuppofe, that if the late Adminiftration had had the conclufion of the peace in their hands, that they might not have rectified, by the definitive treaties, thefe errors in the preliminaries, as well as the prefent Adminiftration have done? Nay, my Lords, it is not to be fupposed that the late Administration, knowing better furely than any other could do, both the feeble and the forte of their own negociations, that the other defects too might not have been remedied, which have efcaped the all-penetrating eye even of the prefent Adminiftration? And if fo, my Lords, where is the merit of the present Miniftry, and in what does the country ftand indebted to them? On the contrary, is it not fhameful and difgraceful in them to take merit to themselves upon fuch an occafion; and, instead of praises, do they not rather deferve the curfes of the nation, if it were but for this very act alone, inafmuch as amended as the peace is by the prefent Adminiftration, it might not only have been equally amended by the late Miniftry, but from their more intimate knowledge of the fubject, might have been infinitely better than it now is? And therefore, my Lords, I do in my turn affert, and dogmatically affert too, that the taking of the peace out of the late Adminiftration under the circumftances in which it was done, was an act of treason to the State, of a kind as nefarious and flagitious as any that ever had trial at your Lordships' bar.

." And now, my Lords, I had done, if it were not for one thing more, and that is the beautiful little image that has been made the ornament of this fpeech, fo beautiful, that I cannot help taking notice of the bantling, and for a while dandling it in my arms; for, my Lords, it is faid, the peace appeared in the fhape of a rickety bantling, dropped at the door of the prefent Minifters by its too hasty parents, and there begging her fupport and protection. They took it up, examined its defects, and as they found a kind of national promife made in its favour, they nurfed it, and by the