Col. Fitzpatrick.

where were we to find men, and at what price, fome years. after it had continued? He obferved, that they collected the opinions and reasonings of their ancestors from hiftory; but by perfonal obfervation, they were able to fpeculate and enquire into the character of their contemporaries: and when the experience of a few years fhould have drawn afide the veil which had been artfully placed between the convention and the Public; when pofterity (he had almost said modern pofterity) fhould have an opportunity of fifting, and examining to the bottom, a meafure founded in ignorance and defended by myftery, they would condemn it on every prin. ciple of justice and true policy. The few thousand pounds incurred by the meafure then under confideration, was only the advance guard of expence; the main body would foon follow and he must beg leave to afk, what compenfation a little whale oil or whale bone could poffibly prove, for the enormous expenditure of three or four millions fterling.

Colonel Fitzpatrick confidered the refolution then moved, as the fulleft confirmation of his own opinion on the fubject; and his own opinion was well known to the Committee.With regard to what had been urged concerning the neceffity for a Commander in Chief, and of there being at all times fome one man in a fituation refponsible for the conduct of the army, and of all military affairs, he was fully convinced of it, and could only lament, that the rights of the army were entrusted to civil hands, becaufe whenever that was the cafe, without meaning to reflect upon the prefent, more than any other War Office, he was fatisfied that injury and injuftice muft prove the unavoidable refult to the profeffion.

Colonel Colonel Simcoe declared, that it was impoffible for him to Simcoe. have liftened to the juft and liberal remarks of the honourable General (Burgoyne), without rifing to add his feeble teftimony to all which he had advanced concerning Lord Rawdon, and to do the noble Lord the juftice to fay, that, to his knowledge, he poffefed every virtue which could ornament a foldier and a gentleman. He was not aware that Lord Rawdon's offer had been on fuch terms as were ftated, but he believed that all the officers, his brother alone excepted, who was an officer of great inerit in the service, were propofed to be taken from the half-pay lift. Colonel Simcoe difcuffed the ufual modes of recruiting, which he faid were twofold; one by way of regimental recruiting, the other by giving rank to fuch men of fpirit and fortune, as would take it upon condition of railing a certain number of men. With regard to the firft, the officers upon that duty were obliged to refufe all but fuch men as would anfwer a particular defcription, becaufe they could not ftand the rifque of having

every seventh man become a deferter, when they merely car, ried on the recruiting fervice for praife; whereas those who, under the other head of recruiting, flood forward with their fortunes to obtain preferment on procuring a certain nume ber of men, it was worth their while to run all rifques, or rather, by the large bounties they gave, to prevent any rifque. Much had been obferved concerning thofe officers who offered their fervices, on the plea that their fathers and relatives had diftinguished themselves in the army; fuch men ought, in his mind, ever to be confidered as the children of the Public; fure he was, for he had known feveral inftances of it, that they were always cherished, affifted, and encouraged by the other officers, who gaye them the best advice on all occafions. Upon the whole, the Colonel said, he muft, in fo many words, give it as his opinion, that the mode of recruiting by raifing independent companies, was, in cafes of preffing emergency, extremely defirable, fince the being by thofe means enabled to raise ten thousand men on a fadden, when not a fourth of the number could be procured in the regular way of regimental recruiting, muft have a ftriking effect upon our enemies, and give them a strong impreffion of the activity, vigour, and fpirit of the country. The ufual mode of accepting offers to raise men, by thofe who did not expect to rife higher than the rank of Captains of companies, he believed, was, to enquire if the parties were fure of any fortune or allowance over their pay; because it must, he fhould imagine, be obvious to the whole Houfe, that regimental pay was not adequate to the support of any fubaltern officer; and if officers of approved merit had no fuch means of eking out their military income, an augmentation of their pay moft certainly muft deferve the serious and benevolent confideration of the Houfe.

Colonel Hartley contended that it was ftriking at the very Colonel root of an army, to adopt, at the commencement of a war, Hartley. fuch a mode of recruiting as raifing new corps. He had known a man who would, at one time, have been glad to take three guineas levy money in the regular course of recruiting, who had refufed to take eight of a recruiting ferjeant, after he discovered that independent companies were

to be raised.

Lord Felding urged the mischievous confequences of giv- Lord ing fuch large bounties at the commencement of a war, as Fielding. were known to be offered by the agents of those who had rank for railing a certain number of men.

Mr.

Mr. Thompfon remarked, that at the opening of the inveftigation of the prefent fubject, he had declared his fatisfaction Tho that it was to be confidered more deliberately at a future day; and the reafon why he had fo expreffed himfelf, arose from a

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hope that the right honourable gentleman would, in the interim, have seen his error, and abandoned a system of recruiting fo injurious to the military fervice, fo palpably calculated to increase the patronage of the Crown, and fo wide of economy. To the right honourable the Secretary at War he was to impute all the blame, not only of the meafure but of the bad confequences which had followed it. It would, he fhould imagine, be generally admitted, that it was the invariable rule for all contracts to be folid and binding on both parties, and moft especially fuch contracts as did not bear about them the fhackles and trammels which the law had provided for the fecurity of the contractor in ordinary cafes, but which depended folely upon honour and good faith. The new corps had been raifed upon a pretence of afferting and maintaining the national honour abroad, and yet, in the mode of raifing them, the right honourable the Secretary at War had contrived to ftab the honour of the British army at home, by violating the conditions on which the contracts for raifing the independent companies had been exprefly made. The letter of inftructions to thofe whofe offers of raifing the new corps were accepted, contained the conditions on which they were to be raised. Let the Houfe, therefore, fee how the right honourable Secretary at War had abided by those inftructions! Mr. Thompfon declared, that in the inftructions it was conditioned, that the officers' commiffions fhould be made out from the day that their corps were declared to be complete, and yet, to his knowledge, thofe whofe corps were declared to be complete in 1790, had their commiffions dated in 1791, and had actually received only the pay of Lieutenants while they were ferving as Captains. This had occafioned loud clamours and complaints without doors, and certainly with great juftice. In conclufion, Mr. Thompfon obferved, that the recollection of the inviolable duty which he owed to his conftituents, had impelled him to a flatement of these facts; nor could he drop the fubject, without expreffing his furprife and indignation at the circumftance of the War Office being converted into an auctioneer's room, and the Secretary at War acting as a broker of commiffions.

Secretary The Secretary at War anfwered, that he was much obliged at War. to the honourable gentleman for the notice he had been pleased to take of him, but he did affure the honourable gentleman, and the Committee, that he had never heard of fuch complaints as the honourable gentleman had alluded to, nor did he believe they had any foundation.

Mr. Fox,

Mr. Fox expreffed his conviction that the adopted mode of raifing troops was expenfive and inconvenient, and tending to damp the fpirit of the army. He wifhed only to speak

to

to two points which had received no fort of anfwer; he did not mean to argue them, but merely to give his opinion, fince he conceived they needed only to be mentioned, to make a due impreffion on the Committee. The first of these was the giving rank to those who got men, without regard to their standing in the army. That appeared to him to be a principle adverfe to all military fpirit, and tending to make the officers of the British army worfe, and lefs anxious for the fuccefs. The other part was the conftitutional point, of which, notwithstanding its importance, no notice had been taken. He meant the novel practice of felling commiffions, and applying the money raised by their fale in diminution of the half-pay lift expence. He declared he did not fee how this practice could be reconciled to any other principle than that most unconftitutional one, the raifing money on the fubject, without either the fanction or confent of Parliament. It had been said that, on the prefent occafion, it would reduce the half-pay lift expence ten thousand pounds; but Mr. Fox declared that, rather than countenance a practice fo likely to damp the spirit of the British army in future, and fo incompatible with the principles of the conftitution of the country, he would vote for the payment of forty thoufand pounds out of the public purfe.

The question was now put and carried, and after the other resolutions were voted, the report was ordered to be received upon the morrow.

The Houfe adjourned.

Tuesday, 29th March.

The order of the day for taking the King's meffage into confideration being read,

Mr. Chancellor Pitt rofe, and obferved; that he was well Mr. Pi affured that the Houfe would coincide with him in the idea, that it could not be confidered but as a matter of great regret, that His Majesty's reprefentations, in conjunction with his allies, for the purposes of re-establishing the peace of Europe, on a permanent bafis, had hitherto proved ineffectual; yet, whilft they felt the advantage of that fyftem of defenfive alliance which had been fo generally countenanced, he trusted that they would admit that a temporary expence might be wifely and judicioufly incurred, to prevent any alteration taking place in the relative condition of the powers of Europe, that tended materially to weaken the fecurity which

expected to derive from that fyftem. On this ground, the attention of His Majefty's Minifters had been directed to the general fate of affairs in Europe; an additional force had been kept up, with the approbation of the Houfe, after the late armament, because the fituation of affairs feemed to

F 2

call

call for it; and farther addition was now judged expedient, because a change in that fituation rendered it neceffary. The Houfe, he was perfuaded, would see the propriety of perfevering in the defenfive fyftem, and whatever opinions might be entertained relpecting the general policy of continental alliances, or our immediate intereft in interfering in the dif putes of continental Powers, there could be no difficulty in deciding, that if defenfive alliances were to be maintained, it was our duty to adhere to those alliances, and our intereft to prevent any changes in the general ftate of affairs, which might render them nugatory and infufficient. It had once been a prevailing opinion in this country, that Great Britain, from the peculiar advantages of local fituation, might maintain her rank and her confequence, unconnected with foreign powers; but from the moment that this opinion was abandoned, and we had connected ourfelves with other powers, there could be no doubt but that we were under the neceffity of watching the progrefs of events in Europe, and taking measures to prevent the intent and purpose of those connections from being defeated. As little would it be doubted that the influence of the Turkish empire was of great effect in the general scale of European Powers, and that the present fituation of it was fuch as to afford juft caufe of apprehenfion to all the other Powers whofe intereft were in any degree liable to be affected by a diminution of that influence. In particular, the power and ability of our ally, the King of Pruffia, to give vigour and efficacy to the defensive system, into which we had entered with him, muft be greatly affected by a diminution of the influence which the Turkish empire has hitherto maintained. Any point tending to render the power of that empire in Europe precarious, must neceffarily affect Pruffia, and be highly detrimental to our interefts, as far as they were connected by a common object with his, the object of mutual defence. Whatever might prove the refult of the war in which that empire was unhappily engaged, if it went to increase the power of Ruffia, the effect of it would not be confined to the two Powers alone; it must be felt by the rest of Europe, and felt more immediately in that quarter, with which, in point of intereft, we were most intimately connected. From thefe reafons, it was evident that we had a direct and important interest in the event of the war, and were not led to interfere by any remote or contingent hope of advantage. The Houfe was informed that His Majefty had made ufe of reprefentations to. fecure the interefts of his fubjects, and his allies. They were arprised that, in order to give greater weight to his representations, he had judged it requifite to make an addition to es matal force; and it remained for the Houfe to decide whether