plained of, the plan of a General Prize Office was submitted to the attention of the legislature.

The next object of inquiry was "the Sixpenny Office," the principal duty of which department consisted in the collection of a considerable part of the revenue of Greenwich Hospital, by means of a deduction of sixpence a month out of the wages of seamen employed in the merchants' service, &c. The business of this office was intended to be managed by means of three commissioners, residing on or near the spot; but it was discovered that one of them lived at Tapley in Devonshire, whilst the other was one of the Esquire Beadles of the University of Cambridge.

The sixth report respected "Plymouth and Woolwich Yards." The seventh was concerning Le Caton Hospital Ship, and the Naval Hospital at East Stonehouse. The eighth, "his Majesty's Victualling Department at Plymouth, and the embezzlement of the King's casks;" and the ninth, the Receipt and Issue of Stores in Plymouth Yard.

In all these departinents, it appears that either great irregularities, or gross frauds, were evident; but it was the tenth report, ordered to be printed February 13th, 1805, that chiefly engaged the attention of the public, and furnished grounds of impeachment by the House of Commons.

As the impeachment of Viscount Melville is founded on this article, we shall here present the reader with a more copious abstract than we have given of the former ones, premising, however, that

we

we mean to give no opinion whatsoever upon this delicate but important subject.

It appears, that by his Majesty's warrant of the 20th of June, 1782, the salary of the Treasurer of the Navy was increased from two thousand to four thousand pounds, in full satisfaction of all profits and emoluments before received by any former treasurers. It was also directed by an act of parliament, (25th George III. cap. 31,) that all monies should be lodged in the Bank of England for this branch of service, and drawn from thence as required for the discharge of debts as they arose. Instead of this, the Right Honourable Henry Dundas, now Lord Melville, while Treasurer of the Navy, by his agent, Mr. Alexander Trotter, formerly a Clerk in the Navy Pay Office, with the privity of the said Treasurer, but not to the extent understood by his Paymaster, as he has since asserted, drew large sums out of the Bank, and placed the same in the hands of Messrs. Coutts and Co, bankers, in the Strand, giving drafts in payment upon them, not only to answer the demands of the Treasurer of the Navy, but likewise on Mr. Dundas's private account.

As it appeared to the commissioners, if the directions of the act of parliament had been complied with, that the sums standing in the name of the Treasurer at the Bank would not have been less than his unappropriated balances, they deemed it their duty to inquire minutely into the affair. Mr. Trotter, en being questioned whether he derived any profit

profit from the money thus withdrawn, refused to answer, under the provisions of the fifth clause of the statute by which the Board had been constituted; and he availed himself of this clause in every question which bore any relation to the use or employment of the public money, either by himself or Lord Melville; urging in the latter case, that as he had drawn all the money from the Bank in the first instance, he conceived himself implicated in its subsequent appropriation.

He, however, gave the commissioners to understand, that money applicable to navy services, was employed by his lordship in the service of the state; and that he was led to this conclusion in consequence of a considerable sum so advanced having been returned to him by Mr. Long, one of the secretaries of the treasury.

On receiving this intelligence, they issued a precept to Viscount Melville, for an account of monies received by him, or any person on his account, or by his order, from the Paymaster of the Navy, between the 1st of July, 1785, and the 31st of December, 1800, stating when such monics were received, and also the time when, and the persons by whom, the same were returned to the Bank of England.

The following is a copy of the answer returned by his lordship:

"GENTLEMEN,

"Wimbledon, 30th of June, 1804.

"I have received your requisition, of date the 26th instant. It is impossible for me to furnish you with the account you ask. It is more than four years since I left the office of Treasurer of the

.

Navy, and at the period of doing so, having accounted for every sum imprested into my hands, I transferred the whole existing balance to the account of my successor. From that time, I never considered any one paper or voucher that remained in my hands as of the smallest use to myself or any other person, and consequently, being often in the practice, since I retired to Scotland, of employing occasionally some time in assorting my papers, and destroying those that were useless, I am satisfied there does not exist any one material by which I could make up such an account as you specify. But, independently of that circumstance, I think it right to remind you, that, during a great part of the time I was Treasurer of the Navy, I held other very confidential situations in Government, and was intimately connected with others. situated, I did not decline giving occasional accommodation from the funds in the Treasurer's hands, to other services not connected with my official situation as Treasurer of the Navy. If I had materials to make up such an account as you require, I could not do it without disclosing delicate and confidential transactions of Government, which my duty to the public must have restrained me from revealing.

(Signed)

"MELVILLE."

So.

Soon after this, Lord Melville himself was examined, but he objected to answering any questions respecting the sums appropriated to any other service than that of the navy, relying on the fifth clause of the act, and also upon the circumstances alluded to in the letter before mentioned. He also declined, and upon the same grounds, to inform the commissioners whether he had received any profit or advantage from the use or employment of money issued for carrying on the current service of the navy, between the 1st of January, 1786, and the 31st of May, 1800; that is, from the time of the operation of the act for lodging the money in the Bank, to the time of his quitting office.

On

On the examination of Mr. Antrobus, one of the partners in the house of Messrs. Thomas Coutts and Co. it appeared that the public money received by this house from the Bank, on Mr. Trotter's drafts, had been invested in exchequer and navy bills, lent upon the security of stock, and employed by Mr. Trotter in discounting private bills; and that considerable purchases of Bank and East India stock had been made on his account. On the whole, it was the opinion of the Board, that the sum of six millions, seven hundred and eighty-three thousand, three hundred and seventeen pounds, two shillings.

The whole of the dividends on Mr. Trotter's property in the public funds, appears by the accounts of Messrs. Coutts, to have

Mr. Trotter's funded property at the close of the account, ap

1,500 。 Imp. An.

His salary was eight hundred pounds per annum.

and