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ENGLISH GOVERNMENT.

compelled to have a licence to meet, and to be registered; and, even after this, the King's Justices might order any lodge to be discontinued; that is to say, broken up. The King's Justices, in case of disobedience of this law, might punish, at once, by a fine of £20, or three months imprisonment; or if the offenders were convicted on indictment, they were to be Publictransported for seven years.

house keepers were to lose their licences if they permitted such meetings at their houses. Every place for lecturing, debating, or reading newspapers, where money shall be paid, is to be deemed a disorderly house, unless previously licensed. The King's Justices were authorized to take the licence from any publican; that is to say, to put an end to his trade, upon receiving information, that seditious or immoral publications were read in his house. -As to the PRESS, every Printer is, by the same act, compelled to give notice to the clerk of the King's Justices, that he keeps a press or presses for printing, and he is to receive a certificate of having given such notice. The Justice's clerk is to transmit a copy of the notice to the King's Secretary of State, in whose office the names and places of abode of all the printers, and the number of the presses, &c. &c. are all nicely registered. Letter Founders are to do the same; and, moreover, they are to keep an account of the types and printing presses that they sell, and are to produce them, whenever required, to any Justice of the peace.Then, again, the name and place of abode of the printer must be printed on every paper, or book; and any one issuing forth, dispersing after published, any paper, or book, without the name and place of abode of the printer, to be punished by the forfeiture of £20.-The printer is compelled to keep a copy of every thing he prints; he is to write on it the name and abode of the person who employed him to print it, under the penalty of £20. Persons selling or handing about papers may be seized and carried before a justice to have it determined, whether they have been offending the law. Any justice may empower peace officers to search for presses and types HE suspects to be illegally used, and to seize them and the printed papers found. As to newspapers, the Proprietors, Printers, and Publishers are all compelled

AMERICAN GOVERNMENT.

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ENGLISH GOVERNMENT.

to go to the Stamp-Office, and make an affidavit of their being such, and a lso of their place of abode. They are compelled to deposit one copy of each paper at the office; and this copy with their own affidavits is all that is called for in proof of their being all guilty of any libel found in the paper.

An act was passed on the 18th of December, 1795, making it death for any part of the people above 50 in number, to meet for the purpose of petitioning, unless notice and authority for holding such Meeting be given to and obtained from the King's justices. The penalty of DEATH, without benefit of Clergy, occurs no less than nine times in this act. This act, not to spin out its details, puts all political meetings wholly under the absolute authority of the Justices, Sheriffs, and other Officers; who can in some cases prevent their taking place at all; and, n all cases, put an end to them at their sole discretion. First a written notice, signed by 7 householders of the place, is to be given of a meeting; this notice is to be conveyed to the clerk of the Justices. The Justices, thus apprized of the meeting, arrive. And, if they hear any body propounding, or maintaining, propositions for altering any thing by law established, except by the authority of King, Lords, and Commons, they may order the offending parties into custody." There needs no more. This is quite clear. It may be excellent; but it is impossible to find any thing like it in America.

According to the amount, ordered to be printed by the House of Commons in 1808, the following are a few of our Sinecure :— Auditor of the Exchequer,

Lord Grenville ....

£.4,000

Teller, Earl Camden 23,117,1

Earl Bathurst.

....

Clerk of the Pells, Hon.

....

2,700

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AMERICAN GOVERNMENT.

No law can be passed to abridge the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition for a redress of grievances.

There are no sinecures in America.

Montague Burgoyne 1,660

This Mr. BURGOYNE has just written a cir cular letter to his neighbours in Essex, calling upon them to spend their last shilling, if neces sary, in a war against the Emperor of France, whom he calls every thing but an honest man. N. B. Mr. Burgoyne has had this place for more than 30 years! Will he now give it up, seeing that money is so much wanted for this just and necessary war?

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Religious opi

I could my Lord, proceed much fur-, a predominant Church. ther, were it necessary; but, from what nions are to be free. There are to be no we have seen, I think, it is plain, that books, which may not be freely comthere is no likeness whatever in the two mented on and examined into. There is governments. As to that of France, as to be nothing so sacred that reason may it is now new-modled, it appears to me not approach it. There are to be no to resemble the American rather than tythes in France, consequently no beneours. People in France vote for Mem-fices to bestow. This is a government bers of the Legislature upon the principle of representation and taxation going hand in hand. There are no feudal titles or rights in France. The Peers are, in fact, no more than eminent citizens, having no great estates attached to their titles and seats. There is, and there is to be, no established religion. The two Chambers in France, like the Congress in America, are forbidden to pass any law respecting

certainly very much like that of America. Mr. Grattan observed that the French people had exchanged the paradise of the Bourbons for the "eternal damnation of

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a military despotism." May be so; but, they seem resolved not to have feudal titles and courts; monastries and tythes; gabelles, corvées and game-laws. May be so; but, it has not been proved.

In conclusion, my Lord, give me leave

to suggest, that it would be as wise in us not to cry up our sort of government so much. If it be better than that of France, why want them to have one like it? Moss of my neighbours are well enough content if they are but able to get good cropt themselves, without thinking much about those of other people. We are always calling the French our enemy, and representing their power as so dangerous to Europe; and, why should we, then, fret ourselves because they will not be happier than they are? It would certainly be wise to let them alone; for, by evincing such an everlasting anxiety about their form of government, I am afraid that we shall give rise to a suspicion, that it is their form of government, and not the ambition of their Chief, that we dread, and against which we are about to make

war

I am, &c. &c.

W. COBBETT.

to express; and yet we boast of the loyalty of the whole nation, the love of the people for their present glorious government, and the universal satisfaction which prevails in all quarters. One would think that forty-two millions of pounds sterling, borrowed on one day, was something of a damper to this "general content." But mind, reader, this nominal forty-two millions is, in fact, a much larger sum, for which the country will next year be called on to provide. It arises thus :-the subsidies, which the generous Lord Castlereagh has ageeed we should pay to the Allied Kings, for the purpose of preserv ing "social order," and the "legiti mate rights of princes," are to be sent, at our expence, to their respective head guarters, and to be there paid in hard cash, good sterling guineas; not thè paper money, which alone is to be seen in this country, but good gold coin.-Now, in order to obtain this, the government agents are at work, in all directions, to buy up whatever coin they can meet with. The Market Price is, this day, Thursday the 15th of June, one pound eleven shil

THE NEW ERA. His Royal Highness the Prince Regent called the commencement of his reign a New Era. I think I may apply that term to the present crisis. The Emperor Na-lings and eight pence, in paper, for one poleon, it is said, has taken the field; he pound one shilling in coin. Therefore, has placed himself at the head of all those for every hundred pounds in coin, which "perjured villains," who so "basely de- we deliver to our glorious disinterested serted" the Royal Bourbons for that Allies, we pay the sum of one hundred "vile monster," their present chief. He and fifty eight pounds six shillings and has left the good city of Paris to protect eight pence in paper. Judge, then, itself, and has withdrawn the whole of reader, what is the real amount of the the regular force, leaving the volunteers, subsidies we grant to the Potentates of or the national guard, as the French call Europe, for fighting in defence of the them, to defend the metropolis of the em-rights of the privileged race: This is no pire that very metropolis which the hire-joke: it is real serious earnest. But we ling press of this country declared Napoleon was afraid to enter in the day time, and which was defended against the Royal legitimate Monarch, by the "perjured horde who had united their crimes to those of the Usurper." I do not think our Ministers would choose to leave the good city of London to defend itself. I remember when that most obnoxious measure the Corn Bill was in progress through the Legislature, that it was the boast of the ministerial papers, how many thousands and tens of thousands of troops, of all sorts, were quartered in the immediate neighbourhood of our metropolis, to defend it against itself. The Times recorded the names of the regiments, with a sort of savage joy, as if it calculated on something which it had not ferocity sufficient

have only began our subsidies are not half granted yet. The King of Denmark says, that his troops cannot march one yard, until he receives a subsidy. The Crown Prince of Sweden says, that he must have an equivalent in money for the cession of Guadaloupe to the Bourbons. And, be it remembered, that the Bourbon soldiers, sent to take possession of that island, immediately on their landing produced each man the national tri-coloured cockade out of his knapsack, and declared for Napoleon, while it was supposed that he was still burried in his exile at Elha. Thus we paid to the Crown Prince of Sweden a large sum for transferring the Island of Guadaloupe te the Emperor Napoleon, to annihilate whom we are now going to pay all Eu

rope, and even this very same Crown pence, have been both killed, all their Prince of Sweden amongst the rest. Fer- stores and arms (which loaded two frigates dinand the Fourth of the Two Sicilies, has and three sloops of war) taken, and their been kept by us so long that it is an old whole rebel party dispersed in all direcstory to talk of him. But now he will be tions!-The subsidies being duly received, rather more expensive, for we shall have andthe preparations being made, it is now to keep up a large British Army to sup- said that the march to Paris will take port him in possession, besides paying his place immediately.-To be sure, it is alown army, and giving him a good round lowed that there are upwards of 600,000 sum to set up royalty, as we gave our own Perjured Villians” on the frontiers, Prince Regent at the commencement of with the "Hellish Monster" at their his new era." By the by, this sum, head. But what can such a Legion of (£100,000) it appears by some very im- Devils do against the Holy Louis, sur-pertinent questions lately asked in Par-rounded as he is by Priests; with the liament, was not applied for the purpose good Cause of Legitimate Right on his for which it was granted; and his Royal side; all the population of France ready Highness has again had occasion to apply to rise and tear the "Perjured Villains" to his faithful Commons for assistance, by whom no doubt it will be most cheerfully relieved. Besides Ferdinand the Fourth, we have the other Ferdinand the Seventh, of the same Royal stock. His army too, it seems cannot march till we find money. Indeed it is shrewdly suspected, that a sum of £800,000 was advanced by us to that beloved monarch, to enable him to fit out his late Cadiz expe, dition to South America; and, as usual, a sort of fatality attends all that we interfere with. The Times, states that by the ship Sarah Jane, arrived in 92 days, from "Buenos Ayres, we learn that the revolu"tionists have got possession of almost the "whole of Spanish America; that General "Orr has 40,000 troops well armed and equipped; that Admiral Brown has 8 sail of large frigates; and that the ut "most anxiety prevailed for the arrival of "the expedition from old Spain, which, "as it would of course fall immediately "into the hands of the revolutionists, "would afford them an ample supply of military stores of all sorts. The British "had embarked their property," &c. &c. But the most extraordinary passage in this piece of information is, that "the King "Ferdinand has expressed the utmost indignation against the province of Vene"zuela, for having afforded such facili"ties to English commerce!" Here is Royal gratitude with a vengence. So we advance Ferdinand, the beloved, £800,000 to enable him to punish those of our friends in America, who are disposed to receive our merchandize! The newspapers of to-day state, that the two Chiefs of La Vendee, who have been equipped by England at an enormous ex

to pieces, and with 1,011,000 men to support him. What can the "Infamous Usurper" do against such a mighty army as this. He must of course be put down immediately, and the Royal Louis will be received with a delirium of joy by all his Liege Subjects. In order to ensure success, the Times declares "from a source “ of undoubted Authority," that the Emperor of Austria is about to bestow one of his Daughters, the sister of the "unfortunate Maria Louisa, on the Duke de Berri, nephew of the "Desired" Louis. One would have thought that the Times would have been rather cautious of adducing this as a proof of fidelity. If so, how does it happen that Napoleon is deserted. And if the Emperor Francis can desert one of his Sons in Law, what proof is there that he will not desert another. A short time will now shew us the result of all this. If it should happen that Napoleon should succeed in defending his kingdom against the prodigious force assembled to destroy him, the effects will be incalculable! Our glorious Ministers have raised the genius of the storm. It is impossible to tell how he is to be appeased. Peace and tranquility were in their reach; they prefered war with all its horrors. But the leisure of peace would have brought about reform, and that would not suit the sent system. War and its enormous expenditure, is better suited to the way of thinking of the Prince Regent's Ministers. But it is a very fearful experiment, and may end fatally. If Napoleon can but resist the first onset; if he can only "hold his own," as the phrase is, he will stagger the Allies. But if he should gain any, even the smallest advantage; if he should

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