Such a ridiculous bugbear as Wilkes could not have imposed for a day even on the lowest rabble, if he had not been supported by the countenance and co-operation of the great political leaders. But even that would not have given consistency to such a shadow, if it had not unfortunately happened to mix itself up with the two constitutional questions of "general warrants" and "parliamentary privilege." The intermixture of these loyal questions enabled such men as Mr. Pitt, who disapproved of the violence and despised the calumnies of Wilkes, to use him as the tool of their ambition. Wilkes, encouraged by such support, and hurried on by his own natural indiscretion, with the recklessness of a man who had nothing to lose, and the prospect of gaining at least notoriety-proceeded to extremes of sedition, obscenity, and blasphemy, which even faction itself hesitated to adopt. At length, Mr. Pitt, professing only to look to the constitutional question, censured the proceedings of the individual in the most decided and unequivocal manner, as we learn from Thackeray's History of Lord Chatham:

"24th Nov., 1763.-Mr. Pitt, though very ill, came down to the House on crutches, and vehemently reprobated the facility with which Parliament was surrendering its own privileges; but he carefully impressed on the House that he was merely delivering a constitutional opinion, and not vindicating the libel or its author. He condemned the whole series of North Britons, and called them illiberal, unmanly, and detestable. 'He abhorred,' he said, 'all national reflections: the King's subjects were one people; whoever divided them

journal for the year 1762:-" September 23. Colonel Wilkes, of the Buckinghamshire militia, dined at our mess. I scarcely ever met with a better companion: he has inexhaustible spirits, infinite wit and humour, and a great deal of knowledge; but a thorough profligate in principle as in practice, his life stained with every vice, and his conversation full of blasphemy and indecency. These morals he glories in; for shame is a weakness he has long since surmounted. He told us himself, that in this time of public discussion he was resolved to make his fortune. This proved a very debauched day: we drank a good deal, both after dinner and supper; and when at last Wilkes had retired, Sir Thomas Worsley and some others (of whom I was not one) broke into his room, and made him drink a bottle of claret in bed."

was guilty of sedition. The author did not deserve to be ranked among the human species: he was the blasphemer of his God, and the libeller of his King. He had no connexion with him; he had no connexion with any such writer!'"

MR. PITT'S SPEECH ON THE AMERICAN STAMP ACT.

With this great man, manner did much. One of the fairest specimens which we possess of Pitt's oratory, is his speech, in 1766, for the repeal of the American Stamp Act. In Almon's Register, the report is tolerably exact, and exhibits, although faintly, its leading features. "But," says Mr. Butler, "they should have seen the look of ineffable contempt with which Pitt surveyed the late Mr. Grenville, who sat within one of him, and should have heard him say with that look,-' As to the late ministry, every capital measure they have taken, has been entirely wrong.' They should also have beheld him, when, addressing himself to Mr. Grenville's successor, he said: As to the present gentlemen,-those, at least, whom I have in my eye,'-(looking at the bench on which Mr. Conway sate)'I have no objection: I have never made a sacrifice by any of them.-Some of them have done me the honour to ask my poor opinion, before they would engage to repeal the Act; they will do me the justice to own, I did advise them to engage to do it,-but notwithstanding-(for I love to be explicit),-I cannot give them my confidence.Pardon me, gentlemen,' (bowing to them)-confidence is a plant of slow growth.'

"Those who remember the air of condescending protection, with which the bow was made, and the look given, when he spoke these words, will recollect how much they themselves, at the moment, were delighted and awed, and what they themselves then conceived of the immeasurable superiority of the orator over every human being that surrounded him. In the passages which we have cited, there is nothing which an ordinary speaker might not have said: it was the manner, and the manner only, which produced the effect."

The whole speech is very fine: "I sought for merit," said Pitt, "wherever it was to be found; and I found it in the mountains of the north. I called it forth, and drew it into your service, a hardy and intrepid race of men. Men, who when left by your jealousy, became a prey to the artifices of your enemies, and had gone nigh to have overturned the state in the war before last. These men, in the last war, were brought to combat on your side; they served with fidelity, as they fought with valour, and conquered for you in every part of the world. Detested be the national prejudices against them! they are unjust, groundless, illiberal, unmanly. When I ceased to serve His Majesty as Minister, it was not the country of the man, (Lord Bute,) by which I was moved ;but the man of that country wanted wisdom, and held principles incompatible with freedom."

Another account of this speech was written by Lord Charlemont to Mr. Henry Flood, of which the following is the substance:

"Mr. Pitt has spoken several times: his first speech was near two hours long. He began by abusing the late ministry, and in particular G. G., who did not choose to answer him: he then found fault with the present also, insinuating that they were under ill influences: 'I say influences in the plural, because I would not be understood to mean only that influence which is most suspected.' By this he is supposed to have hinted at the too great influence of the Duke of N- - He then spoke of the American affair, and boldly and distinctly declared that the act of taxation was illegal; that the colonies could only be taxed by their representatives; and concluded by insisting that the Act should be repealed as illegal. This produced a warm debate; the majority of the House seemed to be of opinion that, if the tax were to be taken off, it should be done upon a supposition that it was too heavy for the colonies to bear, but the rescinding of the Act should be accompanied by an explicit declaration of the right of taxation. Poor expedient! The question of adjournment was put and carried. Yesterday the debate was resumed, and Mr. Pitt

F

declared it as his opinion, that by this illegal act the original compact with the colonies was actually broken, &c. Heavens, what a fellow is this Pitt! I had his bust before, but nothing less than his statue shall content me now."(Note to Thackeray, vol. ii. p. 711.)

A bill for the repeal of the Stamp Act was soon afterwards carried by a considerable majority of the House; in commemoration of which, a colossal statue of Mr. Pitt was erected at Charlestown, in South Carolina. The character and costume of the figure are Ciceronian; the sculptor was Wilton, one of the founders of our Royal Academy, and well known for his bust of Lord Chatham. The pedestal bears the following inscription:

IN DEFENDING THE FREEDOM OF AMERICANS,

THE TRUE SONS OF ENGLAND,

BY PROMOTING A REPEAL OF THE STAMP ACT,
IN THE YEAR 1766.

TIME

SHALL SOONER DESTROY

THIS MARK OF THEIR ESTEEM,

THAN

ERASE FROM THEIR MINDS

THE JUST SENSE

OF HIS PATRIOTIC VIRTUE."

"THE GREAT COMMONER.”

This "common phrase for Mr. Pitt" had been by Pitt himself previously applied to Sir John Barnard, the great London

merchant, and one of the members for the City.

He died in

1749, and Pitt seems to have inherited the distinction. Walpole writes, June 9, 1766:

"The Great Commoner is exceedingly out of humour, and having duped himself, taxes the Ministers with perfidy; he would never connect with them in or out, and who, having proscribed half of them, would not vouchsafe to treat with the rest. The people who think everything right that he does, or does not, and who, as often as he changes his mind backwards and forwards, think that right too, take all the pains they can to indulge his pride. He has been at Bath; they stood up all the time he was in the rooms, and while he drank his glass of water; and one man in Somersetshire said to him as he passed through a crowd, 'I hope your Majesty's health is better!' I am glad,-no, I don't know whether I am not sorry, that he is not at Quito, where they have insisted on crowning one of their fellow-subjects King of Peru."

This year, (1766,) Lord Chatham's town residence was the mansion in Bond-street, (now the Clarendon Hotel,) which had been let to "the Great Commoner" by the Duke of Grafton.

THE FIRST GERM OF PARLIAMENTARY REFORM.

In Mr. Pitt's powerful speech in the debate on the Address in 1766, we find this first germ of Parliamentary Reform:

"There is an idea in some, that the colonies are virtually represented in this House. I would fain know by whom an American is represented here? Is he represented by any Knight of the Shire, in any county in this Kingdom? Would to God that respectable representation was augmented to a greater number! Or will you tell him that he is represented by any representative of a borough-a borough which its own representatives never saw? This is what is called 'the rotten part of the constitution.' It cannot continue a century; if it does not drop, it must be amputated."

Lord Chatham, some years after, reproduced the same image on the same subject, but with a juster conclusion: