claims-however he felt that he had done his

abhorrence which it deserved. He next adverted

Ward, at the St. Thomas's Day. before the last? Did any man ever witness partiality so gross and so foul? Did he not then defend every abuse, every waste of the city's money; nay, did he not tell the Livery to take care how they countenanced such rummaging into their accounts, lest they should be deprived of their funds altogether! Here, too, as in all other respects, the two candidates present a most striking contrast. At that very election Mr. SCALES, though opposed in politics to Sir James Shaw, applauded his impurtiality, and either proposed or seconded a vote of thanks to him on that score. In short, whatever Liveryman reflected, in this case, had no choice: the one candidate was so fit, and the other so unfit, that, to the man who thought, there was no room for choice. Each candidade has got his just allotment: the one, the means of extending the sphere of his benevolence; and the other, a pretty good punishment for his conceit, his insolence, and his greedi

had still borne up, determined to give the
Livery an opportunity of recording their votes
Could he do more-could they require more at
his hands? He felt perfectly satisfied, that if
the Livery, at the commencement of the Elec-
tion, had been made sensible of the deep con-
spiracy which was formed to defeat his just
duty, and that the time had now arrived when
he ought to follow the advice of those friends
who recommended him no longer to continue
so exhausting a contest. (Applause.) He
then proceeded to defend the attacks he had
made upon the characters of his opponents,
saying that they were public men, open to
animadversion, and men whose conduct would
hereafter be marked with the detestation and the
to his conduct respecting the late Queen, and
the sacrifices to which that led. His enemies
might rejoice that his pocket had been picked
of the expenses of the present contest; but
he should still persevere in the same steady
and undeviating course. If he could not
afford to keep a two-pair front room, he would
keep a two-pair back room, and go on still,
and, like Andrew Marvel, dine off his bone
of cold mutton: his health might fail, and
so might his talent; but he would support the
great cause with his dying breath. He felt
bound to do the Bank of England the justice
of saying, that he met with no opposition from
that quarter; but he had been defeated, and
the corrupt influence excited against him only
the more convinced him of the necessity of the
Ballot. (Great applause.) He feared that
the Government was not about to proceed in
a right course-he feared that they would
at last sting the people into violent courses.
He believed that with such a government
the people could not long be prevented
from taking affairs into their own hands.
He might be asked why he had not sooner
exposed the hollowness of the men with whom MY LORD,
he dealt? He confessed, he was, like Fal-
staff, ashamed of his recruits, and he did not

ness.

WM. COBBETT.

TO THE

MARQUIS OF BLANDFORD.
Bolt-Court, Jan. 27th, 1831.

I HAVE been informed, that a few like to expose them; but they had now ex-weeks ago, your Lordship, by letter, posed themselves. He thanked his many told a Clergy man of the Church of Engfriends for their kindness, saying that the land, that the guilt of setting some of the poll-hooks would of necessity be opened on the following morning, but neither he nor any

of his Committee would attend.

66

"Andrew Marvel" indeed! Did Andrew Marvel ever beg for a place? As to his "6 sacrifices for the Queen," I could, if I would, tell a story that would make the town laugh for a month! His pocket picked!' The low, the vulgar man, does he accuse the Livery of picking his pocket, merely because they would not vote for him! They seem, at any rate, to have been resolved, not to lead him into a temptation of the sort. What was his conduct as Alderman of our

fires had been brought home to me, and that, in consequence, I had absconded. The object of this present letter is, to request your Lordship to have the goodness to inform me whether you ever did communicate, in the manner abovementioned, such information; and to apprize you, at the same time, that this letter will be published in the next Register, and also any answer that your Lordship may be pleased to give there

to.

I am, your Lordship's most humble
and most obedient servant,
WM. COBBETT.

I shall make a grund show-up of Spiritual Persons" next week. They have outwitted themselves this time! The whole country rings with Cobbett's Sermons! Cobbett's Protestant Reformation! But, what more is wanted than Two-PENNY TRASH, No. 7? This little work is 11s. a hundred, if than 300 copies are taken. Cheap Government" this, at any

more

rate.

To the Editor of THE REGISTER.

IRELAND.

THE run upon the Banks, though not to any extent worth speaking of, has commenced even directions have been issued by the Bank of in Dublin, and every-where Ireland to limit the discounts, and to sus

perd as much as possible the issue of paper, and this at the approach of a famine in the West of Ireland, and a frightful scarcity in every other part of the kingdom. But it is all for a repeal of the Union-all the consequent suffering must be incurred for the good cause, and to please the great agitator! Fools! you are preparing a whip of scorpions

for yourselves!

know is not in your power; but you are preYou will not injure the Banks-that we paring insolvency for yourselves!

ALARM IN THE MONEY-MARKET. Since the preceding lines were written, we have received several communications from the country and from our mercantile friends in town, which fill us, we confess, with deep alarm. Mr. O'Connell may be much nearer in bringing confusion on the country than January 27, 1831. ever, in his most sanguine moments, he could SIR,I shall feel greatly obliged by have imagined. Circulars, we know, have your telling me, through the medium been sent by one great house, and perhaps by others, in the corn-trade, to their factors and of your paper, how it is that, although correspondents in the country, intimating imeetings are taking place all over the that for the present they must suspend all Kingdom, on the subject of Reform, business-that they will not accept any bills and the necessity of the Ballot, almost in consequence of the panic created by Mr. O'Connell. The Banks in Dublin, including unanimously acknowledged, there has the Bank of Ireland, have declined the most been no meeting for Reform in South-solvent bills-and there is a great gloom this wark. Surely it is not because Sir day spread over the city. "The arrests,' Robert Wilson waxed wroth on the says The Morning Register, "for the cou subject of the Ballot, in the House of spiracy to evade or defeat the Lord Lieutenant's Proclamatlon, caused Bank Stock to Commons, some time since. fall 3 per cent. yesterday. So much for the wisdom of the arrests!""

it

And perhaps you can explain how is that there has been no meeting of the City of Westminster. It cannot be from the fear of cabbage-stalks and turnips; because if that were the case it could be held in Palace-yard, or some other place remote from the danger arising from a shower of these obnoxious missiles.

We are, doubtless, likely to have a grand meeting of the Corporation of the City of London on the subject very shortly, and seeing that our great Champion of Reform was, on the very anniversary of the conversion of Saint Paul, converted to the Ballot, I have no doubt but even that will be agreed to unanimously.

We are surprised that The Register, which, at least, knows something of the operations of trade, and the delicacy of public credit, and the causes which have produced the present alarm, should have let out such a paragraph as this. Every-thing has fallen, as well as hended scarcity of money from Mr. O'CouBank Stock, in consequence of the appre nell's threat.

The Banks have almost declined discounting. Government Stock has fallen less in proportion than other securities, because the who is forced to sell his Bank Stock, which English market is open; but the merchant cannot be sent to England, was obliged to submit to a reduction of three per cent.; for the same reason, Government Debentures informed persous consider, that but for the London market being open, Government Secu rities would be from five to ten per cent, lower than in England.

have fallen much more than Stock. The best

ARREST OF THOMAS CLONEY, ESQ., OF GRAIGUE, COUNTY KILKENNY.-Friday morning, about nine o'clock, two officers from the Head Police-office applied at Mr. Cloney's

hotel, and inquired for him; receiving for of panic. Consòls and other Government answer that he had not as yet left his chamber, Securities are regulated by the prices at the owing to his being somewhat indisposed, they London Stock Exchange; but Bank Stock is politely desired that he should not be disturbed a local security, and capable of being pecuuntil his usual hour of rising, and said they liarly influenced by domestic alarms. The would wait on him about twelve o'clock, by run upon the Bank for gold, which has been which hour a number of gentlemen, having made to a considerable extent, produced a heard of the circumstance, called on Mr. fall in Bank Stock yesterday of nearly Cloney, and tendered their services on the three per cent.; and up to the moment at occasion. They al proceeded to the Head which I write the decline continues, but it will Police-office, accompanied by the two officers, not last long. The Bank, with some inconwhere Mr. Edward Murphy, the eldest son of venience, perhaps, will meet any demand that the late Bryan Murphy, Esq., of Kennedy's- can be made upon it, and the agitation in our lane, in conjunction with Mr. Andrew Tierney, Stock Market, which compared with the ocof the house of Tierney, Brothers, and Co., casional convulsions in your's, may be likendruggists, Skinner-row, entered into the re-ed to a storm in a tea-pot, will very speedily quisite securities for Mr. Cloney's due appearance in the Court of King's Bench on the first day of Term-Dublin Morning Register. The following Order was posted last night (Friday) on the board in the Chamber of Commerce :

"TO THE COUNCIL OF THE CHAMBER OF

COMMERCE.

"We, the undersigned, members of the Chamber of Commerce, request that you will convene a general Meeting of the Members of the Body as early as possible, for the purpose of considering the propriety of presenting an Address to the Marquess of Anglesey, expressive of their confidence in his Administration, and his exertions to preserve public peace, and to promote the commercial and general prosperity of Ireland.

"The foregoing requisition, signed by one hundred and ninety-six highly respectable members of the Chamber, having been laid before the Council, and considered, it was "Resolved-That the Requisitionists be respectfully informed that although the Coun cil cordially approve of the object of the above Requisition, they regret that, in consequence of the existing state of public excitement, they deem it inexpedient to call any special general assembly of the Chamber.

"6 By order,

"THOMAS JAMESON, Register." Mr. COSTELLOE.-Yesterday two warrants for the apprehension of Mr. Costelloe arrived in town, one directly from Dublin, and the other by the way of Dungannon; but he had gone off in the morning coach before their arrival. We expected something of this kind. -Belfast News Letter.

ORANGEMEN. We understand that this body has lately been greatly augmented in the north, and a new lodge of highly respectable members is about to be formed in Belfast; and this is the consequence of Mr. O'Connell's agitation—many public-spirited persons, who, in ordinary cases, would condemn such associations, being now of opinion that they are at this time called on to counteract the agitator's insidious efforts to produce revolution in this country.-Belfast Chronicle.

DUBLIN, Jan. 20,-la our little Stock-market, which may be regarded as a representation of our limited capital, there is now a sort

subside. About a sixth part of the holders of Bank Stock are Englishmen.

Meetings of the peasantry in the North, respecting tithes and rents, continue. All accounts agree in representing the distress amongst the poor as most appalling; and in anticipating a famine in the approaching summer, potatoes are already becoming very scarce, and oatmeal has reached a very high West; but in the South, although the potatoe price. I allude particularly to the North and crop has been deficient in some districts, yet the supply in the chief markets continues abundant, and the price is moderate. In the Clonmel market, for instance, potatoes sell at from 234. to 3d. per stone.

In the South of Ireland several Reform Meetings have recently taken place, and others have been convened.

TO MY CONSTITUENTS.
"Within that land was many a malcontent,
Who cursed the tyranny to which he bent ;-
That soil full many a wringing despot saw,
Who worked his wantonness in form of law."

Merrion-square, Jan. 21, 1831.

MY BELOVED AND RESPECTED FRIENDS,-I am your servant. My duty is to do your business and to obey your commands. 1 entirely disclaim the doctrine that a representative of the people can, without being dishonest, disobey his constituents. If he differs conscientiously from his constituents, there is but one course for him to pursue, and that is to resign. In fact, the contest between a representative and his constituents, is almost always a controversy between selfish interest and sacred duty.

When I solicited your votes, I pledged myself to constant attendance in the House. I have hitherto kept that pledge unbroken. It was and is my fixed determination to be in London the day Parliament meets, unless I am prevented by the paltry prosecution which has been instituted against ine.

I am bound to say that I am perfectly convinced that the principal motive of the most active advisers of this miserable prosecution is to prevent me from attending in my place to describe and denounce the despotic, arbitrary, and most unnecessary measures that have been resorted to in Ireland.

It would not be convenient for some arch

jobbers in Ireland, who contrive to stick their families, like leeches, to suck the heart's blood of Ireland, to have me expose all the details of that species of peculation which enriches one family at the expense of an impoverished and exhausted country.

ingly I do anticipate, that in my absence from the House there will be some new, and probably more severe Algerine acts (as they have been called) introduced by the Whigs. Mark me well, recollect my prophecy-you will have the Whigs introduce some delusive measure-some nibbling at the Subletting actit will, probably, be some aggravation to bę styled au amendment. There will be an altera

But there is one prime grievance which, above all things, it is my duty to expose the vestry cesses and the tithe system. In all my addresses to you before my election, I ven-tion in the Vestry Bill; that probably will tured to prophesy that the time was fast approaching when the people of England would join with us in a loud and irresistible demand for the total abolition of the tithe system.

That salutary cry has commenced in EngJand. It is beginning to he re-echoed in a proper and legal manner in Ireland. The accomplishment of my prophecy is fast approaching. If I shall be permitted to do my duty in Parliament this Session, I hope that this most important result will be advanced; but, after all, it is only by the repeal of the Union that we can look with certainty for the total abolition of tithes.

make it worse than it now is. There will be some little peddling about corporation monopolies, and a grand inquiry, to last three years longer, into tolls and customs-and these mighty boons will be consummated by some law creating a Dictatorship, or something of that kind, in Ireland. Believe me I shall prove a true prophet.

Preserve this prophecy-and you will find that my words will prove true, or, if not quite accurate, it is only because I probably underrate the baseness of some of the Whigs.

If I am prevented from attending in my place in parliament-if the voice of almost universal Ireland be, in my person, suppressed This is one of the great reasons why I insist-do not, indeed you cannot, blame me. upon that repeal. Indeed, the Repeal of the Union is the great and really healing measure which alone is calculated to form the basis, and raise the superstructure of prosperity in Ireland. Without it, distress must accumulate; poverty must increase; famine and pestilence, which are yearly taking a wider range, must become almost universal; and Ireland must become a solitude or a slaughter-house. I say this advisedly.

But the Repeal of the Union terrifies the sordid, aristocratic absentees, and especially the bloated pluralists of the Established Church, who shudder lest we Radical Reformers and anti-Unionists should realize our plan, of the payment by the State of all such of the Protestant Clergy as really perform spiritual functious, in an ample proportion to their real labours, and not paying at all those who do no work.

But I should be to blame if I in anywise transgressed the law. I am a lawyer of great experience in the Criminal Law, and never was there a man more determined not to transgress that law than I was and am. My constant advice to the people for the last twenty-five years always was, as it still is, not to violate the law in any one particular. I should, therefore, be both absurd aud criminal if I violated it myself intentionally; and if it be said that I have violated it unintentionally, then, indeed, there is a demonstration of the enormous absurdity of our Fenal Code-of its unintelligibility, of its capariciousness, when a lawyer of 30 years' standing, determined not to violate the law, and knowing his every action to be watched, has yet, in presence of his enemies, put himself into their power.

What a happy elucidation it would be, of that which I have so often complained of and exposed-under the title given to it by the illustrious and immortal Bentham-of Judge

It is, however, thought wise and prudent to keep me out of the House of Commons this Session, and, accordingly, this strange prose-made Law. cution has been got up against me.

But, my friends, I can assure you, that, without the most violent contortion of everything that has hitherto been considered as fixed law, and stated to be such by the most venerable authorities amongst the English Judges, it is utterly impossible to sustain this prosecution.

I feel it my duty to give you this outline of the motives that have, I am convinced, instigated the advisers of this prosecution. Let me remind you that it requires not only a Reformer but a Lawyer, to speak in the House with effect on the subject of the late Proclamiations, and, in particular, to expose the illegal There must be, I assure you, the most auand mischievous tendency of the famous Stan- dacious perversion of fact, and a still more ley circular. It would not be disagreeable to flagrant violation of law-things, the happenthat young gentleman not to have to encountering of which I certainly do not at all anticime on a subject so vitally important to the first principles of constitutional liberty.

pate-if this prosecution does not totally and ludicrously fail. I tell you as a lawyer and as a mau, that I am entitled to an acquittal, even on the showing of my enemies themselves.

The late administration declared that they would not introduce any coercive measures during the Session. When the Tories made thus a solemn declaration, they were entitled I owe it to you, my constituents, to show to be believed. It would be impossible to you that I have not in any one respect violated give the same credit to the Whigs. Accord-the law; nay, that, in fact, I am not even

accused of any thing which can justly be called | fascinate such persons as even a chance of a violation of the law. reviving an obsolete despotism.

It is indeed part of history, and a remarkable fact, that Lord Coke, when Chief Justice, was earnestly urged by the Crown to give an opinion in favour of the validity of Proclamations. The conduct, on that occasion, of the then Solicitor-General, the toocelebrated Lord BaconWho shined,

The charge against me on the silly warrant is split into two parts. They are, as usual with absurd charges, contradictory of each other, The first is for having disobeyed the Proclamations!! There is a charge for you on which to arrest the man who has the high honour of being the chosen Representative of your county. The second is for having evaded" the same Proclamations. Now, if I disobeyed the Proclamations, it is clear that I did not evade them; and if I only evaded the Proclamations, it is equally clear I did not disobey them.

&

This contradiction is, to be sure, rather a glaring one; but no matter. The entire may serve the purpose of keeping me from exposing, in my place in Parliament, the fatal and foolish proceedings of some of our rulers.

But I proceed to show you the futility of those charges:

The first is, that I disobeyed a Proclamation. I have two answers to this charge.

The first is, that it is quite untrue. It is quite false that I disobeyed all, or any of them. There is not the least foundation of fact in this charge.

The second answer is, that even if I had disobeyed any or all of the Proclamations, should not have been guilty of any offence, unless I came within the terms of the act, called the Algerine Act-which, observe, it is not pretended or alleged that I have done.

The wisest, brightest, meanest, of mankind".
is well known for his servility and audacity.
He endeavoured to cajole, bribe, or terrify
Lord Coke into a declaration that the law
justified the infliction of punishment for
violating a Proclamation; but, although the
Judges were then removeable at pleasure,
Lord Coke, to his eternal honour, resisted.

This is not the place to quote passages of law, but I cannot resist quoting here the abstract of Lord Coke's opinion, as given in a work of the highest authority, called Comyn's Digest. Here is the passage :

Proclamation; and, therefore, nothing will "The King cannot create an OFFENCE by was not so before." "be punishable after a Proclamation which

cannot be punishable as an offence to disobey I need not say any more to show that it a Proclamation. 1 therefore laugh to scorn the charge against me of "disobeying a Proclamation;" and I could defy the powers of human ingenuity to create a scrap of JUDGE-MADE LAW" to suit this occasion. But really this is not all. The act which enables a Lord Lieutenant to use arbitrary, Thus, my friends, I tell you, that this and, indeed, despotic power over all meetings, prosecution is unfounded in two respects-is in its nature sufficiently severe and suffifirst, in point of fact; and, secondly, in point of law.

The fact is for a Jury-all I could desire, if it were to go to a Jury, would be a fair and impartial Jury that is, I should desire-and with such a Jury

The law, however, is so plainly with me, that it will be intelligible to everybody.

I utterly deny that it is any crime or offence to oppose or disobey even a lawful Proclamation.

ciently unconstitutional not to have it extended one iota by construction. It is really most monstrous to talk of extending its effects by any construction; and I trust that the day will shortly arrive when the real advisers of this prosecution, and of the Proclamations, will meet the punishment they so justly merit.

In the quaint language and latinity of Lord Coke, it is said that all indictments conclude contra legem et consuetudinem, or contra leges et statuta. But never was seen any indictment to conclude-contra regiam procla mationem.”

We are, I suppose, soon to see such an indictment-another bad precedent to be added to those already furnished by the Whigs when in office.

That decision has, until a very modern time, and, indeed, with the single exception of one briefless English Barrister, been held in utter contempt. I would wager any man a Leaving this first charge to shift for itself thousand pounds to a shilling, that one of amidst the monstrous novelties of Whig lithe legal advisers of the Crown ferretted out aberality—a liberal, wide, and universal expassage in the work of a modern Barrister-tension of a most penal and restrictive statute and without examining its slender foundation, -a species of Whig anomaly in our lawnor the palpable manner in which this Bar- Leaving it to shift for itself, I come to the rister contradicts himself-they have insti- second charge. tuted the present prosecution upon no better authority, with the hope of reviving NOTHING LESS THAN THE STAR CHAMBER LAW.

I think I know the calibre of some that underhand advised this proceeding, and I cannot conceive any-thing more likely to

It is no less than this-" of a conspiracy to evade the Proclamation !!". There is a criminal charge in a country calling itself freeevading a Proclamation !!!

I did think badly of the Whigs, but really this exceeds all their former outdoings-con