Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

In his speech at the hustings, he took the opportunity to declare, he was not actuated by any private pique in the contest; that he did not even know Mr. Mainwaring.

"I am," said he, "impelled only by the feelings of huma nity-the same feelings which impelled me when I first offered to make good my charges respecting that horrible dungeon (the Cold Bath-Fields Prison) at the bar of the House of Commons. On that ground I principally offer myself to you, trufting, as I hold it impossible that you can suffer a man who countenanced things so contrary to the constitution and the law of the land, to be again sent into Parliament as your representative, that you will join with me in bringing these things and the authors of them to light, and to punishment. I promise you here, that I will never quit the pursuit of these detestable criminals. I will persevere to the last; and I have no doubt that, aided, as I am convinced I shall be, by your support, I shall be ultimately and completely successful.

"I have only now to intreat, that you will understand, that it is not now the question merely, whether you shall choose Burdett or Mainwaring, but whether you will support that jail, and all the cruelties and tortures connected with it, and resulting necessarily from the system by which it has been regulated?"

On the shew of hands the sheriff declared the sense of the electors to be in favour of Mr. Byng and Sir Francis Burdett: Mr. Mainwaring demanded a poll; and had on the first day a majority of nearly four hundred voters. At the end of the eleventh day Mr. Mainwaring's majority was 503; but in the three next days Sir Francis advanced rapidly upon his adversary, and on the evening of the fourteenth day the majority against him was but fourteen.

This success roused the languid spirits of the unpolled freeholders, who, till then, thinking his cause

1802-3.

Kk

desperate,

desperate, would not take the trouble of voting. The enthusiasm in behalf of the popular candidate was universal. The poll had not been opened many minutes on the last day, before Sir Francis obtained a majority over Mr. Mainwaring, and at the final close he had a majority of 271 votes; and it is confidently said, that when the books were shut, the unpolled friends of Sir Francis, either in the town or approaching it, amounted to nearly two hundred.

The knowledge that this was the last day of the poll, and the probability amounting almost to a certainty, that the popular candidate would be successful, elevated the spirits of almost every human being that attended on the road. Every inch of ground between Piccadilly and Brentford was crowded beyond example. The enthusiasm was general; and the joy manifested at the triumph of the popular candidate, was such as was never before witnessed in this, or perhaps in any country on the face of the globe. In his address to the freeholders of Middlesex, Sir Francis Burdett says:

Gentlemen, for having done my duty in my place in parliament against the barbarous, cruel system of secret close imprisonment, I was stigmatized by the Lord Lieutenant of this county: and, in violation of the privileges of parliament, and of all law and decency, I was proclaimed by him throughout the land, as a person not fit to be trusted to visit or perform an office of humanity to any wretched victim within the accursed walls. Permit me to say, it belonged to the same county to wipe away this undeserved stigma; and you have done it nobly."

Such is the Baronet's own observation; the charge which he exhibits is known to every body; not a freeholder

2

freeholder in Middlesex but has read it in the public papers, properly signed, and attested in due form. What has been the result? Those freeholders thought, and wisely thought, that none should have any concern in making laws, who were regardless of that purity, integrity, and humanity with which they should be administered. On this principle they chose Sir Francis Burdett, in defiance of the obloquy thrown upon him by the highest officer of the county. By him he was declared ineligible to enter a prison for any purposes of humanity; by the freeholders he has been esteemed the best qualified of any man in the kingdom, for talents, independence, and purity of principle, to represent them in the British Legislature.

This contest between Mr. Mainwaring and Sir Francis, was not decided upon principles dictated by political party: the constituents conceived it to turn upon an abuse of civil authority.

On these principles the Middlesex election undoubtedly turned; upon these principles, many, whose political opinions were adverse to those avowed by Sir Francis, not only voted for him, but manfully espoused his cause. Among the electors that voted for him, may be found Whigs and Tories joining hands and hearts in favour of the rights of humanity.

We may, therefore, look upon this triumph, not as the triumph of the individual, but as that of the sacred cause of humanity, and the bulwark of the British. Constitution, of which Sir Francis is the representative.

When we view these exertions in behalf of the

[blocks in formation]

claims of humanity, we know there can be no caus for desponding of our country. In the zealous, spirited, persevering, independent, and philanthropic character of such men as Sir Francis Burdett, the public may, with confidence, repose themselves and their privileges. As a people, as a great people, compared with other nations around us, our energies seem to expand, and our hopes, in whatever is va luable to freemen, seem to revive. There are parts of the constitution that still live; that possess a vigour superior to opposition, and, we trust, that are not to be crushed by corruption.

Sir Francis Burdett, to whose character as a public man we have not done that justice that we could have wished, is in private life one of the most ami. able and unassuming men in the world. He possesses all the accomplishments of an orator; an elegant and manly figure; his countenance is handsome and very prepossessing; his voice is strong and musical: he never delivers his sentiments but with the energy of a man who speaks as he feels.

He married, about eight years since, the amiable Miss Coutts, by whom he has a son about seven years old and two daughters. That the father-inlaw should feel interested in the election of his son, no one who has been a parent will be surprized at; but beyond this he never proceeded. Mr. Coutts is not a political character; he has always been in the habit of doing business with persons of all parties; and with characters of every description, from the monarch to the merchant; yet he has been

reviled

reviled for assisting Sir Francis, but certainly by those only who knew not the extent of Sir Francis Burdett's fortune, which was fully equal to all the expences of the election.

To the frequenters of Newmarket, and the gamingtables of St. James's Street, it may appear wonderful for a young man, in high life, to be in possession of ready money for such an occassion. But Sir Francis is not a man that runs into the fashionable vices or expences of his contemporaries; his delight is in doing good, and he is always prepared with his purse to be able to perform acts which his heart delights in. His fortune has ever been ample since he succeeded to his title, and within these three years he came to the possession of a very large unincumbered landed property in Wiltshire, upon the death of Lady Jones, whose name he was obliged to take; but by passing through some expensive legal ceremonies, which it would be needless to state here, he was enabled again to take his own family-name; and a more honourable and virtuous representative than the present Baronet, the family never could boast of.

MR. JAMES WATT,

THE character and talents of this excellent man are not known so extensively as they merit. Among mechanicians and men of science, indeed, the celebrity of the name of WATT yields to that of no living character. To hold up the benefactors of mankind

« ElőzőTovább »