BOOK XXIV. Dispute with Spain relative to the Settlement at Nootka Sound. Reluctance of France to support the Claims of Spain. Convention between Great Britain and Spain signed at the Escurial. Anniversary of the French Revolution celebrated. Mr. Burke publishes calumnious Reflections on the French Revolution. The pernicious and fatal Consequences of the Reflections. Reflections answered by Thomas Paine. Wonderful Effects of Paine's Pamphlet. New Parliament-Attempt of Mr. Pitt to seize the unclaimed Dividends at the Bank. Debate on the Pendency of Mr. Hastings's Impeachment. Catholic Toleration Act passed. Mr. Fox's Motion for a Bill to ascertain the Rights of Juries. Mr. Wilberforce's Motion for the Abolition of the Slave-Trade. Bill for establishing a Constitution in Canada. Alarming Dispute with Russia. Formidable Opposition in Parliament. Mr. Pitt compelled to disgraceful Retractations. State of Affairs in France. Church and King-Riots at Birmingham. Session of Parliament-Flourishing State of the Nation. Mr. Whitbread's Motion of Censure respecting Russia. Mr. Wilberforce's second Motion of Abolition. Insidious Conduct of the House of Lords. Mr. Fox's Motion for a Repeal of the Pena! Laws. Mr. Whitbread's Motion of Enquiry into the Birmingham Riots. Mr. Fox's Libel Bill passed into a Law. Act for the Relief of the Scottish Episcopalians. Society of the Friends of the People instituted. Royal Proclamation for the Suppression of Sedition. State of Affairs in India. State of Affairs in France. Amicable Overtures of the French Court rejected. Deposition of the King of France. Injurious Decree of the Convention. Infamous In BOOK XXIV. 1790. Dispute relative to ment at Nootka vaison of Poland by the Russians. Detestable Perfidy of the King of Prussia. King of Sweden assassinated. English Ambassador recalled from France. Unsolicited Offer of Asistance to the States General. Terrors of Innovation-Associations formed. Royal Proclamation-Militia embodied. Parliament convened-A Plot in Disguise. Defection of the Alarmists. Mr. Fox's Motion for a Negotiation with France negatived. Mr. Dundas's rash and confident Prediction. Ineffectual Efforts of the Executive Council of France to avert the War. French Ambassador ordered to depart the Kingdom. Insults and Injuries offered to France. English Government at length proposes to negotiate. War declared ly France against England and Holland. IN the month of April Mr. Pitt presented, as usual, his statement of the national revenue and expenditure; and it was very consolatory to the with Spain public to be informed that the receipt of the Exthe settle- chequer had surpassed that of the year preceding in the sum of half a million; and more so to be told that still greater accessions might reasonably be hoped from the uninterrupted enjoyment of the inestimable blessings of peace. It therefore ex. cited peculiar astonishment, when, in about a fortnight from this period, viz. May 5th, 1790, a royal message was delivered by the minister, announcing a state of things which bore the undisguised and menacing aspect of war. To elucidate this matter, it is necessary to mention that the celebrated circumnavigator Cook,* * It is impossible, on the incidental mention of a name so famous, not to pause for a moment, in order to pay to his me XXIV. 1790. in his last voyage of discovery, touching at divers BOOK ports on the western coast of North America, purchased from the natives a number of valuable furs bearing a high price in the Chinese market. This branch of commerce proving very lucrative, a spot of ground was, in the year 1788, procured from the Indians, and a regular establishment, defended by a slight fortification, formed at a place called mory the passing tribute of applause. What the combined efforts of former ages had left doubtful was at length ascertained by the skill, courage, and perseverance, of Cook. Those grand geographical problems, the existence of a southern continent, and the practicability of a north-west passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, are now become geographical chimeras. The unfortunate event by which this great navigator, like his renowned predecessor Magellan, lost his life in an encounter with the savages of an island in the Indian ocean, has been celebrated in a most beautiful elegy, by one of the first poetical geniuses of the age-Miss Seward. The lines expressive of the anxious impatience of his widowed consort, as yet unconscious of the loss she had sustained, for the return of him for whose safety she had preferred her daily and nightly vows, are peculiarly striking and emphatic : • But ah! aloft on Albion's rocky steep, That frowns incumbent o'er the boiling deep, Eyes the lone flood, and deprecates the storm. XXIV. 1790. BOOK Nootka Sound, situated about the goth degree of north latitude. This being regarded by the Spaniards as a flagrant encroachment on their exclusive rights of sovereignty, the Princessa a Spanish man of war, dispatched for this purpose by the viceroy of Mexico, in the following spring, seized without ceremony upon the fort, and captured such English vessels, the Iphigenia, Argonaut, &c. as were found trading on the coast. At the same time the Spanish commandant, hoisting the national standard, declared that the whole line of coast from Cape Horn to the 60th degree of north latitude belonged to the king of Spain. After some delay, and much loss and vexation to the proprietors, the captured vessels were restored by order of the viceroy, on the supposition, as he declared, "that nothing but ignorance of the rights of Spain could have induced the merchants in question to attempt an establishment on that coast." Of these particulars the court of London was informed by the Spanish ambassador so long since as the 10th of February; and his excellency at the same time requested" that measures might be taken for preventing his Britannic majesty's subjects from frequenting those coasts, and from carrying on their fisheries in the seas contiguous to the Spanish continent, as derogatory to the incontestible rights of the crown of Spain." This was XXIV. 1790. the exact counterpart of the memorable affair of BOOK Falkland Islands, which had so nearly involved Europe in a war twenty years before. The minister of that day, had he continued in power, would doubtless have avoided striking a second time upon the same rock; but it has been observed, not without too much colour of plausibility, from facts like the present, that although individuals gain wisdom by experience, nations do not. The famous dispute between the courts of Madrid and London, relative to the Scottish settlement on the Isthmus of Darien, in the reign of king William, was of a nature exactly analogous to the more recent ones of Falkland Islands and Nootka Sound and, if it were possible for statesmen to profit by the errors of their predecessors, exhibited a most useful and instructive lesson. The claims of Spain, in relation to her rights of dominion and sovereignty in America, were doubt. less in the highest degree chimerical, and could perhaps be equalled in extravagance only by the claims of Great Britain. By the treaty of 1763, the river Mississippi, flowing from north to south in a direct course of 1500 miles, was made the perpetual boundary of the two empires; and the whole country to the west of that vast river belonged to his Catholic majesty, by just as valid a tenure as the country eastward of the river to the king of England. Exclusive of this recent and decisive line |