advantage wholly unreasonable to the speculators in foreign corn, who held their grain in bond. If they imported when the price was 60s., the duty immediately chargeable to them, if they carried their corn to market, was 20s. a quarter. But if they held back, and the price rose to 65s., then, while the home agriculturist gained an advance of 5s. a quarter on his commodity, the foreign speculator gained an advance of 15s., for he gained 5s. upon the advance of corn in price from 60s. to 65s., and 10s. more upon the diminished

amount which he had to pay in duty. The opinion of the House, however, was not taken on either of these propositions, nor on an amendment moved by lord Althorp, that the averages should be taken every three weeks, instead of weekly. On the 12th of April, the bill was finally read a third time and passed; and, on the same day, the House adjourned for the Easter holidays to the 1st of May, a new writ being ordered to be issued for the borough of Newport, Mr. Canning having accepted the office of first lord of the Treasury.

S the fate which awaited the Corn-bill in the House of Lords was affected, or was believed to be affected, by the changes which took place in the interim among the members of the government as it was only on the adjournment of parliament that the extent of these changes was publicly known-as it was during the adjournment that the new arrangements were formed-and as these arrangements in a great degree deprived the proceedings of the legislature, after parliament had reassembled, of all interest which was not connected with their causes and history, we here suspend our detail of parliamentary business, to mention the dissolution of the old government, and the formation of a new ministry.

The Earl of Liverpool had been present, apparently in good health, at the opening of the session; had on the 12th of February moved the Address to the king on the death of the duke of York; and had given notice that he himself would introduce the intended alterations of the Corn-laws into the House of Lords. Within a few days afterwards, he was suddenly attacked by a paralytic stroke. The immediate and more violent

effects of the disease yielded to the power of medicine, but its permanent consequences were of such a nature as to remove the minister for ever from public life. The office of premier was thus unoccupied; the government was left without a head; and, unfortunately, the difficulties of appointing a successor, which are never small where so splendid an object of honourable ambition awakens the desires of rival statesmen, were greatly increased by the very nature of that cabinet over which lord Liverpool had presided. For some years, it had not been characterized by perfect unanimity of sentiment regarding more than one of the most important public questions. Catholic emancipation was a known and acknowledged source of difference of opinion amongst its members; mutual forbearance regarding it, and an understanding that every minister should follow upon it his own private convictions, without attempting to lend to his opinion the influence and patronage of his particular department, were sufficient to prevent wrangling and dissention at the council table, but could not supply the want of that perfect and mutual confidence, which arises only from unanimity of sentiment.

Some, at least, of the cabinet, who were most steadily and honestly opposed to the Catholic claims, had not much trust in those of their colleagues, who, though formerly hostile, had for some years been favourable to the furtherance of those claims. The latter, on the other hand, coquetted with and courted the good opinion of the opposition; and assumed to themselves the praise of having introduced what were called liberal principles into our foreign and our commercial policy. It was the weight of lord Liverpool alone, which had kept these discordant materials together. Himself immovable in his hostility to the demands of the Catholics, it was still he who had introduced into the office which he now held, Mr. Canning, who, since 1812, had thought it prudent to exert his eloquence in supporting them. The alterations in the Silk-trade, the Navigation-laws, the Corn-laws, in the whole system, in short, of duties and prohibitions, had taken place under lord Liverpool's authority and with his approval. His character, at the same time, was to the public a sufficient pledge, that the love of novelty and theory would not be allowed to run into extravagance for seldom has a minister, not distinguished by any striking brilliancy of genius, and greatly inferior as he was to more than one of his colleagues in popular oratory, gained so much weight, and conciliated such universal favour, by the mere force of his personal character. He possessed a sound, cautious, business mind; a long political life had stored it with all the political knowledge which a minister requires; regular and confirmed habits of business had given him a complete command

ofit, whenever occasion called for it. Above all, the country trusted in his pure and unquestioned integrity. He was never suspected of governing to serve party purposes; he never made a speech for the pleasure of victory; he never entered into an intrigue to acquire or to retain power. He was as open and manly in his conduct, as he was honest and prudent in his resolves. He was confessedly most disinterested; every man knew that he cared little to day though he should lose his place to-morrow, and therefore felt assured that he would do nothing unworthy to retain it. The result was, that his opinions carried with them much more weight than those of even his most brilliant colleagues; and it was to him the public looked as their security, that, whatever differences of feeling and opinion might prevail in the interior of the cabinet, its general policy, so long as it was guided by lord Liverpool, would display prudence, consistency, and integrity.

By his removal from office, these differences were freed from the weight which had hitherto compressed and restrained them. The men who had acted in willing subordination to lord Liverpool, were by no means equally inclined to yield to each other. None of them, except the duke of Wellington, could lay claim to such grounds of pre-eminence as lord Liverpool had possessed; but none of them would recognize any decided claims to superiority in his rival; and, although the necessity of keeping the cabinet together might have made them all willing to remain where they were, the selection of a head to that cabinet was matter which involved not merely their party predilections, but, to a certain extent,

their personal consideration. The Catholic question, above all, was now a stone of offence to them; and it was on this rock, that the cabinet went to pieces. The lord Chancellor, the duke of Wellington, and Mr. Peel, formed the strength of the party opposed to emancipation; Mr. Canning, though his sincerity in the cause had often been denied or questioned by such men as Burdett and Brougham, was placed by his official station at the head of its friends. If a new minister were appointed from among the latter, it was more than doubtful how far the former would think themselves bound, or could justly be expected to remain parts of a government, where, although ostensibly the disputed matter might never be mentioned at the council table, still the whole influence of the premiership would belong to a person hos tile to their views, instead of being wielded, as it hitherto had been, by a nobleman whose determinations on the subject were perfectly in unison with their own. On the other hand, it was still more doubt ful, whether the friends of the Catholics, who, whatever might be their qualifications in other respects for the government of the country, were superior to their opponents, in the power and habit of talking, would tamely submit to be excluded from the highest office in that government, on account of their opinions on a mea sure, mutual forbearance concerning which had hitherto kept the ministry together. To allow that no supporter of Catholic emancipation should be entitled to claim the premiership, was to place themselves and their opinions, in some measure, in subordination to their opponents, and to mark themselves

with a disqualification, which did not seem very reconcileable to the principle, that Catholic emancipation should not be made a ministerial question. This, at least, was the view on which the leading members of this party subsequently professed to have acted. Yet it is very plain that their situation under a new anti-catholic premier would have been, in so far as this question was concerned, precisely the same as it had been under the government of lord Liverpool. The elevation of such a minister would not have been to them a change of hopes, and a new barrier in the way of success, as the elevation of a minister friendly to the Catholics would have been to those of the cabinet who thought differently, and whose dislike of a cabinet not purely anti-catholic had given way to their confidence in its anti-catholic head. If there had remained an anti-catholic statesman, possessing the same weight, and the same claims, with lord Liverpool, the question, in all probability, would never have been stirred; those who had differed from the one, might differ from the other, and yet act with the latter as they had done with the former. As it was, it is impossible not to suspect that a person friendly to the Catholics, declining to continue in the ministry under a new anti-catholic premier, must have been actuated by motives of personal consideration and ambition, no less than by attachment to prin ciples, the sacrifice of which was to be no condition of such continuance. There was nothing extravagant or over-weaning in these personal considerations, considered in themselves, and such an ambition was any thing but dishonourable. It was only necessary that it should

be followed with openness and manliness; that it should not be gratified by secretly undermining former friends, and privately in triguing for the unwonted and suspicious assistance of former enemies.

Unfortunately, the circumstances were precisely those which could not but call into play these motives of personal consideration, and personal ambition. If a minister was to be sought among those members of the cabinet who were friendly to Catholic emancipation, no doubt could be entertained that Mr. Can ning must be the man. Even if the selection had been to be made without any reference to that question, popular opinion at least would have pointed out the foreign Secretary as best entitled by genius, by eloquence, by states man-like accomplishments, as well as by experience, to claim to be prime minister of England in preference to any of his colleagues. There were many, indeed, who, without difficulty, could point out passages in Mr. Canning's political life, which were any thing but fitted to conciliate political confidence; but he was unquestionably a man of infinitely more popular talent than any other of the ministers; and if any other had been named to the premiership, the public voice would have said that the talent of the cabinet did not reside in its head. Of all the ministers, likewise, he was the least obnoxious to the party forming the opposition. The general course of his policy since he had assumed the seals of the foreign office, had been agreeable, they said, to their own views. The complete separation of this country from the supposed schemes of the continental cabinets united under

the name of the Holy Alliance, the recognition of the independence of the South American States, the armed interference in defence of the independence of Portugal, were, according to them, merely the adoption of principles which they themselves had long maintained. They regarded him as being, in a great measure, in their own interest: bitter as their animosity to him had once been (probably still was), they thought it prudent to dissemble it; and, in the House of Commons, they studiously distinguished him from those of his colleagues who were thought to be less accessible to their seductions. Thus, in the event of any schism in the cabinet between these colleagues and himself, he could reckon on the support of the regular opposition-subject only to this drawback, that there was not one of its leaders whom he had not at some time kept writhing under the lash of his ridicule, and not many of them who, in return, had not described his political character and conduct in language which it was not easy either to forget or to forgive. Every thing, therefore, conspired to point out Mr. Canning as the future minister. The anti-catholic party, again, could not select from among themselves any candidate who could claim the vacant office on equally popular grounds with the foreign Secretary. The lord Chancellor and the duke of Wellington might be considered as positively disqualified, the one by his age and official situation, and the other by his military character. Mr. Peel alone enjoyed that sort of weight and reputation which ought to belong to a minister; in him a great portion of the community, and that not the least respectable or influential, reposed