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CHAPTER XLI.

GEORGE III.

George III. (1)--Treaty of Paris (2)-John Wilkes (3)— publication of the debates (4)—revolt of the North American Colonies; foundation of the United States; war with France; death of Chatham; war with Spain and Holland; the "armed neutrality"; invasion of Jersey; Rodney's victory of the 12th April; siege of Gibraltar (5)-the Lord George Gordon Riots (6)– Pitt and Fox; the Prince of Wales; insanity of the King; joy at his recovery; the Regency (7)-War of the French Revolution; Burke and Fox; Lord Howe's victory of the 1st June; suspension of cash payments by the Bank of England; battle of St. Vincent; Neison; mutiny of the Channel Fleet; mutiny at the Nore; battle of Camperdown; death of Burke (8)— Napoleon Buonaparte; his expedition to Egypt; battle of the Nile; defence of Acre; death of Tippoo Sahib; confederacy of Russia, Denmark, and Sweden; battle of Copenhagen; battle of Alexandria; Peace of Amiens (9)—war with Buonaparte; detention of English travellers; Buonaparte seizes Hanover; threatens to invade Great Britain; overthrows the Austrians; battle of Trafalgar; death of Nelson; death of Pitt; Berlin Decree; bombardment of Copenhagen (10)—Arthur Wellesley; battle of Assye; Peninsular War; battle of Vimeiro; death of Sir John Moore; battles of Talavera, Salamanca, Vitoria, and Toulouse; fall of Buonaparte (11)—return of Buonaparte to France; battle of Waterloo; surrender of Buonaparte (12)-war with the United States; bombardment of Algiers (13)—National Debt; general distress; the Luddites; death of George III.; Princess Charlotte (14)-Royal Marriage Act (15)—independence of the Irish Parliament; Irish Rebellion of 1798; Union of Great Britain and Ireland (16)— Indian affairs; Ceylon; discoveries and improvements (17)-Howard; abolition of the slave-trade; Romilly (18)-literature at the end of 18th century (19)—early 19th century literature (20)—painting (21).

1. George III., 1760-1820.—George III., eldest son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, and Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, though not highly educated, was pleasing in manners and appearance, well-conducted, and well-intentioned. The nation, hitherto always grumbling at its foreign kings who were never so happy as when out of their kingdom, hailed with delight the accession of a born Englishman; and the Tories, who, ever since the coming in of the House of Hanover, had been in the position, unnatural to them, of the party opposed to the court, transferred to their new ruler the loyalty formerly bestowed on the House of Stuart. About a year after his accession the King married Princess Charlotte of MecklenburgStrelitz.

2. Treaty of Paris.-The man who had most influence with the young King was John Stuart, Earl of Bute, who early in the reign was made one of the Secretaries of State, and who became perhaps the most unpopular minister of modern times. He was not only a court favourite, but also a Tory and a Scot; and at that time, when the rebellion of 1745 was still remembered, there was much ill-feeling between the Scots and English. The King and Bute meant to put an end to the war ; and in this they had with them many of the ministers, who were beginning to count the cost of Pitt's glories. In 1761 France and Spain entered into a secret alliance, with intent to make war together upon Great Britain. This treaty becoming known to Pitt, he urged his colleagues at once to declare war against Spain; and on their opposition, the "Great Commoner," as he was called, resigned office. The war with Spain nevertheless broke out; but peace was made as soon as possible with both countries by the Treaty of Paris, 1763, under which Great Britain kept Canada and all the French possessions (except New Orleans) east of the Mississipi, and some West Indian islands which had been taken

from France, regained Minorca, and obtained Florida from Spain.

3. John Wilkes.—With the peace began a time of fierce factions and unpopular ministers. King George, who at his accession was two and twenty years of age, had schemes for managing everything himself, and had made up his mind that he would not, as the two Georges before him had done, put himself into the power of the Whig party. But his plans did not work well, and in the early part of his reign nothing went on smoothly. Lord Bute became so unpopular that he durst not appear in the streets without a hired gang of prize-fighters to protect him, and not long after the peace he gave up office. His successor, George Grenville, made his administration odious by the illegal arrest in 1763 of John Wilkes for libelling it in a paper called the North Briton. Wilkes, then member for Aylesbury, was a man of bad character, but witty and agreeable; and his persecution by the ministry made him a popular hero. Some years later, when the Duke of Grafton was prime minister, Wilkes became still more famous as the subject of a struggle between the House of Commons and the freeholders of Middlesex, who maintained their right to return him for their representative, although, having been expelled the House for another political libel, he was so the Commons, by a stretch of power, had resolved-incapable of being elected into that Par

liament.

4. Publication of the Debates. In these struggles it was not, as of old, the House of Commons and the people against the King's ministers, but the House of Commons itself against the people. In 1771 the Commons got into another difficulty by attempting to enforce their right of preventing the publication of their debates,-a privilege which had been a necessary safeguard in bygone times when kings and ministers were in the habit of sending the

leaders of Opposition to the Tower. An attempt to arrest, by authority of the House, a citizen of London who had printed a report of the debates, brought on a dispute with the Lord Mayor Brass Crosby, who maintained that to lay hands on a citizen in the city, without the concurrence of one of its magistrates, was a violation of the charter of London. The Lord Mayor and one of the aldermen were sent to the Tower; but in the end the Commons were wise enough to let the matter drop, and the printers of the debates were no longer molested. By the publication of the debates, the people gained a better understanding of politics, while the Parliament and the government learned to pay more respect to public opinion.

5. The American War of Independence.The severance of thirteen North-American colonies from the mother-country took place in this reign. The English government had attempted to tax these colonies to defray in part the expenses of protecting them; the colonists denied the right of the British Parliament, in which they were unrepresented, to tax them, and claimed the right of taxing themselves in their own Assemblies. The first measure of this kind was the Stamp Act, requiring all legal documents in the colonies to bear stamps a scheme devised by Grenville, who was then at the head of the government. This act was repealed within a year, as the colonists were on the verge of rebellion; but on the proposal of Lord North, who became prime minister in 1770, a duty of threepence a pound laid on tea was retained simply as an assertion of the right of taxation. Upon this there was much disturbance, especially at Boston in Massachusetts, where at last a party of the townsmen threw overboard the cargoes of tea brought into their harbour. Severe measures being taken by way of punishment, the breach widened. till in 1775 actual war began; and on the 4th July in the next year the revolted colonies, under the

name of the United States of America, declared themselves independent of Great Britain. The war was conducted on the British side with no great vigour or skill; and after the surrender in 1777 of the English General Burgoyne and his army, which had got surrounded at Saratoga by the American forces, France formed an alliance with the new States. Thenceforth Great Britain was at war with France as well as with the colonies. Pitt, now Earl of Chatham, had, with others of the ablest men in Parliament, protested against the taxation of the colonies, but he could not bear the idea of seeing the British Empire dismembered by France. Though very ill, he insisted on going down to the House of Lords to speak against yielding, as many of the Opposition had advised, at this crisis. Leaning on crutches, pale, worn, to all appearance a dying man, he faltered out his broken sentences "shreds of unconnected eloquence": -"Shall a people," he exclaimed, "that seventeen years ago was the terror of the world, now stoop so low as to tell its ancient inveterate enemy: 'Take all we have; only give us peace'? . My Lords, any state is better than despair. Let us at least make one effort, and if we must fall, let us fall like men!" On again rising to address the Peers, he sank down in a fit; and, after lingering a few weeks, he died, May 11, 1778. Spain joined France in 1779; and within two years Great Britain found another foe in Holland. Moreover the Northern powers, Russia, Denmark, and Sweden, entered into a confederacy, known as the Armed Neutrality, to resist the system of maritime law upheld by Great Britain. Amongst other maritime rights, the English exercised that of seizing an enemy's property even when carried in neutral vessels; and their claim to visit and search merchant ships for such property or for contraband of war was the cause of much irritation on the part of neutrals. The Northern powers now

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