anything affecting the value of land, on the presentation of the Petitions from these meetings, at once appointed a Committee of Inquiry on the subject, and for a time the Platform here was lulled to rest.1

It is a fact very clearly showing itself in the history of the Platform, that just as Parliament was often encouraged and stimulated by the Platform, so did the Platform often derive stimulus and encouragement from proceedings in Parliament. The proceedings in Parliament during the session of 1821 were admirably calculated to inspirit the Platform-the subject of Parliamentary reform being kept well before Parliament. On the 17th April a great number of Petitions in favour of it were presented, and Mr. Lambton moved "That the House do resolve itself into a Committee of the whole House to consider the state of the representation of the people in Parliament," 2 unavailingly, of course, but still usefully.

On the 8th May 1821 Mr. Lennard moved the repeal of two of the Six Acts, the Seditious Meetings Act, and the punishment of Libels Act, and some good points were made in the debate.

3

"It was the energy, the boldness of a man's mind which, prompting him to speak, not in private, but in large and popular assemblies, that constituted the principle of freedom.

"It was that principle which gave life to liberty, and without it the human character was a stranger to freedom. Would silence ensure security? Did they suppose that they made men forget their grievances when they made them silent? No; if a man who feels himself aggrieved is prevented from declaring his sentiments in a constitutional way, he is forced to other expedients for redress."

Mr. Abercromby drew attention to the fact that "meetings like those which had taken place at Manchester, Birmingham, and Sheffield, had been declared illegal by the Courts of Justice, and therefore there was no pretence for continuing these laws.

But no arguments or considerations could induce the Gov

1 See Edinburgh Review, vol. xxxvi. p. 452, February 1822; and Report from Committee of House of Commons on depressed State of Agriculture in 1821, Parliamentary Debates, vol. v. 1821.

2 Parliamentary Debates, vol. v. p. 360, 1821.

8 Ibid. p. 554.

ernment to repeal these Acts; and then, on the 9th of May,1 Lord J. Russell brought forward the subject of Parliamentary reform, describing the existing corruption in Parliament and at Parliamentary elections; and referring to the disturbances in certain of the large towns he attributed them to the fact of those towns having no representatives in Parliament.

In the same month 2 Mr. Bennett moved to bring in a Bill for the better securing the independence of Parliament, thus bringing into notice again the nomination of the placemen who fought the ministerial battles; and, before the session was ended, Mr. Hume brought forward the ever-interesting subject of economy and retrenchment, his object being to enforce them in every department of the public expenditure -a subject becoming of ever deeper consequence, the expenditure of the country having risen from £16,000,000 in 1792 to £70,000,000 in 1821.

Thus, one way or another, the subjects most engaging the more advanced and intelligent public opinion of the time were kept before the public, and the Platform was given fresh. material for agitation.

The agricultural distress continued severe, and early in January (1822) county meetings were held in Monmouthshire and in Norfolk. As this form of distress affected the landowners more than any other, a large number of them took a prominent and active part in the meetings, and avowed themselves advocates of retrenchment, which was strongly insisted on, Hume's speeches even being referred to with approbation. At the Suffolk meeting on 29th January 1822 two dukes (Grafton and Norfolk), four lords, and three baronets all spoke.

The agricultural distress and financial pressure which was thus occupying the Platform led naturally to the consideration of remedies, and so by degrees the desirability of Parliamentary reform came to be mooted. At the Suffolk meeting a Mr. Merest said: "The lavish expenditure of Government had caused all the mischief; that had been sanctioned by the House of Commons, and without a reform, therefore, no cure would ensue. The only efficient remedy was to make the 1 Hansard, vol. v. p. 604, 9th May. 2 Ibid. p. 1054. 3 Ibid. p. 1345, 27th June.

House of Commons what it ought to be-the representative of the people, and a check upon Government, instead of being what it now is the representative of Government and a check on the people." Meetings followed in Devon, Surrey, Worcestershire, Westminster, Middlesex, Cornwall, Cambridge, and Bedford, and speech after speech at them dwelt on the necessity of reduction of taxation, and declared that the only remedy was Parliamentary reform.

The stream of public opinion and the activity of the Platform is well described in a letter from Croker to Peel, dated 1st February 1822, which is also noteworthy as testifying to the status of the Platform: "The cause of reform, it cannot be doubted, has made great progress; public opinion is created by the Press or by public meetings, and by the numbers and weight of the advocates of a cause. Now, almost the whole Press and all public meetings are loud for reform, and I believe I may say with truth that such is the apathy, or the timidity, on our side of the question that, except an annual speech of Mr. Canning at a Liverpool dinner, and the occasional article of some obscure man of letters in the Quarterly Review, nothing is spoken or written to oppose the torrent of the reformers. To this must be added the accession of names which the reformers have acquired in some of the great Whig lords. Lord Fitzwilliam and Lord Darlington, two of the largest borough owners in England, have joined them." And he adds further on: "In the humbler circle in which I move, at tables, where ten years ago you would have no more heard reform advocated than treason, you will now find half the company reformers-moderate reformers, indeed, individually, but radical in the lump."

Encouraged by the number of Petitions presented to Parliament, Lord J. Russell, on the 25th April 1822, moved "That the present state of the representation of the people in Parliament requires the most serious consideration of this House.

"The question has been so often met and turned aside by fears of Jacobinism in foreign nations, or of tumults at home, that I feel it a great advantage to be able to say that our present state of external peace and internal tranquillity affords opportunity for ample and undisturbed discussion.

1 The Croker Papers, vol. ii. p. 52.

"There is another circumstance which ought to weigh in favour of the motion I make-the number of Petitions for reform of Parliament which have been pouring into this House since the beginning of the session. Petitions have this year been presented from the counties of Middlesex, Devon, Norfolk, Suffolk, Bedford, Cambridge, Surrey, Cornwall, and Huntingdon; also in great numbers from separate towns; and the Petitions which have been presented for the release of Mr. Hunt nearly all contain a petition for reform."1

He drew attention to the fact that the petitioners did not ask for any one plan of reformation. "A few years ago all the Petitions prayed for universal suffrage, but at a meeting, in the present year, of the county of Middlesex-a meeting which might be supposed to bring together all classes of reformers-when a venerable advocate of the cause of reform proposed a petition for universal suffrage, he could find no one to second him. That single circumstance shows the disposition of the people to ask for reform as a cure for abuses existing, and not as a fanciful, untried measure, of which, in their own minds, they have some vague conception." But Parliament by 269 votes to 164 declined to accept Lord J. Russell's motion.

But if the Platform was thriving to a certain extent, despite the attempt of the Government to destroy it, other forces were making against it. Jeffrey, in a letter dated 27th January 1822, sums up the position in these words: "The King has a rooted horror at all liberal opinions. . . . The body of the people are so poor, and their prospects so dismal, that it is quite easy to stir them up to any insane project of reform; and the dread of this makes timid people rally round those who are for keeping order by force, and neutralises the sober influence of the Whigs.

"Our only chance is in the extremity of our financial embarrassments, which will force such retrenchments on the Ministry as at once to weaken their powers of corruption, and to lend credit to those whose lessons they have so long contemned, and must now stoop to follow."

The Platform cry for retrenchment resulted early in March

1 Parliamentary Debates, vol. vii. p. 52.

2 See Life of Jeffrey, by Lord Cockburn, vol. ii. p. 197.

in the curtailment of the salary of one Lord of the Admiralty, and in May, in an address to the Crown for the discontinuance of one of the Postmaster-Generals-but then a Government pull came. Lord Eldon thus describes it in a letter to Lady Bankes (16th May 1822): "To check the efforts making to pull down all the establishments of the Crown, Ministers declared in the House of Commons last night, in a debate upon the Civil List, their intention to resign if those efforts should succeed again. This seems to have brought the country gentlemen to their senses, and the Government succeeded by a majority of 127."1

In the next month Brougham raised a debate on the growth of the influence of the Crown. He described the increased patronage which the Crown now had, owing to the increased number of military and naval officers, and 800 colonial appointments; the increased revenue staff at home, the enormous increase of the amount of taxation; and he maintained that the influence of the Crown had increased by its being better arrayed and organised than it was; but his motion was set aside by 216 votes to 101, or a majority of 115.2

A really graphic description of one county meeting will convey so much more realisable an idea of what county meetings at this period really were that I give the following account of one of them from the pen of Baron A. de Staël Holstein who visited England at this time. He prefaced it with some comments on county meetings generally.

3

"Of all the public assemblages of persons in England, perhaps none are so striking to a stranger as county meetings. These are usually held in the open air, in a marketplace, a court before a town hall, or some frequented public walk, for the number of persons collected by interest or curiosity is too great for any public room to contain them. And, in fact, though the freeholders of the county are the only persons who have a right to vote at them, almost any one that chooses to be present is admitted without distinction. The business is not to decide as legislators or judges on positive rights or interests, but to consult or to guide the opinions of the many."

1 Life of Lord Eldon, vol. ii. p. 451.

2 Hansard, vol. vii. p. 1265.

3 See his Letters on England (published 1825)-Letter XI.