ing to Portsmouth.. A peremptory 'demand of reparation and redress was made by the States without effect; and, on the 17th of April, his Majesty published a declaration, stating, "that repeated memorials having been presented by his ambassador to the States General, demanding the succours stipulated by treaty, to which requisition they had given no answer, nor signified any intention of compliance, his Majesty considered their High Mightinesses as having deserted the alliance that had so long subsisted between Great Britain and the republic; and his Majesty from that time suspended, provisionally, all the stipulations of the several existing treaties, particularly of the marine treaty of 1764." The immediate design of such explicit language was to prevent the States, if possible, from acceding to the late confederacy of Russia, Denmark, and Sweden, the object of which was, that a free ship should make free goods, or, in other words, that a neutral ship, although loaded with a cargo belonging to one of the powers at war, should pass as free and unmolested as in time of peace. The Dutch, unwilling to forego the advantages of a highly profitable trade, had recourse, as usual, to procrastination, till matters were brought to an issue by the following incident. On the 3d of September, the Mercury, a congress packet, was taken by the Vestal frigate off the banks of Newfoundland. On board this packet was Mr. Laurens, late president of the congress, charged with a commission to Holland. On being brought to England, he was examined by the privy council, and committed to the Tower, on a charge of high treason. His papers, which had been thrown overboard, and saved from sinking by the alertness of a British seaman, were found to contain the sketch of a treaty of amity and commerce between the republic of Holland and the states of

America, some articles of which had been provisionally agreed to and signed two years before at Aix-la-Chapelle by William Lee, formerly an alderman of London, but then an agent for congress, and John de Neufville, a merchant of Amsterdamn, acting under powers delegated to him by M. Van Berkel, the grand pensionary of that city. These papers were immediately, transmitted to the British ambassador at the Hague, who was instructed to present a memorial to the States General, requiring them to disavow the proceedings of the grand pensionary and his accomplices, and to inflict upon them, a punishment suitable to the magnitude of their offences: he was farther enjoined to declare, that, if satisfaction in these respects should be either refused or delayed, the States General would be considered as making themselves parties to the injury, and such measures be pursued as the law of nations authorized for compelling a reparation of the wrong. No satisfactory answer being returned to the memorial within the time expected, Sir Joseph Yorke was recalled; and on the 20th of December, letters of reprisal were ordered to be issued against the Dutch, a measure totally unexpected on the part of the States General, and for which they were ill-prepared. The manifesto published on this occasion, which was generally admitted as a master-piece of political writing, has been ascribed to Gibbon, the celebrated historian of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and, at that time, one of the commissioners of trade.

The celebrated Maria Theresa, Empress of Germany, and Queen of Hongary and Bohemia, died on the 29th of November in the 63d year of her age, after a protracted reign of 40 years. She was succeeded by her son, the Emperor Joseph the Second.

CHAPTER XIV.

PARLIAMENT was unexpectedly dissolved on the 1st of September, 1780, and a new one couvened the 31st of October; but nothing worthy of specific notice passed in either House before the holidays, except the election of a speaker of the Commons, in which the strength of the opposition was exerted for the re-appointment of Sir Fletcher Norton; but Mr. Cornwall was chosen in his room by 203 voices against 134. His Majesty, in his opening speech, declared his satisfaction in having an opportunity, by the recent election, of receiving the most certain information of the disposition and wishes of his people, to which he was always inclined to pay the utmost attention. He acknowledged the arduous situation of public affairs; but the late signal successes of his arms in Georgia and Carolina would, he trusted, have important consequences, in bringing the war to a happy conclusion. An amendment to the address, consisting in the omission of several complimentary paragraphs, was moved in the House of Commons by Mr. Thomas Grenville; but it was negatived, by a majority of 69, in favour of the original address.

On the day Parliament met after the Christmas recess, the 23d of January, 1781, the sum of 80,000%. was granted for the relief of Barbadoes, and 40,0007. for Jamaica, in consequence of the dreadful hurricane with which those islands in particular had been visited. Bridge-town, the capital of the former, was almost levelled to the ground, and some thousands of people were killed. At Jamaica, the town of Savanna-laMar was utterly swept away, and the island under

went a terrible devastation of property and loss of lives.

On the 25th of January, two days after, Lord North delivered a message from the King, in which his Majesty acquainted the House of Commons, that, during the recess of Parliament, he had been obliged to direct letters of marque and general reprisal to be issued against the States General of the United Provinces. For the causes and motives of his conduct he referred to his public manifesto, which, with various other papers, he had ordered to be laid before the House. Lord North in consequence moved, "that an address be presented to his Majesty, assuring him, that the House would, with a firm and determined resolution, support the just and necessary war against Holland, for the maintenance of the honour of his crown, and the rights and interests of his people."': This motion was seconded by Lord Lewisham, but it met with considerable opposition in both Houses; and, in the Peers, it was observed, by Lord Camden, that, "as to what was called the treaty between Holland and America, it was the mere unauthorised act of Van Berkel, and betrayed neither directly nor indirectly any intention in the States General of a hostile nature. It did not even appear that they knew any thing of this man or his colleagues; and much less that they had determined to ratify this pretended treaty, or project of a treaty, by which no one was bound, and no one could be injured." The addresses, however, were carried by great majorities; but the dissentient peers recorded their objections in a strong protest.

Mr. Burke, not dismayed by the rejection of his reform bill last year, moved, on the 15th of February, for leave to introduce a similar measure. He opened

his proposition by stating the powerful motives that engaged him now to resume his undertaking; which were, the celebrated resolutions of the late Parliament, respecting the alarming increase of the influence of the crown; the general wish and expectation of the people; and the direct applications to himself from several of the most considerable counties. Leave was given, without opposition, to bring in the bill; but, on the motion for the second reading, it was thrown out by a majority of 238 against 190, after a vigorous debate, which was distinguished by the first parliamentary exertion of the Hon. William Pitt, second son of the late Earl Chatham, who, in early youth, was elected a member of the present Parliament. He delivered himself with grace, facility, and animation; his voice was rich and striking; and his reasoning displayed all the fire of his father. One great object, he said, of all the petitions which had been presented, was a recommendation of economy in the public expenditure; and the design of the present bill was to carry into effect those wishes. The bill had also another object still more important, and that was the reduction of the influence of the crownan influence which was the more to be dreaded, because more secret in its attacks, and more concealed in its operations, than the power of prerogative. The youthful orator adverted to the extraordinary objections which had been made to the bill, which proposed to bring no more than 200,0007, per annum into the public coffers, and that sum was insignificant, in comparison of the millions annually expended. What then, said he, is the conclusion we are left to deduce? The calamities of the present crisis are too great to be benefited by economy. Our expenses are so enormous, that it is useless to give ourselves any