Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

The beginning of a revolution is the most important busi ness of the whole. The first of January, we believe, was the day on which Quiroga proclaimed the Constitution, and proceeded to the Isle de Leon: this day should be a holiday as long as Spain retains her liberty. In this country we have not a single festival that a honest or liberal minded man would trouble himself about celebrating: but we trust that we shall have a day ere long as well as Spain.

We noticed last week the well merited reception which Lord Beresford met with from the government of Portugal, but we had not then seen all the correspondence which took place on that occasion. From the admiration we felt at the true Republican style in which plain Beresford, without a single title or appendage to his name, (not even Esquire,) was received, induces us now to republish the correspondence. It forms an admirable proof of the feeling of the new government, when they could receive the representative of their King in such a manner, and as good as tell him to go to England and make a pair of garters out of his new commission. The whole family of mankind are beginning to see the folly of all kinds of idolatry, particularly that of political idolatry; and to perceive that nothing but the representative system of government can entitle them to the epithet of civilized and rational beings. We rejoice at the idea of living, at the moment of this important change. One year, such as the one we are now passing and approaching its close, is worth a life of twenty ordinary years. It is delightful to observe the rapid spreading of useful knowledge at this moment, not only in England, but in two-thirds of the globe. However, we shall recur again to this subject, and at present we make way for the correspondence be tween "Beresford" and the free and noble government of Portugal.

FROM BERESFORD.

"The Marquis de Campo Mayor, Marshal in Chief of the Armies of the United Kingdoms of Portugal, Brazil, and Algarves, near the King's person, was inexpressibly astonished at the communication he received from the new Government established in Lisbon, in which the latter refuses to receive the Marshal in Chief, and acknowledge him as such, as it is bound to do, since he has recently received, through the favour of his Most Faithful Majesty, honours, which he alone can grant; and if the Government proclaims

him as the head of the nation, it in no way can or ought to alter the precepts of the Monarch, and in this case the nation does or does not acknowledge him. If it does acknowledge him, it ought to preserve to him this undeniable authority, and if it does not acknowledge him, the whole of Europe will feel this offence, but more especially England, and insist on the observance of her treaties, as sincere as they are ancient. On board the Vengeur, &c."

ANSWER,

"The Supreme Government of the Kingdom, in acknowledging his most Faithful Majesty as the head and chief of the nation, declares to Beresford, that the nation has at present re-assumed all the rights belonging to it, in order to recover its happiness.-Lisbon, Palace of Government, &c."

SUBSCRIPTIONS FOR THE REPUBLICAN, NO. 12.

From One Hundred and Nine Deists, near St. £. 8. d.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors]

100

1 0

100000

3

5 0

090

120

6

[ocr errors]

ROYAL CLEMENCY.

The Leeds Mercury has announced, that the men who were lately in York Castle on a charge of High Treason, and who were decoyed into a plea of Guilty and promised the Royal Clemency, because there was no evidence to substantiate the charge against them, have all been transported, but the term of years, or whether for life, is not known. This is royal clemency! These are the men who were drawn into an insurrection, or something called an insurrection, by Castlereagh's hand-bills, proposing a strike from all work on the 1st of April last, until the Parliament of England should be reformed. These hand-bills, which undoubtedly were the work of Castlereagh, Fletcher, and Dennis O'Brien, were the sole cause of all the murders in Scotland, and the transportation of these Yorkshiremen. What a horrid and barbarous brute this fellow Castlereagh must be! He delights in nothing but flogging, hanging, and quartering! When shall we be able to stop this fellow's career? It is dreadful to contemplate the misery which this man has created. Buonaparte, and Frederic of Prussia were mild and humane men when compared with Castlereagh. They met their opponents openly and fairly; but this fellow is worse than an assassin, he stimulates first by his agents, and then murders the innocent for his own acts: just as if he was a beast of prey, and lived on human flesh.

We had most assuredly calculated that all the above men would have been liberated, after the promise which the prosecuting Counsel and the pious and prosecuting Judge made to them. We are sure that the men pleaded guilty under that impression, and we are further sure, that if the witnesses had not began to cry out " Hunt for ever" as soon as they got to York, those men would not have had any compromise offered them. What, are the Ministers weak and foolish enough to think that the transportation of half a dozen or a score of good men will deter others of the same feelings and principles from avowing themselves? Let the Ministers go to Huddersfield and its neighbourhood, and look round and see every man the avowed enemy of their system. Let them travel throughout Yorkshire or Lancashire, and mark the popular feeling and the popular intellect,

and then they will find that any further progress in their dungeoning, transporting, and hanging system, will avail them nothing, nor deter a single man from the open avowal of his principles and opinions. What have the six new Acts of Parliament done? Has any one individual in the country lost or neglected any political information by them?. Not one, in our opinion. We know that the circulation of political pamphlets have been more extensive in the present year than they were in the last; and from an increased size, all the periodical ones have become doubly and trebly useful. We will be bound to say, that Mr. Cobbett's Register produces him more profit now it is sixpence, than it did last year at twopence. The difference in the quantity circulated is a mere trifle, and that difference is occasioned by the readers clubbing their pence instead of each taking their own pamphlet; so that in fact, they have more real political information this year than they had in the last. All those Acts were, in a manner, dead born; they effected nothing. The Republican has decayed further than any other publication, and so far that it has produced no profit for the last year; but the cause of that decay has no connection with the new Acts, it began before they were heard of. The imprisonment of the editor, the shutting up the shop in Fleetstreet, and the prosecution of the venders, have operated jointly to bring it out more like a suppressed and clandestine work than any thing else. But the present year has been a complete harvest for all the venders of political publications, and nothing but a Censorship on the Press can alter it now, or the making the Act High Treason which is is now called Seditious or Blasphemous.

What, then, did it avail the Government to torture the families of those Yorkshiremen by transporting their husbands and fathers? Or what could the gross treatment of Bruce avail them, who, after the Judge had confessed his' belief of his innocence, or he would have hung him without hesitation if he thought otherwise, was sent to the hulks in' double irons, and thence to Botany Bay? Ministers, you must answer for all these things or destroy yourselves, which you like. Every thing like moral and humane feeling has been outraged by the presént administration of Government; and, instead of abating, their career increases.

EDITOR,

Vol. IV. No. 12.

COURT OF KING'S BENCH, Nov. 15.

THE KING v. THOMAS DAVISON.

This defendant, it will be recollected, was convicted at Guildhall, before Mr. Justice Best and a Special Jury, on the 23d ult. upon an indictment charging him with publishing a blasphemous libel concerning the Christian Religion, contained in Mr. Carlile's Republican.

The Defendant being present in Court-

Mr. Henry Cooper now moved for a Rule to shew cause why the verdict of Guilty should not be set aside, and a new trial granted. It is but justice to premise, that the Learned Counsel discharged the duty devolved to him with great good sense, discretion, and ability. He said he was justified in saying, that the case he had to present to the Court was singular and novel, but certainly most important in its character. He sincerely regretted that the duty assigned him had not been cast upon some other member of the profession, of longer standing and of more experience than himself; but he indulged a hope that the candour and consideration of the Court would not be wanting to give effect to his humble exertions. The motion he had instructions to make was founded upon an affidavit, the whole contents of which he should read to the Court, in the discharge of the duty he owed to his client, as well as to the Court; and then submit to their Lordships such observations as appeared fairly to arise out of the case. The deponent

stated

Mr. Justice Bayley.-The deponent, I suppose is the defendant himself?

Mr. Cooper replied in the affirmative. The affidavit stated that at the trial of this indictment, deponent, being a very poor man, and unable to employ counsel, defended himself to the best of his knowledge and ability, by reading a written defence. It happened that the said written defence, in three several places, unfortunately gave offence to the Learned Judge, who interrupted deponent, and imposed upon him three several fines, amounting in all, to the sum of £100 to be levied on his goods and chattels. That deponent being at a loss how to act, and unwilling to subject himself to still more grievous fines, which he was unable to pay, and being

« AnteriorContinuar »