leaders, could opportunities suit their intention. He recommended these circumstances to the consideration of the house, and concluded with these words of lord Bacon, "Let men beware how they neglect or suffer matter of "troubles to be prepared; for no man can forbid the sparks “that may set all on fire." The lords resolved to consider these subjects on the twenty-ninth day of November, when the queen repaired to the house of peers to hear the debates, and by her presence moderate the heat of both parties. The earl of Nottingham reflected so severely on the memory of king William, that he would have been sent to the tower, had not the lords declined any such motion out of respect to her majesty. After much declamation on the Scottish act of security, the grand committee of the peers, by the advice of lord Wharton, resolved, that the queen should be enabled by act of parliament on the part of England, to name commissioners to treat about an union with Scotland, provided that the parliament of Scotland should first appoint.commissioners on their part for the same purpose: That no Scotchmen should enjoy the privileges of Englishmen, except such as were settled in England, Ireland, and the plantations, and such as were or might be in the sea, or land service, until an union could be effected, or the succession settled as in England: That the traffic by cattle from Scotland to England should be prevented: That the lord admiral should issue orders for taking such vessels as should be found trading from Scotland to France, or to the ports of any of her majesty's enemies; and that care should be taken to prevent the exportation of English wool into Scotland. On these resolutions a bill was formed for an entire union, and passed the house on the twentieth day of December. The lords presented an address to the queen, representing that they had duly weighed the dangerous and pernicious effects that were likely to be produced by divers acts of parliament lately passed in Scotland: That they were of opinion the safety of the kingdom required that speedy and effectual orders should be given to put Newcastle in a posture of defence, to secure the port of Tinmouth, and repair the fortifications of Hull and Carlisle. They likewise advised her majesty to give directions for disciplining the militia of the four northern counties; for providing them Ooo

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with arms and ammunition; for maintaining a competent number of regular troops on the northern borders of England, as well as in the north of Ireland; and for putting the laws in execution against papists. The queen promised that a survey should be made of the places they had mentioned, and laid before the parliament; and that she would give the necessary directions, upon the other articles of the address. The commons seemed to concur with the lords in their sentiments of the Scottish act of security. They resolved, that a bill should be brought in for the effectual securing the kingdom of England from the apparent dangers that might arise from several acts lately passed in the parliament of Scotland; and this was formed on nearly the same resolutions which had been taken in the upper house, The bill sent down by the lords, was thrice read, and ordered to lie upon the table: but they passed their own to take effect at Christmas, provided before that time the Scots should not settle the succession. When it was offered to the lords, they passed it without any amendment, contrary to the expectation and even to the hope of some members who were no friends to the house of Hanover, and firmly believed the lords would have treated this bill with the same contempt which had been manifested for that which they had sent down to the commons.

§ XXVI. The duke of Marlborough at his first appearance in the house after his return to England, was honoured with a very extraordinary eulogium, pronounced by the lord keeper, in the name of the peers of England; and a compliment of the same nature was presented to him by a committee of the house of commons. Doctor Delaune, vicechancellor of Oxford, accompanied by the principal members of the university, attended the queen with an address of congratulation upon the success of her arms in Germany, under the admirable conduct and invincible courage of the duke of Marlborough; and at sea, under the most brave and faithful admiral sir George Rooke. He received a civil answer from her majesty, though now she took umbrage at Rooke's being raised upon a level with the duke of Marlborough, whose great victories had captivated her administration, and whose wife had alienated her affection from the tories. The commons perceiving how high he stood in her

majesty's esteem, and having been properly tutored for the purpose, took into consideration the great services of the duke; and, in an address, besought her majesty to consider some proper means to perpetuate the memory of such noble actions. In a few days she gave them to understand by a message, that she was inclined to grant the interest of the crown in the honour and manor of Woodstock and hundred of Wooton to the duke of Marlborough and his heirs; and that as the lieutenancy and rangership of the parks, with the rents and profits of the manors and hundreds, were granted for two lives, she wished that incumbrance could be removed. A bill was immediately brought in, enabling the queen to bestow these honours and manors on the duke of Marlborough and his heirs; and the queen was desired to advance the money for clearing the incumbrances. She not only complied with this address, but likewise ordered the comptroller of her works to build. in Woodstock park, a magni. ficent palace for the duke, upon a plan much more solid than beautiful. By this time sir George Rooke was laid aside, and the command of the fleet bestowed upon sir Cloudesley Shovel, now declared rear-admiral of England. Mareschal de Tallard, with the other French generals taken at Hochstadt, arrived on the sixteenth of December in the river Thames, and were immediately conveyed to Nottingham and Lichfield, attended by a detachment of the royal regiment of horse guards. They were treated with great respect, and allowed the privilege of riding ten miles. around the places of their confinement.

§ XXVII. While the house of commons, in two successive addresses, thanked the queen for the treaty which the duke of Marlborough had concluded with Prussia, concerning the troops to be sent to the duke of Savoy, and desired she would use her interest with the allies, that they might next year furnish their complete proportions of men by sea and land; the lords examined into all the proceedings at sea, and all the instructions of the admiralty; and presented an address to the queen, explaining all the different articles of mismanagement. She promised to consider them particularly, and give such directions upon them as might be most for the advantage of the public service. The remaining part of the session was consumed in disputes and

altercations between the two houses on the subject of the. Aylesbury constables, who were sued by five other inhabitants for having denied them the right of voting at the elec tion. These five persons were committed to Newgate by order of the house of commons. They moved for a ha→ beas corpus in the king's bench; but the court would take no cognisance of the affair. Two of the prisoners petitioned the queen that their case might be brought before her majesty in parliament. The commons, in an address, besought the queen to refuse granting a writ of error in this case, which would tend to the overthrowing the undoubted rights and privileges of the commons of England. She assured them she would not do any thing to give them just cause of complaint; but this matter relating to the course of judicial proceedings, being of the highest importance, she thought it necessary to weigh and consider very carefully what might be proper for her to do in a thing of so great concern. They voted all the lawyers who had pleaded on the return of the habeas corpus in behalf of the prisoners guilty of a breach of privilege, and ordered them to be taken into custody. They likewise ordered the prisoners to be removed from Newgate into the custody of their sergeant at arms, lest they should have been discharged by the queen's granting writs of error. The prisoners, finding themselves at the mercy of the exasperated commons, petitioned the lords for relief. The upper house passed six different resolutions against the conduct of the commons, as being an obstruction to justice, and contrary to magna charta. The lower house demanded a conference, in which they insited upon the sole right of determining elections; they affirmed, that they only could judge who had a right of voting; and that they were judges of their own privileges, in which the lords could not intermeddle.

§ XXVIII. The upper house demanded a free conference, which proved ineffectual. New resolutions were taken by the commons, diametrically opposite to those of the peers, who, on the other hand, attended the queen with a long representation of all the particulars relating to this affair. They affirmed that the proceedings of the house of commons against the Ayslesbury men were wholly new and unprecedented; that it was the birthright of every

Englishman, who apprehended himself injured, to seek for redress in her majesty's courts of justice: that if any power could control this right, and prescribe when he should, and when he should not, be allowed the benefit of the laws, he ceased to be a freeman, and his liberty and property were precarious. They requested, therefore, that no consideration whatever should prevail with her majesty to suffer an obstruction to the known course of justice; but that she would be pleased to give effectual orders for the immediate issuing of the writs of error. The queen

assured them that she would have complied with their request; but, finding an absolute necessity for putting an immediate end to the session, she knew there could be no further proceedings on that matter. On the very day, which was the fourteenth of March, she went to the house of lords, and passed the bills that were ready for the royal assent. Then she thanked the parliament for having despatched the public business: she warned them to avoid the fatal effects of animosity and dissension; and ordered the lord keeper to prorogue them to Thursday the 1st of May; but on the fifth of April they were dissolved by proclamation, and another was published for calling a new parliament. The queen, accompanied by the prince of Denmark, made an excursion to Newmarket, and afterwards dined by invitation with the university of Cambridge, where she conferred the honour of knighthood upon Dr. Ellis the vicechancellor, upon James Montague counsel for the university, and upon the celebrated Isaac Newton mathematical professor. The two houses of convocation still continued at variance. The lower house penned petulant representations; and the archbishop answered them by verbal reprehension and admonition. The tory interest was now in the wane. The duke of Buckinghamshire was deprived of the privy seal, and that office conferred upon the duke of Newcastle, a nobleman of powerful influence with the whig party. The earl of Montague was created marquis of Mounthermer and duke of Montague; the earl of Peterborough and lord Cholmondeley were chosen of

b Burnet. Hist. of Europe. Tindal. Hist. of the Duke of Marlborough, Lockhart. Burchet. Lives of the Admirals. Quincy. Feuquieres. Voltaire.