tice; that on this most angry of all questions they should suffer the population of the country to be committed in mutual hostility, and convulsed with mutual rancour aggravated by the uncertainty of the event, producing on the one side all the fury of disappointed hopes, and on the other side malignity and hatred, from the apprehension that the measure may be carried, and insolence from every circumstance, public or private, which tends to disappoint or postpone it; one half of the king's ministers encouraging them to seek, without enabling them to obtain; the other half subdivided; some holding out an ambiguous hope, others announcing a never-ending despair. I ask, is this a state, in which the government of the country has a right to leave it? Some master-piece of imperial policy must be unfolded, some deep and sacred principle of empire, something far removed from the suspicion of unworthy compromise of principle for power, to reconcile the feelings of the intelligent public, or to uphold a rational confidence in the honesty or seriousness of the government. The consequences of such conduct are disastrous, not merely in the tumult and discord which they are calculated to excite, but in their effect upon the character of the government and the times."

Mr. Canning denied that he had ever said, that he considered the success of the Catholic question as hopeless. What he had said was this that he thought it hopeless, in the present state of the country, and of this, and the other House of Parliament, to form an administration which should agree upon this measure, and upon all other general measures, so as to be able

He

to carry on the business of the nation. If any persons imagined that such a declaration was equivalent to a declaration that he thought that this question could not be carried without its being made what was technically called a government question, all he wished to have recollected was, that it was not he who had promulgated such an opinion. had always thought, and had repeatedly said, that this question would make its way under any government, which did not actually unite or openly set its countenance against it. He believed, that it had been making its way. It might, however, receive its deathblow from the secession which had been threatened that evening; but, if it did so fail, on the heads of

the seceders alone let the blame of its failure be thrown! With respect to the observations which had been made upon his own conduct, he asserted, that, both in and out of office, but more especially whilst out of office, he had done every thing in his power to promote the success of this great cause.

Mr. G. Bennett expressed his approval of the sentiments uttered, as well as of the line of conduct announced, by sir Francis Burdett ; and called in question the sincerity of Mr. Plunkett, no less than that of Mr. Canning. Other members of the opposition, among whom was Mr. Tierney, though equally vehement with the honourable baronet in their condemnation of ministers, thought themselves bound, hopeless as the cause was, to support the claims of the Catholics by their votes. Mr. Peel then defended his conduct upon this subject. He was followed by Mr. Brougham, who, with more than usual ardour of manner, poured out a strain of

warm eulogy of Mr. Peel, and bitter invective against those members of the cabinet, who, pretend ing zeal for the Catholic question, abandoned it to its fate. If, said he, the other ministers had taken example by the single-hearted, plain, manly, and upright conduct of the right hon. secretary for the home department, who had always been on the same side of the question, never swerving from his opinions, but standing uniformly up and stating them; who had never taken office upon a secret understanding to abandon the question in substance, while he continued to sustain it in words; whose mouth, heart, and conduct had always been in unison upon the question-if such had been the conduct followed by all the friends of emancipation, he should not have found himself in a state almost bordering on despair, with regard to the fate of the Catholic claims. Let the conduct of the attorney-general for Ireland have been what it might; let him have deviated from his former professions or not; still, if the right hon. secretary for foreign affairs had come forward at that critical moment for the question, and for his own character, when the point was, whether he should go to India, into honourable exile, or take office in England, and not submit to his sentence of transportation, but be condemned to hard labour in his own country-doomed to the disquiet of a divided council -sitting with his enemies, and pitied by his friends with his hands chained and tied down on all those lines of operation, which his own sentiments and wishes would have led him to adopt-at that critical moment, when his fate depended upon lord chancellor

Eldon, and his sentiments with respect to the Catholic cause-if, at that critical moment, he, who had said on the last night that he would not truckle to a noble lord (Folkestone), but who then had exhibited a specimen, the most incredible specimen, of monstrous truckling, for the purpose of obtaining office, that the whole history of political tergiversation could furnish

Mr. Secretary Canning-I rise to say, that that is false.

The Speaker, after a perfect silence in the House during some seconds, said in a low tone, that he hoped the right hon. secretary would retract the expression he had used. An individual of his high rank and station could not fail to be aware, that such an expression was a complete violation of the orders and customs of the House.

Mr. Canning said, he was sorry to have used any word which was a violation of the decorum of the House; but no consideration on earth should induce him to retract the sentiment.

The Speaker asked the House, whether they would not support him in requiring Mr. Canning to call back his words.

Mr. Canning said, he was ready to acknowledge, that, so far as the orders of the House were concerned, he was exceedingly sorry that any conduct or expression of his should have attracted their displeasure. But, if he was to be required to recall his declaration, by an admission that his impression was erroneous as to the expressions which had been applied to him, he could not in conscience do it.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer requested Mr. Brougham to consider for a moment the lan

guage which he had used; and he would see, that it would not have been borne by one gentleman from another. He would be doing nothing inconsistent with his honour as a man, or as a member of that House, if he would enable his right hon. friend to retract the language he had used, by admitting that the expression he had made use of was not intended to convey a personal insult.

The Speaker seemed disposed to follow up this suggestion, by calling on Mr. Brougham to explain the words which he had used: but Mr. Tierney and lord Archibald Hamilton checked him by insisting, that Mr. Canning was not in a condition to call for an explanation of any ambiguous phrases that had been applied to him, till he had retracted that expression which was a direct violation of the orders of the House. Mr. Bankes then moved, that both parties should be committed to the custody of the sergeant at arms. During all this time, Mr. Brougham remained silent, except that when Mr. Wynn requested him to state what was really the intention of his language, Mr. Brougham refused to give one word of explanation.

Mr. Canning had declared that he would not retract his words: and it was impossible to call on Mr. Brougham to be the first to explain. In this situation of things, there seemed to be no other course than that proposed by Mr. Bankes. It was one, however, which the House was loath to adopt: the manager of the House of Commons in the custody of the sergeant at arms would have been a novel spectacle. At last, sir Robert Wilson hit upon a mode of smoothing down the difficulties, by proposing that Mr. Canning should

make a conditional retractation, so as to enable Mr. Brougham to disavow any purpose of personal offence. Sir Robert stated, that he was satisfied, that the expressions which had fallen from his learned friend were addressed to the right hon. gentleman in his official character, either as governor general of India, or as secretary of state for foreign affairs: and that the interruption of the right hon. gentleman arose only from the firm conviction of the moment, that the expression was personal, and no otherwise intended. With this view of the case, he thought the right hon. gentleman might, consistently with his honour and feelings, say, that it was under an impression that the language was meant to be personal that he had applied the epithet which had called forth the present discussion.

Mr. Canning declared that the suggestion was one which he should not be unwilling to receive and to act upon: but he begged to be understood as acceding to it under the assurance, that the learned gentleman denied the intention to convey any personal imputation in the language he had

used. Personal he had considered that language; as it went to impute to him, that he had made unbecoming submissions to a high individual in the administration of the country, for the sake of obtaining office. Such an imputation he felt to have been cast, not on his official, but his private character. If that imputation should be denied, he was ready to admit, that, in what he had stated subsequently, he was mistaken: if, on the other hand, the imputation should be avowed, he retracted nothing.

The Speaker then stated, that his own opinion was, that no per

sonal offence had been meant by Mr. Brougham, and he trusted the House would believe, that, if he had thought the words were used with any such intention, he would have interfered. He hoped, therefore, to have the sanction of the learned gentleman for saying, that the impression he had received from his language was that which it was intended by him to convey. Mr. Brougham, thus called upon by the Speaker, and the whole House, declared, that he felt that it was an extremely difficult thing to speak with the accuracy, which had now become necessary, of the expressions he had used; and that he was incapable of telling the House exactly what he had said: but he perfectly remembered what was his meaning. He did not know whether his expressions might have been used too warmly, or if they might have had a personal application; because he did not profess that his mind was capable of making a very nice distinction in the selection of phrases, which should apply exclusively to the personal or to the political character. He would, however, tell the House what he meant to say. He had used the words " political tergiversation," and described the conduct of the right hon. gentleman, as something which stood prominent in the history of parliamentary tergiversation. The expression, he admitted, was strong; but he entertained a strong feeling, and he had meant to express it with respect to the right hon. member's public and political life. As a private individual, he had never known aught of him, which did not do him the highest honour. He considered that the right hon. gentleman had, by his speech defivered at Liverpool, for the first

time in his life, said, that he did not wish the Catholic question to be discussed again in Parliament. At that moment it was known, that the right hon. gentleman was about either to become a minister, or to go as governor-general of India: and the lord chancellor was the person of the highest authority and influence in the cabinet. He had talked of the conduct of the right hon. gentleman as it appeared to him from the change which had taken place in his conduct with respect to this question; and he had a right to form an opinion of his motives from the outward and visible form of his actions, which seemed to him to show a truckling to the lord chancellor. He surely had a right to speak of his conduct as a statesman, which he deplored, and this he had done. He had not done so for any party, and still less for any personal purposes, but because its consequences were likely to prove a death blow to that cause, in the support of which they had both been engaged. Whether this explanation were full enough or not, the right hon. gentleman must decide for himself. He (Mr. Brougham) could have wished to have given a fuller one; but what the right hon. gentleman had added to his last speech, in which he almost repeated the disorderly expressions, had stopped him his mouth was closed, on his part, reluctantly and unwillingly.

Mr. Peel then put it to the House, whether it was not their sincere conviction that a satisfactory explanation had been given, and that the affair ought not to be further proceeded in. Mr. Bankes having expressed himself completely satisfied and withdrawn his motion, Mr. Tierney mentioned, that all that remained to be done,