"John Cam Hobhouse, Esq. whose zeal and perseverance in the late contest, and his declaration in favour of Radical Reform, have insured him the support of 3,861 Independent Electors.' "It was received with long continued peals of approbation, which lasted some minutes. It "Mr. HOBHOUSE.-We might have been expected, perhaps, to have met under other circumstances, but it is always gratifying to me to meet the Electors of Westminster, under any circumstances, and those who are not sorry to see each other after a defeat, must be bound together, at least, by honorable ties. We can have no regrets our purpose was honest, was a truly national object-we can have no mutual recriminations, the means which we pursued to obtain that purpose were such as all good citizens must be proud to acknowledge. Our recollections cannot be any other than agreeablewe had, during our long struggle, none but the purest of all motives to animate us-we had the approbation of our consciences-we had the prayers and the good wishes of the great mass of our fellow countrymen, and those applauses which would have rendered our victory more precious, are a sufficient consolation for want of success. was, perhaps, too much to hope, that those who had neither terror nor chicanery in their pay, who had no temptation beyond the persuasion to honesty to employ, should be a match for all those who applied themselves to all the bad passions, and who had at their command all the engines of corruption. But it was not too much to hope that a great national benefit should be conferred upon their fellow-countrymen by the Electors of Westminster, let what would be the event of the contest; and, I am sure, that no one has been disappointed in this hope. The country has long looked up to Westminster; and has been accustomed to see in its example, a living lesson for the instruction of all disinterested patriots. This was the case long before Westminster had been successful in her struggle for independence; and, doubtless, as much was taught by the effort made in favour of Mr. Tooke, (although that gentleman was not returned to parliament,) as could be taught by the successful endeavours of any other body of electors whatsoever. For, you, Gentlemen, proceeded upon principle, and, as it were, embodied an opinion that had long been gaining ground in England, namely, the conviction of the real inefficiency of all party combinations. The party which had been popular by opposing the American war, no sooner got into place, than (to use the words of Bishop Watson) 'they lost the king's confidence, lost the people's confidence, and lost their power for ever! The same discerning bishop saw, that there was neither Whiggism nor Toryism left; excess of riches and excess of taxes, combined with excess of luxury, had introduced universal selfism. What was felt by the bishop, was felt by the nation; nor could the splendid abilities of Mr. Fox, and those extraordinary men that acted with him, nor their patriotic services in opposing the French war, recover the confidence of the people of England. Mr. Fox himself felt that the Whig party did not exist; for, in his letter to Lord Holland, he talks of re-establishing it. Whatever were his wishes, nothing certainly could have been more contrary to such an object than his coalition with Lord Grenville and Lord Sidmouth. This did, indeed, give the death-blow to the miserable distinctions of Whig and Tory.' This was the signal for the resurrection of the people, whose rights had been undermined and frittered away during the contentions of these rival parties. This was the consummation which was to crown the efforts of Westminster. This was the true epoch for the appearance of that much-desired and long-expected character, the real disinterested patriot, not the seeker of place-not the lover of power-not the adorer, nor the vilifier, of princes, but that which in a representative government, strange as it might appear, had been hitherto wanting, A TRUE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE PEOPLE, without an end, an aim, or an ambition, independent of that noble and useful character. It was indeed the pride of Westminster, and the glory of England, to have found such a man; but had the Electors of Westminster not found him, their conduct would have made him: such constituents would not have been long without a suitable representative. I need not recal to you the long and happy connexion which has subsisted between you and your representative, nor the triumph which your principles obtained by the return of two reformers to parliament. The eminence on which you stood was too high not to attract envy. You know that, for several years, those who had formerly domineered in Westminster have been employing the usual weapons of party to disturb your tranquillity. Having lost the representation, their next care was to degrade it; an attack on the Westminster Reformers was always acceptable to these politicians, but more especially to the Whigs. Degraded as they thought it was, they still thought it worth a manœuvre to obtain a seat, and took advantage of a division amongst the Reformers, to put forth a man of high character as their own. For this, Gentlemen, is an ancient trick of the Whigs-they appropriate for the party every thing that is good amongst them, but never think themselves answerable for any of *In the article Universal Suffrage, in Edinburgh Review for January 1819, it is owned that the Whig party was broken up by the Burkites. the discreditable acts of their party. They called the return of Sir Samuel Romilly the triumph of the Whigs, though that gentleman divided more than 2,000 votes with each candidate. Their exultations at that event, and at a few successful returns elsewhere, were unbounded; they condescended to feel some corresponding kindness for the people, and to tell them so, in terms which would have suited a Russian Ukase, pronouncing the manumission of a whole region of slaves. It is easy, then, to conceive the horror and dejection with which they viewed the approaching probability of Westminster being again totally freed from their shackles. They were reduced to a dilemma, which their pride could not brook--either they were to acquiesce in a choice not made by themselves, or they were openly to object, and confess their impotence. There was, indeed, another plan, and that was to allow of the election of the man chosen by you, and then to say that it had been the work of their own hands. This, indeed, we knew, as it was afterwards proved by what we heard on the hustings, and from the Whig organ. This would have been said, notwithstanding the former complaint that my nomination was wholly managed by those not connected with the Whigs-so inconsistent is cunning. Such an after-pretence would have been a compromise of the freedom of Westminster, and of the individual chosen by you. It was necessary to prevent the possibility of such an assertion, by openly laying down the principle on which we proceeded. It was necessary that the General Committee should declare itself still true to that cause from which others had apostatised. It was necessary that I should declare myself convinced, as I was convinced, that a true Reformer cannot be a party man, and that a member for Westminster ought not to be a party man. The hatred begotten by truth, was the fruit of this sincerity-you know the consequence. The Whigs have kindly given you another proof that this monstrous invention of party, that this Fourth Estate was contrived for the corruption of all political honour and honesty; and that individuals, however good in themselves, no sooner join the party, than they rush headlong into the commission of every infamy, and hide their very selfishness, under the pretext that what they do, is not done for one, but for many. If there ever was a transaction attended with peculiar circumstances of depravity, it was the conduct of these pretenders to patriotism in the last election; and whatever may have been the former opinion of any man respecting the Whigs, this election has developed their characters beyond all possibility of further delusion. It is idle to talk of former opinions about those who seem to become worse and worse, as occasion allows them the opportunity. The tricks, the falsehoods, the fraud, the force resorted to by these Noble Persons-their open and eager coalition with those whom they have so long stigmatized as the enemies of the people-all are too fresh in our recollection. Their base and mean manner of charging you, Gentlemen, with the employment of those very arts which were resorted to solely by themselves, will never be obliterated from the memory of Englishmen. If I said before the election, that the country was sick of Party, what terms will now suffice to show the detestation in which that madness is held-not only in the metropolis, where Whig is a by-word of reproach, but in the provinces, where the press has pronounced upon the last election? The country is sick of party-it never will return to its vomit. It is all in vain talking of their Whig principles. Where are they? Who acts upon them? I shall say of them, as a Noble Lord said of the English Constitution, in those days, when the Whigs used to laugh at the word Constitution as much as we do now, 'Thus Harlequin extolled his horse, The Whig borse is dead-and dead indeed. Nobody cares twopence for his pedigree-the matches he has won are forgotten or doubtful. Lately, indeed, they put him to a sorry purpose, and actually killed him by trying to make him carry double-but Whig and Tory at once would have broken down a high-mettled charger -no wonder it was too much for a wretched worn-out hack. And yet I dare say we shall hear of the animal again—but it will not do. They may Galvanize the malefactor who has been hanged and cut down-he may seem alive-a grin or distortion-a kick of the leg may frighten or amuse the by-standers, but he is dead-and dead for ever. No, Gentlemen, the Whigs of England-the old Whigs have been respectable, but they are now, like the ancient Catos, vain names and nothing else. Well said Dr. Bentley, that no man was ever written down but by himself. We have been accused of bringing public men into contempt, but no man was ever brought into contempt but by himself. These proud men are angry merely because when they demand future confidence we remind them of past misdeeds. They are angry because we tell them not always to boast of what was half done by their ancestors some one hundred and forty years ago, and remind them, that if they will always be looking backwards themselves (when they do not allow us to look backwards) they will never look forward, and be sure to stumble over the first obstacle in their way. These proud men are angry with us, who think Reform every thing, because we remonstrate with those who were once of the same opinion as ourselves, but now think Reform almost nothing, and good only for a placard at an election. They are now absolutely angry with us with tracing back the word Radical Reform to themselves, and pretend not to know what the word means. They are not the most learned of mankind; but, I dare say, they have read Foote's farces-they may be instructed of the meaning of this hard word by Dr. Last. What do you do,' says the doctor to him, to cure a tooth-ache?" 'I pulls him out by the roots,' says Dr. Last. Good,' answer the doctors, a radical cure, indeed.' But our empirics won't have their rotten part even touched, much less extracted-for it is my conscientious belief, and I do not speak without inquiry, that the Whigs will never make even the repeal of the Septennial bill a cabinet measure. Why then do they affect to be surprised if the great bulk of the people of England, who are convinced that nothing but a Reform in Parliament can save us, are totally indifferent to that for which alone the Whigs labour, namely, for the Whigs coming into place? Why are they surprised to find that there are many people in England like the old woman of Syracuse, who prayed for the life of Dionysius, the tyrant, because she knew his wickedness, but did not know what might be the villainies played by those who came after him? But, really, Gentlemen, I forget myself—I forget what sort of a person it is that presumes to address you-I forget that the organ of the great body of the educated nobility has pronounced me, not only ignorant, arrogant, and malignant,' but has interdicted me from fire and water, has pronounced me unworthy of all honest society, as one who must henceforth live as an exile in the heart of his own country. Upon my honour this is a serious sentence; but I shall not unnecessarily afflict myself at it, until I see whether it is confirmed by the voice of my fellow-countrymen. I may, I think, be allowed to say, that I have seen no proof of it in the reception I have been honoured with this evening. I shall, therefore, beg the Whigs to put off my punishment to the day of their Reform of Parliament, and if they agree to this adjournment, I am sure that I shall sleep sound for the rest of my life. "Mr. Hobhouse, at the desire of the Chairman, gave "The illegally disfranchised Electors of Westminster, and a speedy end to that taxation which makes men poor, and punishes them for being so.' "Mr. RICHTER said, the disfranchisement of electors called upon him to state, that the recent illegal disfranchisement will not go without remedy. By a petition which would be presented to |