Mr. Fyshe Palmer was not tried till the 12th of September. He was then brought before the Circuit Court of Justiciary at Perth, and charged with writing and publishing an "Address to the People," which had been issued by the Society of the Friends of Liberty, at Dundee. Palmer was an Englishman of good family, in Bedfordshire. He had taken his degree at Cambridge, and obtained a fellowship at Queen's College; but he had afterwards joined the Unitarians, and had resided and preached some time at Montrose and Dundee, and had delivered lectures on Unitarianism in Edinburgh and Forfar. It appeared that Palmer was not the author of the Address, but had only been asked to correct the proof of it, and that he had, whilst so doing, struck out some of the strongest passages. One Mealmaker, a weaver, acknowledged himself the author of the Address; but Palmer was a Unitarian, and this, to the bigoted Presbyterianism of his judges, was rank poison. His advocate pleaded that he was not quite sane, but neither did this avail; the jury brought in an instant and unanimous verdict of guilty, and the judges condemned him to be transported for seven years. This was a still more outrageous sentence than that of Muir, for Palmer had corresponded with no French or Reforming societies whatever; he had simply corrected a proof!
Besides this, there remains a number of other lawyers, amounting, in the whole, to thirty-four, bought up at from four and five hundred to six and eight hundred a year.This concession, though deemed by the Home Government a large one, did not satisfy the Canadians. They took it as an instalment, but gave no pledge to make the return that was sought, by liquidating the arrears. In their answer to the Governor they said, "The great body of the people of this province, without distinction, consider the extension of the elective principle, and its application to the constitution of the Legislative Council in particular, and the repeal of the Acts passed in Great Britain on matters concerning the internal government of the province, as fully within the jurisdiction of the provincial Parliament, as well as the privileges conferred by such Acts; and the full and unrestrained enjoyment on the part of the legislature and of this House of their legislative and constitutional rights, as being essential to the prosperity and welfare of his Majesty's faithful subjects in Canada, as well as necessary to insure their future confidence in his Government, their future contentment under it, and to remove the causes which have been obstacles to it." Mr. Roebuck had become their champion and paid agent in the British House of Commons, and one of their first acts was to insert the agent's bill for the amount of his expenses (500) in the public accounts. This the Government refused to sanction, whereupon the Assembly took it upon them to pass it themselves without such sanction. The temper exhibited on both sides in these proceedings indicated no sign of a fair prospect of conciliation between the ruler and the ruled, more especially as the British Government exhibited anything but a conciliatory spirit. The discontent and agitation went on increasing during the following year. The Assembly rose in its demands, still persisting in refusing to vote the supplies. They required that the "executive council" of the Governor should be subjected to their control, and that their proceedings should be made public. The Assembly, in fact, had become quite refractory, owing to the violent measures of the democratic party, led on by Papineau, the Canadian O'Connell.
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ONE:When these infamous doings were known in England, a feeling of horror and indignation ran through the country. The East India Company was compelled to send out Lord Pigot to Madras to do what Clive had so vigorously done in Bengalcontrol and reverse the acts of the Council. Pigot most honourably acquitted himself; liberated the outraged Nabob of Tanjore and his family, and restored them. But Pigot had not the same overawing name as Clive. The Council of Madras seized him and imprisoned him, expelling every member of the Council that had supported him. This most daring proceeding once more astonished and aroused the public feeling of England. An order was sent out to reinstate Lord Pigot, but, before it arrived, his grief and mortification had killed him. Sir Thomas Rumbold, a most avaricious man, was appointed to succeed him, and arrived in Madras in February, 1778, Major-General Hector Munro being Commander-in-Chief, and the army of Hyder, one hundred thousand in number, already again menacing the frontiers.The Americans did not make their Declaration of Independence till they had communicated with France. The British Government, as Lord North publicly declared in Parliament, had long heard of American emissaries at Paris seeking aid there. A secret committee, which had Thomas Paine for its secretary, was appointed to correspond with the friends of America in Great Britain, Ireland, and other parts of the world. Encouraged by the assurances of France, the secret committee was soon converted into a public one, and agents were sent off to almost every court of Europe to invite aid of one kind or another against the mother country, not omitting even Spain, Naples, Holland and Russia. Silas Deane was dispatched to Paris in March of this year, to announce the growing certainty of a total separation of the colonies from Great Britain, and to solicit the promised co-operation.
Within a few days of taking Philadelphia, Lord Howe raised three batteries on the side of the river. On the 3rd of October Washington issued from his camp on the Schuylkill, about fourteen miles from Germantown, having heard that two British detachments had been withdrawn thence to attack the forts on the Delaware. He had been reinforced by militia from Maryland and New Jersey, and determined to surprise the British camp at Germantown. Two columns of Continental troops, led by Greene and Sullivan, were to gain the front of the British, and attack it; whilst two other columns of militia were to attack the rear. This force marched all night, and entered Germantown about sunrise, and all seemed likely to favour their enterprise. A fog prevented the discovery of their approach. But, at the first surprise, Colonel Musgrove threw himself into a storehouse, and kept up such a fire from the windows as checked the assault of the Americans, and gave time for the rest of the British force to get under arms. The village of Germantown consisted of one long street. Across this street the British army had encamped, and stoutly resisted the advance of the Americans. Musgrove was summoned to surrender; but he continued his fire from the house without taking any notice, and, before artillery could be brought up to batter the house, General Greig and Brigadier Agnew came up to his assistance. The Continental troops in front, led on by Washington himself, made a brisk attack, but were repulsed at all points, and were badly co-operated with by the militia in the rear. Washington was compelled to fall back to his camp at Skippack Creek, leaving behind him about eight hundred killed and wounded, and four hundred prisoners. So far, however, was Sir William Howe from availing himself of this opportunity to follow up the attack on Washington, and disperse his army, that he, as usual, thought only of getting into snug winter quarters.[See larger version]This royal denunciation of the Repeal movement greatly exasperated O'Connell. He had recently submitted a plan to the Repeal Association, recommended by a committee of which he was chairman, for the restoration of the Irish Parliament. In the document containing this plan it was declared that the people of Ireland finally insisted upon the restoration of the Irish House of Commons, consisting of 300 representatives, and claimed, in "the presence of the Creator," the right of the Irish people to such restoration, stating that they submitted to the union as being binding in law, but solemnly denied that it was founded on right, or on constitutional principle, or that it was obligatory on conscience. The franchise was to be household suffrage, and the voting by ballot. It was also provided that the monarch or regent de jure in England should be the monarch or regent de facto in Ireland. This revolutionary scheme was to be carried into effect, "according to recognised law and strict constitutional principle." The arbitration courts which O'Connell had threatened to set up, in consequence of the superseding of magistrates connected with the Repeal Association, had actually been established; and the Roman Catholic peasantry, forsaking the regular tribunals, had recourse to them for the settlement of their disputes.
路见不平Eason吼
