Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 5.djvu/416

402 character and privileges, we must consult the industry, the manners, and feelings of the people. Standing, as we did, the first country in the world for literature, for science, and for all which could improve and adorn mankind, that the source of these enjoyments should be thus forgotten must mortify every man who admired the freedom of our constitution and the equality of our laws.

The bill, somewhat modified, was passed; but in the lords it met also with considerable opposition, especially from lords Longhborough and Stormont and the lord chancellor. Thurlow had seen that his double conduct in the late regency case had given great offence to Pitt and his party, and he now determined to keep no measures with the ministry. He declared that the commons were now sending up to them bills that would disgrace the merest schoolboys; that there was neither sense, consistency, nor grammar in them; and he moved an amendment, which, however, was rejected, as was another by the duke of Richmond, and the bill passed, but only on the very morning of the prorogation.

Whilst the proceedings which we have debated were in course, the trial of Warren Hastings had scarcely advanced, partly in consequence of the managers, and of the whole body of the lords and commons, being absorbed by the interest of the king's lunacy and the regency bill. We may now notice these trial incidents consecutively. Early in the year, there was made a most determined attempt, on the part of Hastings and his friends, to get rid of the impeachment altogether, by ruining the credit of the managers, and especially of Burke. On the 3rd of February, Hastings presented a petition to the lords, complaining of the great hardship which the extraordinary length of the trial inflicted on him. He stated that already several of his judges were dead, as also were several of his witnesses, and that the detention of others occasioned them the most intolerable inconvenience; that the certain consequences would be, that he should be deprived of his judges best acquainted with the whole proceedings, and of his witnesses by the ordinary accidents and changes of life; that his own health was broken, and his fortune fast disappearing; that already the cost to him had exceeded thirty thousand pounds; that if the trial proceeded at this rate, his fortune must have evaporated before the end of his life, and he should, if still alive, have no means left of defending himself; and he implored their lordships to devise some means of expediting the trial.