in a quarter, where no fuch intereft or enmity can be fuppofed to exift, without the highest injuftice and the highest dishonour? On the other hand by what judicious management have you contrived it, that the only act of mercy, to which you Sover ever advised your far from adding to the luftre of a character truly gracious and benevolent, fhould be received with univerfal difapprobation and difguft? I fhall confider it has a minifterial measure, because it is an odious one, and as your measure, my Lord de, because you are the minifter.

As long as the trial of this chairman was depending, it was natural enough that government should give him every poffible encouragement and fupport. The honourable fervice for which he was hired, and the spirit with which he performed it, made a common cause between your Grace and him. The minifter, who by fecret corruption invades the freedom of elections, and the ruffian who by open violence destroys that freedom, are embarked in the fame bottom. They have the fame interefts, and mutually feel for each other. To do justice to your Grace's humanity, you felt for Mac Quirk as you ought to do, and if you had been contented to affift him indirectly, without a notorious denial of juftice, or openly infulting the fenfe of the nation, you might have

r

fatisfied every duty of political friendship, without
committing the honour of your or hazard-
ing the reputation of his government. But when
this unhappy man had been folemnly tried, con-
victed and condemned;-when it appeared that
he had been frequently employed in the fame fer-
vices, and that no excufe for him could be drawn
either from the innocence of his former life, or
the fimplicity of his character, was it not hazard-
ing too much to interpofe the ftrength of the pre-
rogative between this felon and the juftice of his
country? You ought to have known that an ex-
ample of this fort was never fo neceffary as at pre-
fent; and certainly you must have known that
the lot could not have fallen upon a more guilty
object. What fyftem of government is this?
You are perpetually complaining of the riotous
difpofition of the lower clafs of people, yet when
the laws have given you the means of making
an example, in every fenfe unexceptionable, and
far the most likely to awe the multitude, you
pardon the offence, and are not ashameed to give
the fanction of government to the riots you com-
pain of, and even to future murders.
You are
partial perhaps to the military mode of execution,
and had rather see a score of those wretches butch-
ered by the guards, than one of them fuffer death
by regular courfe of law. How does it happen,

my

my Lord, that in your hands, even the mercy O the prerogative is cruelty and oppreffion to the fubject.

The measure it seems was fo extraordinary, that you thought it neceffary to give fome reasons for it to the public. Let them be fairly examined.

1. You fay that Meffrs. Bromfield and Starling were not examined at Mac Quirk's trial. I will tell your Grace why they were not. They must have been examined upon oath; and it was foreseen, that their evidence would either not benefit, or might be prejudicial to the prisoner. Otherwise, it is conceivable that his counfel fhould neglect to call in fuch material evidence?

You say that Mr. Foote did not fee the deceased until after his death. A furgeon, my Lord, muft know very little of his profeffion, if, upon examining a wound, or a contufion, he cannot determine whether it was mortal or not. While the

party is alive, a furgeon will be cautious of pronouncing; whereas by the death of the patient, he is enabled to confider both cause and effect in one view, and to speak with a certainty confirmed by experience.

Yet we are to thank your Grace for the eftablishment of a new tribunal. Your inquifito port mortem is unknown to the laws of England, and does honour to your invention. The only mate

rial

rial objection to it is, that if Mr. Foot's evidence was infufficient, because he did not examine the wound till after the death of the party, much lefs can a negative opinion, given by gentlemen who never faw the body of Mr. Clarke, either before or after his deceafe, authorife you to fuperfede the verdict of a jury, and the fentence of the law.

Now my Lord, let me afk yon, Has it never occurred to your Grace, while you were withdrawing this defperate wretch from that justice which the laws had awarded, and which the whole people of England demanded against him, that there is another man who is the favourite of his country, whose pardon would have been accepted with gra titude, whose pardon would have healed all our divifions? Have you quite forgotten that this man was once your Grace's friend? Or it is to murderers only that you will extend the mercy of the c-n?

These are queftions you will not answer. Nor is it neceffary. The character of your private life, and the uniform tenour of your public conduct, is an anfwer to them all.

JUNIUS.

LET

LETTER.

IX.

ΤΟ HIS GRACE THE D

OF G

I

MY LORD,

have fo good an opinion of your Grace's dif cernment, that when the author of the vindica tion of your conduct affures us, that he writes from his own mere motion, without the least authority from your Grace, 1 fhould be ready enongh to believe him, but for one fatal mark, which feems to be fixed upon every measure, in wbich either your perfonal or your political character is concerned. Your first attempt to fupport Sir William Proctor ended in the election of Mr. Wilkes; the fecond enfured fuccefs to Mr Glynn. The extraordinary step you took to make Sir James Lowther Lord Paramonnt of Cumberlaud, has ruined his interest in that county for ever. The Houfe Lift of Directors was curfed with the concurrence of government; and even the miferable Dy could not efcape the misfortunes of your Grace's protection. With this uniform experience before us, we are authorised to fufpect, that when a pretended vindication of your principles and conduct in reality contains the bittereft reflections upon both, it could not have been writVOL. I.

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ten