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I am now as much a member of the houfe of commons as the Speaker nimfelf. The only difference 1 can find out is, I repre fent the first county in England, he a fmall borough in Lincolnfhire; I am a knight of the fhire, he is a fimple burgefs. At this time I am actually supporting, as far as I can, the right of representation of my worthy conflituents, and of every elector in the island, which is violated in my pretended expulfion. I will pursue with unwearied zeal fo a great a caufe. I hold myself till the colleague of Mr. ferjeant Glynn, because we were both chofen by a majority of the freeholders of the county of Middlefex. I am befides determined not to vacate my feat in parlia ment, and therefore I cannot be in the capacity of receiving fuch obliging marks of regard from our Westminster friends, whom I much efteem, but cannot reprefent. I have taken my refolution, which you know is always very decifive. I will never fit in parliament but by the favour and free choice of the freeholders of Middlesex. No political changes, nor any confideration whatever shall induce me to quit the particular fervice of my prefent worthy constituents. They have under the moft trying circumitances fupported me with unparallelled firmness and generofity. I am theirs for life from every principle of honour and gratitude.

Believe me ever your most affectionate,

and obliged humble servant, JOHN WILKES.

Copy of a Letter from George. Onflow, Efq; to John Wilkes, Efq3 Ember-court, Sept. 21, 1765.

My dear old friend,

HA

AVING been moft fhamefully filent to you during the remainder of an oppofition, which did honour to every man concerned in it, and to the credit of which you so much contributed, I now begin my correfpondence with you, at my firft entering into office with and under an adminiftration, whofe principles, I hope and believe, will authorize your giving equal fap port to, in their very different fituation. If they did not, as I know they do, revere and hold facred those fentiments they avowed during the two laft years, and in abhorrence thofe vile and deteftable ones of perfecution and injuftice, which the public were fo injured in, in your perfon, I fhould be afhamed, of what I am now proud of-bearing the fmall share I do among them.-Pub lie marks of this, as well as private ones I hope will foon take place.

Honeft Humphry has dined with me here to-day, and we have juft drank your health, as we have often done. Honest as he is, I never felt him more fo, than your last letter to him, which he has just now fhewed me, has made him appear to me, in having done justice to my very fincere and conftant regards to and admiration

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miration of you. Every word of this letter of your's, (dated the 26th of Auguft of Geneva) I fubfcribe to, and think and perfuade my felf the completion of our patriot, not selfish withes (for fuch they are not) will foon appear among many other proofs of integrity, fteadiness, and virtue, in the prefent ministry, and of their being as inimical as ever to thofe whom they have been oppofing, for having acted contrary to all thefe principles.

Your friend Mrs. Onflow has been enjoying with us in infinite mirth your last specimen of notes on different parts of great Churchill's works, viz. Hogarth, Talbot, and the fcoundrel bifhop. They are fpecimens, indeed, of your amazing wit and abilities; and when he has more of them, he has promised me a

copy.

Believe me, my dear John, your mentioning me as you do, gratifies my pride, as it will always do to fhew myself your friend and humble fervant, I was always fo as a public and as a private man. Our good friend Humphry and I are at this moment in your fervice, and from us both fhall foon, hear, particularly as to the contents of your letter of the 26th. I beg you to believe that I most truly and affectionately am, your faithful humble fervant,

GEORGE ONSLOW.

Poftfcript. Poftpone your judgment, till you hear again from me, on what I lament as much as you can do, and think of as you do Mr. Pitt and Lord Temple's being not in employment.

La vrai fcience au jeu eft de fçavoir écarter-la plus baffe de ta couleur, qui tourne, vaut mieux que la plus haute de la partie prece

dente.

L'homme de cour de BALTHASAR GRATIAN, nouvelle impreffion, imprimée à Epfom, 1769, par Monfieur G-e Ow.

PETITION of the LIVERRY of LONDON, and an Account of the Delivery of it.

GREABLE to the refolutions taken at Guildhall on Sa

Aturday June 24th, for which fee page 49 of our last num

ber, on Wednesday July 5th. The right honourable Samuel Turner, Efq; lord mayor; Sir Robert Ladbroke; Mr. Alderman Beckford, and Mr. Alderman Trecothick, together with the fheriffs, accompanied by Peter Roberts, Efq; the city's remembrancer, waited upon his majefty at St. James's, and being introduced to his majesty by the right honourable the earl Orford, the lord in waiting; the Lord mayor addrefied his majefty to the following effect,

Moft gracious Sovereign,

We the lord mayor, the reprefentatives in parliament, together with the sheriffs of your najelly's ancient and loyal city of London, prefume to approach your royal perfon, and beg leave to prefent with all humility to your majefty, the dutiful and moit humble petition of your majefty's faithful and loyal fubjects the livery

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livery of London, in common-hall affembled, complaining of grievances; and from your majesty's unbounded goodnefs and paternal regard and affection for all your fubjects, they humbly prefume to hope, that your majefty will graciously condefcend to liften to their juft complaints, and to grant them fuch relief as in your majesty's honour, wifdom and justice fhall feem meet.

After which his lordship had the honour of prefenting the faid petition to his majefty; which was graciously received, and is as follows;

To the KIN G's moft excellent Majefty; The humble Petition of the Livery of the City of London, in Common-hall affembled.

Moft gracious Sovereign,

WE your majefty's dutiful and loyal fubjects, the livery of the city of London, with all the humility which is due from free fubjects to their lawful fovereign, but with all the anxiety which the fenfe of the prefent oppreffions, and the just dread of future mifchiefs produce in our minds, beg leave to lay before your majefty fome of thofe intolerable grievances which your people have fuffered from the evil conduct of thofe who have been intrufted with the administration of your majefty's government; and from the secret unremitting influence of the worst of counfellors.

We should be wanting in our duty to your majefty, as well to ourfelves and our pofterity, fhould we forbear to reprefent to the throne the defperate attempts which have been, and are too fuccefsfully, made, to deftroy that conftitution, to the spirit of which we owe the relation which fubfifts between your majefty and the subjects of these realms, and to fubvert thofe facred laws which our ancestors have fealed with their blood.

Your minifters, from corrupt principles, and in violation of every duty, have, by various enumerated means, invaded our invaluable and unalienable right of trial by jury

They have, with impunity, iffued general warrants, and violently feized perfons and private papers.

They have rendered the laws non-effective to our fecurity, by evading the Habeas Corpus.

They have caufed punishments, and even perpetual imprisonment, to be inflicted, without trial, conviction, or fentence.

They have brought into difrepute, the civil magistracy, by the appointment of perfons who are, in many refpects, unqualified for that important truft, and have thereby purpofely furnished a pretence for calling in the aid of a military power.

They avow, and endeavour to establish, a maxim, abfolutely inconfiftent with our conftitution ;-that "an occafion for effectually employing a military force, always prefents itself, wher. the civil power is trifled with or infulted;" and, by a fatal and falfe application of this maxim, they have wantonly and wickedly facrificed the lives of many of your majefty's innocent fubjects, and have proftituted your majefty's facred name and authori

tys

ty, to juftify, applaud, and recommend their own illegal and bloody actions.

They have fcreened more than one murderer from punishment, and in its place have unnaturally fubftituted reward.

They have established numberlefs unconftitutional regulations and taxations in our colonies. They have caufed a revenue to be raised in fome of them by prerogative. They have appointed civil law judges to try revenue caufes, and to be paid from out of the condemnation-money.

After having infulted and defeated the law on different occafions, and by different contrivances, both at home and abroad they have at length compleated their defign by violently wrefting from the people the last facred right we had left, the right of election, by the unprecedented feating of a candidate notoriously fet up and chofen only by themselves. They have thereby taken from your fubjects all hopes of parliamentary redress, and have left us no refource, under God, but in your majefty.

All this they have been able to effect by corruption. By a fcandalous mifapplication and embezzlement of the public treafure, and a fhameful proftitution of public honours and employments; procuring deficiencies of the civil lift to be made good without examination; and, instead of punishing, conferring honours on a paymafter, the public defaulter of unaccounted millions.

From an unfeigned fenfe of the duty we owe to your majefty, and to our country, we have ventured thus humbly to lay before the throne these great and important truths, which it has been the bufinefs of your minifters to conceal. We mot earnestly befeech your majesty to grant us redrefs. It is for the purpose of redrefs alone, and for fuch occafions as the prefent, that thofe great and extenfive powers are intrufted to the crown by the wifdom of that conftitution which your majefty's illuftrious family was chosen to defend, and which we truit in God it will for ever continue to fupport.

Various reports have been circulated concerning the reception of the Lord mayor at St. James's: among which, the following feems to bave gained univerfal credit:

That his lordship after waiting a fhort time in the anti-chamber fent in a meffage by the remembrancer, to the lord of the bed-chamber. He was defired by Mr. Pitt, groom of the bedchamber, to deliver his meffage. The remembrancer anfwered, his bufinefs could only be delivered to the lord of the bed-chamber, and that his orders were to communicate it to none but his lordship. Soon after lord Huntington came out, and acquainted the lord mayor, that lord Orford was in waiting, that the levee was begun, and therefore he could not leave the king; but if they had any thing to prefent, they might walk into the levee. Mr. Beckford anfwered, they were there ready to obey the king's commands; and lord Huntington returned. After fome time, lord Orford, the faid lord in waiting, came out, and told them, that if they had any thing to deliver, they might walk into the

levee, which they did, and the king being near the door, the lord mayor delivered the petition into his majefty's hand, and at the fame time made a short speech fuitable to the occafion. The king made no answer, but turned about to baron Dieden, the Danith minifter, and delivered the petition to the lord in waiting.

A concife Account of the Controverfy that has been carried on in the public News papers, owing to Lord Holland's applying to himself one of the Articles of Grievances contained in the Petition of the Livery of London to his Majesty.

L

ORD Holland imagining he was the pay mafter reflected on thought proper to write a letter to the right honourable the lord mayor, complaining of the injuftice of the charge, and affuring him that Mr. alderman Beckford had papers in his poffef fion which would acquit him of the imputation, alfo intimating that he fhould look upon the lord mayor to be refponfible for this attack on his reputation as being the perfon who prefented the petition to the king. The lord mayor in anfwer having informed lord Holland that he looked upon himself only as the carrier of the faid petition, and not in the leaft accountable for any part of the contents; very fevere cenfures have been thrown out against the apparent timidity of this worthy magiftrate, which feems wholly undeferved, as a profecution for a charge of fo high a nature is a ferious matter, and had not the lord mayor been extremely cautious in what he wrote, and taken care to avoid all refponfibility for the contents of the petition, it cannot be doubted, that lord Holland's lawyers would have been ready to have feized on their prey. The public muft finally acquit this very candid magiftrate, when they fee that lord Holland ftands upon his defence, and is attempting to clear himself of the crime laid to his charge.

The reference made by lord Holland to papers in Mr. Beckford's poffeffion produced the following letter in the news-papers from that gentleman;

An authentic Copy of a Letter received by a Liveryman of London. Fonthill, July 15, 1769.

Dear Sir, "I am as much furprized as you feem to be, at feeing my name, and papers in my poffeffion, appealed to by a noble lord. You and my friends in the city, think it incumbent on me to vindicate (as they are pleased to exprefs themselves) my honour and character, which are called in queftion. The only proper fatisfaction in my power to give you, and my other triends, is, to relate plain matters of fact, to the best of my recollection.

In the last feffions of parliament, on a queftion of revenue (as far as my memory ferves) I did declare to the house, that the public revenue had been fquandered away, and the money of the nation had not been regularly audited and accounted for;

That in the department of the pay-office, I had been informed, there were upwards of 40 millions not properly accounted for: that

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