more vigorous resistance might be expect ed to the power and the encroachments of France. It was by a resistance strong and persevering, and by such resistance only, that they could hope for a lasting and honourable peace. Such a peace was only to be won by impressing upon the enemy a conviction of their power to resist his efforts; and it was only by such a peace that they could give to the exhausted powers of Europe, safety, independence, and prosperity.

A pause of some length here ensued. The question was put, and was about to be carried without discussion, when

Mr. Canning rose, and spoke to the following effect:

Sir; I have no intention to interrupt the unanimity with which the question in your hand seems about to be carried. I have waited until the very last moment in the expectation that the rumour which has been so currently circulated of an amendment to be proposed from another quarter, would be realised; having myself no amendment to offer; and wishing for the convenience of the order of debate, to follow rather than to precede the speech of the hon. gentleman who was expected to propose one. But no such proposition being made, and the question being put from the chair, I cannot allow it to pass without explaining the grounds on which I concur in the Address that has been moved, and the qualifications with which I feel my self bound to accompany that concurrence. Sir, whatever amendment, if any, had been proposed, I should have felt, that under the circumstances of the time, and under the circumstances in which the House and the country are placed, it would have been desirable, in making our decision between two different forms of address, to decide in favour of that which would least pledge our judgment, and would allow the greatest freedom to our future deliberations. In the first session of a new parliament,-a parliament too in which there is a greater infusion of new members than is ordinarily reen on a change in the representation; in a state of public affairs so complicated as that in which the country is at this moment placed,-when we are called upon to answer a speech from the throne, embracing so many important topics, upon many of which enquiry and information may be requisite, it would have been highly undesirable that this House

should pledge itself, in any way, by a precipitate decision; and as any amendment that could have been proposed, would in all probability have been more precise than the Address moved by the noble lord, I should undoubtedly have preferred the original Address to such an amendment. The Address, so far as I have been able to collect its tendency, very properly abstains from pledging the House to any thing farther, than that to which every individual in the House, and every individual in the country, must be ready to testify an instant and cordial assent, namely, to the affording every possible support to the executive government in the great contest in which we are engaged. It goes no farther than to rejoice at the fortunate, and to lament the unfortunate, occurrences of the last six months; to promise every aid that may be necessary to improve the former, to repair the latter, and to bring the whole to a happy issue. In these pledges, Sir, I trust that every man who hears me, and I am confident that an incalculable majority of the country at large are prepared, without hesitation, to concur.

But, if the Address proposed by the noble lord, however unexceptionable in its general tenour, had been allowed to pass without comment or observation, it might possibly be inferred that every man who had concurred in it was bound to approve the details of every measure referred to in it, and that all enquiry was precluded by this unanimous and approving vote, on points which might hereafter appear to require further illustration. It is merely to guard myself against such a sweeping conclusion, that I presume, Sir, at the present moment, to detain you and the House for a short time, while I explain my sentiments on several of the topics comprehended in the noble lord's Address.

Sir, the general view of our situation naturally divides itself into domestic and foreign; and the foreign portion of that view into the contemplation of three distinct wars, in which we are principals or accessaries.-The first is the war in the north of Europe, which we are cheering with our encouragement, animating with our applause, and following in its progress from day to day with our fondest hopes and most lively anxieties; but with respect to which our situation is that of deeply interested spectators rather than of active partisans. The second is the war

in the peninsula, carried on principally from our own resources, aided however in some degree by those of the allies whose cause is immediately concerned; and upon the measure of whose co-operation, therefore, our success must in the same degree depend. The third is the war with the United States of America, in which we are engaged alone, and in the conduct of which, therefore, our government is exclusively responsible.

With respect, Sir, to the war in the north of Europe, it was well said by the noble lord who moved the Address, that it is the child of that great effort in the peninsula, which has enabled Europe to reflect on its condition, and has roused it to a struggle for emancipation. There can be but one feeling-that of unbounded admiration at the great efforts which Russia has made. Noble indeed has been the struggle, and glorious beyond anticipation the results in that quarter;-there even there, where the tyrant of the world doubtlessly anticipated an easy victory, and concluded, from former experience, that one decisive battle would be the precursor of an abject peace-there, where thinking that he knew his man, and that he should have only one man to cope with, and to cajole, he found what he had forgotten to take into his estimate, a nation; where imagining that, having issued a bulletin and taken a fort, his work was done, he unexpectedly found a countless population thronging to the standard of their sovereign, prepared for exertions and for sacrifices such as the world has seldom, if ever, witnessed before; and opposing not merely with the arms of a disciplined soldiery, not merely with the physical mass of impenetrable multitudes, but with famine and with fire, with the voluntary destruction of their own resources, and with the conflagration of their own homes, the progress of his desolating ambition. Sir, there is no man who can contemplate the recent occur rences in the north of Europe without feeling his heart burn within him. There is no man who can contemplate them without exulting at the defeat of those principles of false philosophy which, having first misled the world, have at length deceived those by whom they were originally asserted. The invader of Russia flattered himself, as the noble mover of the Address has justly observed, that a nation, to which he affixed the appellation of barbarous, and which he pictured to

himself as in a condition of degrading and disheartening servitude, could entertain no generous and patriotic sentiment. He had yet to learn, that there is a principle of instinctive patriotism, which prevails even over the vice of positive institutions; he had to learn that in spite of the doctrines, and it may be added of too many of the events of the last twenty years, it is not an universal truth that before the people of any country determine to resist an invader, they coldly speculate on all the possible improvements to be made by regenerating laws in the actual condition of their society, that they refuse to draw a sword in defence of their altars or their fire-sides, until they have weighed well the question, whether they be worth defending, and entered at full leisure and with all imaginable research into a comparative anatomy of various political constitutions. Sir, the invader of Russia has found that the natural feelings of man, the sacred attachment to home, the ties of custom, of family, of kindred, are enough to arouse resistance to a foreign invader, come though he may with splendid promises of freedom and improvement; that he may be resisted, and gallantly and effectually resisted, by those whom he proposes to regenerate, not merely because it may be apprehended that he might not realize those promises, but simply because he is a foreigner and an invader. Sir, if this were to be the sole result of what has taken place in the north, it would be an invaluable addition to, or rather it would be a timely and salutary revival of, those ancient maxims of national independence, which the convulsions of the modern world have almost buried in oblivion. But is this all? Can any man who looks at the present condition of Buonaparté, with what wonderful ability soever he may have rescued himself from former difficulties, (and I am sure, I am not disposed to deny him the possession of stupendous ability) but can any man look at his present condition, and so chastise his feelings as not to entertain a sanguine hope of events most decisively favourable to the general cause of Europe?

This, Sir, is the view which I at least take of this subject. So far as I can be apprised of the circumstances, I give full credit to ministers for the conduct which they appear to have pursued towards Russia-in what regards the commencement of the war, and for (what I

take for granted to be) their intention to give to the emperor of Russia every possible aid in the prosecution of the war, when once begun. I understand them to have abstained from any advice or interference tending to urge the emperor of Russia to embark in a war, which, had it been carried on with ordinary means, or in an ordinary spirit-had it not been national-had it not been a war of the people as well as of the government, must ere now have led to his ruin. I give them credit at the same time for having hailed with admiration and delight, the first symptoms of such a determined spirit on the part both of the government and of the people of Russia, as has been exhibited in this unexampled campaign; and for having endeavoured to aid a contest begun (without their advice) by Russia, for Russian objects, and conducted by Russian councils, with purely Russian energy and zeal, as warmly, as if it had been commenced at their instigation.

But here, Sir, a question arises, respecting which some future explanation seems to me indispensable. How has it happened, that having made a treaty of peace with Sweden, upon which we are called upon to congratulate the Prince Regent; and having for the last six months heard notes of preparation in every port of that kingdom, how happens it that the power of Sweden has not been brought to bear in aid of the Russian cause, at a moment when, if ever, the interposition of a third power might have been decisive of the contest? To this question I do not desire an immediate reply; but I cannot vote for an Address containing a congratulation on the conclusion of a treaty with Sweden, and at the same time observe Buonaparté retreating, and in a situation which an effective attack on his rear might render doubly perilous, without asking, what impediment prevented the co-operation of Sweden, and whether that impediment was indeed such as it was not in human foresight to anticipate, or in human wisdom to remove? The treaty with Sweden is not before the House; I can therefore argue upon it only from the general information, which every one possesses. But, it ought not to be forgotten, that in concluding this treaty, the court of St. James's and that of Stockholm, did not stand on an exact footing of equality. We had a boon to grant, for which we had a right to require an equivalent. (VOL. XXIV.)

At all times, the acknowledgment of a new dynasty (to say nothing of an usurpation) is counted as a concession for which, if necessary or desirable, a compensation may be demanded. In the treaty with Sweden, we began with the acknowledgment of a new dynasty, and incidentally of the Frenchman who is now the crown prince, and eventually heir to the throne. That an equivalent for this acknowledgment should have been required merely for the sake of maintaining the principle and the right, I am not so pedantic or so scrupulous as to pretend but with Russia in the situation in which she was, I think our right ought not to have been improvidently waved, if we could have stipulated any thing for her benefit. That such a stipulation must have been in our contemplation when we made peace with Sweden, there can be no doubt: it remains to be explained, how that stipulation has been missed, or has been rendered inefficient.

In considering the war in Russia, as arising out of the war in the peninsula, (the view of it taken by the noble lord), a new question arises. Hitherto we have carried on the war in the peninsula, with no relation to any other nations than those which inhabited the peninsula itself. But our efforts in the peninsula are no longer to be considered as devoted exclusively to the interests of Portugal and Spain; it is not for their sakes, or for our own and theirs, alone, that we were under an obligation to prosecute vigorously a contest, on the faith of the vigorous prosecution of which Russia involved herself in hostilities with France. I have already said, that judging what must probably have been the language held by our government to Russia, I entirely and unequivocally approve it. I believe our government to have said to the court of St. Petersburgh, "if you engage in a war with France with a view to your own interests, we will help you as far as we may be able; but depend not on our direct and immediate aid. Our principal efforts must be made in the peninsula, and in making them there we shall do more towards your assistance than by any pecuniary or military support that we should be able to afford you." That, I take, Sir, to have been the language held to Russia; and it was wise language. Having held it, it behoved us to strain every nerve in the peninsula, to make good the expectations which we had raised.

(F).

While, therefore, I cordially join in every word of the Address which congratulates his Royal Highness on the splendid exploits of our army in the peninsula, and of their gallant and immortal leader, if I am called upon to declare that the result of those brilliant exploits, such as we now see it, has satisfied the hope and expectations of the country, I must beg leave expressly to guard myself against being supposed to concur in that interpretation of the Address. Do I, therefore, count the victory of Salamanca as nothing, even if its consequences terminated on the plains upon which it was fought? Certainly not. I, who held up the barren laurels, (as they were often described), of Talavera, to the admiration of the country, can hardly be suspected of a disposition to withhold my applause from the splendid achievement of Salamanca, even had no result proceeded from it but the acquisition of national glory. But, Sir, I am compelled to compare the hopes which the victory of Salamanca inspired, with the situation of our affairs in the peninsula presented to us at the opening of the present session. It is impossible for any man not in an official situation, actually to demonstrate that we could have made greater efforts in the peninsular war, or, if we had made greater efforts, that they would have been successful. On a former occasion-an occasion which occurred not in this House, but in the course of transactions which took place last year, and which became matter of publicity-I mean, Sir, during the negociations last year for the formation of a new administration, I studiously and explicitly declined giving a decided opinion myself, or concurring in an opinion given by others, (with whom in most points of public moment I did concur), that the scale of the war in the peninsula had not been as great as our means might enable us to make it. I had not then the materials for forming a confident, much less a criminatory judgment upon that point. I have not those materials now. It would require a detailed knowledge of the state of the military, and the pecuniary means of the country, which, out of office, and without any official information as yet laid before parliament, I do not pretend to possess. But this information must be laid before us. And in the mean time I cannot hesitate to allow, that the prima facie case of such successes, terminating in such a retreat, does call for explanation.

I cannot hesitate to say, that if there be in the power of ministers any means yet untried-any effort yet unattempted-any resources yet unexplored-any accumulation of force yet omitted-any increase of energy yet delayed-not only such additional exertion ought to be immediately made, but that it ought to have been made long ago. If a reinforcement can be sent out now, it is for ministers to prove that it could not have been sent out before. If any measure can now be adopted by which the disposable force of the country may be augmented, the burden is on ministers to prove that such a measure could not have been taken six months ago; when, instead of retrieving reverses, it might have ensured a continuance of success. If ministers have it in contemplation at present to call on the country to make any extraordinary effort, why was not that call made in July last? Why was not the last session of the last parliament prolonged for that purpose? I can, therefore, concur in the implied approbation of the conduct of the war in the peninsula, only on the understanding that it shall be hereafter shewn that government did not possess the means of making any additional effort, to bring the contest to a favourable termination. The higher we estimate lord Wellington's merit, and no man is disposed to estimate it more highly than myself, the more should we regret any misplaced economy, any shrinking from exertion that had a tendency to cripple his operations, and prevent him from attaining those important objects which his great mind had in contemplation. It is difficult, as I have already said, to prove to a demonstration that more might have been done. But if I were put to the question, I must say, that I believe that greater efforts might have been made, and I believe, that if those efforts had been made, they might have proved eminently, nay, perhaps conclusively successful.

To those, Sir, who habitually despond of the means and resources of the country; who think that she has taken her stand too high among the nations of the earth, and that she ought to return to her proper level, to shrink into her shell, I may expose myself to the imputation of insanity, when I talk of extending our military exertions. But I will ask those gentlemen, whether if the efforts which we have lately been making had been predicted ten years ago, the prophecy