profits, I fhould fay fomething of thofe which feem of eminent inutility in the ftate; I mean the number of Officers who by their places are attendant on the perfon of the King. Confidering the common wealth merely as fuch, and confidering thofe Officers only as relative to the direct purposes of the itate, I admit that they are of no ufe at all. But there are many things in the conftitution of establishments, which appear of little value on the first view, which in a fecondary and oblique manner produce very material advantages. It was on full confideration that I determined not to leffen any of the offices of honour about the Crown, in their number or their emoluments. These emoluments, except in one or two cafes, do not much more than answer the charge of attendance. Men of condition naturally love to be about a Court; and women of condition love it much more. But there is in all regular attendance so much of conftraint, that, if it were a mere charge, without any compensation, you would foon have the Court deferted by all the Nobility of the kingdom. Sir, the most serious mifchiefs would follow from fuch a defertion. Kings are naturally lovers of low company. They are fo elevated above all the relt of mankind, that they must look upon all their fubjects as on a level. They are rather apt to hate than to love their Nobility, on account of the occafional refiftance to their will, which will be made by their virtue, their petulance, or their pride. It muft indeed be admitted, that many of the Nobility are as perfectly willing to act the part of flatterers, tale-bearers, parafites, pimps, and buffoons, as any of the lowest and vilelt of mankind can poffibly be. But they are not properly qualified for this object of their ambition. The want of a regular education, and early habits, and fome lurking remains of their dignity, will never permit them to become a match for an Italian eunuch, a mountebank, a fidler, a player, or any regular practitioner of that tribe. The Roman Emperors, almoft from the beginning, threw themselves into fuch hands; and the mischief increafed every day till its decline, and its final ruin. It is therefore of very great importance (provided the thing is not overdone) to contrive such an establishment as muft, almost whether a Prince will or not, bring into daily and hourly offices about his perfon a great number of his firft Nobility; and it is rather an useful prejudice that gives them a pride in fuch a fervitude. Though they are not much better for a Court, a Court will be much the better for them. I have therefore not attempted to reform any of the offices of honour about the King's perfon. But that part of my plan, Sir, upon which I principally rett, that on which rely for the purpose of binding up and fecuring the whole, is to establish a fixed and invariable order in all its payments, which it fhall not be permitted to the first Lord of the Treafury, upon any pretence what foever, to depart from. I therefore divide the Civil Litt payments into nine claffes, putting each clafs forward according to the justice or importance of the demand, and to the inability of the perfons entitled to enforce their pretenfions; that is, to put thofe first who have the most efficient offices, or claim the jufteft debts; and, at the fame time, from the character of that defcription of men, from the retiredness, or the remoteness of their fituation, or from their want of weight and power to enforce their pretenfions, or from their being entirely fubject to the power of a Minister, without any reciprocal power of aweing, ought to be the most confidered, and are the moft likely to be neglected; all these I place in the highest clafles: I place in the lowest thofe whofe functions are of the least importance, but whofe perfons or rank are often of the greatest power and influence. In the first class I place the Judges, as of the first importance. It is the public justice that holds the community together; the eafe, therefore, and independence of the Judges, ought to fuperfede all other confiderations, and they ought to be the very laft to feel the neceffities of the state, or to be obliged either to court or bully a Minifter for their right: they ought to be as weak folicitors on their own demands,' as ftrenuous affertors of the rights and liberties of others. The Judges are, or ought to be, of a referved and retired cha racter, and wholly unconnected with the political world. In the fecond clafs I place the foreign Minifters. The judges are the links of our connections with one another; the foreign Ministers are the links of our connection with other nations. They are not upon the spot to demand payment, and are therefore the most likely to be, as in fact they have fometimes been, entirely neg lected, to the great difgrace, and perhaps the great detriment of the nation. In the third class I would bring all the tradesmen who fupply the Crown by contract, or otherwife. In the fourth class I place all the domestic fervants of the King, and all perfons in efficient offices, whofe falaries do not exceed two hundred pounds a-year. In the fifth, upon account of honour, In the fixth clafs, I place thefe efficient In the eighth, the offices of honour a- In the ninth and the laft of all, the falaries and penfions of the firft Lord of the Treafury himfelf, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the other Commiffioners of the Treafury. If by any poffible mifmanagement of that part of the revenue which is left at difcretion, or by any other mode of prodigality, cafh thould be deficient for the payment of the lowest claffes, I propofe that the amount of thofe falaries where the deficiency may happen to fall, fhall not be carried as debt to the account of the fucceeding year, but that it shall be entirely lapfed, funk, and lott; fo that Government will be enabled to ftart in the race of every new year, wholly unloaded, fresh in wind and in vigour. Hereafter, no Civil Litt debt can ever come upon the public. And 145 thofe who do not confider this as faving, ground their calculations of the future on because it is not a certain fum, do not their experience of the past. allowance to the Civil Lift is perfectly Affuming, then, that the prefent vast adequate to all its purposes, if there fhould be any failure, it must be from the mifmiffioner of the Teafury; fince, upon management or neglect of the first Comof any confequence, which he is not himthe proposed plan, there can be no expence felf previously to authorize and finally to politic, that the lofs fhould attach upon controul. It is therefore juft, as well as the delinquency. If the failure from the delinquency the clafs directly above the first Lord of fhould be very confiderable, it will fall on the Treafury, as well as upon himself and his Board. It will fall, as it ought to fall, upon offices of no primary importance in whom it will be a matter of no flight imthe state: but then it will fall upon perfons, portance for a Minister to provoke-it will fall upon perfons of the firit rank and confequence in the kingdom; upon those who have a more interior credit with him than are nearest to the King, and frequently the Minifter himself. It will fall upon Mafters of the horse, upon Lord-chamberlains, upon Lord-stewards, upon Grooms of the Stool, and Lords of the Bed chamwho will be ready to mutiny for want of ber. The houfhold troops form an army, pay, and whofe mutiny will be really dreadful to a Commander in Chief. EXPLANATION of the annexed PLATE, exhibiting the Drefs of the Grecian Inhabitants of the Island of NAXIA. Nihand in the Grecian Archipelago, AXIA, or Naxos, is a confiderable 25 miles in length, and 88 in cireumference. The whole is covered with orange, lemon, olive, cedar, citron, pomegranate, fig, and mulberry trees; and abounds with fprings and brooks. The illand has no good harbour, yet the inhabitants carry on a confiderable trade in barley, wine, figs, cotton, filk, flax, cheefe, falt, oil, and cattle. It is inhabited both by Greeks and Latins, who live in great dread of the Turks; fo that when the meanest of their fhips appear here, they always wear red caps like galley-flaves; but as foon as they are gone, they then put on their caps of velvet. There are four Archbishoprics on the island, and a great many villages, but fo thin of people, that the whole number does not amount to eight thoufand, The highest fomething truly ridiculous in its appearance. a better a better name, we must be content to call a circular fhelf, calculated to fupport the ends of a kind of laced lappets hanging down from their thoulders; in which all we have to admire, is a compofition of ab furdity: the annexed plate is defigned from one of the most diftinguished Ladies of the island. They add to this romantic cumberous dress all the coquetry of behaviour they can affume; they paint, blacken their eye brows and eye-lafhes, and cover their face with patches, made of the leaves of a black thining talc which they find in the island. But in the form of their patches they betray a ficklenefs beyond even what is fhewn in our climate; they fometimes cut them triangular, fometimes like a star; but a patch like a crefcent or half-moon placed between the eyes, is thought to be irrefiftibly beautiful. To finish the character of these fantastic Ladies, it may be added, that they are fo vain, that when they return out of the country to their town-houfes, they will have perhaps forty women in their train, fome on affes, and fome on foot; one of whom carries a napkin or two, a fecond a petticoat, a third a pair of stockings, and fo on all which compofes a very whimfical kind of proceffion to ftrangers. However, were we difpofed to palliate the eccentricities of the Ladies of Naxia, it must be at the risk of difobliging our own country-women, by hinting, that vanity difplays itself every-where in the forms that caprice and cuftoms dictate; and that fashion reconciles us to any thing. : DEBATES in the prefent SESSION of Parliament, continued from Page 97 of our last. HOUSE OF LORD S. Thursday, February 24. THIS day his Majefty came to the Houfe, and gave the Royal Affent to the Irish trade-bill; bill for amending an act of the last feffion relative to prizes, by extending the fame to Spanish prizes; the Banbury road and several other private bills. Wednesday, March 1. The order of the day being read, Lord Sandwich rofe, and ftated to the House the fervices which the nation had received from the good conduct and bravery of Sir George Rodney, in his late engagement with the Spanish fleet-His Lordship obferved, that more hips had been taken by the Admiral, than had been captured in any engagement during the laft war, or the war before; faid he had not a doubt but every Lord would join in his motion-and then moved, That the thanks of the Houfe fhould be given to Admiral Sir George Brydges Rodney, for the very fignal fervice performed in his late engagement with the Spanish fleet; which was carried without a divifion. The two noble Lords, whofe removal was the cause of the motion, rofe fucceffively, explained the motives of their conduct, and of the circumstances which attended it. They faid, they could not with propriety fecond the motion, nor vote, though they were ready to acknowledge that it was a very fit fubject for Parliamentry enquiry. This gave birth to a very long and important debate, in which the motion was very ably fupported. The principal fpeakers on the part of the propofition made by the noble Lord were the Dukes of Richmond, Grafton, and Devonthire, and Lords Effingham, Temple, Abingdon, Camden, and the Marquis of Rockingham; against, Lords Stormont, Hillfborough, Denbigh, the Lord Prefident, and the Lord chancellor. A few minutes before eleven o'clock, the question being put, the House divided, Contents 31 39 85 } Proxies The House rofe at eleven o'clock, and adjourned till to-morrow. Wednesday, March 8. A proteft was entered against the proceedings of Monday laft relative to the motion then made by the Earl of Shelburne.-This protest is figned by the following Peers, viz. Harcourt, Camden, Derby, Manchefter, Abergavenny, Richmond, Wycombe, De Ferrars, Beaulieu, Rockingham, Abingdon, Ponsonby, Craven, Rutland, Devonshire, Radnor, Fitzwilliam, King. Friday, |