HISTORY: OF EUROPE. 
Solutions ; especially as new circum= 
stances had since occurred, which 
had an alarming influence on the 
commercial credit of the country, 
and tended to impair its’ ability of 
carrying on the war? He charged 
administration with indulging a spi- 
rit of intrigue, when the welfare 
not enly of this but other nations 
-of Europ: was concerned, and when 
it should be clearly understood on 
what terms this country was wil- 
ling to make peace. Administration 
was much to blame, in risking the 
events of war, by refusing to treat 
-for peace, after the reduction of Va- 
lenciennes, since which time those 
events‘had turned in favour of the 
“enemy. France, he said, had as 
good a right to retain Belgium, as 
this country to retain Canada, in 
- 1783, orthe Cape of Good Hope, 
in any treaty that might now be 
agreed on. ' 
' The marquis of Lansdowne la- 
“mented to see a motion of such. 
importance passed over in the shuf- 
fling manner in which ministers 
seemed inclined to treat it. After 
the measures of distress, to which 
we had lately beea obliged to re- 
cur, we ought not to adhere to the 
determination of December thirty, 
or of any former period.—Ilt was 
idle, after the shock given to public 
credit, to talk of half measures. No- 
thing short of making bank notes a 
legal tender, with all the calamities 
incident to this step, could save us. 
The minister must know this, and 
only waited, perhaps, to have the 
tall to do so, froni the public. If 
~so, he was ready for one, to make 
the call, and to share in the respon- 
sibility for a measure which alone 
could give us time to look about 
us. He did not despair of his coun- 
try, but the longer the system of 
[163 
war was pursued, the difficulties, in 
the way of peace, would be in- 
creased. It was by relieving the 
balance of trade, by reviving coms 
nerce, by restoring public con- 
fidence, and, above all, by peace, 
that the dangers which threatened 
us were to be averted. He wished 
the present ministers might accom- 
plish this point ; but if they avowed 
that they knew not how, it would 
become them to surrender the task 
to those who did. He referred to 
the correspondence of lord Malmes- 
bury, and observed, it was impos- 
sible to form a right judgment of 
the steps taken in that negociation, 
when only a part of that correspond- 
ence was laid before the house, 
and the instructions and intentions 
of ministers were kept back: with- 
out this Knowledge it was impos- 
sible to say which was the unrea- 
sonable party; but if it could be 
proved, by the documents, to be 
the enemy, it would unite the hearts 
and hands of the people in this 
country. 
Lord Borringdon did not at all 
approve the motion, which tended 
to depress the spirits of the people; 
nor of the words of it, which re- 
sembled those of the minutes of the 
executive directory more than the 
language of the British house of 
peers. 
The earl of Guildford said, that 
his majesty’s ministers, it appeared, 
persevered in their resolution not to 
enter upon any negociation which 
should not. make the restoration of 
Belgium a sine gua non. He who, 
during the whole course of the war, 
had questioned their sincerity in ne- 
gociating, must own that they were 
consistent in acting upon the ad- 
dress of December : since they had, 
by that method, secured themselves 
{[M 2] from 
