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declaration in their favour, and by a direct avowal of his determination to assist them while they acted upon the principles which had been the rule of his own conduct. This assistance he gave publicly and privately, with a zeal and disinterestedness of which there is no other instance in the history of political parties."*

Mr. Pitt took an active part in all the discussions on the best means of defending the country against the threatened invasion of the enemy, at this critical period. The national defence was a subject to which, it appears, he had directed all the powers of his active, acute, and comprehensive, mind. The measures proposed by Ministers, for the general defence of the country, in the summer of 1803, had his support, as far as they went; but it was his opinion-an opinion, indeed, with which the nation concurred--that they did not go far enough; that government did not seem to have a proper sense of the danger to which the country was exposed, and that, consequently, they did not apply means of adequate strength for repelling it. In all the debates on this important point, Mr. Pitt and Mr. Windham distinguished themselves most; both of them differing, essentially from Ministers, in the measures which they proposed in 1804;-both equally solicitous to

Tomline's speech on the character of Mr. Pitt.

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render the military power of the state efficient for offensive, as well as for defensive, purposes; but not entirely agreeing with each other as to the most eligible means for producing that desirable effect. Mr. Windham considered the volunteers as useless, if not worse than useless, and contended for the necessity of an exclusive reliance on a regular army; while Mr. Pitt regarded a formidable and regular force as indispensably necessary; but, at the same time, thought a large body of volunteers as essentially important to the defence of the country.

In a debate, on the 27th of February, 1804, Mr. Pitt reproved Ministers for not having taken sufficient care to render the volunteers as useful and efficient as they were capable of being made by proper discipline, and instruction in military evolutions. After pointing out the means which appeared to him most proper for remedying this defect, he adverted to the low state of our naval preparation. In this statement, he declared, he was not influenced by the slightest prejudice against any man; on the contrary, in the whole of his observations, he wished to keep aloof from every description of asperity, which, he thought, ought not, upon any account, to be introduced in the course of that discussion. This was not a time for the operation of any party-spirit. Every mind

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should be engaged, every heart should be devoted, to the consideration of the public defence; and, in the prosecution of it, he expressed his hope, that Ministers would weigh well the sacred duty they had to perform, the awful responsibility of their situation. would not be enough for them to say, that our preparations were great-they ought to be complete. He postponed, however, the full declaration of his sentiments, on the actual state of the naval defence of the country, till the 15th of March, when he made some specific motions on the subject.

His first motion was for an address to the

King, "that he may be pleased to give directions to have laid before the House an account of the number of ships of the line, ships of fifty guns, frigates, sloops of war, bombs, hired armed vessels, &c. in commission on the 31st of December, 1793, on the 30th of September, 1801, and on the 31st of December, 1803, specifying the service in which they were respectively employed." His next motion. that an humble address be presented to his Majesty, for a copy of the contracts made, and the orders given, by the Lords of the Admiralty, in 1793, 1797, and 1803, with respect to the number of gun-vessels to be built, distinguishing the time at which such contract was made, the period at which it was to be

was,

brought to a conclusion, and the account of the sum to be paid for the performance of it.” His third motion was, "that there be laid before the House a list of such ships as have been built, in the King's yards, in 1793 and 1801."

Mr. Pitt acknowledged, that the object of these different motions was to obtain proof of a criminal neglect, in the Board of Admiralty, to provide a sufficient force for the defence of the country, in the present critical situation of public affairs. He stated that, since the present Lords of the Admiralty had come into office, only two ships of the line had been contracted for, to be built in the merchants' yards; while, during the last war, only two ships of the line had been furnished by the King's yards, out of twenty-nine ships of the line; and that there were, at that moment, docks and slips in the river unoccupied, which were calculated for building fourteen or fifteen ships of the line. He also charged the Admiralty with having admitted the necessity of gun-brigs, and other vessels drawing little water, to counteract any efforts which might be made, by the immense number of light vessels, stationed at Boulogne and elsewhere, for the avowed purpose of attempting a descent upon some part of the British shores. Mr. Pitt expressed his surprize at the opposition which

was made to his motions, because Ministers had previously applied to him to be informed of the nature of them, and which information he gave them; and he understood, that it was their intention to assent to two of the motions, without any objections being suggested.

One of the most strenuous opposers of Mr. Pitt's motions was Mr. Sheridan, who did not blush to declare, that he "could only be actuated by factious and party motives!!!"— He was probably led to prefer this most unfounded charge, by a consciousness of its applicability to his own public conduct for some years past. He could not bear the smallest reflection on a Whig Minister; and, therefore, sought to counteract the effects of Mr. Pitt's plain statements, by a declamatory panegyric on the services of Lord St. Vincent, of which, however, he deemed it prudent to avoid all specification. In the blindness of his zeal, he ridiculed the idea of gun-brigs, although the Admiralty had recently acknowledged their utility, by ordering twenty of them to be built, and totally forgot, that there were numerous parts of our coast, most exposed to attack, which ships of the line could not possibly approach; and which, therefore, in the event of an attempt at invasion, would admit of no other naval defence than gun-boats, or armed vessels of a similar nature. He proclaimed

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