tract refers in part to the proposal which
he made to the Duke to resign his office as Secretary of State, and to
support the Emancipation as a private member, a design which he only
relinquished at the Duke's earnest entreaty. The second extract refers
to the seat in Parliament alone.--See _Peel's Memoirs_, i., 310, 312.]

[Footnote 214: Speech to the electors of Bristol on being declared by
the sheriffs duly elected member for that city, November 3,
1774.--_Burke's Works_, iii., 11, ed 1803.]

[Footnote 215: It is worth pointing out, however, that, as if it were
one of the natural fruits of the Reform Bill, the Liberal Committee of
the Livery of London in 1832 passed a series of resolutions asserting
the principle of delegation without the slightest modification; one
resolution affirming "that members chosen to be representatives in
Parliament ought to do such things as their constituents wish and direct
them to do;" another, "that a signed engagement should be exacted from
every member that he would at all times and in all things act
conformably to the wishes of a majority of his constituents, or would at
their request resign the trust with which they had honored
him."--_Annual Register_, 1832, p. 300; _quoted by Alison_, 2d series,
v., 355.]

CHAPTER IX.

Demand for Parliamentary Reform.--Death of George IV., and Accession of
William IV.--French Revolution of 1830.--Growing Feeling in Favor of
Reform.--Duke of Wellington's Declaration against Reform.--His
Resignation: Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.--Introduction of the
Reform Bill.--Its Details.--Riots at Bristol and Nottingham.--Proposed
Creation of Peers.--The King's Message to the Peers.--Character and
Consequences of the Reform Bill.--Appointment of a Regency.--
Re-arrangement of the Civil List.

One of Pitt's great measures of domestic, apart from financial or
commercial, policy having become law, it seemed in some degree natural
to look for the accomplishment of the other, a reform of the House of
Commons, which, indeed, after the conclusion of the war, had been made
at times the subject of earnest petition, being one in which a far
greater number of people had a lively interest than that excited by
Catholic Emancipation. The Englishmen who had advocated that measure had
been striving for the adoption of a principle rather than for a
concession from which they could expect any personal benefit, since very
few in any English or Scotch constit