n, and were besides accompanied with felonies, as the burning
of houses, property, &c, all of which was sufficient legal ground
for the king's proclamation calling out the military. Under such
circumstances he said, the military must act with and under the civil
power, and that if the soldiers exceeded the powers with which they were
invested, they must be tried and punished, not by martial law, but
by the laws of the realm. This being the law, he added, it was an
ill-founded apprehension that the metropolis was under martial-law, or
that the military had more power since the riots than before. The noble
lord made one allusion to his own serious losses, which greatly affected
all the peers present. He had been obliged, he said, to form his
opinions without the aid of books; adding, "indeed I have now no books
to consult." On the following day the house of commons having resolved
itself into a committee upon the petitions for repealing Sir George
Saville's tolerating act, which had been made an occasion of so
much mischief, adopted five resolutions, on the motion of Mr. Burke,
expressing satisfaction in the law as it now-existed, together with an
abhorrence of the late tumults, and of the misrepresentations which led
to them. Many members, however, thought it necessary to do something to
quiet the minds of the petitioners and remove the dread of Popery; and
a bill was brought in to deprive Roman Catholics of the right of keeping
schools in which there were any Protestant scholars. This bill passed in
the commons, but it was rejected by the lords, as carried by the fear
of popular outrage, and therefore derogatory to the dignity and
independence of parliament. All signs of popular rage had now, however,
disappeared; and government had evidently derived an accession of
strength out of doors as well as within the walls of parliament. The
minds of the public had become impressed with the danger arising from
popular assemblies for political purposes; and the associations of
reform were therefore deserted by members who had hitherto supported
them. Men found that it was easy to raise the storm of human passion by
exciting language; but that it was the most difficult thing in the world
to allay it when once lashed into fury.

[Illustration: 147.jpg PORTRAIT OF LORD RODNEY]

PARLIAMENT PROROGUED.

Parliament was prorogued on the 8th of July. In his speech the king
dwelt at some length on the recent riots, and thanked par