, or rear the canopy; they might
perform the offices assigned by Roman pride to their barbarian
forefathers--_Purpurea tollant auloa Britanni_--but with the pageantry
of that hour their importance faded away. As their distinction vanished,
their humiliation returned: and he who headed the procession of peers
to-day, could not sit among them as their equal, to-morrow." This motion
was strongly opposed by Mr. Peel, who was unable to see any reason for
exempting Roman Catholic peers from political restrictions to which
a community professing the same tenets were by law subject. The bill,
notwithstanding, passed the commons by a majority of five; but it was
rejected by the lords.

MOTION ON AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS, ETC.

Early in this session Mr. Brougham moved that it was the duty of the
house to relieve agricultural distress by a reduction of taxes. This
motion was made with a view of trying the strength of parties, as the
small corps of Grenvillites, which had lately joined their ranks,
could not support ministers, if the country members deserted them. Lord
Londonderry met this covert attack on the ministers, however, by an
assurance, that they intended to propose measures for that purpose, so
that the arrow aimed at them fell pointless to the ground. The motion
was negatived from this assurance, and his lordship soon after proposed
the reappointment of the agricultural committee. On the report of this
committee he submitted a plan of relief to the house; the principal
heads of which were a repeal of the annual malt-duty, and a loan of
L1,000,000 in exchequer-bills to the landed interest, on the security of
warehoused corn. It was also enacted that when wheat should reach
eighty shillings a quarter, a new scale of duties should be brought into
permanent operation. At the same time the chancellor of the exchequer
brought forward two financial operations. The first of these was a
reduction of the navy five per cents., to stock carrying only four per
cent; the holders having the option of being paid off at par, or of
accepting the lower rate of interest with a small increase of capital as
a bonus: the second was a plan to diminish the present charge for naval
and military half-pay and civil pensions, known in financial jargon
under the name of the dead-weight, by extending it in the form of
annuities over a period of forty-five years, instead of allowing it to
be gradually extinguished through the death of annuitants.