nocent of every charge preferred against her; not only of every charge of criminality, but also of every charge of indecency or impropriety or indiscretion of conduct; and 1 am further assured, that you will agree with me, that there are comparatively very few married women, though living happily with their husbands, whose conduct would bear such a scrutiny as that which the conduct of this calumniated Lady has been compelled to undergo. Tried and retried and tried again and again; rummaged and sifted and bolted as it has been, through statements and declarations and depositions and minutes and debates and pamphlets and paragraphs, it comes out at last with out any thing sticking to it, which the most modest and happy married woman in the world might not own without a blush; and, after having carefully read and impartially weighed every word of these documents, I most solemnly declare, that, if I had a daughter twenty years married, I should think myself a happy and a fortunate father, if as little could be said against her conduct as has been proved against the conduct of the Princess of Wales. many more especially as the Report and the Sir John Douglas, however, has presented a petition to the House of Commons, on behalf of himself and of Charlotte, his wife, praying the House to put them in a You will naturally be anxious to know, situation to re-swear all that they have whether any measure, and what, has been before sworn. That the prayer of this adopted by the ministry, the parliament, petition could not be granted, they knew or the people, in consequence of the dis- very well. However, as the petition was closure, which has now, fortunately for the upon the Table of the House, Mr. COCHcause of truth, taken place. By the mi- RANE JOHNSTONE, one of the members, nistry no measure has, as yet, been adopted. upon the ground, that, while it so lay, In parliament there have been some move- without any opinion of the House proments, but, hitherto, without producing nounced upon it, it seemed to receive some any measure of a decided character. A degree of countenance from the House, motion has been brought forward by Mr. moved, on the 24th instant, the following Whitbread for the prosecution of Sir John resolution: "That the petition of Sir John and Lady Douglas for perjury; but was" Douglas, in behalf of himself and of given up, upon its appearing, that they "Charlotte his wife, is regarded by this could not be so prosecuted, having given" House as an audacious effort, to give, their oaths before persons, acting in a capa-" in the eyes of the nation, the colour of city which did not make it perjury for any "truth to falsehoods before sworn to, one to swear falsely before them. Of this," during the prosecution of a foul and deas you will perceive, the Princess complains" testable attempt against the peace and in her defence. And, surely, it was very "happiness, the honour and life of Her hard for her to have her conduct tried, to "Royal Highness the Princess of Wales." have evidence touching her honour and her This motion, upon the ground of there life, taken down before a tribunal, whose being no documents regularly before the competence did not extend far enough to House, whereon to ground such a resoluallow of false swearers being prosecuted for tion, was got rid of by a motion to adperjury. This should have been thought journ; but, during the debate that took of before the warrant was issued; for, it place, it was avowed on all hands, that seems to me, that the hardness of the case the opinion which the resolution expressed is without a parallel. If the oaths had was perfectly just. Not a single man was been taken before the Privy Council, or found in the House to attempt to justify, before magistrates, a prosecution for per- to excuse, or to palliate the conduct of the jury might have dollared and, it is to be petitioners; and, therefore, the effect of greatly ente his most important the motion of Mr. COCHRANE JOHNSTONE circum to in time; upon the public mind has been just the same as it would have been if the motion | doubt, that, though acquitted upon all had been carried by an unanimous vote of capital points, she was still an immoral the House. woman; an opinion, too, which I will fairly avow, was neither removed nor shaken by her public reception at court and her restoration to apartments in one of the Royal Palaces; acts which, without being The public feeling, which was before strong on the side of the injured Princess, has now received the sanction of the conviction of her perfect innocence; and, which is well worthy of remark, this con-over-suspicious, I might, and indeed, I viction has been produced, in general, by the reading of the Evidence only; for, there is not, up to this hour, one person out of fifty thousand in the kingdom, who has read the Defence, contained in the letter of the 2d of Oct., the greater part of which I now pub-influenced in the forming of this opinion. lish in this Double Number. What, then, must be the feelings of the people, when time and circumstances shall have enabled them to read and well reflect on that Defence and the Affidavits in support of it? did, ascribe to mere prudence, which must have dictated to the whole of the Royal Family to use all the means in their power to cause a veil to be drawn for ever over: the whole transaction. I was, moreover, by the total silence of the Princess herself; for, one must have actual experience of forbearance and magnanimity like hers, before one can possibly believe in their existence. If I viewed the matter in this light, how must others, with less opportunity of getting at the truth, have viewed it? Certainly in a light less advantageous to the Princess, who, it appears to me,' must have had very faithless advisers; or, she could not, for so long a time, have remained silent." The fact which first led me to suppose, that I had formed a wrong opinion upon this point, I was this; that a certain Noble Earl, well known was informed of about eighteen months ago. It to be much attached to the Prince, had expended, through the hands of a gentleman, some hunTHE BOOK. What could this be for? What dreds of pounds in purchasing up a stray copy of could be the motive? From that time I began to think, that the Princess was not so very guilty; and, when, soon afterwards, Mr. Perauthor of the Book; when he, who was now ceval, who was well known to have been the become the prime Minister of the Prince, and who had been chosen to that office to the exclusion of the Prince's old friends; when, in open parliament, he explicitly declared, the Printhat had been preferred against her, I could no cess to be perfectly innocent of all the charges longer doubt of her perfect innocence; and, from that hour, as the pages of my Register win show, I did all in my little power to inculcate the same opinion on my readers. Another thing worthy of remark, is, that those news-papers, which, upon the appearance of Her Royal Highness's Letter to the Prince, and upon that of the farbetter letter which she addressed to the Speaker of the House of Commons; those news-papers, which called her a misguided woman, an unfortunate woman, a rash woman, who taunted her with the evidence of Cole, Bidgood, and Fanny Lloyd, and who menaced her with a new Inquiry; those same news-papers, perceiving the universal cry excited by their baseness, accompanied with a disclosure of all the dark machinations of her vindictive enemies, have, all of a sudden, turned round, and, while they have become her panygerists, have fallen, in the most violent manner, upon Sir John and Lady Douglas; just as if the conduct of these persons were not now what it always had been known to be! You will be shocked to hear of such a perversion of that noble instrument, the Press; but, my friend, you must be here, and be acquainted with the means made use of to move that instrument; you When the Prince was addressed by the City must see the working of the secret wheels, of London upon his being constituted Regent, I before you can have a sufficient horror of the thought that the Princess ought to have been cause of so apparently unaccountable an effect. addressed too. I think so still; and, if she had, For my own part, I confess, that, with court, THE BOOK would still, in all human at that time, been placed in a situation to hold a out any motive whatever to bias my judg-probability, have slept in quiet. The want of ment, I, for a long while, for several years, thought the Princess guilty to some considerable extent. The very existence of a commission to inquire into her conduct was sufficient to produce that impression in my mind; and this, added to the tales and anecdotes which were circulated with an industry and in a way, of which you, who live in a happy ignorance of the crafty intrigues of this scene, cannot form the most distant idea, had left me in little wisdom in the advisers of the Prince and the sense and courage of the Princess have combined to order it otherwise; and, I should be a very for it. The disclosure will do great good in many great hypocrite if Lwere now to affect to be sorry ways, while to the nation at large, and especially to the calumniated Princess, it is impossible that it should do any harm. With this remark I leave well satisfied, that you will need nothing more Botley, 26 Mar. 1813, THE BOOK.. can be any question upon the legality of such a Warrant or Commission, the extreme hardship with which it has operated upon me, the extreme prejudice which it has done to my character, and such persons as they think fit: and to report to to which such a proceeding must ever expose your Majesty the result of their Examination. the person who is the object of it, obliges me, By referring to the written Declaratious, it ap- till I am fully convinced of its legality, to forpears that they contain allegations against me, bear from acknowledging its authority; and, amounting to the charge of High Treason, and with all humility and deference to your Majesty, also other matters, which, if understood to be to protest against it, and against all the proceedas they seem to have been acted and reported ings under it.- -If this, indeed, were matter of upon, by the Commissioners, not as evidence mere form, I should be ashamed to urge it. But confirmatory (as they are expressed to be in the actual hardships and prejudice which I have their title) of the principal charge, but as distinct suffered by this proceeding are most obvious; and substantive subjects of examination, can- for, upon the principal charge against me, the not, as I am advised, be represented as in law, Cominissioners have most satisfactorily, and amounting to crimes. How most of the De- "without the least hesitation," for such is their clarations referred to were collected, by whom, expression, reported their opinion of its falseat whose solicitation, under what sanction, hood. Sir John and Lady Douglas, therefore, and before what persons, magistrates, or others, who have sworn to its truth, have been guilty of they were made, does not appear. By the title, the plainest falsehood; yet upon the supposition indeed, which all the written Declarations, of the illegality of this Commission their falseexcept Sir John and Lady Douglas's bear, viz. hood must, as I am informed, go unpunished. "That they had been taken for the purpose Upon that supposition, the want of legal autho of confirming Lady Douglas's Statement," it rity in the Commissioners to inquire and to admay be collected that they had been made by minister an oath, will render it impossible to give her, or, at least, by Sir John Douglas's pro- to this falsehood the character of perjury. But curement. And the concluding passage of one this is by no means the circumstance which I feel of them, I mean the fourth declaration of W. the most severely. Beyond the vindicating of Cole, strengthens this opinion, as it represents my own character, and the consideration of proSir John Douglas, accompanied by his Solicitor viding for my future security, I can assure your Mr. Lowten, to have gone down as far as Chel Majesty, that the punishment of Sir John and tenham for the examination of two of the wit- Lady Douglas would afford me no satisfaction. nesses whose declarations are there stated. I It is not, therefore, with regard to that part of am, however, at a loss to know, at this mo- the charge which is negatived, but with respect ment, whom I am to consider, or whom I could to those which are sanctioned by the Report, legally fix, as my false accuser. From the cir those, which, not aiming at my life, exhaust them cumstance last mentioned, it might be inferred, selves upon my character, and which the Commisthat Sir John and Lady Douglas, or one of them, sioners have, in some measure, sanctioned by is that accuser. But Lady Douglas, in her their Report, that I have the greatest reason to written Declaration, so far from representing complain. Had the Report sanctioned the prin the information which she then gives, as mov- cipal charge, constituting a known legal crime, ing voluntarily from herself, expressly states my innocence would have emboldened me, at all that she gives it under the direct command risques (and to more no person has ever been exof His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, posed from the malice and falsehood of accusers) and the papers leave me without information, to have demanded that trial, which could legally from whom any communication to the Prince determine upon the truth or falsehood of such originated, which induced him to give such charge. Though I should even then, indeed, commands.Upon the question, how far have had some cause to complain, because I the advice is agreeable to law, under which it should have gone to that trial under the preju. was recommended to your Majesty to issue this dice necessarily raised against me by that ReWarrant or Commission, not countersigned, nor port; yet, in a proceeding before the just, open, under Seal, and without any of your Majesty's and known tribunals of your Majesty's kingdom, advisers, therefore, being, on the face of it, re- I should have had a safe appeal from the result sponsible for its issuing, I am not competent to of an ex parte investigation; an investigation determine. And undoubtedly, considering that which has exposed me to all the hardships of a the two high legal authorities, the Lord Chancel- secret Inquiry, without giving me the benefit of lor, and the Lord Chief Justice of the King's secrecy, and to all the severe consequences of a Bench, consented to act under it, it is with the public investigation, in point of injury to my greatest doubt and diffidence that I can bring character, without affording me any of its submyself to express any suspicion of its illegality. stantial benefits in point of security. But the But if it be, as I am given to understand it is, charges which the Commissioners do sanction by open to question, whether, consistently with law, their Report, describing them with a mysterious your Majesty should have been advised to com- obscurity and indefinite generality, constitute, mand, by this warrant or commission, persons as I am told, no legal crime. They are described (not to act in any known character, as Secreta as "instances of great impropriety and indecen ries of State, as Privy Counsellors, as Magistrates" cy of behaviour," which must occasion the otherwise empowered, but to act as Commission-" most unfavourable interpretations," and they ers, and under the sole authority of such warrant) to inquire, (without any authority to hear and determine any thing upon the subject of those inquiries) into the known crime of high treason, under the sanction of oaths, to be administered by them as such Commissioners, and to report the result thereof to your Majesty. If, I say, there are reported to your Majesty, and they are stated to be, "circumstances which must be credited till they are decisively contradicted."--From this opinion, this judgment of the Commissioners bearing so hard upon my character (and that a female character, how delicate, and how easily to be affected by the breath of calumny, your trial. Majesty well knows), I can have no appeal; her proceedings may be had against me (desir for, as the charges constitute no legal crimes, ab as it may have been thought that the Inquiry they cannot be the subjects of any legal trial, should have been of the nature which has, in this I can call for no I can, therefore, instance,obtained), your Majesty would be grahave no appeal; I can look for no acquittal. ciously pleased to require to be advised, whether Yet this opinion, or this judgment, from which my guilt, if were guilty, could not be as effecI can have no appeal, has been pronounced tually discoverea and punished, and my honour against me upon mere ex parte investigation. and innocence, if nocent, be more effectually -This hardship, Sire, I am told to ascribe to secured and established by other more known -Having, the nature of the proceeding under this Warrant and regular modes of proceeding.or Commission; for had the inquiry been entered therefore, Sire, upon these grave reasons, veninto before your Majesty's Privy Council, or be- tured to submit, I trust without offence, these fore any magistrates, authorized by law as such, considerations upon the nature of the Commisto inquire into the existence of treason, the sion and the proceedings under, I will now known course of proceeding before that Council, proceed to observe upon the Report and the exor such magistrates, the known extent of their aminations; and, with your Majesty's permission, jurisdiction over crimes, and not over the pro- I will go through the whole matter, in that course which has been observed by the Report itself, prieties of behaviour, would have preserved me from the possibility of having matters made the and which an examination of the important matsubjects of inquiry, which had in law no substan- ters that it contains, in the order in which it tive criminal character, and from the extreme states them, will naturally suggest. The Rehardship of having my reputation injured by ca- port, after referring to the Commission or War. lumny altogether unfounded, but rendered at rant under which their Lordships were acting, once more safe to my enemies, and more injuri- after stating that they had proceeded to examine ous to me, by being uttered in the course of a the several witnesses, whose depositions they proceeding assuming the grave semblance of legal annexed to their report, proceeds to state the form. And it is by the nature of this proceed effect of the written declarations, which the ing (which could alone have countenanced or ad- Commissioners considered as the essential founmitted of this licentious latitude of inquiry into dation of the whole proceeding. "That they were statements which had been laid before His the proprieties of behaviour in private life, with which no court, no magistrate, no public law has Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, respecting any authority to interfere), that I have been de- the conduct of Her Royal Highness the Princess; prived of the benefit of that entire and unquali- that these statements not only imputed to Her fied acquittal and discharge from this accusation, Royal Highness great impropriety and indecency to which the utter and proved falsehood of the of behaviour, but expressly asserted, partly on -I trust, the ground of certain alleged declarations from accusation itself so justly entitled me. therefore, that your Majesty will see, that if this the Princess's own mouth, and partly on the per proceeding is not one to which, by the known sonal observation of the informants, the followlaws of your Majesty's kingdom, I ought to be ing most important facts, viz. that Her Royel subject, that it is no cold formal objection which Highness had been pregnant in the year 1802, in leads me to protest against it. I am ready to consequence of an illicit intercourse, and that acknowledge, Sire, from the consequences which she had in the same year been secretly delivered might arise to the public from such misconduct of a male child, which child had ever since that as have been falsely imputed to me, that my ho- period been brought up by Her Royal Highness nour and virtue are of more importance to the in her own house, and under her immediate inState than those of other women. That my con- spection. These allegations thus made, had, as the Commissioners found, been followed by deduct, therefore, may be fitly subjected, when necessary, to a severer scrutiny. But it cannot clarations from other persons, who had not, in follow, because my character is of more import- deed, spoken to the important facts of the preg ance, that it may, therefore, be attacked with nancy or delivery of her Royal Highness, but more impunity. And as I know, that this mis- had related other particulars, in themselves exchief has been pending over my head for more tremely suspicious, and still more so, when conthan two years, that private examinations of my nected with the assertions already mentioned. neighbours' servants, and of my own, have, at The Report then states, that, in the painful situtimes, during that interval, been taken, for the ation in which His Royal Highness was placed by purpose of establishing charges against me, not, these declarations, they learnt that he had adopt. indeed, by the instrumentality of Sir John and ed the only course which could, in their judg Lady Douglas alone, but by the sanction, and in ment, with propriety be followed, when informathe presence of the Earl of Moira (as your Ma- tions such as these had been thus confidently aljesty will perceive by the deposition of Jonathan leged and particularly detailed, and had in some Partridge, which I subjoin); and as I know also,degree been supported by collateral evidence, and make appear to your Majesty likewise by the applying to other points of the same nature same means, that declarations of persons of un-(though going to a far less extent), one line could "Every sentiment of duty questionable credit respecting my conduct, at-only be pursued.”to your Majesty, and of concern for the public testing my innocence, and directly falsifying a most important circumstance respecting my sup-welfare, required that these particulars should posed pregnancy, mentioned in the declarations, not be withheld from your Majesty, to whom on which the Inquiry was instituted; as I know, more particularly belonged the cognizance of a I say, that those declarations, so favourable to matter of state, so nearly touching the honour me, appear, to my infinite prejudice, not to have of your Majesty's Royal Family, and by possibibeen communicated to your Majesty when that lity affecting the succession to your Majesty's The Commissioners, therefore, your Inquiry was commanded; and as I know not crown." how soon nor how often proceedings against me Majesty observes, going, they must permit me to may be meditated by my enemies, I take leavesay, a little out of their way, begin their Report to express my humble trust, that, before any by expressing a clear and decided opinion, that His Royal Highness was properly advised (fe | your Majesty will undoubtedly conclude, at, upon a subject of this importance, His Royal Highness could not but have acted by the advice of others), in referring this complain to your Majesty, for the purpose of its undergoing the investigation which has followes. And unquestionably, if the charge referred to in this Report, as made by Sir John and Lady Douglas, had been presented under circumstances in which any reasonable degree of credit could be given to them, or even if they had not been presented in such a manner as to impeach the credit of the informers, and to bear internal evidence of their own incredibility, I should be the last person who would be disposed to dispute the wisdom of the advice which led to make them the subject of the gravest and most auxious inquiry. And your Majesty, acting upon a mere abstract of the declarations, which was all that, by the recital of the warrant, appears to have been laid before your Majesty, undoubtedly could not but direct an inquiry concerning my conduct. For though I have not been furnished with that abstract, yet I must presume that it described the criminatory contents of these declarations, much in the same manner as they are stated in the Report. And the criminatory parts of these declarations, if viewed without reference to those traces of malice and resentment with which the declarations of Sir John and Lady Douglas abound; if abstracted from all these circumstances, which shew the extreme improbability of the story, the length of time which my accuser had kept my alleged guilt concealed, the contradictions observable in the declarations of the other witnesses, all which, I submit to your Majesty, are to an extent to cast the greatest discredit upon the truth of these declarations;-abstracted, I say, from these circumstances, the criminatory parts of them were unquestionably such as to have placed your Majesty under the necessity of directing some inquiry concerning them. But that those, who had the opportunity of reading the long and malevolent narration of Sir John and Lady Douglas, should not have hesitated before they gave any credit to it, is matter of the greatest astonishment to me.The improbability of the story would of itself, I should have imagined (unless they believed me to be as insane as Lady Douglas insinuates), have been sufficient to have staggered the belief of any unprejudiced mind: for, to believe that story, they were to begin with believing, that a person guilty of so foul a crime, so highly penal, so fatal to her honour, her station, and her life, should gratuitously and uselessly have confessed it. Such a person, under the necessity of concealing her pregnancy, might have been indispensably obliged to confide her secret with those, to whom she was to look for assistance in concealing its consequences. But Lady Douglas, by her own account, was informed by me of this fact, for no purpose whatever. She makes me, as those who read her declarations cannot fail to have observed, state to her, that she should, on no account, be intrusted with any part of the management by which the birth was to be concealed. They were to believe also, that, anxious as I must have been to have concealed the birth of any such child, I had determined to bring it up in my own house; and what would exceed, as I should imagine, the extent of all human credulity, that I had determined to suckle it myself: that I had laid my plan, if discovered, to have imposed it upon His Royal Highness as his child. Nay, they were to believe, that I had stated, and that Lady Douglas had believed the statement to be true, that I had in fact attempted to suckle it, and only gave up that part of my plan, because it made me nervous, and was too much for my health. And, after all this, they were then to believe, that having made Lady Douglas, thus unnecessarily, the confidant, of this most important and dangerous secret; having thus put my character and my life in her hands, I sought an occasion, wantonly, and without provocation, from the mere fickleness and wilfulness of my own mind, to quarrel with her, to insult her openly and violently in my own house, to endeavour to ruin her reputation; to expose her in infamous and indecent drawings enclosed in letters to her husband. The letters, indeed, are represented to have been anonymous, but, though anonymous, they are stated to have been written with my own hand, so undisguised in penmanship and style, that every one who had the least acquaintance with either, could not fail to discover them, and (as if it were through fear, lest it should not be suffi ciently plain from whom they came) that I had sealed them with a seal, which I had shortly be fore used on an occasion of writing to her hus band. All this they were to believe upon the declaration of a person, who, with all that loyalty and attachment which she expresses to your Majesty and His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, with all her obligation to the whole Royal Family (to whom she expresses herself to be bound by ties of respectful regard and attachment, which nothing can ever break), with all her dread of the mischievous consequences to the country which might arise from the disputed succession to the crown, on the pretensions of an illegitimate child of mine, nevertheless continued, after this supposed avowal of my infamy and my crime, after my supposed acknowledg ment of the birth of this child, which was to occasion all this mischief, to preserve, for near a twelvemonth, her intimacy and apparent friendship with me. Nay, for two years more, after that intimacy had ceased, after that friendship had been broken off, by my alleged misbehaviour to her, continued still faithful to my secret, and never disclosed it till (as her declaration states it) "The Princess of Wales recommenced a fresh "torrent of outrage against Sir John; and Sir "John discovered that she was attempting to "undermine his and Lady Douglas's character." Those, then, who had the opportunity of seeing the whole of this Narrative, having had their jealousy awakened by these circumstances to the improbability of the story, and to the discredit of the informer, when they came to observe, how maliciously every circumstance that imagination could suggest, as most calculated to make a woman contemptible and odious, was scraped and heaped up together in this Narrative, must surely have had their eyes opened to the motives of my accusers, and their minds cautioned against giving too easy a credit to their accusation, when they found my conversation to be represented as most loose, and infamous, my mind uninstructed and unwilling to learn; my language, with regard to your Majesty and the whole of your Royal Family, foully disrespectful and offensive; and all my manners and habits of life most disgusting, I should have flattered myself, that I could not have been, in character, so wholly unknown to them, but that they must have observed a spirit, and a |