TWO:The rest of the Speech consisted of endeavours to represent the country as in a prosperous condition; to have escaped from insurrection by the vigilance of Ministers, and to have recovered the elasticity of commerce. No amendment was moved to the Address in either House, but not the less did the conduct of Ministers escape some animadversion. In the Peers, Lord Lansdowne ridiculed the alarms which had been raised regarding the movements in Derbyshire, which, he said, had not been at all participated in by the working population at large, and had been put down by eighteen dragoons. He contended that there was no evidence of any correspondence with these conspirators in other quarters; but this was notoriously incorrect, for there had been a correspondence in Lancashire and Yorkshire, a[132] correspondence especially disgraceful to Ministers, for it was on the part of their own incendiary agents. He observed truly, however, that the insurrection, as it was called, had by no means justified the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, for it could have been most readily put down without it by the regular course of law. In the Commons, Sir Samuel Romilly thought that the Derbyshire insurrectionists had been very properly brought to trial; for Brandreth had committed a murder, and, therefore, those who acted with him were, in the eye of the law, equally guilty. But if they were properly brought to trial, there were others who ought still more properly to have been brought to trial toothe very men whom Government had sent out, and who had aroused these poor people into insurrection by false and treacherous statements. There was no justice in trying and punishing the victims, and screening their own agents; and this was what Government had done, and were still doing. It is in vain, therefore, that their defenders contend that they gave no authority to Oliver and the other spies to excite the people to outbreak: these spies having notoriously done it, they still protected and rewarded them, and thus made themselves responsible for their whole guilt. If they had not authorised the worst part of the conduct of the spies, they now acted as though they had, and thus morally assumed the onus of these detestable proceedings. One thing immediately resulted from the p?ans of Ministers on the flourishing state of the countrythe repeal of the Suspension Act. The Opposition at once declared that if the condition of the country was as Ministers described it, there could be no occasion for the continuance of this suppression of the Constitution; and accordingly a Bill for the repeal of the Suspension Act was at once brought in and passed by the Lords on the 28th, and by the Commons on the 29th of January.Buonaparte, seeing that nothing was to be expected from the Chambersfor even the Peers adopted the resolutions of the Representativeswho had already demanded his abdicationassumed the air of the despotic emperor, and demanded of Carnot that he should issue orders for a levy of three hundred thousand men, and should find supplies. Carnot said both propositions were impossible. Napoleon then summoned, on the night of the 21st, a general council, consisting of the late Ministers, the Presidents, and Vice-Presidents of the two Chambers, where Regnault and Maret recommended a show of resistance whilst offering terms of peace; but Lafayette said that would only make matters worse. The Allies were victorious, and there was but one course for the Emperor; and Lanjuinais and Constant supported that view. On the 22nd the Chamber of Representatives met early, and again demanded an act of abdication. Napoleon complied, but, as on his former abdication, only in favour of his son. The Chamber thanked him, but took no notice of the clause in favour of Napoleon II. But Lucien Buonaparte[103] and Labdoyre, in violent language, pressed on the House of Peers the recognition of Napoleon II. They persisted in passing it quietly over; but they required Napoleon to issue a proclamation to the army, declaring his abdication, without which the soldiers would not believe it, and, to conciliate them, he complied. Still, fearing lest he should put himself at the head of Grouchy's division, or some other, though small, troublesome force, they insisted that he should retire to Malmaisonso long the favourite abode of the repudiated Josephine, With this, too, he complied, but immediately discovered that he was surrounded by Guards, and was in fact a prisoner. General Becker was appointed to have surveillance over Napoleon; and it was supposed that, as Becker had personal cause of resentment against him, this surveillance would be rigorous. But Becker was a man of honour; he respected the misfortunes of a man who, whatever had been his crimes, had made himself almost master of the world, and he treated him with the utmost courtesy. Orders were issued by the Provisional Government for two frigates to convey Napoleon to the United States, and Becker was to allow of his retirement to Rochefort, in order to his embarkationto accompany him there, but not to permit his movement in any other direction.
