means of justification should be as manifest as the measure.”": the last man to refuse; but inder the present circumstances, I must tell them, that from me they have no letter of attorney to involve fire credit and honour of the country, and to tarnish it with a stain, which no fature circumstances can remove." The attack on Copenhagen, Mr. Windham considered as a violation of that public law of nations, which, though adverse on occasions to the particular views of communities, was still conducive to the general interests of mankind. Did the partizans of that measure vainly hope, that its advantages would outlive the danger and the calamities that would spring from it? When Denmark or France should have recruited that marine with the hearts and energies which our conduct bad afforded them? Here Mr. Windham drew a very lively pic ture of the recollections and sentiments of the Danes, and other nations, on beholding the monu ments of our havoc in Copenhagen. There was a class of men, he said, so prone to all the narrow views and sordid inducements of life, that no measure appeared to be of va lue, but in the sordid profit it produced. These men would greet with acclamation every act of plun‹ der and rapine, careless of the means and manner in which it was effected. "But I wish to hear the opinion of your learned doctors of the law, of your profound sages, and learned civilians, on the opposite side of the house. Are they converts to the new doctrine? Willing forward motions of this descripthey disclaim the efficacy of that public law of nations, which they have taken such care to understand and to communicate Are they prepared to throw off their wigs, bury their books, and break their wands, in order to substitute the new system of unprovoked outrage, in place of the exploded doctrine of moral justice? A due and proper coufidence in ministers, I would be Mr. Milnes said, that while gentlemen opposite to him gave credit to the assurances of Buonaparte, they omitted no opportunity of calling in question the declarations of their owu sovereign and his ministers. It had been contended that the measure now before the house was wrong upon the face of it; but was there not something wrong on the face of a motion, which requir ed a disclosure of information confidentially communicated? Would it not be injudicious to throw open the records of the foreign office, by which the enemy would be put in possession of the means that government had of obtaining a knowledge of his plans, and eventually of frustrating their execution? He considered the motion as an at-/ tempt, on the part of the opposition, to convert the money voted by parliament for secret service into means of procuring information for themselves, which no one else was at all solicitous to obtain. He advised them, instead of bring tion, at once to propose a resolution, that ministers had lost the confalence of parliament. Mr. Bathurst observed, that the" danger of disclosing proofs shouldnot be pleaded generally. Let ininisters tell, why this or that spesi cific paper could not be granted. Nor was it necessary, in grauting any paper, that they should ack quaint the house how they came by it. He did not think, that there could be any objection to the production of any documents that had been moved for; and, in his opinion, the letters, extracts from which had been read, ought to be among the number. The letter of Mr. Garlicke, for instance, stating the hostile mind of Denmark, was very important. It was important also, for the house to know, upon what the opinion of that gentleman was founded; that, if the French were once in possession of Holstein, the island of Zealand must fall into their power. Mr. Canning, in allusion to the conduct of the late administration towards Portugal, had argued, that if we could attack our ally, surely we might attack a power which we had every reason to suspect of hostile intentions against us; but the honourable secretary seemed not to know, or to have forgot, that the expedi tion alluded to was sent, not to attack, but to protect an ally, at a time when there were British troops in Portugal, to repel an actual invasion of French and Spanish troops. He could not, however, but remark that ministers, while they withheld all information respecting the late expedition, had not the smallest scruple in disclosing all the secrets of government for the last seven years. Mr. Leslie Foster conceived, that the expedition to Copenhagen was imperatively dictated by the ascend ancy which Buonaparte had acquired over the arms and counsels of the powers of the north, in consequence of the negligence and supineness of the late administration, which had done nothing for the common cajise, except sending a miserable, subsidy to the king of Prussia, which was like à present to the dey of Algiers. Mr. Morris called upon gentlemen to reflect on the imminent dan4 ger with which this country was threatened, and particularly Ireland; the invasion of which was the object to which the use of the Danish fleet was destined. › Mr. Lyttleton confessed, that differing as he did from the present administration, on many important · points, from the satisfaction they. had given the house on the mea sure of the late expedition, he had on that point become their prosclyte. The Danish fleet was undoubtedly intended for the invasion of Ireland. Mr. Whitbread concluded a speech in support of the motion before the house, as follows: "Ministers wanted to imitate the enemy of France. How did they do that? France had slain a giant, and then, England must go and kill an help-. less, innocent child; but the question now, was, not whether the ex-, pedition was justifiable, but whether that house was bound to give creditto the assertions of ministers, and whether it ought not to require more information. Lord Leveson Gower denied po sitively, that the hostility of Russia was occasioned, either by the negleet of England to send her succours, or by the attack on Copenhagen. The real cause of that. hostility, was, the battle of Friedland. When the emperor Alexander arrived at Petersburgh from Tilsit, after signing the peace with France, the first person he visited was his minister of marine; and the first orders he afterwards gave, was to repair the batteries of Cronstadt Lord Lord Castlereagh, among a great variety of particulars touched on in a long speech, in vindication of the expedition to Copenhagen, gave an account of the various endea vours used by his majesty's government to bring the court of Denmark to an explanation of its views, without effect; and concluded, that the crown prince, in the whole of his conduct, had secretly favoured the views of France. He denied, that Denmark was competent to defend itself against the power of France. As to the assertion, that we ought to have remained in Copenhagen, government had given that question every discussion; and the naval and military officers being consulted on the occasion, were of opinion, that it would require a larger force to keep possession of Zealand than this country could spare; and much greater than was then in Zealand. The question, also, had been put to the first naval authorities, whether the island could be surrounded by our vessels, so as to prevent an invasion on the part of the French. The report of Admiral Keith was, that on the Jutland side there were seven or eight forts, in which might be collected to the amount of sixty thousand men; that, if the ninety pendants which were then flying round Zealand were to occupy the Belt, they must be five miles distant from each other; and that, as some of these might be driven from their stations the French could on that occasion send over their forces in the small craft, of which there was a sufficient number along the shores of Jutland. Mr. Lushington defended the expedition on the usual grounds. On the topic of the law of nations, he said, the sentimental system of gentlemen on the other side of the house, embraced all nations but their own. Their disquisitions might be well enough calculated for the amusement of schools; but they were not fitted for the events of real life, or a state of ferocious war.-On a division of the house, there appeared for Mr. Ponsonby's motion 108. Against it 253. House of Lords, Feb. 8.-The duke of Norfolk called the attention of their lordships to the important subject, on which he had moved them to be summoned. The expedition to Copenhagen, was a measure which deeply affected the character of the country; and, in order that they might come to a true judgment of it, it was material that they should be furnished with all that body of information, to which ministers had, on a former night, alluded, but which was not regularly on their table. Violence of an extraordinary kind had been used, and great scandal had been incurred both to the government and the nation, from which nothing but clear evidence of an imperious necessity could acquit them: an evidence not to be afforded but by the examination of papers. He would so word his motion, as to steer clear of all difficulty and danger of disclosure; and he should even have no objection to alter the words, if it should be thought any inconveniency could arise from it as it now stood to any of the agents of ministers, or to the state. The duke moved, for "the substance of all the communications that had been made to ministers in the course of the last year, with respect to the state of the Danish navy, of any apparent increase thereof, or of any steps steps taken to prepare the same for sea; the proclamation and correspondence of our commanders at Copenhagen; and the substance of all the secret communications re-. specting the secret articles of the treaty of Tilsit." A long and animated debate ensued, in which the arguments on both sides of the question, which have already been laid before our readers, were urged, with additional circumstances, and placed in a great variety of points of view. The duke of Norfolk's motion, was supported by lord Hutchinson, lord Erskine, lord Buckinghamshire, the earl of Moira, the earl of Jersey, the earl of St. Vincent, earl Grey, lord Darnley, and lord Sidmouth. It was opposed by the marquis Wellesley, lord Boringdon, lord Harrowby, lord Lime rick, lord Hawkesbury, and lord Mulgrave. The marquis of Wellesley, who immediately rose up when the duke of Norfolk sat down, took a survey of all the objections that had been urged against the expedition. He maintained, that the facts and circumstances already before the house, were abundantly sufficient to enable the house to form a judgment on the justice and policy of the measure; that it was the design of Buonaparte to employ the resources of Denmark among the other naval means which he meditated to wield against the maritime superiority of Great Britain. As it was the interest, so it was in the power of Buonaparte to accomplish this design, either by fraud and intrigue, or by open force and violence. In proof of this assertion, he entered into a minute detail of the navigation of the Belt. The VOL. L. possibility of crossing the Belt in the ordinary season of the year, in spite of the utmost vigilance of our. cruizers, was confirmed by the fact, that several bodies of the enemy's troops actually got over into Zealand, during the operations exerted to prevent it. And, as to the design of Buonaparte, who could doubt it? Had he hesitated, in his usual abrupt tone and manner, to enquire of the ministers of Portugal and Denmark, whether they had transmitted to their respective courts, his instructions, that their fleets should be equipped, and ready to unite with him in crushing the maritime despotism of England, and with that view to declare war, in concert with him, against England by the 1st of September ? But it was said Denmark could defend herself. Could Denmark defend Zealand after she was deprived of Holstein, from whence she drew provisions for the support of her insular dominions?-Nor was it the policy only of Denmark, that inclined her to lean towards France. Her commercial interests gave her the same bias, for they were founded on the principles of the armed neutrality. It might also be said, that the accession of the Danish fleet to the naval means of France, could not have created any serious danger to the safety of this country. But there was a wide diffe rence between the present state of affairs, and that previous to the glorious battle of Trafalgar. Then almost all the great powers of the continent were in arms against France. But when the expedition was sent against Copenhagen, the whole of the continent was subdued, and subdued not merely for the purpose of conquest, but the [D] subjugation |