MEETING OF PARLIAMENT.
The new parliament met on the 31st of October. The first debate was occasioned by the election of a speaker. Sir Fletcher Norton had given offence to ministers during the last session, and Lord George Germaine, urging the precarious state of Sir Fletcher’s health, moved that Mr. Cornwall should fill the chair. Sir Fletcher and his friends replied, that his health was now re-established, and that Lord George Germaine’s condolence was a mockery of the house; and Dunning moved that he should be continued speaker. The house was divided on his re-election, but opposition were left in a minority of one hundred and thirty-four to two hundred and three: Mr. Cornwall was therefore elected speaker. His majesty delivered his opening speech on the following day. In it he declared his satisfaction in having an opportunity, by the recent election, of receiving the most certain information of the disposition and wishes of his people; and again complained of the unprovoked aggression of France and Spain, who were exerting all their power to support the rebellion of his colonies, to destroy the commerce of Great Britain, and to give a final blow to her power. He added, that the bravery of his fleets and armies had enabled him to withstand their hostility; and that he hoped the late successes in Georgia and Carolina would have important consequences in bringing the war to a happy conclusion. The opposition denied that the successes obtained in America were likely to be decisive, and an amendment was moved in the house of commons by Mr. Thomas Grenvilie, consisting in the omission of several complimentary paragraphs, but it was negatived by two hundred and twelve against one hundred and thirty. In the upper house there was but little debate, and the original address was carried by an equally large majority. The same success attended ministers with reference to the army and navy estimates, which were carried by such large majorities as served to remind Lord North of the earlier years of his administration, and to efface the recollection of the narrow divisions and minorities of the last session. In the course of the debates on the estimates, Fox pledged himself to move, after the Christmas holidays, for the dismissal of the Earl of Sandwich, and afterwards to bring him to condign punishment. He should found these motions, he said, on two different causes: first, for Sandwich’s having advised his majesty to promote Sir Hugh Palliser to the government of Greenwich Hospital; and, secondly, for his having shamefully neglected the navy. This led to a display of fierce party spirit, which was subsequently renewed from a remark made by Mr. Thomas Townshend; namely, that he thought it was highly necessary that the house should inquire why, in this season of public danger, the nation was deprived of the services and abilities of such men as Admiral Keppel, Lord Howe, Sir Robert Harland, Pigot, Campbell, and Barrington. This remark was made on the 4th of December, and in the course of the debate which ensued, Mr. Fox having again censured the promotion of Sir Hugh Palliser, Lord North defended the unpopular admiral in one of his most ready and effective speeches. Two days after this the two houses of parliament adjourned to the 23rd of January.