I applied to many of the leading members of both Houses of Parliament, but to very little effect. Those who deputed me were very desirous that I should see Mr. Fox on the subject; and Sir Peter Burrell, who was also greatly hostile to the Bill, and acted at that time as Lord Great Chamberlain of England at the trial of Mr. Hastings, recommended me to take an opportunity of the managers for the Commons, waiting at that trial to desire to speak with Mr. Fox in the manager’s box; and with this view gave me a pass ticket for the whole trial, by means of which I could be at the bar ready to serve such an opportunity when it offered. These tickets were sold at twenty guineas each; and this afforded me many opportunities of much entertainment. I accordingly saw Mr. Fox, and found him by no means inclined to patronise any opposition to the Bill. All that could be done was to make him a master of certain important facts of which he was ignorant, and which did seem to have some little weight with him. It may here be observed that as I was walking one day in Fleet Street with my pass ticket and a 20l. note in my pocket book, I was hustled unskilfully by a knot of rascals, who picked the book out of my pocket, but I missing it instantly, luckily observed it on the pavement near my foot, and seized on it immediately, and the rascals went off at once. By means of this ticket I was present when Mr. Sheridan made the speech that rendered his eloquence so celebrated.[[123]] I was examined at the Bar of the Houses of Lords and Commons, and published two pamphlets on the subject of the Wool Bill.
But notwithstanding all the opposition that was made to the measure, after moderating some of the most hostile clauses the Bill passed; but the manufacturers experienced so determined and vigorous an opposition that they would hardly engage again in any similar attack upon the landed interest. In the course of this business I experienced a strange instance of roguery in an Ipswich attorney named Kirby. This man was appointed secretary and receiver of the Suffolk subscriptions for supporting the expense of opposing the Bill. He paid the reckoning twice at the ‘Crown and Anchor’ when a few persons dined there; and after that, under various pretences, when money was to be paid; and on a moderate computation put more than 100l. into his own pocket. I was unwilling to believe it, but upon his death a few years after it was found that he was one of the greatest knaves the devil ever created.
My deputation by the county of Suffolk to represent it, in opposing the Bill at the bar of the two Houses of Parliament, in the same manner as Sir Joseph Banks, a highly eminent character for influence and affluence, was deputed by the county of Lincoln, did me much honour, and shows that a prophet may sometimes be esteemed, even in his own country. The reader who is desirous of becoming acquainted with this portion of the history of wool in England may consult my Question of Wool—my speech that might have been spoken—my Reasons against the Bill, and various other papers by myself, inserted in the ‘Annals.’
The opposition certainly would have been successful if Mr. Pitt had not found what so many ministers have experienced before—that the trading interest at large is a hundred times more active than the landed interest; for very few counties exerted themselves on this occasion. Had half of them acted like Suffolk the Bill would have been inevitably lost, and had I not been a resident in Suffolk that county would have slept with the rest. It may not be amiss to observe that a pamphlet was published, entitled a ‘Letter to Arthur Young, Esq., on the Wool Bill, by Thomas Day,[[124]] Esq.,’ from which the following is an extract:—
‘If we are delivered from the present danger, I know no one who has so great a claim to the public gratitude as yourself. As soon as the storm began to gather, your active eye remarked the curling of the waters and the blackening of the horizon, while all our other Palinuruses were quietly slumbering around. Distinguished, therefore, as you long have been for literary talents, you have now added a nobler wreath, and a sublimer praise to all you merited before.’ Mr. Day in this letter calls my opposition to the Bill ‘A noble stand in defence of the common liberties.’
‘April 22.—I was examined on the Wool Bill in the House of Commons. It was a most hard-fought battle between the manufacturers and the landed interest; the Bill laid heavy shackles on every movement of wool near the sea coast, and was opposed with great resolution, both by Sir Joseph Banks and myself.
‘We opposed it both in the Commons and the Lords, both being examined at the Bar of the two Houses; the manufacturers on this occasion were so hotly opposed that Sir Joseph thought they would be quiet in future. I was of a different opinion, being convinced that they never would omit any opportunity of imposing their shackle on that insensible, torpid, and stupid body “the landlords of Britain.”’
About this time Count Leopold Berchtold[[125]] visited me at Bradfield. But part of the time which he spent in Suffolk (I being absent) was at the ‘Angel’ at Bury, where he lived an extraordinary life of retirement and economy. He daily went out, and employed the whole day in writing and reading. Such temperance has scarcely been known. He drank neither wine nor beer, and would dine upon a potato or an egg.
He told the landlord of that inn that he could not live in the manner of other travellers, but that he might charge what he pleased for his apartments. He was a most extraordinary personage. His father had a considerable estate in Bohemia, and one reason for the son’s travelling over a great part of the world was the extreme disgust he took at the measures of the Emperor Joseph II., which were oppressive and ruinous to the nobility &c., constantly changing his ill-formed political schemes. He had lived in the principal countries of Europe long enough to become a master of their languages, in every one of which he printed a work which he conceived might be useful to the inhabitants. When at Bradfield he was working hard to learn Arabic, as he proposed passing from England to Morocco, thence to Egypt and Arabia. This journey afterwards he executed, and returned home to Bohemia through the greatest part of the Turkish Empire; and, after escaping a thousand dangers, as he was going to Vienna was murdered by banditti.
He was very tall and graceful in his person, of a handsome, expressive countenance, and as elegant as if he had passed his whole life in a Court. Though invested with the Order of St. Stephano by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Leopold, he never wore it in England, as his father being alive made it necessary for him to live economically. His conversation was intelligent and pleasing, his knowledge almost universal. He travelled much on foot; and once through France or Germany—I forget which—when he was beset by three or four robbers; but he assumed so much firmness in his manner, with so resolute and determined an air, and with so threatening an attitude of defence, that, after a pause, the robbers retired, thinking it best to let him alone. He had a sabre or some other weapon, and said that they might have had the worst of it if they had made the attack, as he had before been set on in the same way more than once.