I have been the more diffuse in detailing the particulars of this meeting; because, when the reader shall have perused an account of two subsequent public meetings, which I attended in this county (at both of which the propositions that I supported were carried by overwhelming majorities); when he shall have coupled them with the great public meeting that I was instrumental in calling at Bath, in the year 1816, at which meeting I presided, and at which those resolutions and that petition were adopted, and signed by 20,000 names, which was the cause of Lord Camden resigning his sinecure place of Teller to the Exchequer; when he shall have reflected upon all these things, the reader will, perhaps, discover the reason why the corrupt tools of the Boroughmongers sent me to be imprisoned in the Bastile of this county. There had never been a public meeting of the inhabitants at Bath in the memory of the oldest person residing in that city; and it is possible there never would have been a public meeting held in it, if it had not been for my exertions. There had never been a public county meeting in Somersetshire before, at least not any thing worthy to be called a county meeting, till I procured one; and my readers may be well assured that these things were the cause of the Government selecting this Gaol for the place of my incarceration. Another thing was, that the Judges knew it to be one of the worst, the most confined, and most unwholesome Gaols in the kingdom. At these public meetings that spirit was engendered, which blazed forth with so much splendour at the late county election for Coroner, at which the little freeholders spurned the arbitrary dictation of the Magistracy of the county, and elected a Coroner of their own choice, in spite of the overbearing threats held out by those who had so long been in the habit of ruling them with a rod of iron.

I have before mentioned that I was a member of, or rather an annual subscriber to, what is called the Bath and West of England Agricultural Society; and, as a farmer, possessing, perhaps, the very best and largest stock of Southdown sheep, having my extensive farms cultivated under my own eye in such a manner, as to be more like a garden than like a large arable farm, that farm, of course, producing its produce in the market at all times of a superior quality; I had been often asked, why I did not exhibit some of my stock, and claim some of the numerous prizes for good husbandry, which were annually given by the society? My answer was this, "I pay my guinea a year, that I may have an opportunity to watch the motions of those gentry who have the management of the concern, and to see how the pegs and wires work." When I first became a member, my father warned me against being made the dupe of the artful and designing knaves, who were the leading parties concerned in it; and he always declared that the society was composed of three classes of persons, namely, "RAPACIOUS LANDLORDS; CUNNING, GRASPING, LONG-HEADED PARSONS; AND SHALLOW, VAIN, JOLTER-HEADED FARMERS;" the object of the two former being to suck the brains of the latter, for the purpose of ascertaining the utmost value of their lands and tithes, that they might screw up the rents of both to the highest possible pitch: in fact, he always set them down for a set of unprincipled gamblers and swindlers, whose sole design was to benefit themselves at the expense of a starving community, by increasing the price of the necessaries of life, through the means of every possible chicanery, trick, and delusion. He used to say, that one half of them ought to be sent to Botany Bay for swindling, and the other half of them deserved to be whipped at the cart's tail for their folly end vanity. "But," said he to me, in the most solemn and impressive manner, "whatever you do, never, on any account, become a candidate for any of their premiums or prizes, because there, 'kissing goes entirely by favour,' and, therefore, unless you will submit to become one of their unprincipled gang, by assisting them to dupe and plunder others, be you assured that they will dupe and plunder you; and, let your merit be what it will, take my word for it, you will never obtain a prize." I always followed my father's advice; and, by the most strict and impartial observation, I have satisfied myself beyond the possibility of doubt that he was correct in his conclusions. They are, however, not only eminent in knavery, but that their folly keeps full pace with their ignorance and stupidity; the following are splendid proofs. One of their members, Mr. Thomas Crook, of Futherington, actually exhibited a fat sheep, as a pig. He made a bet with a friend, that he would prove the members of the Bath Agricultural Society to be such a set of contemptible pretenders and impostors, that they did not know a sheep from a pig. There was to be a premium, as usual, for the best fat pig, with the greatest quantity of fat with the least bone. Mr. Crook ordered a very fat sheep to be killed; the wool was then burnt off with straw, the inside taken out, and the carcase dressed after the manner of a bacon hog, and as it was a horned sheep, he had the head cut off, as well as the legs. Mr. Crook was so confident of their want of knowledge, that he actually had his PIG hung up at the entrance of the sapient society's room; so that every one who passed must of necessity see it as they went in or out. Mr. Crook's pig was the admiration of the whole society, and it was declared by the judges far to surpass all the others that were exhibited. Unbounded encomiums were passed upon Mr. Crook, and his most excellent breed of pigs, every one being anxious to possess some of this valuable sort of swine. The prize was, of course, awarded to Mr. Crook; but, as he was a plain, honest, strong-headed farmer, who had always held this society in the highest contempt, he, after dinner, treated them with a suitable lecture upon their profound ignorance, and a well-merited satire upon their false pretensions; and then openly declared, that the PIG which they had, one and all (several hundreds of them), so much admired, was nothing more nor less than a SHEEP! How the jolterheaded ideots could ever look each other in the face again, and have the audacity to prate about their proficiency in agriculture, must surprise all those who are unacquainted with their brazen-faced, hardened impudence.

Another of these worthies, a few years afterwards, played off a similar trick upon these sapient agricultural asses. He exhibited an ox for the prize. When it was killed, he and the butcher placed the fat of two oxen in the inside of it. The beast was wonderfully admired by all who saw it, and the judges awarded the prize and the premium to Mr. Kemp, who was the owner of the ox, thus crammed with the fat of another ox in addition to its own. Mr. Kemp was, it seems, very well satisfied with playing off this trick upon these tricksters; and it never would have been known, if the butcher had not, some time afterwards, divulged the secret. Mr. Kemp knew that the whole thing was trick and imposition from beginning to end; and, therefore, he thought them fair game. While collectively the gang constantly imposes upon the public, its members constantly dupe and impose upon each other; and yet this is the most respectable society of agricultural asses in the kingdom! As a body they may be described as a set of the greatest impostors I ever met with in my life. There are, of course, many honourable exceptions, but they are, for the most part, the dupes of their more designing associates. A great number of them never paid up their subscriptions, and even Vice-presidents were eight or ten years in arrears. When they were seven years in arrear, there was a mark of degradation placed against their names, which were annually published, and many bore this disgrace with surprising fortitude, though some of them were Members of Parliament, with upwards of ten thousand a year income.

One year, while I resided at Bath, the society were by some means deprived of their show-yard; the place in which they used to exhibit their live stock, &c. &c. The late secretary, Mr. Mathews, a very worthy man, applied to me for the loan of my premises in Walcot-street, which, being very roomy and spacious, were deemed peculiarly eligible, particularly as at that time the society could not procure any other place, and consequently Mr. Mathews offered me any price that I chose to name for the use of them. As some part of these premises was unoccupied at the time, I felt great pleasure in having it in my power to oblige this worthy man; and I told him the society should be very welcome to the use of my premises upon that emergency, but that I should not think of making any charge for the use of them. The premises were, therefore, occupied with the cattle that were brought from all parts of the country to be shown, and, as this very liberal society always made those persons who wished to see their show-cattle pay for peeping, each person who entered was obliged to pay a shilling, and when I passed in at my own gate-way, their keeper actually demanded my shilling, which I readily paid, although my stables and garden led through the same. This was allowed by all persons to be much the best place the society ever had wherein to exhibit their cattle, &c. and the secretary offered me, I think it was, thirty pounds a year, to continue the show there. This I declined to accept, as it would have been a bar to the letting of the whole premises, which were worth nearer two hundred a year than thirty. The next season the society hired some very confined and inconvenient premises, at a rental of twenty-five or thirty-five pounds a year, I forget which; and the secretary informed me that the committee had come to a determination that, as I would not accept any thing for the use of my premises, they would write my subscriptions paid in their books for a number of years, equivalent to the value which they had been saved thereby. Of course, I expected that they would, at the very least, have written paid for twenty-five years, the amount of what they annually paid for premises which were not one-fifth so convenient as those which they had occupied of mine. However, I received a formal intimation that the committee had ordered the secretary to write me off five years subscription, which was five guineas. When the secretary, Mathews, informed me of this, the society had left Bath, or I really believe that I should have thrown the five guineas at the head of the chairman, so indignant did I feel at their meanness. But Mr. Mathews was a Quaker, and a peace-maker, and to oblige him I took no notice of it; although he admitted that it was very shabby conduct of the committee, as they had offered forty pounds for a place very inferior to that with which they had been accommodated by me. I should not have mentioned this circumstance here, had it not been for the disgraceful and dastardly conduct of the society to me a few years afterwards; when, without giving me any previous notice, they came to a vote to exclude me from among them, because my subscriptions were THREE YEARS in arrear, while at the time scores of their members were upwards of SEVEN YEARS in arrear; and the only rule about the subject was, that "no member should be eligible to vote in the society who was three years in arrear." Be it remembered, too, that when they HONOURED me by this vote, the society was fairly indebted to me fifteen or twenty pounds, out of which they have, as I consider it, actually swindled me. But the very last time I attended their meeting they were guilty of a transaction still more mean and more dastardly than the one I have above described, and which I shall record in its proper place, when that period of my history arrives. I think, however, that what I have stated above will give my readers a pretty fair specimen of the character of that society, and it will be a warning to the public how they place any reliance upon their proceedings.

In the early part of the spring of 1811, I went to reside with my family at Rowfant House, in the county of Sussex, near East Grinstead, about thirty miles from London. This gave me an opportunity of frequently visiting my friend Mr. Cobbett, in Newgate. While he was in the King's Bench, and before he was called up for judgment, he expected that he should be sentenced to some distant county gaol, and in case it had been so, I had promised him that, wherever it was, I would come and take lodgings in the town, and visit him for a week or a fortnight at a time, several times during his imprisonment. This, however, was rendered unnecessary, by his imprisonment being in London. Nothing could have been more convenient for his business, as a public writer, than his being in London; and I have no hesitation in saying, that the punishment of six months' imprisonment in this Bastile is a much greater punishment than that of two years in Newgate. In fact, it was not more than it would have been to have sentenced him to be imprisoned in any house in Ludgate-hill. All persons had free access to him, from eight o'clock in the morning till ten at night, and he had as good apartments as he could have had in any house in London, and quite as good accommodation as he could have had at any private lodgings. Still it was imprisonment; but, when compared with my situation, it was no imprisonment at all. He had his family staying with him night and day, the very same as he would have had at a private lodging. Indeed, I have paid five guineas a week for lodgings in London which were worse in every respect. There was nothing about his residence that had the appearance of a prison but the name. Mr. Newman was a worthy and a benevolent man, quite the reverse of what prison keepers are in general, and every thing was done for Mr. Cobbett's accommodation and for that of his family and friends.

In February, Mr. Peter Finnerty received the judgment of the Court of King's Bench, for a libel upon Lord Castlereagh. There never was a man who stood upon the floor of the Court for judgment who made a more able or a more brave defence than he did; he did not retract one sentence, one syllable of the original publication, but, on the contrary, he produced affidavits to prove the truth of every word that he had published about Lord Castlereagh's cruelty to the people of Ireland, when he was in power, at the Castle of Dublin. The Attorney-General, Sir Vicary Gibbs, as well as Lord Ellenborough, were almost frantic with rage at the boldness and the perseverance with which he proclaimed the truth of his statements, as to the conduct of Lord Castlereagh. He was sentenced, by old Judge Grose, to be imprisoned in his Majesty's gaol of Lincoln for eighteen calendar months, and to give security for his keeping the peace far five years from that time. When he first went to Lincoln he was treated very harshly; upon which he caused a petition to be presented to the House of Commons, complaining of the treatment which he received from the Gaoler and some of the Visiting Magistrates. This brought the High Sheriff to the gaol, and Mr. Finnerty was partially relieved from the privations of which he had complained. He, however, afterwards caused a petition of one of the debtors to be presented to the House, by Sir Samuel Romilly, which ultimately led to a COMMISSION being sent down, to inquire into the truth of the matters contained in these petitions. As these proceedings were very similar to those which have recently taken place in this gaol, I will, at the proper time, give a more ample detail of them; particularly as Mr. Drakard, the editor of the Stamford News, was at this time also a prisoner in Lincoln Castle. He was confined thereby a sentence of the Court of King's Bench, for a libel upon the army, he having been tried and found guilty at the Spring Assizes at Lincoln, in consequence of an article on the fogging of soldiers, which article appeared in his excellent paper. On the 25th of May, he was brought up to receive judgment, and was sentenced to be imprisoned in his Majesty's gaol of Lincoln, and to pay a fine of 200_l_. As there were two such men of talent as Mr. Finnerty and Mr. Drakard confined in Lincoln Castle at the time that a commission was sent down to inquire into its abuses, and the misconduct of the Gaoler Merewether, and the Parson Justice Doctor Illingworth, the public of course expected that some important exposures would be made, and that very important benefits would result from the inquiry; but we shall see, by and by, that, from some cause or other, although Mr. Finnerty and Mr. Drakard were much better treated, yet that the commission and the inquiry ended together in mere smoke.

On the nineteenth of March, dollars were made current at five shillings and sixpence each; and on the twentieth of March in this year, 1811, the Empress Maria Louisa of France was brought to bed of a son, who was immediately created King of Rome. On the ninth of May, the first stone of Vauxhall Bridge was laid; and on the eleventh of October, the first stone of the Strand bridge was laid: this last is the bridge which is now foolishly called by some silly people, Waterloo bridge. A similar circumstance occurred when Blackfriars bridge was built; some foolish people wished to change its name to Chatham bridge, as a compliment to Lord Chatham; and it was so called by many silly people for some time: but at length good sense overcame vanity, and it reverted back to its original and proper name of Blackfriars bridge, in spite of Chatham-place, &c. &c. So, I have no doubt, the good sense of the people will ultimately overcome their folly, and that it will be again universally denominated by its original and proper name, the STRAND BRIDGE.

On the fourth of June, the King's birth-day, the usual public rejoicings were suspended, in consequence of his severe illness, although our most gracious Regent, soon after he attained that dignity, had given a fete in February, at Carlton-House, where at least two thousand persons were present. On the ninth of June, Christophe, a man of colour, was proclaimed and crowned King of St. Domingo, or Hayti. At the time, it was supposed to bring the kingly office into some degree of ridicule, to have a black man solemnly going through the mockery of a coronation; although it is a fact, that it was a very splendid, as well as a very popular coronation.

It was in this year, that Mr. now Sir Charles Wolseley, first publicly declared his sentiments as to political matters; at least, it was the first time I ever noticed them. In a letter which he addressed to the Freeholders of the county of Stafford, he makes this honest, open, and manly declaration: "The principles upon which a person ought to be sent to serve in Parliament, are, to keep the prerogatives of the crown unimpaired; to secure the liberties of the people; to oppose in every shape the system of Pitt's administration; and to obtain a RADICAL REFORM in the representation of the people in Parliament. These are my principles." These principles has Sir Charles Wolseley honestly acted up to ever since; and to this may be attributed the reason that we have never had the benefit of the worthy Baronet's patriotic and able exertions in the senate as a Member of Parliament. He has always been a staunch Radical Reformer, and he never disguised his sentiments; therefore it is, that he has never been taken by the hand and placed in the House by any of the great Borough Lords of either of the two factions of Whigs and Tories; and from principle he has alike declined to become a slave and a tool to the Boroughmongers, or to purchase one of their seats.

In consequence of the failure of a Bank at Salisbury, of the firm of _Bowles, Ogden, and Wyndham, immense distress was caused throughout the county of Wilts; almost all the country people having a great portion of their property in the notes of this Bank. It was on this occasion that Mr. Cobbett wrote those famous letters, which he called "Paper against Gold," addressed to the tradesmen and farmers in and near Salisbury, being an examination of the report of the Bullion Committee. These celebrated letters formed a clear and comprehensive exposition of the Paper System; they developed the whole juggle of Stock Jobbing, the Sinking Fund, and the National Debt, and the operation of taxes upon the industry and happiness of the people. These letters, which are now published in a small volume, prove, beyond all doubt, the clear and comprehensive mind of this inimitable writer, and the work will live in after-ages as a monument of his superior talent and knowledge in these heretofore intricate and mysterious matters, which were rendered still more intricate and incomprehensible by the very means which such men as Mr. Horner, the chairman of the Bullion Committee, used to elucidate them. Had Mr. Cobbett never written another line but what is contained in this work, his name, as an author, in matters of English finance, would have gone down to posterity hand-in-hand with that of our immortal countryman, Mr. Paine. Perhaps Mr. Cobbett would never have written this valuable work, if he had not been imprisoned in Newgate by the tyrannical proceedings of the Boroughmongers, assisted by a packed special jury, always the best ally of tyranny and tyrants, because it enables them to carry on a most nefarious despotism, and inflict death, loss of liberty, and torture upon its victims, under the assumed forms of law and justice; the very worst species of tyranny, and the most horrible of all despotisms.