Peltier’s counsel, a Mr. Mackintosh, defended him very ably, asking pertinently: “When Robespierre presided over the Committee of Public Safety, was not an Englishman to canvass his measures? Supposing we had then been at peace with France, would the Attorney General have filed an information against any one who had expressed due abhorrence of the furies of that sanguinary monster? When Marat demanded 250,000 heads in the Convention, must we have contemplated that request without speaking of it in the terms it provoked? When Carrier placed five hundred children in a square at Lyons, to fall by the musketry of the soldiery, and from their size the balls passed over them, the little innocents flew to the knees of the soldiery for protection, when they were butchered by the bayonet! In relating this event, must man restrain his just indignation, and stifle the expression of indignant horror such a dreadful massacre must excite? Would the Attorney General in his information state, that when Maximilian Robespierre was first magistrate of France, as President of the Committee of Public Safety, that those who spoke of him as his crimes deserved, did it with a wicked and malignant intention to defame and vilify him....

“In the days of Cromwell, he twice sent a satirist upon his government to be tried by a jury, who sat where this jury now sit. The scaffold on which the blood of the monarch was shed was still in their view. The clashing of the bayonets which turned out the Parliament was still within their hearing; yet they maintained their integrity, and twice did they send his Attorney General out of court, with disgrace and defeat.”

However, all the eloquence, and ingenuity, of his counsel failed to prevent a conviction. Peltier was found guilty and, time being taken to consider judgment, he was bound over to appear, and receive judgment when called upon. That time never came, for war broke out between France and England, and Peltier was either forgotten, or his offence was looked upon in a totally different light.

The English Government looked with great distrust upon Napoleon, and the increasing armament on the Continent, and temporized as to the evacuation of Malta, to the First Consul’s intense disgust. But the Ministry of that day were watchful, and jealous of England’s honour, and as early as the 8th of March, the King sent the following message to Parliament:

“George R.

“His Majesty thinks it necessary to acquaint the House of Commons, that, as very considerable military preparations are carrying on in the ports of France and Holland, he has judged it expedient to adopt additional measures of precaution for the security of his dominions; though the preparations to which His Majesty refers are avowedly directed to Colonial service, yet, as discussions of great importance are now subsisting between His Majesty and the French Government, the result of which must, at present, be uncertain, His Majesty is induced to make this communication to his faithful Commons, in the full persuasion that, whilst they partake of His Majesty’s earnest and unvarying solicitude for the continuance of peace, he may rely with perfect confidence on their public spirit, and liberality, to enable His Majesty to adopt such measures as circumstances may appear to require, for supporting the honour of his Crown, and the essential interests of his people.

“G. R.”

An address in accordance with the message was agreed to by both Houses, and, on the 10th, the King sent Parliament another message, to the effect he intended to draw out, and embody, the Militia. On the 11th of March the Commons voted the following resolution, “That an additional number of 10,000 men be employed for the sea service, for eleven lunar months, to commence from the 26th of February, 1803, including 3400 Marines.”

Events were marching quickly. On the 13th of March Napoleon behaved very rudely to Lord Whitworth; in fact it was almost a parallel case with the King of Prussia’s rudeness to M. Benedetti on the 13th of July, 1870. But let our Ambassador tell his own story:

“Despatch from Lord Whitworth to Lord Hawkesbury dated Paris the 14th of March, 1803.