All of which is most humbly submitted to your Majesty, by your Majesty's most dutiful Subject and Servant,
Fitzgerald and Vesci.
Viscount Melbourne to Queen Victoria.
BEAN'S ATTEMPT ON THE QUEEN
South Street, 4th July 1842.
Lord Melbourne presents his humble duty to your Majesty, and is anxious to express his earnest hope that your Majesty is well and not disturbed by the event45 which took place yesterday, and which, although it appears not to have been dangerous in itself, is formidable as affording additional evidence of the ease with which persons of the lower orders can incite themselves, or be incited by others, to the contemplation and commission of such acts. The only observation that can be made upon these attempts is, that hitherto they appear to have been made by those who have not the means of executing their own wicked designs, and that they are not marked by the same determination and the same long and ferocious preparation which characterised in France the conduct of Fieschi and Alibaud.46 Lord Melbourne is not of opinion that the extension of mercy to Francis—which from what Lord Melbourne hears of the opinion of the judges he apprehends to have been unavoidable—could have had any effect in encouraging this man to a similar act; at the same time it is impossible to say what may have had an effect upon the mind, and we can only collect the intentions of men from the deeds which they perform.
Lord Melbourne thanks your Majesty much for your letter of the 26th ult. Lord Melbourne again expresses his fervent wishes for your Majesty's health, safety, and tranquillity of mind.
Footnote 45: Bean, a deformed lad, presented a pistol at the Queen in the Mall.
Footnote 46: The perpetrators of attempts on King Louis Philippe.