"This establishment is at No. 3, Blackfriars Road or Great Surrey Street, the third house from the bridge on the right hand side coming from the City. It was built by Sir Ashton Lever as a museum of natural history and curiosities. It is a curious coincidence that the Museum Tavern at No. 1 takes its name from the original institution. It is also a curious coincidence that the Museum Tavern should also bear the sign of the Cross Keys or St. Peter's Keys, and that the first purpose of the present occupation of the Rotunda should have been the possession of a theatre in which the Rev. Robert Taylor should pursue an interpretation of the sacred writings of Christendom upon the important allegory of those two keys—the keys of the mysteries of the physical and moral nature. Why the building was discontinued as a museum we are not informed, but there succeeded that which was called the Surrey Institution, being an institution for literature and science, which contained a good library and in which many eminent men lectured. The aim of the present occupant is to bring it back to that character, with the addition of freedom of speech and discussion in political and theological matters. The Surrey Institution is supposed to have failed for want of funds, and a thousand pounds a year will now be required to support it, with its attendants, as a generally useful and respectable establishment. The founders of the Mechanics' Institute in Southampton Buildings applied for its terms, but found it too heavy for its now (it is hoped) thriving establishment. Failing to let it for any literary or scientific purpose, the proprietors yielded it up as a place of public entertainment, having a coffee-room, wine, and concert-room, and afterwards an amphitheatre for Cook's equestrian performances, to which succeeded a panorama."
This change from that which was really an honor to the neighborhood, gave great offence, and opposition was carried on till the parties were all ousted and the premises thrown on the hands of the assignees. They had been some time vacant and in a state of dilapidation when Carlile entered into possession of the buildings, which then consisted of a neat dwelling-house, two large billiard-rooms, with apartments, a vestibule or extensive bar, a coffee-room, a long room, or that which was the library; a small circular hall, which was originally the theatre, having a gallery supported by marble pillars and balustrades, and a dome on which the Signs of the Zodiac were painted, as illustrations of the Rev. Mr. Taylor's theologico-astronomical discourses. The theatre was used also for political meetings.
Hither came all the public speakers of the day, and here every man could express his opinions upon any subject so that it was done in an orderly manner. The Rotunda was the first place in Europe where this could be done, and it is interesting to note the names of the speakers or lecturers.*
* Among them Henry Hunt, Wm. Cobbett, Daniel O'Connor,
Feargus O'Connor, Gale Jones, Julian Hibbert, Rev. Robert
Taylor, Robert Owen, Rowland Detrosier, Richard Carlile, and
later on "Isis ".
It is needless to say that this place was an eyesore to the Government, and was watched with suspicion. Spies and informers were constantly on the ground, and many were the attempts made to break up the place. Many attempts also were made to draw the supporters of the Rotunda into premature and naturally abortive schemes of revolution, from which they were saved only by their own good sense.
The last effort to raise a tumult occurred on the 9th of November, 1830. It was a regularly planned effort, and all the parties received their instructions early in the day on the condition of nothing else turning up. The civil force, with a military reserve, was directed to attack the Rotunda; but all turned upon one point, and on that point the whole scheme failed.
News came to the Rotunda that the place was to be attacked that night, and the manner in which it was to be done was so accurately stated that everything was afterwards found to correspond with the information given. Mr. Carlile took his measures accordingly; first, by barricading the door of the theatre through which the charge was to have been made, and beyond which everything was cleared for action; secondly, by lecturing on such a subject and in such a way as to bid defiance to magisterial interference. At eight o'clock the theatre was filled. Among the company were the magistrates of Union Hall, with a body of officers, and Sir Richard Birnie described himself as having been in attendance at the theatre. Partitioning boards were torn away from another entrance, for which there could have been no other reason than the projected attack. No policemen were seen about the building or doors of the theatre; the mob and its orators were allowed to collect, and to make what noise and to do what mischief they pleased until the whole plot was found to be frustrated. Then at twelve o'clock that night the police came to disperse the crowd, after a whole hour's effort had been made to break into the passages of the Rotunda and to get out the proprietor. Mr. Carlile entered the theatre at eight o'clock, and took as the subject of his lecture Sir Robert Peel's explanatory speech in the House of Commons on the Monday previous. The effect of his lecture was universal conviction on the part of the audience, and their declaration that the Ministers had been plotting against the people and that the people had not plotted against the Ministers. There was not a sentence in the lecture of which the Union Hall magistrates could make a handle for a warrant to arrest the speaker; and they must have sneaked away in utter confusion at the temper of the audience and the frustration of their plot. The company left the theatre at ten o'clock, and a few minutes afterwards the doors of the Rotunda were closed and everything quiet. This was a matter of intense astonishment to the concealed forces that were impatiently waiting to be brought into action. Rumors had been spread through the City that a tumult was to begin at the Rotunda at eleven o'clock. Mr. Carlile had been challenged out just before that time by a young man with a moustache, apparently an undressed military officer, "to head the insurrection" and to lead the mob! But he smiled and shut the door, to the great annoyance of the plotters outside. He retired to bed soon after eleven, but was aroused by what seemed to be an effort to break into the premises by a mob, and by a succession of harangues of a most violent kind. This was the disappointed crowd of plotters who tore down the bell of the house and would have forced the doors if they had not been more than ordinarily strong. Mr. Carlile was prepared for their entry, and allowed them to waste their vengeance on the doors and the knocker—a war upon which was kept up for an hour. All hopes of the desired tumult being over, the policemen began to order the accumulated passengers to walk on, and Sir Richard Birnie, if he stopped until two o'clock, must have spent an hour and a half in the agony of disappointment after the whole scheme had become hopeless. The calculation was that, as Mr. Hunt's meeting on the night before lasted till half-past eleven, the meeting on that night would not break up before eleven. In case of failure to arrest Mr. Carlile on the platform, the plot was to have been completed at eleven. The subject of the evening and the breaking up of the meeting at ten frustrated that step which, more than the votes of the House of Commons on the 15th instant, was the death-blow to the Wellington Administration. The last hope of all their little schemes for a premature insurrection among the people had been vanquished, and from that moment they felt that they could no longer hold office.*
* See Prompter, Nov., 1831.
This is an exact copy of the article in No. 3 of the Prompter which was selected for indictment, and which, with a little rough handling of the jury, ended in giving Carlile three years' imprisonment in the Giltspur Street Compter:—
"A list of officers in the King's Household is the most ludicrous and ridiculous thing that can be read. It will not bear mention in the present day, and is of itself an evidence that a constitutional monarchy is a most ridiculous state of government. More than mimicking absolute monarchy and perpetuating all ancient follies and abuses, everything conspires against a king to tell him that he is something more than human, and all that sort of flattery is calculated to unman him and to make him less than a man! We want no mummeries and nonsense wherewith to please savages and fools in the present day. We want public officers who shall really be men of business. We want laboring men to carry on the affairs of government, who shall be paid for their labor and their labor only. Let us see what the Whigs will do to make their constitutional monarchy appear decent to the brightening eye of the public."