The Leading Facts of English History Part 51

524. Manufactures.

Woolen goods continued to be a chief article of manufacture. Silks were also produced by thousands of Huguenot weavers, who fled from France to England in order to escape the persecutions of Louis XIV.

Coal was now extensively mined, and iron and pottery works were giving industrial importance to Birmingham and other growing towns in the Midlands.

525. Commerce.

A permanent English colony was established in America in 1607, and by 1714 the number of such colonies had increased to twelve. During a great part of this period intense commercial rivalry existed between England and Holland, each of which was anxious to get the monopoly of the colonial import and export trade. Parliament pa.s.sed stringent navigation laws, under Cromwell and later, to prevent the Dutch from competing with English merchants and s.h.i.+ppers. The East India and South Sea companies were means of greatly extending English commercial enterprise, as was also the tobacco culture of Virginia.

526. Roads and Travel.

Good roads were still unknown in England. Stagecoaches carried a few pa.s.sengers at exorbitant rates, requiring an entire day to go a distance which an express train now travels in less than an hour.

Goods were carried on pack horses or in c.u.mbrous wagons, and so great was the expense of transportation that farmers often let their produce rot on the ground rather than attempt to get in to the nearest market town.

In London a few coaches were in use, but covered chairs, carried on poles by two men and called "sedan chairs," were the favorite vehicles. They continued to be used for a century after this period closes. Although London had been in great part rebuilt since the Great Fire (1666), the streets were still very narrow, without sidewalks, heaped with filth, and miserably lighted.

527. Agriculture; Pauperism.

Agriculture generally made no marked improvement, but gardening did, and many vegetables and fruits were introduced which had not before been cultivated.

Pauperism remained a problem which the government had not yet found a practical method of dealing with. There was little freedom of movement; the poor man's parish was virtually his prison, and if he left it to seek work elsewhere, and required help on the way, he was certain to be sent back to the place where he was legally settled.

VI. Mode of Life, Manners, and Customs

528. Dress.

In the time of Charles II and his successors the dress of the wealthy and fas.h.i.+onable cla.s.ses was most elaborate and costly. Gentlemen wore their hair long, in ringlets, with an abundance of gold lace and ruffles, and carried long, slender swords, known as rapiers.

Sometimes indeed they outshone the ladies in the splendor of their costume, and in one instance the bride at a wedding burst into tears because her gorgeously dressed husband looked so much handsomer than she did that all eyes were fixed on him alone. Later on, large flowing wigs came into fas.h.i.+on, and no man of any social standing thought of appearing without one.

In Queen Anne's reign both ladies and gentlemen powdered their hair.

The ladies also painted their faces and ornamented them with minute black patches, which served not only for "beauty spots," but showed, by their arrangement, with which political party they sympathized.

529. Coffeehouses.

Up to the middle of the seventeenth century ale and beer were the common drink of all cla.s.ses; but about that time coffee was introduced, and coffeehouses became fas.h.i.+onable resorts for gentlemen and for all who wished to learn the news of the day. Tea had not yet come into use; but, in 1660, Pepys says in his diary: "Sept. 25. I did send for a cup of tee, a China drink, of which I never had drank before."

530. The Streets of London.

No efficient police existed in London; at night the streets were infested with brutal ruffians, and, as late as Queen Anne's time, by bands of "fine gentlemen" not less brutal, who amused themselves by overturning sedan chairs, rolling women downhill in barrels, and compelling men to dance jigs, under the stimulus of repeated p.r.i.c.ks from a circle of sword points, until the victims fell fainting from exhaustion. Duels were frequent, on the slightest provocation.

Highwaymen abounded both in the city and without, and, unless one went well armed, it was often dangerous to travel any distance in the country.

531. Brutal Laws.

Hanging was the common punishment for theft and many other crimes.

The public whipping of both men and women through the streets was frequent. Debtors were shut up in prison, and left to beg from pa.s.sers-by or starve; and ordinary offenders were fastened in a wooden frame called the "pillory" and exposed on a high platform, where they were pelted by the mob with mud, rotten eggs, and other unsavory missiles. In some cases their bones were broken with clubs and brickbats. The pillory continued in use until the accession of Victoria in 1837.

TENTH PERIOD

"The history of England is emphatically the history of progress. It is the history of a constant movement of the public mind, of a constant change in the inst.i.tutions of a great society."--Macaulay

India Gained; America Lost--Parliamentary Reform--Government by the People

The House of Hanover (1714) to the Present Time

George I, 1714-1727 William IV, 1830-1837 George II, 1727-1760 Victoria, 1837-1901 George III, 1760-1820 Edward VII, 1901-1910 George IV, 1820-1830 George V, 1910-

532. Accession of George I.

As Queen Anne died without leaving an heir to the throne (S515), George, Elector of Hanover, in accordance with the Act of Settlement (S497), now came into possession of the English crown. (See Genealogical Table opposite.) The new King had no desire whatever to go to England.

As he owed his new position to Whig legislation (S479), he naturally favored that party and turned his back on the Tories (S479), who, deprived of the suns.h.i.+ne of royal favor, were as unhappy as their rivals were jubilant. The triumphant Whigs denounced "the shameful Peace of Utrecht" (S512). Next, they impeached the three fallen Tory leaders,[2] of whom Harley was the chief (S510), on a charge of treason. The indictment accused them of having given back to Louis XIV, in the late war, more captured territory than was necessary. Furthermore, they were said to be guilty of having intrigued to restore the House of Stuart with the design of making the "Pretender" King (SS490, 491). Harley was sent to the Tower of London for a time; he was then acquitted and released. Meanwhile his two indicted a.s.sociates had fled to France.

[2] The three Tory leaders were Harley, now Earl of Oxford (S510), St. John (Viscount Bolingbroke), and Butler (Duke of Ormonde).

Bolingbroke and Ormonde fled to Frnce, where the first entered the service of the "Pretender," but he was ultimately permitted to return to England. Ormonde never came back. Harley, as stated above, was sent to the Tower; while there he secretly wrote to the "Pretender"

(S490), and offered him his services.

Later, the Whigs repealed two harsh religious statutes (S511) directed against Dissenters (S472), which the Tories and the High Churchmen had enacted in the previous reign for the purpose of keeping themselves in power.

The House of Hanover, also called Brunswick and Guelf

James (Stuart) I of England I +------------------====================== | I Charles I Elizabeth, m. Frederick, | Elector-Palatine,* and ------------------------------- later King of Bohemia | | | I Charles II James II Mary, m. Sophia, m. the Elector | William II of of Hanover+ ----------------------- Orange I | | | | George, Elector of Mary, m. Anne James William III of Hanover, became William III Edward Orange, became George I of England, of Orange, Stuart, William III of 1714 afterward (the so- England, I William III called "Old 1689 George II of England Pretender, I b. 1688, Frederick, Prince of d. 1765 Wales (died before | coming to the throne) Charles Edward I Stuart (the so-called ============================ "Young Pretender"), I I I b. 1720, d. 1788 George IV William IV Edward, Duke of Kent, d. 1820 *Elector-Palatine: a prince ruling over the I territory called the Palatinate in Victoria western Germany, on the Rhine. I +Elector of Hanover: a prince ruling over the Edward VII province of Hanover, a part of the German I Empire, lying on the North Sea. The elector George V received his t.i.tle from the fact that he was one of a certain number of princes who had the right of electing the German Emperor.

533. Character of the New King.

The new sovereign was a selfish, coa.r.s.e old man, who in private life would, as Lady Montagu said, have pa.s.sed for an honest blockhead. He neither knew anything about England, nor did he desire to know anything of it. He could not speak a word of the language of the country he was called to govern, and he made no attempt to learn it; even the coronation service had to be explained to him as best it might, in such broken Latin as the ministers could muster.

Laboring under these disadvantages he wisely declined to take any active part in the affairs of the nation. He trusted everything to his Whig friends (S532) and let them, with Sir Robert Walpole at their head, manage the country in their own way.

Forunately, the great body of the English people were abundantly able to take care of themselves. A noted French writer said of them that they resembled a barrel of their own beer, froth at the top, dregs at the bottom, but thoroughly sound and wholesome in the middle. It was this middle cla.s.s, with their solid practical good sense, that kept the nation right.

They were by no means enthusiastic wors.h.i.+pers of the German King who had come to reign over them, but they saw that he had three good qualities: he was no hypocrite, he did not waste the people's money, and he was a man of unquestioned courage. But they also saw more than this, for they realized that though George I might be as heavy, dull, and wooden as the figurehead of an old-fas.h.i.+oned s.h.i.+p, yet, like that figurehead, he stood for something greater and better than himself,-- for he represented Protestantism, with civil and religious liberty,-- and so the people gave him their allegiance.

534. Rise of Cabinet Government; the First Prime Minister.

The present method of Cabinet Government dates in great part from this reign. From the earliest period of English history the sovereign was accustomed to have a permanent council composed of some of the chief men of the realm, whom he consulted on all matters of importance (SS144, 145). Charles II, either because he found this body inconveniently large for the rapid transaction of business, or because he believed it inexpedient to discuss his plans with so many, selected a small confidential committee from it (S476). This committee met to consult with the King in his cabinet, or private room, and so came to be called "the Cabinet Council," or briefly, "the Cabinet," a name which it has ever since retained.

During Charles II's reign and that of his immediate successors the King continued to choose this special council from those whom he believed to be friendly to his measures, often without much regard to party lines, and he was aways present at their meetings. With the accession of George I, however, a great change took place. His want of acquaintance with prominent men made it difficult for him to select a Cabinet himself, and his ignorance of English rendered his presence at its meetings wholly useless. For these reasons the new King adopted the expedient of appointing a chief adviser, or Prime Minister, who personally chose his own Cabinet from men of the political party to which he belonged.

Sir Robert Walpole, who held this office of chief adviser for more than twenty years (1721-1742), is commonly considered to have been the first actual Prime Minister, and the founder of that system of Cabinet Government which prevails in England to-day. He was a master hand at managing his fellow ministers in the Cabinet, and when one of them, named Townshend, aspired to share the leaders.h.i.+p, Walpole said to him, "The firm must be Walpole and Townshend, not Townshend and Walpole."

But later (1741) a minority in the Lords protested "that a sole or even First Minister is an officer unknown to the law of Britain, inconsistent withthe Const.i.tution of this country, and destructive of liberty in any government whatsoever." Then Walpole thought it expedient to disclaim the t.i.tle; but many years later the younger Pitt declared (1803) that there ought to be "an avowed minister possessing the chief weight in the Council" or Cabinet, and that view eventually prevailed.[1] The Cabinet, or "Government," as it is usually called,[2] generally consists of twelve or fifteen persons chosen by the Prime Minister, or Premier,[3] from the leading members of both houses of Parliament, but whose political views agree in the main with the majority of the House of Commons.[4]

But this system, as it now stands, was gradually developed. It had advanced to such a point under the dictatorial rule of Sir Robert Walpole that George II, chafing under the restriction of his power, said bitterly, "In England the ministers are King." George III, however, succeeded, for a time, in making himself practically supreme, but Cabinet Government soon came to the front again, and, under William IV, the Prime Minister, with his Cabinet, ceased to look to the sovereign for guidance and support, and became responsible to the House of Commons (provided that body reflects the public opinion of the nation).

[1] Feilden's "Const.i.tutional History of England," Taswell-Langmead's "English Const.i.tutional History," and A.L. Lowell's "The Government of England," 2 vols.

[2] "The Cabinet, the body to which, in common use, we have latterly come to give the name of Government." Encyclopaedia Britannica (10th edition, VIII, 297).

[3] "Premier": from the French premier, first or chief.

[4] The existence of the Cabinet depends on custom, not law. Its three essential characteristics are generally considered to be: (1) Practical unanimity of party; (2) Practical unity of action under the leaders.h.i.+p of the Prime Minister; (3) Collective responsibility to the party in the House of Commons which represents the political majority of the nation. Its members are never OFFICIALLY made known to the public, nor its proceedings recorded. Its meetings, which take place at irregular intervals, according to pressure of business, are entirely secret, and the sovereign is never present. As the Cabinet agrees in its composition with the majority of the House of Commons, it follows that if the Commons are Conservative, the Cabinet will be so likewise; and if Liberal, the reverse. Theoretically, the sovereign chooses the Cabinet; but practically the selection is now always made by the Prime Minister. If at any time the Prime Minister, with his Cabinet, finds that his political policy no longer agrees with that of the House of Commons, he and the other members of the Cabinet resign, and the sovereign chooses a new Prime Minister from the opposite party, who forms a new Cabinet in harmony with himself and the Commons. If, however, the Prime Minister has good reason for believing that a different House of Commons would support him, the sovereign may, by his advice, dissolve Parliament. A new election then takes place, and according to the political character of the members returned, the Cabinet remains in or goes out of power. The Cabinet, or Government, now invariably includes the following officers: