Alarming as might be considered the aspect of domestic affairs, the Government, so far from betraying apprehension, carried on the business of the country with untiring vigilance and decision. Hunt and five of his associates, after a long trial, were on the 23rd of March, at York, found guilty of unlawfully assembling and inciting to hatred of the Government. On the same day, Sir Francis Burdett was found guilty of uttering a seditious libel. On the 10th of April, Sir Charles Wolseley and Mr. Joseph Harrison were also found guilty of sedition. The most guilty of the Cato Street heroes made their last public appearance at the Old Bailey on the 1st of May; the remainder were expatriated to New South Wales. Thus the supremacy of the law was vindicated; but there still existed in the more populous districts feelings inimical to the authorities, that might be restrained by coercive demonstrations, but which only waited a favourable season for bursting through all control: and as, on the 20th of April, Mr. Denman and Mr. Brougham had been acknowledged by the Lord Chancellor, from his seat in the Court of Chancery, the Queen's Solicitor and Attorney-General, the discontented took heart, and saw in this admission of the Queen's position, a prognostication of the struggle that was to create for them the opportunity for which they were waiting.
The Court of the Monarch did not appear more apprehensive than his Ministers. A day was fixed for the Coronation; and among those who would have to assist in the ceremonial, no one ventured to hint on the possibility of the Queen having any position in it. On the 3rd of May, the King received addresses at Carlton House; and on the 10th, his Majesty held his first Levee since his accession to the throne, at which nearly 1800 persons of distinction were present, who testified their attachment to his person in a manner that must have left him little to desire. It was known that his consort intended to agitate the empire from end to end, and her arrival was looked for in a few weeks; but the families of the great political party that formed and supported the Government, betrayed no uneasiness--indeed, the most influential regarded, or affected to regard, the coming struggle with a quiet disdain, that evinced their confidence in the loyalty and good sense of the nation. "His Majesty's Opposition," however, talked and looked very differently;--the Democratic party were vehement in their denunciations of the Queen's wrongs, and the leading Whigs began to come forward prominently as champions of her rights. This is about the date of the following communications:--