The University of Oxford were the next to display their zeal for the Court, and presented a loyal address; so did Cambridge, Kent, and the merchants of Bristol. The same was attempted in Surrey, but agreed to by only part of the grand jury. Liverpool, Lichfield, and Edinburgh followed, and, in general, all the Scotch boroughs,--which did but increase the opposite spirit, and contributed to the mortifications that fell on the Court from such injurious measures. At a large meeting of the Common Council, previous to one intended at Guildhall, for presenting an address, but twenty-one persons declared for it, one hundred and forty-one against it; and the latter voted an address of thanks to Turner, the Lord Mayor, who had distinguished himself on Wilkes’s side. Shropshire, Leicestershire, and the town of Coventry joined in the incense to the King; but the latter with a circumstance peculiarly ridiculous, and which proved how much the enemies of the Constitution were charmed with the arbitrary measures of the Court--for the address from Coventry was drawn by a physician, so rancorously Jacobite, that at church he always rose from his knees, when the King was prayed for. The Supporters of the Bill of Rights advertised against the Coventry address, which, with the same unconstitutional views, had attacked that society. Mankind might judge of a cause, in which King George’s and King James’s friends were equally interested!--and what interest, but that of despotism, could they have in common?
The last instance made the Court sick of that fulsome flattery. The merchants of London, to the number of six or eight hundred, amongst whom were Dutch, Jews, and any officious tools that they could assemble, having signed one of those servile panegyrics, set out in a long procession of coaches to carry it to St. James’s. The mob accompanied them, hissing and pelting. When they came to the end of Fleet Street, they found the gates of Temple Bar shut against them. Another mob was posted at Gray’s Inn Lane. The coaches turned down lanes and alleys wherever they could, and not a third part arrived at the palace. Mr. Boehm, Chairman of the East India Company, concealed the address under the seat of his coach, which he was forced to quit, and take shelter in a coffee-house. In the meantime a hearse, drawn by two black and two white horses, and hung with escutcheons representing the deaths of Clarke at Brentford and of Allen in St. George’s Fields, appeared in the streets, and was driven to the gates of St. James’s, where the attendant mob hissed and insulted all that entered the Court. The Ministers, who had received no intimation of this pageant, remained trembling in the palace;[213] and all they did was to order the grenadiers to defend the entrance till the magistrates could arrive and read the Riot Act. At last, Earl Talbot took courage, and went down with his white staff, which was soon broken in his hand. He seized one man, and fourteen more of the rioters were made prisoners. The Duke of Northumberland was very ill treated; and the Duke of Kingston,[214] coming from a visit from Bedford House, was taken for the Duke of Bedford, and was so pelted, that his coach and new wedding liveries were covered with mud. It was half an hour past four ere the address could be carried to St. James’s; and then was not presented by the Chairman, who was not in a condition to appear. At night, a proclamation was issued against riots. Ten of the rioters were discharged: the grand jury threw out the bills against the other five. Such was the consequence of an unpopular Court, at once affecting popularity, and affecting to despise it!