VOL. XX. No. 13.] LONDON, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1811. [Price 1s. "There is now nothing that the Prince may wish to do for any one a'tached to his person (so that "the party to be served meddle not with politics), which will not be readily and cheerfully done. Nay, "I should not wonder, if Mr. Tierney and another or two were to be admitted into the buildings at "Whitehall; but, as for the Ministry-Makers, the men of "stake," never will they again put their "noses into those buildings. "But, at the end of a year, the Restrictions will expire." So they "will; but, a year is a long while many things happen in a year; and if all other matters hold toge"ther till February next, Mr. Perceval must be a very lame man indeed if he be not then more power"ful than he now is, and if the Prince have not much stronger reasons for keeping him than he had for "choosing him."-POLITICAL REGISTER, Vol. XIX. page 311, Feb. 6, 1811. 385] SUMMARY OF POLITICS. For COL. M'MAHON'S SINECURE. now nearly twenty years the people of this "most thinking nation," as the sinecure placeman, Lord Stormont, once called them, at the beginning of the French Revolution; for now nearly twenty years, this most thinking people have been told, that it is necessary for them to give their money freely, in order to save them and their dear wives and children from the horrible effects of Jacobinical principles, from confusion and uproar, from robbery, violation and murder, and, what has been still more loudly insisted on, from atheism. It was very difficult, to be sure, for any people to see in what way their giving their money could preserve them from atheism. Yet, this thinking, this "most thinking nation" do seem to have believed the fact; and, I trust, that our children, in speaking of it, will not forbear from those expressions of contempt, for which so degrading a fact, a fact so disgraceful to human intellect, calls with so audible a voice. Yes, let it be remembered; let it be told through the world; and let it be handed down to posterity, that the people of England were told by Old George Rose and many others, who were receiving large sums annually out of the public money in the way of sine cures and pensions; that by these men the people of England were unblushingly told, that, to preserve them and their chil. dren from atheism, they must continue to make pecuniary sacrifices; and, Oh! indelible disgrace! the people of England, or, at least, many of them, believed what was thus told them; or, which is still worse, they affected to believe it, in order to disguise their baseness in keeping silence under such an abominable insult.-And yet we affect to despise those who give priests money to say masses for them: we affect [356 to laugh at those who give their money at the shrines of Saints, with a view of thereby obtaining safety to their souls. But, is there in this any thing so absurd, so despicably stupid, so wretchedly base, as for a whole nation, or, at least, a great majority of it, to believe, or affect to believe, that it was necessary to give immense sums of money to sinecure placemen and pensioners, in order to preserve the nation in the enjoyment (to use a phrase of Old George Rose) of "the blessed comforts "of religion?" George, who was, I believe, about thirty years ago, a purser of a man of war, now, together with one of his sons, receives from the public, upwards of TEN THOUSAND POUNDS a year. They have been in the receipt of a sum equal to this for nearly twenty years past; and a considerable portion of it is to be paid them for life; George, who has, during the war against France, written upon the subject of politics, has, in these his writings, told the most thinking people of England, that, they had their choice, either to make great pecuniary sacrifices, or, to be deprived of the blessed comforts of religion, and to be made atheists: that is to say, that if they did not give their money freely, they would be dama ed to all eternity.This is the fair, the clear, the indubitable meaning of that part of his writings which I here allude to; and which I would quote at full length, had I not done it so lately, in my letters to the People of Salisbury.George may have done no more than many others, and no more than is done by every Methodist Preacher who wants to live well upon the labour of his truly sheep-like flock. But, what shall be said of the people of England, who believed him, or affected to believe him? What shall be said of their stupidity, or their baseness? The little child, in Somersetshire, who lately gave a Wuch money to prevent her from tormenting her, is not to be laughed at by "this most thinking people;" and, indeed, I can form an idea of no folly, of no stupidity, of no baseness, equal to this belief, or affectation of belief, on the part of the people of England.Let us take one more look backward before we go forward. The people of France, whom we had, for ages, called slaves, had risen upon their masters. They had declared that they would no longer be slaves. They had refused any longer to be compelled to bake their bread at other mens' ovens and to pay a toll for it. The poor had refused to make the roads, without being paid for it, for the rich to ride upon. The farmer and the land-owner had resolved to kill game upon their own property and possessions without being liable to be punished for it, and they had also resolved that others should no longer come there and kill their game and destroy their property with impunity. The people of France had resolved no longer to give one tenth part of all the fruits of the earth to priests and monks. These résolutions were no sooner known in England, than, by some, a cry was set up, that the French were about to destroy all religion, and social order, and to make all the world Atheists! There seemed to be no connection between the two things. It seemed not to be at all necessary, that Atheism should be the consequence of an abolition of feudal tyranny and ecclesiastical exactions; but the most thinking people of England were persuaded to believe that this consequence was a necessary one, and they acted accordingly. They have, from that day to this been carrying on a war against France, which war, though its object was changed, was begun as a war against principles, as a war against Atheism, as a war, to use the words of George Rose, for the preservation of " the "blessed comforts of religion."-The consequences of having thus acted are now before us and are fast coming upon us. This war, from sixteen millions a year, has swelled our taxes to seventy millions a year. It has spread misery amongst the poor from one end of the kingdom to the other. It has caused many thousands of the most industrious and enterprising people to emigrate from the country. It has caused the current coin of the realm to give place to a degraded paper currency. It has, in short, been productive of every evil that a nation can experience.--In looking forward, I should have been happy to be able to say that I saw a prospect of a change of system; but truth compels me to say, that I now see no such prospect.- When his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales was constituted Regent, all the persons with whom I had an opportu nity of conversing upon the subject, were very anxious in their hopes that great changes might be expected. They saw in the character of the Prince, generally, what they regarded as good grounds of such an expectation. They had, indeed, no proof that he would adopt a new system; but they thought, that experience, that what he himself had seen; they thought that what has passed upon the continent of Europe held forth such a lesson to him, that, together with what they regarded as the bent of his own disposition, a very material change must take place. At any rate they thought it fair and just not to be too hasty in expressing any fears that should arise of his pursuing the old system. They thought it just to give him full time, and to make due allowances for the difficulties of his situation.But, though they expected little from him during the continuance of the restrictions; though they expected nothing of any consequence to be done, they had a right to expect, that every newthing which essentially partook of the present system, would, as far as lay with the Prince, be left undone. It was with no less grief than surprise, therefore, that they saw, amongst the first of the Prince's acts, the restoration of the Duke of York to his former situation. In this restoration they thought they perceived a sort of earnest of what they had to expect in future; but still, it was the first act of hostility to their wishes, and they were willing, if possible, to consider it rather as the offspring of fraternal affection than as that of political system. But, when they saw the heir of Lord Melville, which heir had always belonged to the set of men at present in power; when they saw this man made the successor of his father in his sinecure places; when they saw this and looked back to the history of Lord Melville and considered what he had done to the country, it brought into their minds Pitt and the whole system, and they could not help fearing, that, by this act, his Royal Highness had irrevocably declared himself the supporter of that system.If, however, they still doubted, could they possibly doubt, after the appointment of Colonel M Mahon? In the case of the Duke of York, the boon was to a Brother, and though the relation ought to be sunk in the Sovereign, the triumph of the former will, except in very monstrous cases, be excused. In the case of Lord Melville it might be said that the Prince yielded to the importunities of the ministry; that it was a place destined to be the reward of political men; and, in short, that, to give it contrary to the wishes of the ministry, would have been the same thing as to quarrel with the ministry and turn them out, or rather worse. These are pitiful excuses for such an act; pitiful as they are, however, there are none such to offer for the appointment of Colonel M'Mahon, who, it is well known, has been an attendant about the Prince's person for a great number of years; who would not, therefore, have accepted of the office without the Prince's cordial approbation, and who, indeed, must have been selected for the office by the Prince himself; or, at least, the circumstances of the case are such as fairly to warrant this conclusion. This being the case, the appointment is a pretty fair criterion of what the nation has to expect, in this way, at least, at the hands of | his Royal Highness. Let us, then, enquire, what is the nature of this office, which has been given to Colonel M Mahon, what are the profits of it, and what are his pretensions to it.The title of the office is that of Paymaster of Widows Pensions. The widows of officers who are killed in the land service have certain pensions allowed them as mentioned in the note below.* These pensions are paid out of money voted annually by the House of Commons, at the same time that the pay is voted for the army. The pensions are paid at the War-office by a clerk upon the establishment of that War-office, who receives one hundred pounds a year, for transacting the whole of the business.Yet, strange to tell! Or, at least, it would be strange to tell, in any other country but this, there are a Paymaster and a Deputy Paymaster, neither of whom performs any duty whatever connected with this office, or, at most, the deputy, alone, has any thing at all to do with it. The deputy, which is odd enough, is not paid by the paymaster himself, but by the public, and the paymaster has only to pay one of the clerks in the War-office, who, as I said before, really does all the business.- -This post, then, of Paymaster of Widows Pensions, is a complete sinecure; that is to say, it is a name of a place made use of for the purpose of giving a man so much a year out of the public money for doing nothing at all. And now let us see, then, how much it is that Colonel M'Mahon is to have annually. Last year, General Fox, who had the office from his childhood to the day of his death; General Fox, (the brother of Mr. Fox) who held the place, and sucked in its profits from the first year of the King's reign to the fifty-first year of his reign, and who is now succeeded by Colonel M'Mahon; General Fox, during the last year, sucked in a neat two thousand seven hundred pounds, from this office, while, at the same time, he had a most lucrative command abroad.The profits of the office vary with the number of wiRates of Annual Pension to the Wi-dows, who, of course, increase in propordows of Officers of the Land Forces; the tion to the increase of the army, and the same to commence from the 25th of June, number and destructiveness of the battles, 1806. £. s. d. in which that army is engaged, or in proColonel..... 80 O O portion to the success of hardships and Lieutenant Colonel............... 60 o odisease. That these profits have gone on Major..... Captain........ First Lieutenant Second Ditto Cornet....... Ensign..... Paymaster. Adjutant Quarter Master Surgeon Assistant Surgeon.... 20 0 0 Hospital Mate who has served 20 0 6 Physician dying subsequently abroad as such.................. 20 at 10s, ditto........ 20 women, But, increasing need not, therefore, be asserted the more will Colonel M'Mahon continue when one considers the state of the army to thrive; and if the war were to continue and the events of the war. Three years upon its present scale for only a few ago the number of widows of officers in years, the profits of this office would prothe army was 1,400. Now, in all proba-bably amount to 5,000l. a year. bility, the number may surpass 2.000. And this suggests a remark not wholly inapplicable to the subject; and that is, that, if we reckon 20 non-commissioned officers, drummers and private soldiers to every commissioned officer in the army, and take the number of commissioned officers at 12,000, which is not far from the mark, we shall find, that there are, at this time, in this kingdom, not less than 40,000 the widows of non-commissioned officers, drummers and soldiers; unless, indeed, we suppose, that the soldiers marry less than the commissioned officers. Say, then, there is but half the number; say there are only 20,000 widows; and then bear in mind that the far greater part of them have been made widows by a war begun against the Republicans in France, lest they should spread anarchy and misery over the dominions of Great Britain!The profits of the office vary, then, with the number of widows, because the Paymaster receives a shilling in the pound upon the sum paid to the widows. There has been a mistake as to the source of this poundage. It is not taken from the pensions of the widows, who receive the amount of their pensions without any deduction (other than that fearful deduction which the paper money is daily making) but is paid by the public, upon the sum voted on this account in each year. For the present year 58,000l. has been voted, and, of course, the profits of the Paymaster will amount to 2,900. except one hundred pounds which he will have to pay to that particular clerk of the war office, who does the duty. The Paymaster's deputy receives his hundred pounds from the public, out of the sum voted annually for the service; so that the real profits of Colonel M'Mahon will be 2,8004.This is a pretty good sum of money as it now stands; but if we take into view what the battle of Albuera, the battle of Almeida, the siege of Badajoz, the battle of Barrosa, and the diseases of the peninsula have done for the Paymaster, we shall find him placed, in point of income, upon a level with some Peers, and above great numbers of country gentlemen of ancient families. The longer the war continues and the more destructive its progress, the longer and as it is, we may well enquire what Colonel M'Mahon has done, to entitle him to such an income from the public purse, granted him for life. I shall be told, perhaps, that it is not granted him for life, and only to the time when the restrictions upon the Regent will cease. But, my answer is, that it has been granted by the Prince for as long a time as his Royal Highness has the power to grant it. I say that he has done all that he can do, with respect to the perpetuating this burthen upon the people. There is no man in his senses, who, when he views all the circumstances of the case, will affect to believe, that the grant will not be continued at the termination of the restrictions. Every one must perceive that this will be the case; but, whether it be or not, I repeat, that the Prince has done all he can, all that he has the power to do, in the perpetuating of this burthen, and, which I regard as of much greater consequence, he has, unfortunately, done all he can to give countenance to that system which has been fostered and maintained by appointments like that, which is the subject of these observations.What, to return to my question, has this Colonel M Makon done, then, to merit this large sum of money, this splendid income, this income equal to that, I believe, of twenty Captains in the army, and equal to that of seventy Captains widows; what has he done, I say, to merit this at the hands of the people of England, who are never backward, God knows, either in acknowledging or rewarding services of men in the public employ? What has he done; where are we to look for the record of his services? For many years he has been an attendant upon the person of the Prince. He has been a servant, very likely an obe dient and faithful servant, in the household of His Royal Highness; and, doubtless, the Prince deemed him worthy of some reward. But, Mr. M‹Mahon has been an officer in the army all this while. He has not been losing his time. His rise in the army has gone on, and we may be sure it has not advanced less slowly on account of his being so near the fountain of favour. What he has gained, in the way of promotion, which, let it be observed, has been accompanied with a corresponding augmentation of pay; what he has thus "chosen servants displaced should re"plunge him into that state from which, "with the assistance of Divine Providence, "we may be permitted humbly to hope "to see him raised. Now, Sir, how stands "the case? The ministers advise you to "grant me the place of Paymaster of "Widow's Pensions; worth about three "thousand pounds a year more or less. "Your Royal Highness, if you were to con"sult nothing but your own wishes, would " abolish the place; but, to abolish the "place under these circumstances would derly alive to your character for con"sistency, refrain from advising you to " yield to the advice of your ministers.' gained, has been gained without any risk of life or of health; without any hardship to undergo; without any losses from being sent to this place or that place. In short, he has gradually risen in the army; his pay has been gradually augmenting, and during the time he has enjoyed all the advantages and all the pleasures attendant upon a state of life, which leaves a man nothing to wish for.--Here, I think, we shall find an ample compensation for any services that he can have rendered to his Royal Master; but, at any rate, be those services what they may, they are utterly" be to reject the advice of the ministers; unknown to the public, and, therefore, to "to reject the advice of the ministers, the public it appears to me he ought not to "would, in fact, be to turn them out of have come for a reward.Here I should" their places; and thus, your Royal Highhave stopped, had I not perceived that "ness would wholly depart from that rule some endeavours have been made by the "of conduct, which your amiable disposi out party, through their paper, the Morn- "tion has, upon the grounds just stated, ing Chronicle, to ascribe this extraordi- "led you to prescribe to yourself. And, nary grant solely to the ministers. Such en- "therefore, Sir, whatever pain I may indeavours only tend to expose the insin- "dividually experience upon the occerity and the meanness of those who make "casion, I cannot, as a faithful servant use of them. Why should the ministers "to your Royal Highness, and as tenselect Colonel McMahon? He has never been a partizan of theirs. I am aware, that, if their object was to prevail upon the Prince to perpetuate this burthen upon the -The words in the Morning Chronicle people, and thus give his countenance to are not precisely these: but the sense, if these grants so much complained of; I am I may be permitted to call it so, is exactly aware, that if this was their object, they as I have here given it; and if the reader, would be likely enough to chuse a favourite or any body else, can find any thing more of the Prince on whom to confer the despicably hypocritical, I should be very grant. But, it is to degrade the Prince, it much obliged to them if they would point is to undervalue his intellect, it is to con- it out to me; but, at present, I must regard sider him in a light, which, from respect this as the master-piece of its kind.to His Royal Highness, I forbear to de- The truth is that the Out party are in a scribe; it is to commit the greatest possi- most forlorn condition. The present men ble outrage upon his character to suppose have beat them in all ways whatever. The that his consent was inveigled from him Prince, from whom the Outs expected so upon this occasion: it is to strip the act much, has left them for their rivals, whom of its only possible apology, namely, the he finds surrounded by all the old adhegrateful remembrance of past private ser- rents of Pitt, by all the Anti Jacobins, by vices; it is to do all this to ascribe the all the weak-minded and long-pursed part grant to the insidious influence of the mi- of the community, by all those most thinknisters. And what has been said of the ing people who think that Buonaparté eats motives of Colonel M'Mahon in accepting children and drinks the blood of their fathe grant; the supposition of the Morning thers and mothers, by all the innumerable Chronicle that the Colonel would naturally swarms of tax-gatherers and dependants advise his Royal Master thus: "Sir, you of every description, making a good half "have said that, from filial tenderness of the talking part of the nation; while, "towards your Royal Father, and, from on the side of the Outs, he sees nobody "duteous attention to your Royal Mother, but their own greedy relations; the inde-. "you will make no changes in the mi-pendent part of the people being all for that re"nistry, at least, that you will not do it "while there is the smallest chance of "your Royal Father's recovery, lest, upon "his being happily restored to the use " of his Royal faculties, grief at seeing his form in the Commons House of Parliament, which would be still more destructive, if possible, to the Outs than to their oppo nents, the former having even greater quantities of sinecures in their possession |