productions; and to an Englishman, at least, the incidents are of a still more engrossing interest: at the same time, it is not to be supposed that it is destitute of faults. The following objections, among others, have occurred to us :1st. The third Act is the flattest of the five; containing too much dialogue, and too little incident. This is a pity, because a third Act is always an important one, and ought to be the keystone, as it were, to the two which follow. Yet, in "Alfred," the business decidedly flags in the third Act. It might be left out altogether, and the story would go on nearly as well without it. 2d. The fourth Act is a better Act than the fifth. This, too, is not exactly as it should be; yet Mr. Knowles has committed a similar mistake, both in "Virginius" and "William Tell." 3d. We regret that Alfred has not a little more to do. There are only three scenes-in the second Act, the fourth, and the last-in which he is brought prominently forward. The character, however, is well sustained; and unless the third Act were remodelled, it would probably be difficult to give Alfred more work. 4th. We should have been glad to have been interested a little more in Ina. Up to the fifth Act she appears to be little more than a sweet, and rather common-place, girl. Mr. Knowles has never yet drawn a very effective heroine; yet his poetry abounds so much in delicate feeling, that we think he could hardly fail to succeed, were he to set about it seriously. These faults, if they be such, are by no means of a magnitude sufficient to blind us to the many and substantial merits of the play. As a whole, it has increased our already high respect for the talents of the author, and we should be well contented to see a production of similar value issuing annually from the same pen.

REPORTING PROGRESS.

UNDER this head, it is our intention, in future numbers, to give a brief sketch of the events of the month,-tragic, comic, or farcical,-that seem to demand a more permanent record than the fleeting pages of a daily journal. During our present, however, our notes must be wholly political.

In our last number, under the title of "The Reform Bill," we gave a conspectus of that celebrated measure, which is destined to produce as important consequences in the nineteenth, as the expulsion of the Stuarts did in the eighteenth century. We need no apology for reverting at some length to what is the subject of all men's thoughts, and the theme of all men's discourse. We do so for the purpose of noting certain alterations in detail, which were announced on the 18th instant. The rule of disfranchisement and restriction laid down in the bill is, that all places with a population of less than 2,000 shall cease to return members; that all places having more than 2,000, and less than 4,000, shall return one member only. Now, it so happens, that in the elaborate folio of population returns, printed by order of the House in 1821, (a tome which bids fair to rival in fame the proudest that the typographical art has produced,) the distinction between a borough, and the parish or parishes with which it is immediately or remotely connected is seldom noted; indeed, in all but eight or ten cases, the population of the borough and parish is given conjointly. The list of boroughs to be disfranchised, inserted in our last number, contained the names of five-namely, Aldborough, (Yorkshire,) Buckingham, (Bucks,) Malmesbury, (Wilts,) Okehampton, (Devon,) Reigate, (Surrey,) which subsequent examination

has proved to contain-taking into account the parishes in which they are situated-more than 2,000 inhabitants each. These, to use the language of the bill, have been transferred from schedule A. to schedule B.; that is, instead of being disfranchised altogether, each will in future return one member. Again, in the list of reduced boroughs there were included seven-namely, Leominster, (Hereford,) Morpeth, (Northumberland,) Northallerton, (York,) Tamworth, (partly Stafford, partly Warwick,) Truro, (Cornwall,) Westbury, (Wilts,) Chipping Wycombe, (Bucks,) which, with their respective parishes, contained more than 4,000 inhabitants each. These are removed from schedule B., or, in other words, their right of returning members remains undisturbed. By these corrections, the number of boroughs to be disfranchised will be 55; the number of boroughs to be reduced, including Weymouth, 45; the number of seats disengaged by the double process 155. Of the seats disengaged, the bill had already absorbed 110, of which 99 went to augment the unrepresented towns, and larger counties in England; one was given to Wales, five to Ireland, and five to Scotland. The future number of the House was thus fixed at 601, instead of 658. The perpetuation, under the amended bill, of twelve small constituencies, seemed to call for a corresponding increase in the number of large constituencies. To the towns, therefore, formerly contained in schedule D., are now addedBury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stoke-upon-Trent, Salford, (apart from Manchester,) Wakefield and Whitby; and to all counties in England and Wales, containing above 150,000 inhabitants, an additional member is assigned. The counties which will return three instead of two members are—Berks, Bucks, Cambridge, Dorset, Glamorgan, Hereford, Hertford, Oxford. The only remaining alteration is the transfer of Halifax, which, with its parish, was meant to return two members, from schedule C. to schedule D. The town, not including the parish, will thus return one member. The parish is large, and thinly peopled; and, on mature deliberation, great difficulties were anticipated in taking the polls. The representation, as finally arranged by ministers, will stand thus:

55 disfranchised boroughs 2 members each 44 reduced

Weymouth

Seats disengaged

do. 1

do.

2 do.

109

44

2

155

54

9

24

27

10

124

31

658

627

The alterations of the qualification, in the amended bill, are small, and in strict accordance with the principles at first laid down. According to those principles, existing rights, during the lives of the holders, were every where recognised, provided the parties were resident; that is, in a position honestly to exercise them. To existing are now added inchoate rights, provided they be completed by residence. Residence has been defined so as to include the occupancy of shops or warehouses, as well as simple habitancy, to which it had

* Except Higham Ferrers, which returns only one.

been previously restricted; and ten-pound leases for sixty years, or leases for any term of years, for which a consideration equivalent to an annuity of ten pounds has been given, are to have the same privileges as copyhold estates of similar value.

One plausible objection, and but one, has hitherto been urged against the bill, the value of which may be estimated by a careful consideration of it as thus amended. We allude to the objection, that the contemplated reform diminishes the representation of England.

The number of English representatives is indeed nominally reduced from 513 ot 472; and the representation of Ireland, and that of Scotland, are each augmented by five. But it must not be lost sight of, that, of the 513 members, which, at present, constitute the representation of England, no more than 255 are returned by the people of England under all the difficulties which the present state of the elective franchise throws in the way of their exercising that proudest privilege of free men: 258 of the 513, as far as the views and principles of those who nominate them are concerned, might be quite as well returned by the Great Mogul. To him who looks not to names but to things, it must be obvious that, supposing each and all of the 258 members, returned by the Duke of Newcastle and Co., to effect neither good nor ill, the cutting off 155 of them, would leave the real representation precisely where it was. But when it is considered, that they not only do a monstrous deal of ill, but on all possible occasions interfere to prevent the accomplishment, by the rest, of any the least portion of good, it will evidently appear, that the mere disfranchisement is tantamount to a real and important increase. The 258, and yet more especially the 155, are the black horses, which are occupied in pulling the wagon down the hill; the 255 are the white horses, which are striving to pull it up; and, as the wagon has a natural tendency downward, the blacks work at a manifest advantage. To cut their traces, was the only method by which it had the slightest chance of reaching the top. But the Bill does more; it not only throws off the blacks, but it adds an entire new and active team to the whites; it takes away the drag, which is equal to 155, and it raises the power from 255 to 472; it increases, in a word, the real representation of England, from 100 to 472, or in the proportion of 1:5. Again, under the present law, the real representatives of Ireland are seventy-six, the mock members are twenty-four, the power of the Irish representation is therefore fifty-two; under the bill it will be raised to 105, that is in the proportion of 1:2. Will any man say, that if 100 Englishmen be equal to fifty-two Irishmen, that 472 Englishmen will not be equal to 105 Irishmen ? The truth is, and we hope our cannie neighbours will not be offended at our letting it out, the danger to be apprehended from the destruction of the rotten boroughs, comes wholly from the north. At present the Scotch people are represented by 0. And if 100 John Bulls have, at times, proved insufficient to withstand these wily Northerns, even when represented by a cipher; what may not happen when the cipher gets a 5 before it? Sir Richard Vyvyan has repeatedly endeavoured to impress on the House of Commons, the danger which may accrue to the Church, from the increase of Catholic Members; but he has wholly kept out of view the more imminent danger which threatens it from the increase of the Presbyterian Members.

We have no space or inclination to record debates, but we shall give the steps of the bill, as we may have occasion, at some future period, to revert to them. On the 1st of March, the declaration of ministers was made. The period that intervened between the 1st and the 9th, the bill being still unprinted, and, for any thing that members knew, unwritten, was, with the judgment and propriety usually exercised by the House, spent in discussing its details. On the 9th, having argued, for nine mortal nights, a measure which they did not know, the House permitted the first reading for the express purpose that, being known, it might be rejected. On the 21st, the debate on the second reading, a debate

which turned, like the former, wholly on the details of the bill, commenced with a long, rambling, and inconclusive harangue from Sir Richard Vyvyan; and on Tuesday it closed, with a pointed, well-argued, and weighty reply from Lord John Russell. The second reading was carried in the fullest house that ever assembled in England, by a majority of one; the numbers being 313 to 312.*

On Monday the 18th, the motion for the committal was made, to which, by way of amendment, General Gascoyne moved a resolution, founded on the objection of which we have already disposed. The necessary consequence of the amendment must have been, either that the number of representatives in England should be raised to 548, and the whole number of the House of Commons to 703, or that the ten members promised to Ireland and Scotland should be withdrawn. General Gascoyne's motion was carried by 316 to 308. Of those who voted for the second reading of the bill fifteen voted for General Gascoyne's motion, and nine were absent; eight members voted against the second reading and against the General's motion. In the interval between the two divisions it would thus appear that the cause of reform was retrograding instead of progressing. On Wednesday Lord Wharncliffe gave notice of a motion for Friday, to address the King, praying him not to dissolve parliament; and on Thursday, in the Commons, ministers formally gave up the bill. The same evening Mr. Bennet moved the confirmation of the report of the committee in the case of the Liverpool election. It was a motion of course in which ministers had not the slightest interest. A debate ensued, not on the corruption or the purity of the Liverpool voters, but on the event which it was the object of Lord Wharncliffe's motion to avert. It was prolonged to one o'clock, and then, contrary to all precedent, Mr. William Bankes moved the adjournment, not of the debate, but of the House. Lord Althorpe protested, and intreated that the report on the ordnance estimates, which was on the table, and to which not a single soul had offered the slightest objection, should be allowed to be brought up, but Mr. Bankes was inexorable; the adjournment was carried by 166 to 144. The object of delaying the supplies was to force ministers to keep parliament assembled until Lord Wharncliffe's motion was carried, and thus to ensure their resignation, for, that motion carried, how were they to advise the King to dissolve? The attempt to make assurance doubly sure failed, as over much precaution not uncommonly does. The delaying of the supplies furnished Earl Grey with the opportunity which he had been anxiously expecting, for doing that at once, and in the most decisive way, which would otherwise have been done with more leisure and courtesy. The first intimation of the intention to dissolve parliament on Friday, was communicated to the public by the boom of the Park guns that announced the Sovereign's departure from St. James's. Few of the ministerial members were aware of it before twelve o'clock, and of the opposition members a very

* The following is a correct summary of the votes on this remarkable occasion :for agst. abst.

England, Counties

53 27

Corporate Boroughs open 93 42

for agst. abst.

Nominee Boroughs

83 168 13

Wales, Counties

3
0

4 11

40 21

Total, 312 311 27

Vacant seats, England 4; Scotland 1; Ireland 2. Of the 312 for the measure, 208 were real, and 104 nominal members of the 311 who voted against the measure, 200 were nominal, and 111 real members. In a word, so far as the voice of the people was concerned, the second reading was carried by a majority of two to one.

large number were in profound ignorance until, at two o'clock, the hasty summons of their chiefs sent them hurry scurry to the House, which had already begun to assemble. Of the Lords not less than twenty or thirty were in their ordinary habiliments, time not having been allowed them to send for the robes in which strict etiquette required that they should appear before Majesty.

The confusion in the Commons was great, but it was by no means so remarkable as to call for particular observation. The Commons have a permament chairman, to whom appeals on points of order are uniformly addressed, and a very few words from whom are generally sufficient to allay the turbulence of the most disorderly; the Lords do not recognise in him who fills the chair any right of calling to order, or laying down rules respecting it, that does not belong to every peer in the House. When, therefore, the peers break bounds, there is no master's voice to call them back again. In the Commons, the discussion, which was confined to Sir Richard Vyvyan and Sir Robert Peel, (for though many members besides spoke, Sir Richard and Sir Robert were the only members that speechified,) began at half-past two, and continued till about three o'clock, when the mace of the Usher of the Black Rod gave it the coup de grace. In the Lords, the riot did not begin until ten minutes later, but was proportionably more violent. At twenty minutes to three o'clock, it being announced to Lord Brougham that his Majesty was approaching, he hastily quitted the woolsack; and the moment his back was turned, the Marquess of Londonderry called on Lord Shaftesbury to take his place. The Lords were at that moment some standing, some walking, some sitting, without regard to order or precedence, and all of them conversing "fast and furious." The Duke of Richmond, with a view to produce some degree of decency before the King entered, moved that the peers should retire to their proper places, a motion which was commented on by Lord Lyndhurst in terms so exceedingly strong, (what the words were does not appear,) as to produce from the Duke of Richmond a second motion,-that the standing order against violent language, should be read. The clamour on this motion being announced, was tremendous; and many of the peeresses, who were present, as is usual on such occasions, seemed to entertain serious fears that the opposition and ministerial members were about to have a regular set-to on the floor of the house. The Marquess of Londonderry shook his fist in the Duke of Richmond's face; and, according to one report, swore he would see him before he should put down the expression of opinion by such a motion! Lord Wharncliffe at length rose, and without a word of preface put his motion, when the Chancellor rushed from the door, ran up to the table, and exclaimed, in the loudest tones of his singularly powerful voice," that he had never heard the right of the King to dissolve Parliament disputed, still less had he ever heard a doubt on the subject, when the lower house had refused the supplies." The sudden apparition and appeal of Lord Brougham, who withdrew the instant it was made, stilled the storm for but a moment. The cries of "order! the King! shame!" issuing from fifty mouthsthe shouts of Lord Londonderry occasionally rising above the strife of weaker lungs, mingled with the huzzas of the people, and the report of the cannon from without, formed, for several minutes, a chorus of discordant sounds such as only St. Luke's, on a day of general muster, when, by some accident, the keepers were off duty, could at all pretend to rival. Lord Mansfield had at length contrived to command some degree of attention, and was proceeding to descant on the imbecility of Earl Grey and Lord Brougham, and other weaklings of the Upper Chamber, when the ample doors of the robing room swung open, and Britain's Patriot King walked in to stop short the ravings of his hereditary councillors.

Of "the agitation parliament," thus dissolved, we shall not stop to write the history or the epitaph; our thoughts are in the future, not the past. The writs