This motion,
therefore, proved abortive. Wilkes, however, with his friend Oliver,
succeeded in obtaining from the court of alderman a resolution "that a
frequent appeal to the people by short parliaments was their undoubted
right, as well as the only means of obtaining a real representation;"
and the livery not only passed a similar resolution, but proposed it
as a test for the city candidates at a future election. Another strong
petition and remonstrance on the old grievances, the Middlesex election,
the imprisonment of the lord mayor, etc., and praying for a dissolution
of parliament, and a change of ministers, was got up in the city and
presented to the king, by the lord mayor, Sergeant Glynn, Alderman
Bull, and others of the city officers, on the 26th of March. Before the
citizens were introduced to his majesty, they were given to understand
that they would not be allowed the honour of kissing his hand, and when
it was presented, the king sternly told them, that their petition was so
void of foundation, and conceived in such disrespectful terms, that he
felt convinced the petitioners did not seriously imagine that its prayer
could be complied with.
CONTINENTAL POLITICS.
While the cabinets of Petersburg, Vienna, and Berlin were occupied in
dismembering Poland, and aggrandizing their dominions at the expense
of that ill-fated country, France was making preparations to send a
powerful fleet into the Baltic.
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