t was only with the
greatest difficulty that Wilkes was able to detach himself from the
zeal of the populace {120} and get quietly into his prison. The prison
immediately became an object of greater interest than a royal palace.
Every day it was surrounded by a dense crowd that considered itself
rewarded for hours of patient waiting if it could but get a glimpse of
the prisoner's face at a window. All this show of enthusiasm
exasperated the ministers and drove them into the very acts that were
best calculated to keep the enthusiasm alive. On the day of the
opening of Parliament, May 10, the Government, under the pretence of
fearing riot, sent down a detachment of soldiers to guard the King's
Bench Prison, in St. George's Fields. This was in itself a rash step
enough, but every circumstance attending it only served to make it more
rash. As if deliberately to aggravate the popular feeling, the
regiment chosen for this pretence of keeping the peace was a Scotch
regiment. At a moment when everything Scotch was insanely disliked in
London such a choice was not likely to insure good temper either on the
part of the mob or on the part of the military. That good temper was
not intended or desired was made plain by a letter written by Lord
Weymouth, the Secretary of State, to the local magistrate, urging him
to make use of the soldiers in any case of riot.

What followed was only what might have been expected. The crowd,
irritated by the non-appearance of Wilkes, still more irritated by the
presence of the soldiery, threatened, or was thought to threaten, an
attack upon the prison. Angry words were followed by blows; the brawl
between the mob and the military became a serious conflict. A young
man named Allan, who seems to have had nothing to do with the scuffle,
was killed in a private house by some of the soldiers who had forced an
entrance in pursuit of one of their assailants. Then the Riot Act was
read; the troops fired; half a dozen of the rioters were killed,
including one woman, and several others were wounded.

News of this bad business intensified the angry feeling against the
Government. A Scotch soldier, Donald Maclean, was put on his trial for
the murder of Allan. His {121} acquittal caused an indignation which
deepened when the colonel of the regiment presented him with thirty
guineas on behalf of the Government. This was taken as an example of
the determination of the Crown to silence the voice of t