power in support of an enterprise which,
if successful, must be fatal to her commerce and to her finances. A
representation was drawn up and communicated to the Commons. The Commons
eagerly concurred, and complimented the Peers on the promptitude with
which their Lordships had, on this occasion, stood forth to protect the
public interests. The two Houses went up together to Kensington with
the address. William had been under the walls of Namur when the Act
for incorporating the Company had been touched with his sceptre at
Edinburgh, and had known nothing about that Act till his attention had
been called to it by the clamour of his English subjects. He now said,
in plain terms, that he had been ill served in Scotland, but that he
would try to find a remedy for the evil which bad been brought to his
notice. The Lord High Commissioner Tweeddale and Secretary Johnstone
were immediately dismissed. But the Act which had been passed by their
management still continued to be law in Scotland, nor was it in their
master's power to undo what they had done.

The Commons were not content with addressing the throne. They instituted
an inquiry into the proceedings of the Scotch Company in London.
Belhaven made his escape to his own country, and was there beyond the
reach of the Serjeant-at-Arms. But Paterson and some of his confederates
were severely examined. It soon appeared that the Board which was
sitting in Clement's Lane had done things which were certainly imprudent
and perhaps illegal. The Act of Incorporation empowered the detectors to
take and to administer to their servants an oath of fidelity. But that
Act was on the south of the Tweed a nullity. Nevertheless the directors
had, in the heart of the City of London, taken and administered this
oath, and had thus, by implication, asserted that the powers conferred
on them by the legislature of Scotland accompanied them to England. It
was resolved that they had been guilty of a high crime and misdemeanour,
and that they should be impeached. A committee was appointed to frame
articles of impeachment; but the task proved a difficult one; and the
prosecution was suffered to drop, not however till the few English
capitalists who had at first been friendly to Paterson's project had
been terrified into renouncing all connection with him.

Now, surely, if not before, Paterson ought to have seen that his project
could end in nothing but shame to himself and ruin to his worshippers.
F