Lord Lieutenant is coming over to settle Wood's
halfpence."

We know very well that the Lords Lieutenants for several years past have
not thought this kingdom worthy the honour of their residence, longer
than was absolutely necessary for the King's business, which
consequently wanted no speed in the dispatch; and therefore it naturally
fell into most men's thoughts, that a new governor coming at an unusual
time must portend some unusual business to be done, especially if the
common report be true, that the Parliament prorogued to I know not when,
is by a new summons (revoking that prorogation) to assemble soon after
his arrival: For which extraordinary proceeding the lawyers on t'other
side the water have by great good fortune found two precedents.

All this being granted, it can never enter into my head that so little a
creature as Wood could find credit enough with the King and his
ministers to have the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland sent hither in a hurry
upon his errand.

For let us take the whole matter nakedly as it lies before us, without
the refinements of some people, with which we have nothing to do. Here
is a patent granted under the great seal of England, upon false
suggestions, to one William Wood for coining copper halfpence for
Ireland: The Parliament here, upon apprehensions of the worst
consequences from the said patent, address the King to have it recalled;
this is refused, and a committee of the Privy-council report to His
Majesty, that Wood has performed the conditions of his patent. He then
is left to do the best he can with his halfpence; no man being obliged
to receive them; the people here, being likewise left to themselves,
unite as one man, resolving they will have nothing to do with his ware.
By this plain account of the fact it is manifest, that the King and his
ministry are wholly out of the case, and the matter is left to be
disputed between him and us. Will any man therefore attempt to persuade
me, that a Lord Lieutenant is to be dispatched over in great haste
before the ordinary time, and a Parliament summoned by anticipating a
prorogation, merely to put an hundred thousand pounds into the pocket of
a sharper, by the ruin of a most loyal kingdom.

But supposing all this to be true. By what arguments could a Lord
Lieutenant prevail on the same Parliament which addressed with so much
zeal and earnestness against this evil, to pass it into a law? I am sure
their opinion of Wood and his proj