except as members of the annual "vestry," where they could
object to a rate but might be out-voted by a majority of their
fellow-parishioners. Althorp had proposed a scheme for the removal of
this grievance in 1834, involving a parliamentary grant of L250,000.
Setting aside this alternative, as well as that of a special
contribution, voluntary or otherwise, from members of the Church, Spring
Rice now proposed a solution of his own. It consisted in vesting the
property of bishops and chapters in a commission which, by improved
management, might raise the necessary sum for church repairs, without
impairing the incomes of these ecclesiastical dignitaries. Before the
government plan was discussed in the house of commons, Howley,
archbishop of Canterbury, entered a strong protest against it in the
house of lords on the ground that it would reduce the bishops and
chapters from the position of landowners to that of "mere annuitants".
Melbourne complained of his protest somewhat angrily as premature, and
provoked a vehement reply from Blomfield, bishop of London, who, though
a member of the ecclesiastical commission, denounced any such diversion
of revenues as "a sacrilegious act of spoliation". In the elaborate
debates on the resolutions moved by Spring Rice in the house of commons
Peel took his stand partly on financial objections and partly on the
injustice of taking away from the Church a fund belonging to it by
immemorial usage, and in the main willingly contributed. Amendment after
amendment was proposed by members of the opposition, and, though each
was defeated, the government resolutions were ultimately carried by so
narrow a majority in May that no further action was taken.

The conservative reaction, now in visible progress, was typified by the
open secession of Burdett from the ranks of the reformers. This sincere
but indiscreet radical, who had once enjoyed a popularity similar to
that of Wilkes as a political martyr, became estranged from his party
when it accepted O'Connell as an auxiliary, if not as an ally. Having
failed in procuring the exclusion of the great Irish demagogue from
Brooks's club, in 1835, he withdrew his own name. Soon afterwards he
became irregular in his parliamentary attendance, and more than lukewarm
in his allegiance. Early in 1837 he was, like Stanley and Graham, so
much suspected of gravitating towards conservatism, that some of his
Westminster constituents publicly called upon him to resi