-chancellor of the university, the mayor and magistrates of Oxford,
praying to be heard. One of the court members observing that it would
be irregular to receive a petition while the house was in a grand
committee, a motion was made that the chairman should leave the chair;
but this being carried in the negative, the debate was resumed, and the
majority agreed to the following resolutions:--That the heads of the
university, and mayor of the city, neglected to make public rejoicings
on the prince's birth-day; that the officers having met to celebrate
that day, the house in which they had assembled was assaulted, and the
windows were broken by the rabble; that this assault was the beginning
and occasion of the riots that ensued. That the conduct of the mayor
seemed well justified by the affidavits produced on his part; that
the printing and publishing the depositions upon which the complaints
relating to the riots at Oxford were founded, while that matter was
under the examination of the lords of the committee of the council,
before they had time to come to any resolution touching the same, was
irregular, disrespectful to his royal highness, and tending to sedition.
An inquiry of this nature, so managed, did not much redound to the
honour of such an august assembly.

{1717}

The commons passed a bill prohibiting all commerce with Sweden, a branch
of trade which was of the utmost consequence to the English merchants.
They voted ten thousand seamen for the ensuing year; granted about a
million for the maintenance of guards, garrisons, and land-forces; and
passed the bill relating to mutiny and desertion. The house likewise
voted four-and-twenty thousand pounds for the payment of four battalions
of Munster, and two of Saxe-Gotha, which the king had taken into his
service, to supply the place of such as might be, during the rebellion,
drawn from the garrisons of the states-general to the assistance of
England. This vote, however, was not carried without a violent debate.
The demand was inveighed against as an imposition, seeing no troops
had ever served. A motion was made for an address, desiring that the
instructions of those who concluded the treaties might be laid before
the house; but this was over-ruled by the majority. The supplies were
raised by a land-tax of three shillings in the pound, and a malt-tax.
What the commons had given was not thought sufficient for the expense
of the year; therefore Mr. secretary Stanhope