222 History of the Radical Party in Parliament. [i Say- proved to what a system the evil of corruption had been reduced. In the eye of the law such practices had always been criminal, and the electors had a right to their votes free from any interference by compulsion or bribery, and number- less bills to prevent corruption had been introduced and passed. Now the very leader of the reform party of the Whigs came forward with a motion which recognized corrup- tion, not as an offence to be suppressed, but as a right not to be extinguished without compensation. This fourth resolu- tion was " That it is expedient that compensation be granted to those boroughs that have been reduced to one member to serve in Parliament, by means of a fixed sum to be paid to them annually for a certain number of years." Nothing could add to the force of this resolution as a proof of the utter rottenness of the existing so-called representative system. The whole of the four resolutions were rejected by 213 votes to 117. These various motions were rather indications of a future than parts of a present practical struggle. In the mean time, the opposition to the Ministry grew stronger, and their position more irksome. Whether or not they could, under ordinary circumstances, have lived through the session is doubtful, but the trial was destined not to be made, for on the 26th of June George IV. expired. Perhaps no man who had held so eminent a position in the world ever left it and caused so few regrets. There could scarcely be a single living person attached to the miserable being, either by affec- tion or respect. Coarse, selfish, and insincere, depraved alike mentally and morally, it was a strong proof of the attachment of the people to their national institutions, that the appearance of personal loyalty could be preserved towards such a king. Of active influence in the policy of the country, such as that which, as long as he was sane, his father had exerted, he possessed nothing. Eldon had tried to make him use such power in the case of the Emancipation Act, but though ready to cry and moan like a child over the necessity which was imposed upon him, his cowardice and weakness made resist-
