Complete Works of Edmund Burke

by Edmund Burke

  This Virginian history is an instance of the diffused stile of the Gazette, contrasted with the opposite extreme of excellence, — the expressive and eloquent silence. The instances of a less violent, but equally judicious contrast, are frequent, and happily mixed in. I will endeavour to recall them to the reader’s memory. Without such a retrospect it will not be easy to enter into the true spirit of this exquisite politico-literary performance, which is now the sole source of authentic intelligence, and the only vehicle of our summer’s delight and information.

  When the forts of St. John and Chamblé were taken by the Provincials, and upwards of 500 regular troops made prisoners, there was a demand for the compact, close, laconic, style. The Gazette did not altogether omit these events; but with a wonderful energy and brevity, related them in much fewer lines than the shortest article of the capitulation, by which those unhappy troops had surrendered prisoners of war. Of cannon and stores, not one word. These were left to the imagination of the reader. All accounts of the taking of cannon, in the explicit stile, belonged, exclusively, to Lord Dunmore.

  We may remember too, that when Arnold made the astonishing march, which will for ever immortalize his name, the Gazette was not absolutely silent. It gave to merit one honest line; and in the laconic brevity of Lord George Germain,

  “one Arnold appeared at Point Levi.”

  Of the taking of Montreal, which place with the whole strength of England and America conjoined, had formerly given glory and Peerage to Lord Amherst — on the part of the Gazette SILENCE; — Col. Prescot, his ships, his soldiers, his stores taken afterwards — SILENCE.

  This uniformity of silence, however prudent, and even chastly eloquent, might seem rather dull, and at length begin to disgust. People might learn an ugly habit of looking elsewhere for intelligence. In this distress an event happened, which justified the drawing up the floodgate, and letting out all that flow of eloquence which had been so long dammed in. Montgomery, an obscure man, of whom we had heard nothing before from authority, was killed at Quebec, and his troops repulsed. But unfortunately, even on this fairest of all occasions, we were again sadly at a loss. This happy opportunity was in danger of being wholly thrown away. The question arose, where is the authority for this good news? The conquering General was too closely blocked up, to send a messenger of the decisive victory he had obtained. To take intelligence from the Philadelphia news papers, and to put at the foot of the account,

  “Charles Thompson,”

  (not our Sir Charles) and

  “by order of the Congress,”

  was too much. In effect, it was to register a rebellious libel among the consecrated records of office. This was hard undoubtedly.

  The difficulty staggered the American Secretary of State. In an hurry a council is called. The Attorney General, in his firm, sturdy, direct way, objected to the measure, He relied on it, that such a step might teach people to put some trust in rebellious publications; and would, besides, totally take away the best, and sometimes only excuse we had for our prudent reserve on most of our defeats, viz. that we had them only from the narrative of the rebels. This had some weight. But Mr. Weddurburne, whose forte is dexterity and refinement, observed, that the Congress, as they are a raw, new government, and to that time unacquainted with disgraces, had not learned the art of glossing a misfortune, but had delivered

  “a plain round, unvarnished tale”

  of their defeat. This advantage is not to be missed. Here (said Mr. Wedderburne) we may dilate at the expence of an enemy. The narrative, as far as it goes, is their own; and our imagination is at liberty to add full enough on this foundation. We cloath ourselves with the spoils of the enemy. We may dress ourselves

  “à la Congrèss.”

  — Danaum{que} insignia nobis

  Aptemus, dolus an virtus quis in hoste requirit?

  Lord George carried it for his friend the Solicitor’s opinion. The Philadelphia Congress Gazette supplied the materials for our’s; and here, (but at their expence) we expatiated again. The stunted Gazette once more shot out into a full luxuriance of narrative.

  This mode, however, of borrowing an enemy’s account is too ticklish to be adopted as a regular practice. Then came in the great delicate point in all human affairs,

  “to know when to leave off.”

  For, unluckily those exotic Congress News-papers began to shoot out some things that would not bear transplanting, and were not at all adapted to flourish in the soil of the London Gazette. The taking, for instance, of Brigadier General Macdonald in North Carolina — the killing Colonel Macleod — the defeat of 1500 of our Highland troops, and the disarming of the whole party; — although all undeniably true — was not proper stuff for a London Gazette. — The expedition of General Schuyler into the Indian country, although equally certain — the capitulation of Sir John Johnson — the making him a prisoner on parole — the submission and laying down their arms by 600 of our loyal subjects (Scots and Tories) and the compelling some of our natural allies, the humane Savages of the Five Nations, to lay down the hatchet — these accounts, one sees at first sight, could by no art be made fitting for the Gazette. Of these, therefore, nothing was said.

  The end of writing is et prodesse et delectare. In a paper where the profit of Ministers, and the delight of the people, were to be the great objects, it would be a piece of downright absurdity to mention such things as cannot possibly tell to the advantage of the one of the parties, or afford any sort of satisfaction to either of them.

  Mr. Miller, I find it impossible to do justice to the merits of Ministers, as Historians of their own exploits, in a single paper. The subject grows upon me, as the matter rises in dignity, and importance. Reserving therefore the inimitable beauties of the Boston narrative to another time, I shall for the present satisfy myself with remarking, that the naval part of the war, though probably it comes from another quarter, is related on the same principle, and with no less perfection than that, which is carried on upon the Terra firma.

  One of our men of war returns home rather in a shabby condition. But what does she come home for? In reality to bring the news of her own escape from the Americans. Since our affairs are in that pleasant situation, that retreats are happy shiftings of position, and, that escapes are to take rank as victories, it becomes necessary to display this eminent advantage at full length; and it is accordingly related at large in the true technical style, and with all the elegant perspicuity of the nautical dialect. The Gazette, so lately on the reserve, here becomes prodigal of information. We have, on the escape of the Glasgow (for the first time) an account of Commodore Hopkins’s squadron; the number of vessels; the number of guns; the number of men; an account as exact as if we were furnished with it from the Navy Office of Philadelphia. The state of the British Navy was refused on the motion of a Marine officer in Parliament, last session. Amends are now made by a precise detail (given gratis) of one of the American Fleets. We have the satisfaction to find that this navy is in shoal water, (but safe enough) in New England. In the late war, the escape of one of our stout frigates, built and furnished for war, from a little squadron, consisting of a decayed merchantman, with a sloop and schooner or two, hastily and ill fitted into privateers, would scarce have deserved a long laboured account in the Gazette. But things are altered; Mr. Pitt was, Lord George Germaine is, Secretary of State.

  In this last piece we are furnished at one and the same time with a curious example of the various excellencies of the full display, and of the judicious reserve. The Gazette, which knows so minutely every gun in Hopkins’s fleet, and its weight of metal, says nothing at all of this fellow’s carrying his convoy, and the military stores with which he was heavily laden, safely to the place of their destination: Nor does it know, that he had taken a transport and tender in his Majesty’s service. It even omits a piece of good fortune of the Glasgow, whose shot in the very first broadside damaged Hopkins’s rudder in such a manner, that his ship lay for two hours incapable of pursuit
or fight.

  To compleat this account of the American Regatta, made for our special amusement; by the same use of light and shade in the narrative, we are informed that a great number of ships and vessels have been taken. By this judicious choice of terms, the number is as effectually swelled by the seizure of a cock boat, as by the taking of the largest ship that ever sailed in the Virginia trade.

  As to captures made on the part of the Americans, we might conclude from the prudent silence of the Gazette, that there were absolutely none. If it were not for an impertinent tell-tale in the city, called Lloyd’s List, (who, in all good policy ought to be silenced) we should never have guessed that above FIFTY transport ships had been taken by the Americans; the ships themselves, exclusive of the cargoes, of as much value at least as the whole of the prizes taken from the Americans.

  In a word, whether by land or sea, we are scarcely intitled from authority to believe, that one misfortune has happened in the whole war. All is Glory, Success, and Victory. Yet Thirteen Provinces are lost.

  VALENS.

  LETTER XIII. SHIFTING OF POSITION.

  Thursday, July 11, 1776.

  MR. MILLER,

  THE emission of authorised news-papers is an homage paid by the most despotic powers to public opinion. By the sending abroad Gazettes, they tacitly, but fully admit two very material points. First. the right of the people to be informed of the state of national affairs. Secondly, the influence of popular judgement on their own fortune. They know it would be an enterprise too desperate, to think of keeping the people wholly in the dark.

  We are apt to entertain rather too mean an opinion of the spirit and understanding of our neighbours. There is not a nation in Europe so servilely passive, as to abandon all concern about its own welfare; and to give a credit absolutely unlimited to its administration. It is true, that the people under despotic governments, have it not in their power to take a legal vengeance on those who abuse their trust, or to remove those who shew themselves unequal to it. This is the grand defect of their scheme of government. But nature sometimes supplies the place of law, and their illegal sensibility frequently takes a severe vengeance on those, who confiding in the weakness and imperfection of the constitution of their country, presume to act in violation of the spirit of all laws. Even when such a people are not able to punish an unskilful state actor, their voice is generally sufficient to explode, and hiss him from the public stage.

  We have seen not long ago, that the same King of Spain, who with an high hand protected, promoted, honoured, and rewarded Don Francisco Bucarelli, although he was impeached of high crimes and misdemeanors, even from the throne of Great Britain itself, was obliged to dismiss and banish the Marquis of Squillace, his Favourite and Prime Minister, to appease the discontents of the people of Madrid. The same King was but the other day obliged, on account of the displeasure of his subjects, to dismiss and remove from Court the Condé O’Reilly, a Minister and a General high in his favour, upon his failure in an enterprize against Algiers.

  The King of France, on the discontent of a part of his people, and the ill success of some financial projects, dismissed, Monsieur Turgot, as he had raised that Minister, to gratify the opinion of his subjects.

  Ministers in other countries finding themselves obliged to humble their pride before their necessities, do not venture to keep all information from the people. On the contrary, they affect to supply them with it very liberally, and very honestly. Possessed of the only source of authentic intelligence, they indeed gloss and varnish, but never attempt grosly to misrepresent, much less wholly to conceal. Even at Constantinople, the Minister stands in awe of public opinion. Not having a press there, the government keeps in its pay a set of walking Gazettes (somewhat like our Court runners) who mount on a stool in Coffee-houses, and entertain their grave turban’d hearers with an account of the designs of the Court of Petersburgh, or the progress of the rebellion in Egypt.

  As a nation declining from greatness is the most mean, and a people sinking from freedom are the most eminently servile, our Ministers think this is a fit season for an experiment, to find out the maximum of human patience, submission, and passive-obedience. Their proceedings in the Gazette, with regard to the late war in New-England, shew what progress they have made in that experiment.

  From the begining of our present troubles, our hopes and fears were all engaged at Boston. This was the heart and vital spring of all disorder. It was not so much the metropolis of America, as the head-quarters of rebellion. Boston accordingly became the object of all our civil regulations for several sessions, and of all our military operations for two years together. Our eyes were never a moment turned from it. Expectation panted on every Western breeze — when the Gazette suddenly announced to a longing and anxious people, that General Howe had taken a resolution to evacuate Boston, and was actually on his way to Halifax. Habituated as we are to every thing extraordinary, the easy brevity of this account did excite some degree of surprise. There was nothing in it which could give you the least idea of war, or warlike operations. It was delivered with as easy and careless an air, as if the story was nothing more than that a corps had changed their country quarters; just as if General Howe’s regiment had shifted their quarters from Boston in Lincolnshire, to Halifax in Yorkshire. And this is all the satisfaction that the nation has ever yet received for six millions expended, and the last town in thirteen Provinces lost.

  Lord George Germain’s experiment on the temper of the people of England was made, and it answered. This proud and jealous nation bore that treatment with a patience, that would have shamed the hired credulity of contented cuckoldom. Those who would have imposed Ovid’s Metamorphoses for articles of faith, never presumed so much upon the weakness of the human understanding. A more perfect passive-obedience was never preached by interested priests, for the practice of the credulous laity. A Turk, blinded with the smoke of tobacco, and dozed with opium, would have pushed his live Gazette from his stool, and kicked him out of the Coffee-house, if he had dared to give this account of the evacuation of Ockzakow or Bender. Even the foreign Gazettes, skilled and practised as they are in the trade and mystery of intelligence, stood in astonishment at the bold push of their dear brother of Whitehall; and publicly avowed their amazement at this new political phaenomenon.

  That noble and venerable body, in which a Minister of State lately boasted that he had concealed from them, and from his own colleagues, the true state of their affairs, lest they should be slow in entering into a civil war, they of course desired to know nothing. They looked on the proceedings of their Minister, as on the feats of Mr. Breslaw, in which a knowledge of the slight would only spoil their pleasure in the deception. Both Houses are coolly and deliberately acting their part in this great work. Declaring themselves totally indifferent about every part of public duty, and even destitute of common human feelings, they are preparing to make their country as indifferent about the existence of Parliament itself. Several worthy and diligent Members already shew themselves heartily tired of parliamentary attendance. They imagine, that with their talents they might get as much under any other form of government as under this, with an attendance less fatiguing, and a far lighter expence. They think a Minister’s levee room, has as wholesome an air as St. Stephen’s chapel; and that the domestics of a Court Favourite, are a cheaper object of bribery, and full as worthy an object of adulation, as the scot and lot of a venal borough. Perhaps they may be in the right.

  On occasion of this real Gazette Extraordinary, the Earl of Suffolk, one of his Majesty’s principal Secretaries of State, discovered some marks of good breeding; though he does not come quite up to all the graces which Lord Chesterfield requires as qualifications to office. He has, I suppose, some remains of complaisance to that minority, in which he made so flaming a protest against his present associates. In condescension to the weakness of the Lords in opposition, he submitted to tell them the reason why he told them nothing. He lamented in the most pathetic strains to
his noble audience, the necessity he was under of not producing any part of General Howe’s letter; for (he said) “the account of the retreat was so mixed with matters that went before, and operations which were to follow after (very improper to be publicly known) that he could not possibly disentangle them; and that thus he was disabled from doing justice to the incomparable merits of the General, who had made so happy

  “a shifting of position.”

  Every thing has its place, and in the House of Lords this gave satisfaction. We the rabble below the bar, however, thought it odd; that what had passed before General Howe’s retreat should be concealed from us, since it could never have been concealed from the enemy. Perhaps what went before, might be the cause of the retreat that followed after. If indeed this preceding cause should consist in some batteries too fierce to be borne, and too strong to be forced, this I admit was a good reason for concealment. We ought not to know that the rebels have any cannon since Lord Dunmore seized all their artillery; or that they know how to erect batteries, or that they have courage to defend them.

  The other part of the reason for concealing the account of General Howe’s retreat, I must beg leave to observe, is not quite so honourable to the clearness of head of that General, or demonstrates so fully as one could wish, the calm situation of one who makes an undisturbed retreat. So perplexed and involved (if we believe Lord Suffolk) was General Howe’s account, that the Secretary of State’s office, in full practice of garbling papers for the diversion of Parliament, was not able to unravel the complicated texture of the commentaries of our American Caesar, or to give one particular of his proceedings for several months to the hour of his departure, without disclosing all the secrets of the coming campaign.