The Poetry of Mary Robinson: Form and Fame

Stuart’s Laureates I 167

demanded that she forego the use of pseudonyms and claim a stance

of her own, particularly at this time, just weeks after the passage of

Pitt’s Two Bills, and in this place—the Morning Post. On 25 January

1796, Stuart published in full a thorough denunciation by the Whig

Club, with Fox chairing, of the Two Bills. Founded, as it claimed,

on constitutional principles established by the so- called Glorious

Revolution, this “Declaration” asserts that the Whig Club “cannot

be unconcerned spectators of the destruction of the most important

securities of Public Liberty which were provided in that glorious æra.”

Appealing to the people, the document asserts that the “Constitution

can, in our judgment, now only be restored by the exercise of that

just authority which the National Opinion must ever posses over the

proceedings of the Legislature.” Over the next few years, Stuart’s

paper would continue to be a source of vexation to Pitt’s government.

To cite one noteworthy example, Stuart took the occasion of a royal

procession to St. Paul’s in celebration of and thanksgiving for the

country’s military success to look askance at the government’s pros-

ecution of the war, writing on 19 December 1797:

Mr. FOX, Mr. SHERIDAN, the Duke of BEDFORD, and other Members

of Opposition, intend, we believe, to join in the ceremony at St. Paul’s

this day. The naval victories obtained over our enemies are a subject

for rejoicing to every Friend of the Independence of this Country; and

those Gentlemen have convinced the world that they are the most sin-

cere friends of that Independence. It is only to be regretted, that such

victories should tend to keep in power men like our present Ministers.

The affair was a particularly hollow display given the fact that the

Austrians had a few months earlier made peace with France, leaving

Great Britain as the sole relict of the First Coalition. In the same

issue, the paper delightedly reported in great detail the “DREADFUL

OUTR AGE” perpetrated the day before when protesters hanged an

eff igy of “Billy Pitt,” with a sign that identif ied Pitt as “Robespierre’s

brother.” In the adjacent column, Stuart printed a poem called

“Verses on the 19th of December, 1797” and signed “Humanitas.”

In stronger terms than Stuart’s pose of tempered patriotism permit-

ted, this poem angrily derides the procession as not only vacuous, but

also horrifically callous:

WHILE shouts and acclamations rend the skies,

From the deep Ocean, bleeding, cold, and wan,

See groaning SPECTR ES in a body rise,

To mourn the mis’ries of ambitious MAN!

9780230100251_06_ch04.indd 1679780230100251_06_ch04.indd 167 12/28/2010 11:08:50 AM12/28/2010 11:08:50 AM

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