wounding several of the foremost rioters. So tragical an event seemed to
Wilkes to furnish him with exactly such an opportunity as he desired to
push himself into farther notoriety. He at once printed Lord Weymouth's
letter, and circulated it, with an inflammatory comment, in which he
described it as a composition having for its fruit "a horrid massacre,
the consummation of a hellish plot deliberately planned." Too angry to
be prudent, Lord Weymouth complained to the House of Lords of this
publication as a breach of privilege, and the Lords formally represented
it to the House of Commons as an insult deliberately offered to them by
one of its members. There could be no doubt that such language as Wilkes
had used was libellous. In its imputation of designs of deliberate
wickedness, it very far exceeded the bitterest passages of _The North
Briton_; and Lord Weymouth's colleagues, therefore, thought they might
safely follow the precedent set in 1764, of branding the publication as
a libel, and again procuring the expulsion of the libeller from the
House of Commons. There were circumstances in the present case, such as
the difference between the constituencies of Aylesbury and Middlesex,
and the enthusiastic fervor in the offender's cause which the populace
of the City had displayed, which made it very doubtful whether the
precedent of 1764 were quite a safe one to follow; but the ministers not
only disregarded every such consideration, but, as if they had wantonly
designed to give their measure a bad appearance, and to furnish its
opponents with the strongest additional argument against it, they mixed
up with their present complaint a reference to former misdeeds of Wilkes
with which it had no connection. On receiving the message of the Lords,
they had summoned him to appear at the bar of the House of Commons, that
he might be examined on the subject; but this proceeding was so far from
intimidating him, that he not only avowed the publication of his comment
on Lord Weymouth's letter, but gloried in it, asserting that he deserved
the thanks of the people for bringing to light the true character of