THE PENENDEN HEATH MEETING.

ANXIOUS to witness the great assembly of "the men of Kent," of which the High-Sheriff had called a meeting (having appointed twelve o'clock upon Friday the 24th for the immense gathering), I proceeded from Rochester to Maidstone at an early hour.

Upon my way, I saw the evidences of prodigious

*The Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, early in 1828, with little more than a shadow of resistance from the Wellington Ministry, was a sort of political "writing on the wall," to the Protestant Ascendency people throughout the United Kingdom. To check any further concessions, particularly as the Catholics had more and juster claims than the Dissenters, it was resolved to establish Brunswick Clubs, which were practically much the same, minus the secret oaths and obligations, as the Orange Lodges, put down by a prohibitory and penal statute in 1825. The Duke of Cumberland (brother of the reigning sovereign) was the patron of these associations, and Lords Winchilsea, Kenyon, and other persons of rank and property, were openly members. Clare Election, ending July 5, 1828, on the victory of O'Connell, a Catholic, excited the anger and apprehension of these ultra-Protestant agitators, who determined to hold public meetings, in defence of Protestant Ascendency in all the English counties. The first of these came off in Kent, on the 24th of October, 1828, on Penenden Heath, and from twenty thousand to thirty thousand persons were present. Mr. Sheil, whose graphic description brings the scene before us, happened in London when the meeting was about taking place, and several friends of civil and religious liberty strongly pressed him to attend, as a speaker, confident that he might thereby advance the cause which they had at heart. He consented, prepared a long and elaborate speech, obtained the small landed qualification requisite to allow him to address the meeting as a freeholder, and proceeded to Penenden Heath, where the clamor was so great that he could utter only a few sentences, though what he intended to say was printed, and distributed far and wide. The Penenden Heath Meeting, however, did not encourage similar attempts elsewhere, and Protestant Ascendency made no further public display until February, 1829, when Catholic Emancipation was proposed as a Government measure.--The newspapers of the day amused them

exertion to call the yeomanry together, and from the summit of a hill that surmounts a beautiful valley near Maidstone, I beheld a long array of wagons moving slowly toward the spot which had been fixed by the High-Sheriff for the meeting. The morning was peculiarly fine and bright, and had a remnant of “summer's lingering bloom ;" and the eye, through the pure air, and from the elevated spot on which I paused to survey the landscape, traversed an immense and glorious prospect. The fertile county of Kent, covered with all the profusion of English luxury, and exhibiting a noble spectacle of agricultural opulence, was before me; under any circumstances the scene would have attracted my attention, but, upon the occasion on which I now beheld it, it was accompanied by circumstances which greatly added to its influence, and lent to the beauty of nature a sort of moral picturesque. The whole population of an immense district seemed to have swarmed from their towns and cottages, and filled the roads and avenues which led to the great place of political rendezvous. In the distance lay Penenden Heath; and I could perceive that, long before the hour appointed by the Sheriff for the meeting, large masses had assembled upon the field, where the struggle between the two contending parties was to be carried on.

After looking upon this extraordinary spectacle, I proceeded on my journey. I passed many of "the men of Kent," who were going on foot to the meeting;* but the great majority were conveyed in those ponderous teams which are used for the purposes of conveying agricultural produce: and, indeed, "the men of Kent," who were packed up in those vehicles, seemed almost as unconscious as the ordinary burdens with which their heavy vehicles are laden. The wagons went on in their dull and monotonous rotation, filled with human beings, selves with ridiculing Mr. Sheil's printed but unspoken oration; the public, however, perused it eagerly, and multitudes of copies were circulated all over the Kingdom. This is included in the volume of Sheil's published speeches, and is in every way worthy of his great reputation for political rhetoric.— M. *There is a difference between Men of Kent and Kentish men. The former are locally accounted superior to the latter. A Kentish man, is a native of Kent county, born north of the river Medway; a "Man of Kent" comes from the district south of that river, which includes two thirds of that county.-M

whose faces presented a vacant blank, in which it was impossible to trace the smallest interest or emotion. They did not exchange a word with each other, but sat in their wagons, with a half-sturdy and half fatuitous look of apathy, listening to the sound of the bells which were attached to the horses by which they were drawn, and as careless as those animals of the events in which they were going to take a part. It was easy, however, to perceive to which faction they belonged; for poles were placed in each of these wagons, with placards attached to them, on which directions were given to the loads of freeholders to vote for their respective proprietors. I expected to have seen injunctions to vote for Emancipation, or for the Constitution, or against Popery and Slavery. These ordinances would, in all likelihood, have been above the comprehension of "the men of Kent;" and, accordingly, the more intelligible words, "Vote for Lord Winchilsea," or “Vote for Lord Darnley,"* were inscribed upon the placards.

I proceeded to my place of destination, and reached Penenden Heath. It is a gently-sloping amphitheatrical declivity, surrounded with gradually-ascending elevations of highly-cultivated ground, and presenting in the centre a wide space, exceedingly well calculated for the holding of a great popular assembly. On arriving, I found a great multitude assembled at about an hour before the meeting. A large circle was formed, with a number of wagons placed in close junction to each other, and forming an area capable of containing several thousand persons. There was an opening in the spot immediately opposite the Sheriff for the reception of the people, who were pouring into the enclosure, and had already formed a dense mass. The wagons were laden with the better class of yeomen, with the gentry at their head. A sort of hustings was * John Stuart Bligh, fourth Earl of Darnley, was born in 1767, and died in 1831. In 1829, he claimed the Scottish Dukedom of Lennox, as next heir, in default of male issue for the last of the Stuarts. Cardinal York, who died in 1807 and was the next-of-kin (legitimate) of King Charles II., had been duly served heir to the peerage. The House of Lords have not come to a de cision on this claim. The Darnley property in Kent, is Chobham Hall, near Gravesend. The Earldom is Irish, but its holder sits in the Lords, for his English barony of Clifton.-M.

raised for the Sheriff and his friends, with chairs in the front, and from this point the wagons branched off in two wingsthat on the left of the Sheriff being allotted to the Protestant, and the right having been appropriated to the Catholic party. The wagons bore the names of the several persons to whom they belonged, and were designated as "Lord Winchilsea's," or "Lord Darnley's," or as "The Committee's," and ensigns were displayed from them which indicated the opinions of their respective occupiers.

The moment I ascended one of the wagons, where all persons were indiscriminately admitted, I saw that the Protestants, as they called themselves, had had the advantage in preparation, and that they were well arrayed and disciplined. Of this the effects produced by Lord Winchilsea's arrival afforded strong proof; for the moment he entered, there was a simultaneous waving of hats by his party, and the cheering was so well ordered and regulated, that it was manifest that every movement of the faction was preconcerted and arranged. The appearance of Lord Darnley, of Lord Radnor,* and the other leaders of the Catholic party, was not hailed with the same concurrence of applause from their supporters; not that the latter were not warmly zealous, but that they had not been disciplined with the same care.

I anxiously watched for the coming of Cobbett and of Hunt I not only desired to see two persons of whom I had heard so much, but to ascertain the extent of their influence upon the public mind. Cobbett, I understood, had, before the meeting took place, succeeded in throwing discord into the ranks of the liberal party. He had intimated that he would move a petition against tithes. To this Lord Darnley vehemently objected, and asked very reasonably how he could, as a peer of

*William Pleydell Bouverie, third Earl of Radnor, was born in 1779, and sat in the House of Commons, from an early age until 1828. He was known. as a Commoner, by his courtesy title of Viscount Folkstone, during his father's life. He took a leading part, in 1809, in the investigation of the charges against the late Duke of York, of having allowed Mary Anne Clarke, his mistress, to dispose of commissions in the army, by her influence. Whither in the Upper or Lower House, the speeches and votes of Lord Radnor have generally been in aid of the liberal cause.-) - M.