A Speech intended to have heen spoken at the Meeting of the NORTH AMERICAN Merchants, at the King's Arms Tavern, JANUARY 4, 1775.

The great and important business you are here convened upon, cannot, I presume, be conducted well in so large a body as I see here met at present; therefore, I suppose you will appoint a Committee; and lest I should not be present when you have determined on those who are to compose it, I beg leave to recommend to those gentlemen all that coolness and deliberation which the importance of the object demands, and to bear always in mind that every resolution which irritates, disserves any cause, as violence destroys it; witness the late violent measures at Boston, respecting the Tea. The whole world condemned the outrage, in consequence of which Parliament passed an Act to block up the Port of Boston; and lest that should not be sufficient to inflame the neighbouring Colonies, the same power takes away the Charter, mutilates the whole form of Government of Massachusetts Bay, and, to complete all, presents our new Canadian subjects, purely to oblige them, with a code of Laws as near to those of France as could possibly be framed.

You see, then, gentlemen, how violence produces violence; notwithstanding which, it is hardly to be believed that three or four hundred people should consent to such measures; but it so happened. Now, gentlemen, I will speak a few words on the subject of your meeting.

If you had petitioned Parliament last Spring against those ruinous Acts which then passed, I should now have been against any petition; nor indeed is it clear to me that it is at this time expedient; but as so many respectable gentlemen think it ought to be done, I entirely acquiesce, in expectation that a new Parliament, which I am told is composed of wise men, honest men, and of men who are open to conviction, which I think there is not a gentleman present will or can say of the last. I say, gentlemen, if you had their petitioned against those ruinous Acts, you ought now to leave the authors of them to get out of the pit they had dug for themselves, as well as they could; but as, by your silence, if you did not aid them, you did not warn them of the danger, you ought now, as good Christians, to lend Administration your hand to get out of that dismal hole into which the rashness of the last Parliament has precipitated it. On this principle I am for an humble petition, as; an excuse for their undoing that which no wise Administration would have ventured to propose, much less to have carried it to so ruinous a length. I say, gentlemen, as an excuse; for if I am informed right, that is all Administration wants. But I beg, gentlemen, that neither in your petition nor advice, if asked by men of power, that you require less than a repeal of all the Acts passed last year respecting America, as well as the remains of that impolitic one passed in 1767, which laid a duty of three pence pet pound on Tea. This being done, I will venture to engage, and so will every one present who is fully acquainted with the disposition of the Colonists, that peace and good order will soon be re-established, and that love and brotherly affection restored, which subsisted at the conclusion of the late war between the mother country and the Colonies, besides our having any reasonable pecuniary assistance in their power, which this Kingdom shall require or stand in need of from them.

EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM LONDON, DATED JANUARY 6, 1775

A circumstantial account of the proceedings of the American Merchants, assembled on Wednesday, at the King's Arms Tavern; Thomas Lane, Esq., being placed in the Chair, Mr. Barclay first opened the debate. He went fully into the nature of the meeting, which was to consider of some proper methods for stemming those evils that threatened no less than the destruction of the whole Empire, by the present unhappy disputes between this country and North America. As this was a subject of the greatest magnitude and importance to the trade of this country, he hoped It would be treated with great temper and circumspection, and that consequently it should be only taken up merely on a commercial ground, leaving the political to those who should best know how to discuss it. He then produced the two following written propositions, which were severally read and seconded:" That it is the opinion of this meeting, that the alarming state of the trade to North America makes it expedient to petition Parliament for redress. That a Committee be appointed to prepare a Petition to the House of Commons, and lay the same before a general meeting to be held at this place this day se'nnight."

Mr. Bacon, Member for Aylesbury, rose after Mr. Barclay, and after joining with him in thinking the present question of the greatest importance to this country, yet thought the mode of petitioning rather premature. There was, he said, a Petition from America already presented to the King, and the King had given his answer it should be laid before the Parliament. Now, says he, let us wait till we hear how this Petition is received, before we go upon one, the prayer of which might be different from the other.

Mr. Barclay answered him, by saying that the least protraction might be dangerous; and that if they waited for the fate of one Petition, the Parliament, by that time, might take some measures which might defeat, in a great measure, the purpose of petitioning at all; that besides, so large a body as the North American Merchants of London, should not sit idle spectators in so great a struggle as the present; that their not exerting themselves before, was made a handle of last session by the Minister; and that their present union and assistance must necessarily strengthen the grounds of an amicable accommodation.

Mr. Samuel Vaughan acquainted, the assembly, that having had the honour of attending a meeting of the West India Merchants and Planters, on the night before, at London Tavern, upon the same subject as the present, he would declare to them their Resolutions. He then read a letter from the Merchants, Traders, &c., in the West India business, residing at Bristol, requesting to join themselves to the London meeting of Merchants, &c., and that, upon this letter being read at the last night's meeting, they had resolved to accept of the association, and likewise resolved to have a general meeting at the London Tavern, on the 18th instant, for that purpose.

Mr. Hayley read a letter from the Council of Commerce at Liverpool, requesting to know what steps the London American Merchants intended to take, He likewise said he had letters from Manchester, Leeds, and other places, to the same purport. These letters urged for the immediate necessity of coming to some determination. Mr. Barclay corroborated this by reading a letter from Leeds, giving a most pitiable account of the miseries and distresses of the Manufacturers in that Town, on account of the Non-Importation Article.

After several other gentlemen had spoken successively to the business of the meeting, in which they all essentially agreed, (though two warned them of petitioning in favour of those who had resisted the authority of Parliament,) the motions were severally put by the Chairman, and carried unanimously. The Committee were then appointed to consist of twenty-three, and the names given in accordingly, at the proportion of three to a Province, and two over, nine of whom wore to constitute a Committee. A short debate then ensued, on including the Tradesmen and others concerned in American Commerce, in the prayer of the Petition, which was finally agreed to. It was unanimously agreed that these Resolutions should be inserted in all the Newspapers.

The above meeting consisted of between three and four hundred of the most respectable Merchants and Trader? Concerned in the American business, and was conducted throughout with much spirit, good sense, and moderation.

It is supposed the Petition of the American Merchants will be followed by others from Bristol, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, and by the other manufacturing Towns in England.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE LONDON EVENING POST.

Leeds, January 9, 1775.

Observing that in the narrative printed in your Paper, dated the 5th instant, of the proceedings of the American Merchants, assembled at the King's Arms Tavern, it is said that Mr. Barclay read "a letter from Leeds, giving a most pitiful account of the miseries and distresses of the Manu-