PARLIAMENT REVIVED BY PROCLAMATION.

As the act of union did not take place till the first of May, a great number of traders in both kingdoms resolved to make advantage of this interval. The English proposed to export into Scotland such commodities as entitled them to a drawback, with a view to bring them back after the first of May. The Scots, on the other hand, as their duties were much lower than those in England, intended to import great quantities of wine, brandy, and other merchandise, which they could sell at a greater advantage in England after the union, when there would be a free intercourse between the two nations. Some of the ministers had embarked in this fraudulent design, which alarmed the merchants of England to such a degree, that they presented a remonstrance to the commons. Resolutions were immediately taken in the house against these practices, and a bill was prepared; but the lords apprehending that it in some measure infringed the articles of the union, and that it might give umbrage to the Scottish nation, it was dropped. The frauds had been in a good measure prevented by the previous resolutions of the house; and the first day of May was now at hand; so that the bill was thought unnecessary. On the twenty-fourth day of April the queen prorogued the parliament, after having given them to understand that she would continue by proclamation the lords and commons already assembled, as members in the first British parliament on the part of England, pursuant to the powers vested in her by the acts of parliament of both kingdoms, ratifying the treaty of union. The parliament was accordingly revived by proclamation, and another issued to convoke the first parliament of Great Britain for the twenty-third day of October. The Scots repaired to London, where they were well received by the queen, who bestowed the title of duke on the earls of Roxburgh and Montrose. She likewise granted a commission for a new privy-council in that kingdom, to be in force till the next session of parliament, that the nation might not be disgusted by too sudden an alteration of outward appearances. The first of May was appointed as a day of public thanksgiving; and congratulatory addresses were sent up from all parts of England; but the university of Oxford prepared no compliment; and the Scots were wholly silent on this occasion.