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to make in the bounds and banks which had hitherto kept them out.
At the commencement of summer, we began to feel, that the mischief which
had taken place in distant countries was greater than we had at first
suspected. Quito was destroyed by an earthquake. Mexico laid waste by the
united effects of storm, pestilence and famine. Crowds of emigrants
inundated the west of Europe; and our island had become the refuge of
thousands. In the mean time Ryland had been chosen Protector. He had sought
this office with eagerness, under the idea of turning his whole forces to
the suppression of the privileged orders of our community. His measures
were thwarted, and his schemes interrupted by this new state of things.
Many of the foreigners were utterly destitute; and their increasing numbers
at length forbade a recourse to the usual modes of relief. Trade was
stopped by the failure of the interchange of cargoes usual between us, and
America, India, Egypt and Greece. A sudden break was made in the routine of
our lives. In vain our Protector and his partizans sought to conceal this
truth; in vain, day after day, he appointed a period for the discussion of
the new laws concerning hereditary rank and privilege; in vain he
endeavoured to represent the evil as partial and temporary. These disasters
came home to so many bosoms, and, through the various channels of commerce,
were carried so entirely into every class and division of the community,
that of necessity they became the first question in the state, the chief
subjects to which we must turn our attention.
Can it be true, each asked the other with wonder and dismay, that whole
countries are laid waste, whole nations annihilated, by these disorders in
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