Walpole did not know how strong his enemies were this time. He did not know what a capital cry they had got, what a powerful appeal to national passion they could put into voice, and what a loud reply the national passion would make to the appeal. On Saturday, March 2, 1738, a petition was presented to the House of Commons from divers merchants, planters, and others trading to and interested in the British plantations in America. The petition was presented by Mr. Perry, one of the representatives of London, and an alderman of the City. The petition set forth a long history of the alleged grievances, and of the denial of redress, and prayed the House to "provide such timely and adequate remedy for putting an end to all insults and depredations on them and their fellow-subjects as to the House shall seem meet, as well as procure such relief for the unhappy sufferers as the nature of the case and the justice of their cause may require; and that they may be heard by themselves and counsel thereupon." On the same day several other petitions from cities, and from private individuals, were presented on the same subject. The debate on Mr. Perry's motion mainly turned, at first, on the minor question, whether the house would admit the petitioners to be heard by themselves and also by counsel, or, according to the habit of the House, by themselves or counsel. Yet, short and almost formal as the debate might have been, the opponents of the Government contrived to import into it a number of assumptions, and an amount of passion, such as the earlier stages of a difficult and delicate international dispute are seldom allowed to exhibit. Even so cautious and respectable a man as Sir {154} John Barnard, a typical English merchant of the highest class, did not hesitate to speak of the grievances as if they were all established and admitted, and the action of Spain as a wilful outrage upon the trade, the honor, and the safety of Great Britain. Walpole argued that the petitioners should be heard by themselves and not by counsel; but the main object of his speech was to appeal to the House "not to work upon the passions where the head is to be informed." Mr. Robert Wilmot thereupon arose, and replied in an oration belonging to that "spread-eagle" order which is familiar to American political controversy. "Talk of working on the passions," this orator exclaimed; "can any man's passions be wound up to a greater height, can any man's indignation be more raised, than every free-born Briton's must be when he reads a letter which I have received this morning, and which I have now in my hand? This letter, sir, gives an account that seventy of our brave sailors are now in chains in Spain. Our countrymen in chains, and slaves to Spaniards! Is not this enough to fire the coldest? Is not this enough to rouse all the vengeance of a national resentment? Shall we sit here debating about words and forms while the sufferings