In August some riots occurred in Wiltshire, caused by the introduction of machinery into cloth-working. What Hargreaves, Arkwright, and Crompton, had done for the cotton trade, was bound, sooner or later, to be followed by other textile industries. In this case a shearing machine had been introduced into a large factory, some three years back, and, like the silversmiths at Ephesus, the cloth-workers thought that “thus our craft is in danger of being set at nought;” and they did what most poor ignorant men have done under like circumstances, they thought they could retard the march of intellect, by breaking the objectionable machines. Not only so, but, in their senseless folly, they cut, and destroyed, much valuable property in the cloth-racks—altogether the damage done was computed at over £100,000. For this, one man was tried at Gloucester Assizes, and hanged—a fate which seems to have acted as a warning to his brother craftsmen, for there was no repetition of the outrage. In this case, the machinery, being very expensive, could only be introduced into large mills, the owners of which did not discharge a man on its account, and the smaller masters were left to plod on in the old way, in which their soul delighted, and to go quietly to decay, whilst their more go-ahead neighbours were laying the foundation of a business which, in time, supplied the markets of the world. But there was the same opposition to the _Spinning Jenny_, and we have seen, in our time, the stolid resistance offered by agricultural labourers to every kind of novel machine used in farming, so that we can more pity, than blame, these deluded, and ignorant, cloth-workers, because they were not so far-seeing as the manufacturers. It was mysteriously whispered about on the evening of the 18th of November, that a plot had been discovered, having for its object the assassination of the King; and next day the news was confirmed—Colonel Despard, of whom I have before spoken (see p. 37), was at the head of this plot. He was an Irishman, and had seen military service in the West Indies, on the Spanish Main, and in the Bay of Honduras, where he acted as Superintendent of the English Colony; but, owing to their complaints, he was recalled, and an inquiry into his conduct was refused. This, no doubt, soured him, and made him disaffected, causing him to espouse the doctrines of the French Revolution. On account of his seditious behaviour, he was arrested under the “Suspension of the Habeas Corpus” Act (1794), and passed some years in prison; and, as we have seen, preferred continuing there, to having a conditional pardon. On his liberation, this misguided man could not keep quiet, but must needs plot, in a most insane manner, not for any good to be done to his country, to redress no grievances, but simply to assassinate the King, forgetting that another was ready to take the place of the slaughtered monarch.