The anxiety of the Commons to gain good places from which to listen to the Speech is all the greater nowadays, since it has ceased to be customary to publish it beforehand. In Walpole's time the Government used to meet at the Cockpit in Whitehall on the eve of the opening to consider the royal speech.[233] This practice came to an end with the eighteenth century, but the Speech was still made public property by being sent to the papers on the evening of the Ministerial and Opposition dinners which precede the opening of Parliament. It is still read aloud by the official hosts at these banquets, but does not appear in the Press on the following morning, and the contents of the Speech are not made public until it is read by the King (or the Lords Commissioners) at the Opening of Parliament.[234] In 1756 a spurious speech was published and circulated, just before the opening, much to the annoyance of the authorities. King George, however, took a lenient view of this outrage. He even expressed a hope that the printers might not be too severely punished. He had read both speeches carefully, he said, and, as far as he could understand either, infinitely preferred the spurious one to his own.[235] [233] The Cockpit was pulled down in 1733, but the name continued to be given to the Treasury meeting-room. See Dodington's "Diary": "Went to the Cockpit to a prize cause," p. 72 (1828). [234] "November 20, 1798. Called on Sir Francis Burdett, who had just been reading in the newspaper the King's intended Speech to-day (which for some sessions past has been published the morning before it is spoken)." Holcroft's "Memoirs," p. 229. [235] It was burnt by the hangman in Palace Yard. Waldegrave's "Memoirs," p. 89.