"The Petition of Thomas Dugood, of the Parish of St. Paul, Covent-Garden, in the City of Westminster,
"That your petitioner is a parentless and friendless boy, seventeen years of age, who, until lately seized by two Police Officers and sent to prison by the police, obtained the honest means of living by the sale of Religious and Moral Tracts, which he used to purchase of Mr. Collins, of Paternoster-row.
"That your petitioner has, for more than four months last past, lodged, and he still lodges, at the house of Keeran Shields, who lives at No. 13, Gee's-court, Oxford-street, and who is a carter to Mr. White, of Mortimer-street, and who is also a watchman in Marybone parish.
"That your petitioner has never in his life lived as a vagrant, but has always had a settled home, has always pursued an honest and visible means of getting his living, has always been, and is ready to prove that he always has been an industrious, a peaceable, sober, honest, and orderly person.
"That, on the 10th of January, 1817, your petitioner, for having pulled down a posting bill, entitled, "_Mr. Hunt hissed out of the City of Bristol_," was committed by Mr. Sellon to the New Prison, Clerkenwell, where he was kept on bread and water and compelled to lie on the bare boards until the twenty-second of the same month, when he was tied, with about fifty others, to a long rope, or cable, and marched to Hicks's Hall, and there let loose.
"That your petitioner has often heard it said, that the law affords protection to the poor as well as to the rich, and that, if unable to obtain redress any where else, every subject of his Majesty has the road of petition open to him; therefore your petitioner, being unable to obtain redress in any other manner for the grievous wrongs done him by the Magistrate of the police, most humbly implores your Honourable House to afford him protection and redress, and to that end he prays your Honourable House to permit him to prove at the bar of your Honourable House all and several the allegations contained in this his most humble petition.
"THOMAS DUGOOD.""To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled.
"The Petition of Henry Hunt, of Middleton Cottage, in the County of Southampton,
