Foley was placed in the chair of the committee.  Within a week he reported that the Speaker, Sir John Trevor, had in the preceding session received from the City a thousand guineas for expediting a local bill.  This discovery gave great satisfaction to the Whigs, who had always hated Trevor, and was not unpleasing to many of the Tories.  During six busy sessions his sordid rapacity had made him an object of general aversion.  The legitimate emoluments of his post amounted to about four thousand a year; but it was believed that he had made at least ten thousand a year.572 His profligacy and insolence united had been too much even for the angelic temper of Tillotson.  It was said that the gentle Archbishop had been heard to mutter something about a knave as the Speaker passed by him.573 Yet, great as were the offences of this bad man, his punishment was fully proportioned to them.  As soon as the report of the committee had been read, it was moved that he had been guilty of a high crime and misdemeanour.  He had to stand up and to put the question.  There was a loud cry of Aye.  He called on the Noes; and scarcely a voice was heard.  He was forced to declare that the Ayes had it.  A man of spirit would have given up the ghost with remorse and shame; and the unutterable ignominy of that moment left its mark even on the callous heart and brazen forehead of Trevor.  Had he returned to the House on the following day, he would have had to put the question on a motion for his own expulsion.  He therefore pleaded illness, and shut himself up in his bedroom.  Wharton soon brought down a royal message authorising the Commons to elect another Speaker.

The Whig chiefs wished to place Littleton in the chair; but they were unable to accomplish their object.  Foley was chosen, presented and approved.  Though he had of late generally voted with the Tories, he still called himself a Whig, and was not unacceptable to many of the Whigs.  He had both the abilities and the knowledge which were necessary to enable him to preside over the debates with dignity; but what, in the peculiar circumstances in which the House then found itself placed, was not unnaturally considered as his principal recommendation, was that implacable hatred of jobbery and corruption which he somewhat ostentatiously professed, and doubtless sincerely felt.  On the day after he entered on his functions, his predecessor was expelled.574

The indiscretion of Trevor had been equal to his baseness; and his guilt had been apparent on the first inspection of the accounts of the City.  The accounts of the East India Company were more obscure.  The committee reported that they had sate in Leadenhall Street, had examined documents, had interrogated directors and clerks, but had been unable to arrive at the bottom of the mystery of iniquity.  Some most suspicious entries had been discovered, under the head of special service.  The expenditure on this account had, in the year 1693, exceeded eighty thousand pounds.