claims, introduced February 28th, 1821. In adducing names of authority in support of his arguments, he said: 'Backed by the memories of the great lights and ornaments of the late reign-of Dunning, Pitt, Fox, Burke, Sheridan, and Windham-backed, I say, by the name of every man who possessed buoyancy enough to float down the stream of timeI feel that I have made out, I had almost said that I had established, the position that I sought, triumphantly. But when I look around me, and reflect on those whom I miss, and who were present when I last had the honour of addressing the House on this question, I am checked. When I reflect that since that period we have lost Whitbread, the incorruptible sentinel of the constitution-that we have lost the aid of the more than dawning virtues of Horner-that we had then Romilly, whose mature excellencies shed a steady light on his profession, on his country, and his nature that Elliott, the pure model of aristocracy-that the illustrious Ponsonby, the constitutional leader of the ranks of Opposition in this house, revering alike the privileges of the Crown and the rights of the subject-are no more; but, above all, when I dwell on that last overwhelming loss, the loss of that great man (Henry Grattan) in whose place I this night unworthily stand, and with the description of whose exalted merits I would not trust myself-God knows, I cannot feel anything like triumph. Walking before the sacred images of these illustrious dead, as in a public and solemn procession, shall we not dismiss all party feeling, all angry passions, and unworthy prejudices?" 66 The Felon Transformed.-Lord Plunket thus explained why he had become a Reformer, although he had before opposed the agitation: Circumstances," said he, "are wholly changed; formerly Reform came to our door like a felon—a robber to be resisted. He now approaches like a creditor; you admit the justice of his demand, and only dispute the time and instalments by which he shall be paid." Professional Acumen.-Lord Brougham records the following circumstance in the preface which he wrote for the Life of Lord Plunket":"There was on one occasion a very remarkable instance of his readiness at taking up a subject under extraordinary difficulties, and of this my personal recollection is very distinct, for I had in the debate experience of his power. On the case of Windham Quin, brought before the House of Commons by the friends of Chief Baron O'Grady, we examined witnesses for above a week, and Sir Robert Peel sat by us supporting his friend Quin, heard all the evidence, and, indeed, took a part in the examination of the witnesses. The evidence was, of course, printed, and Plunket's only knowledge of our proceedings was from reading it on his journey to London. Peel made an elaborate and able defence of his friend, and Plunket took the same side; but there was this remarkable difference between the two speeches: Peel, familiar with the case in all its particulars, spoke in mitigation of censure, admitting the charge to have been proved. He had gone over the ground without perceiving that there was enough to support a plea of not guilty. Plunket at once took that course; he had found the materials for it in the printed evidence, though absent during the whole proceedings; and, having had to answer his wonderful speech, I can truly say that no one could have supposed he had not been present. This incident was often referred to as showing the difference between an ordinary person, however able, but unprofessional, and one with the experience and habits of an advocate. The admirable defence by Plunket was justly ascribed to his professional skill, and no one questioned the ability of Peel or his heartiness in supporting his friend.” His Maiden Speech and Parliamentary Failure.-Erskine was returned to Parliament for Portsmouth, November 20th, 1783, and ́ delivered his maiden speech on Fox's India Bill. Pitt sat, evidently intending to reply, with pen and paper in his hand, prepared to catch the arguments of this formidable adversary. He wrote a word or two. Erskine proceeded; but with every additional sentence Pitt's attention to the paper relaxed, his look became more careless, and he obviously began to think the orator less and less worthy of his attention. At length, when every eye in the house was fixed upon him, with a contemptuous smile he dashed the pen through the paper, and flung them on the floor. Erskine never recovered from this expression of disdain. His voice faltered, he struggled through the remainder of his speech, and sank into his seat dispirited, and shorn of his fame.-Croly's " Life of George IV." Sir N. Wraxall says of this speech: "Erskine's enemies pronounced the performance tame, and destitute of the animation which so powerfully characterised his speeches in Westminster Hall. They maintained that, however resplendent he appeared as an advocate while addressing a jury, he fell to the level of an ordinary man, if not below it, when seated on the ministerial bench, where another species of oratory was demanded to impress conviction or to extort admiration. To me, who, having never witnessed his jurisprudential talents, could not make any such comparison, he appeared to exhibit shining powers of declamation."-Lord Byron said of Erskine's parliamentary oratory: "I don't know what Erskine may have been at the bar, but in the House I wish him at the bar once more."Butler, in his "Reminiscences," relates that, Fox having made an able speech, Mr. Erskine followed him with one of the very same import. Pitt rose to answer them. He announced his intention to reply to both. "But," said he, "I shall make no mention of what was said by the honourable gentleman who spoke last; he did no more than regularly repeat what was said by the member who preceded him, and regularly weaken all he repeated." Defence of Liberty.-During the session of 1795-96 Mr. Erskine (says Roscoe) distinguished himself in Parliament by his strenuous opposition to two measures, which were, as he conceived, directed against the liberty of the subject. Upon the first of these (the Seditious Meetings Bill) he spoke with an energy and boldness not often exhibited within the walls of Parliament. "If the King's ministers,"" said he, adopting the words of Lord Chatham, 'will not admit a constitutional question to be 666 decided on according to the forms and on the principles of the constitution, it must then be decided in some other manner; and rather than that it should be given up-rather than the nation should surrender their birthright to a despotic minister-I hope, my lords, old as I am, I shall see the question brought to issue, and fairly tried between the people and the Government.' With the sanction of the sentiments of the venerable and illustrious Earl of Chatham, I will maintain that the people of England should defend their rights, if necessary, by the last extremity to which free men can resort. For my own part, I shall never cease to struggle in support of liberty. In no situation will I desert the cause. I was born a free man, and, by God, I will never die a slave!" Whitebait and Seal.-Lord Campbell relates that when Erskine was Chancellor, being asked by the Secretary to the Treasury whether he would attend the ministerial fish dinner to be given at Greenwich at the end of the session, he answered, "To be sure I will; what would your fish dinner be without the Great Seal?" SIR WILLIAM GRANT. Hard to Answer.-Lord Brougham classes Sir William Grant with speakers of the first order, and says his style was peculiar; it was that of the closest and severest reasoning ever heard in any popular assembly. The language was choice, perfectly clear, abundantly correct, quite concise, admirably suited to the matter which the words clothed and conveyed. In so far it was felicitous, no farther; nor did it ever leave behind it any impression of the diction, but only of the things said; the words were forgotten, for they had never drawn off the attention for a moment from the things; those things were alone remembered. No speaker was more easily listened to; none so difficult to answer. Once Mr. Fox, when he was hearing him with a view to making that attempt, was irritated in a way very unwonted to his sweet temper by the conversation of some near him, even to the show of some crossness, and (after an exclamation) sharply said, “Do you think it so very pleasant a thing to have to answer a speech like THAT?" "The Wisdom of our Ancestors."-The signal blunder (remarks Brougham) which Bacon long ago exposed, of confounding the youth with the age of the species, was never committed by anyone more glaringly than by this great reasoner. He it was who first employed the wellknown phrase of "the wisdom of our ancestors;" and the menaced innovation, to stop which he applied it, was the proposal of Sir Samuel Romilly to take the step of reform, almost imperceptibly small, of subjecting men's real property to the payment of all their debts. A Syllogistic Speech.-Francis Horner writes (1803): "I contrived to get the second day of the debate on the Spanish papers. Fox was very slovenly, desultory, and incomplete. Pitt's reply was very angry and loud, and full of palpable misrepresentations. . . There was one extra ordinary oration that night-Sir William Grant's-quite a masterpiece of his peculiar and miraculous manner. Conceive an hour and a half of syllogisms strung together in the closest tissue, so artfully clear, that you think every successive inference unavoidable; so rapid, that you have no leisure to reflect where you have been brought from or to see where you are to be carried; and so dry of ornament or illustration or refreshment, that the attention is stretched-stretched-racked. All this is done without a single note. And yet, while I acknowledge the great vigour of understanding displayed in such performances, I have a heresy of my own about Grant's speaking: it does not appear to me of a parliamentary cast, nor suited to the discussions of a political assembly. The effect he produces is amazement at his power, not the impression of his subject; now this is a mortal symptom. Besides this, he gives me a suspicion of sophistry, which haunts me through his whole deduction. Though I have nothing immediately to produce, I feel dissatisfied, as if there were something that might be said. And after all, there are no trains of syllogism nor processes of intricate distinctions in subjects that are properly political. The wisdom, as well as the common feelings that belong to such subjects, lie upon the surface in a few plain and broad lines. There is a want of genius in being very ingenious about them." LORD ELDON. His First Election Speech.-Mr. Scott (afterwards Lord Eldon) put up for Weobly in June, 1783, and being returned, took his seat for the first time as representative of that borough. He says he delivered his speech to the crowd from the top of a heap of stones. "My audience liked the speech, and I ended, as I had begun, by kissing the prettiest girl in the place-very pleasant, indeed." Lengthy Tenure of Office.-Scott was appointed SolicitorGeneral in 1788, and Attorney-General five years later. He was made Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and raised to the peerage as Lord Eldon, in 1799. He received the great seals for the first time in 1801. "I do not know," he said, "what made George III. so fond of me, but he was fond of me. When I went to him for the seals, he had his coat buttoned at the lower part, and putting his right hand within, he drew them out from the left side, saying, 'I give them to you from my heart."" On the death of Pitt in 1806, Eldon resigned the Chancellorship, but was reinstated in 1807, on the dismissal of the Grenville ministry, and continued in the office until the breaking up of the Liverpool administration in 1826, having held it for nearly twenty-five years, and for the longest period during which it had been held by any individual since the Norman Conquest. Conquering the Gout.-Writing to a female friend (Mrs. Forster) Lord Eldon said: "I will tell you what once happened to me. I was ill with the gout; it was in my feet, so I was carried into my carriage, and from it I was carried into my court. There I remained all the day, and delivered an arduous judgment. In the evening I was carried straight from my court to the House of Lords; there I sat until two o'clock in the morning, when some of the lords came and whispered to me that I was expected to speak. I told them I really could not, I was ill, and I could not stand; but they still urged, and at last I hobbled, in some way or other, with their assistance, to the place from which I usually addressed the House. It was an important question, the peace of Amiens-I forgot my gout, and spoke for two hours. Well, the House broke up, I was carried home, and at six in the morning I prepared to go to bed. My poor left leg had just got in, when I recollected I had important papers to look over, and that I had not had time to examine them; so I pulled my poor left leg out of bed, put on my clothes, and went to my study. I did examine the papers; they related to the Recorder's report, which had to be heard that day; I was again carried into court, where I had to deliver another arduous judgment, again went to the House of Lords, and it was not till the middle of the second night that I got into bed." Tailors and Turncoats.-While (says Campbell) the Catholic Relief Bill was making progress in the House of Commons, there were, from the commencement of the session, nightly skirmishes in the House of Lords on the presentation of petitions for and against the measure. The Chancellor (Lyndhurst, who had changed sides on the question) sometimes mixed in these, and received painful scratches. Lord Eldon presenting an Anti-Catholic petition from the Company of Tailors at Glasgow, the Chancellor, still sitting on the woolsack, said in a stage whisper, loud enough to be heard in the galleries, "What! do tailors trouble themselves with such measures?" Lord Eldon: "My noble and learned friend might have been aware that tailors cannot like turncoats." (A loud laugh.) Offered the Reins of Government.-March 3, 1829 (writes Mr. Greville), "the Catholic question was in great jeopardy. The Chancellor (Lyndhurst), the Duke, and Peel went to tell the King that unless he would give them his real, efficient support, and not throw his indirect influence into the opposite scale, they would resign. He refused to give them that support; they placed their resignations in his hands and came away. The King then sent to Eldon, and asked him if he would undertake to form a Government. He deliberated, but eventually said he could not undertake it. On his refusal the King yielded, and the bill went on; but if Eldon had accepted, the Duke and his colleagues would have been out, and God knows what would have happened." Consistency. When Lord Encombe, Lord Eldon's grandson, received his doctor's degree at the hands of the Duke of Wellington-then Chancellor of the University of Oxford-Lord Eldon was present as High Steward, and was treated with great respect and attention. He himself related the following anecdote: "What charmed me very much when I left the theatre, and was trying to get to my carriage, was: one man in the crowd shouted out, 'Here's old Eldon! Cheer him, for he never ratted!' I was very much delighted, for I never did rat. I will |