At the time I spoke of he was turned sixty, yet he was as playful as a child. The extremes of youth and age were met in him : he had the experience of the one, and the simplicity of the other."-(Recollections of Curran and some of his Contemporaries, p. 3.)

Let one specimen of Curran's powers be added, and it is one of the most certainly known to be unpremeditated of any in the history of the rhetorical art; for who could ever have supposed a judge capable of sneering at a barrister's poverty by telling him he suspected "his law library was rather contracted?" Yet this was the brutal remark of Judge Robinson, the author of many stupid, slavish, and scurrilous political pamphlets, and by his demerits raised to the eminence which he thus disgraced.

"It is very true, my Lord, that I am poor, and the circumstance has certainly somewhat curtailed my library : my books are not numerous, but they are select, and I hope they have been perused with proper dispositions. I have prepared myself for this high profession rather by the study of a few good works, than by the composition of a great many bad ones. I am not ashamed of my poverty; but I should be ashamed of my wealth, could I have stooped to acquire it by servility and corruption. If I rise not to rank, I shall at least be honest; and should I ever cease to be so, many an example shows me that an ill-gained elevation, by making me the more conspicuous, would only make me the more universally and the more notoriously contemptible!"

LORD ELLENBOROUGH.

It would not be easy to find a greater contrast between two individuals filling places of the same kind, than the great judge whose character we have lately been contemplating, afforded to one of the most eminent that have flourished in later times, Lord Ellenborough. In some respects, indeed, he presented a contrast to all other judges; for he broke through most of the conventional trammels which those high functionaries generally impose upon themselves, or fancy that others expect to behold. Far from abounding in that cautious circumspection, that close adherence to technical proprieties, that restraint of his mind to the mere matter in hand, he despised even much of what goes to form ordinary discretion; and is so much overrated by inferior natures as the essence of wisdom, but so justly valued by calculating ones as the guarantee of success. Of compromise, whether regarding his opinions or his wishes, he knew not the meaning; of fear, in any of its various and extensive provinces, he knew not even the name; or, if he saw its form, yet he denied its title, held its style in mockery, and would not, even for an instant, acknowledge its sway. Far, indeed, from cradling himself within the details of a subject, he was wholly averse to such narrow views of particulars; and took a large and commanding survey of the whole, which laid open before him all its parts and all their relations. Bred a pleader, he, however, on coming to the bar, early showed that he only retained the needful technical knowledge which this preparatory practice had

*Lord Camden.

pro

bestowed on him; and he at once dashed into the leading branch of the profession. The famous case of Mr. Hastings-the opprobrium of English justice, and, through mismanagement and party violence, the destruction of the greatest remedy afforded by our constitution-soon opened to Mr. Law the highest walks of the bar. He was the defendant's leading counsel; and his talents, both as a lawyer and a speaker, shone forth conspicuous even upon that great occasion of oratorical display-the only fruits duced by this proceeding, so costly to the country, so much more costly still to the free constitution of England. He soon rose to the unrivalled lead of the Northern Circuit, to which, by birth, he belonged; his father having been Bishop of Carlisle, and himself born at the village of Salkeld,* in Cumberland. In Westminster Hall he had also good success, though he never rose there into the first lead; having indeed to contend with most able rivals, and among them with Erskine, the greatest advocate of all. Lord Kenyon, whose favour for this illustrious ornament of his court I have already had occasion to remark,† was felt, or was supposed by Mr. Law, to be partial more than became him to this formidable antagonist; and a quotation to which this feeling gave rise is often cited, and with justice, as singularly happy. Mr. Erskine had been, somewhat more than was his practice with any adversary, triumphing over him, when Mr. Law, first addressing him and then Lord Kenyon, thundered forth these fine, and expressive, and perfectly applicable lines, with the volume of tone which he possessed beyond most men

-Non me tua fervida terrent

Dicta ferox; Di me terrent et Jupiter hostis.

This village is now remarkable as the residence of Mr. Gaskin, a man of the most sterling merit as an astronomer and maker of exquisite telescopes; father of Mr. Gaskin, late tutor of Jesus College, Cambridge, so well known for his mathematical accomplishments.

† Lives of Statesmen, vol. i. p. 321.

Here he bowed sarcastically to the Chief Justice, while he dwelt and paused upon the name of the heavenly archetype.

As a lawyer, without being very profound, and confining his learning to the ordinary matters of common law, he yet knew quite enough for ordinary occasions; and afterwards, as generally happens with able men, Sir W. Grant among them, greatly extended his information when raised to the bench. As an advocate he was vigorous, impressive, adventurous; more daring than skilful; often, from his boldness, not a safe leader; always despising the slow progress, the indirect avenues to victory, which the rules of art prescribe;-preferring to vault over obstacles, follow the shortest line, and cut the knot rather than waste time in untying it. But he could powerfully address the feelings, whether to rouse indignation at cruelty, or contempt at fraud, or scorn at meanness. For his own nature had nothing harsh in it, except his irascible temper, quickly roused, as quickly appeased; his mind was just, abhorring any deviation from equity; his nature was noble, holding in utter contempt everything low or base; his spirit was open, manly, honest, and ever moved with disgust at anything false or tricky; his courage was high, leaving him more scorn than compassion for nerves less firm than his own. Nor was it only the thunder of his fierce declamation-very effectual, though somewhat clumsy, and occasionally coarse-with which he could prevail against an adversary, and master an audience. He had no mean power of ridicule, as playful as a mind more strong than refined could make it; while of sarcasm he was an eminent professor, but of the kind which hacks, and tears, and flays its victims, rather than destroys by cutting keenly. His vigorous understanding, holding no fellowship with anything that was petty or paltry, naturally saw the contemptible or inconsistent, and therefore, in this wise, ludicrous

aspect of things; nor did he apply any restraint on this propensity of his nature when he came into stations where it could less freely be indulged. His interrogative exclamation in Lord Melville's case, when the party's ignorance of having taken accommodation out of the public fund was alleged-indeed, was proved-may be remembered as very picturesque, though perhaps more pungent than dignified. "Not know secrecy money? Did he see it when it glittered? Did he hear it when it chinked?" On the bench he had the very well known, but not very eloquent Henry Hunt before him, who, in mitigation of an expected sentence, spoke of some who " complained of his dangerous eloquence."-"They do you great injustice, sir," said the considerate and merciful Chief Justice, kindly wanting to relieve him from all anxiety on this charge. After he had been listening to two conveyancers for a whole day of a long and most technical argument in silence, and with a wholesome fear of lengthening it by any interruption whatever, one of them in reply to a remark from another judge said, "If it is the pleasure of your lordships that I should go into that matter"—" We, sir," said the Chief Justice, "have no pleasure in it any way." When a favourite special pleader was making an excursion, somewhat unexpected by his hearers, as unwonted in him, into a pathetic topic-"An't we, sir, rather getting now into the high sentimental latitudes ?"

It was observed with some justice, that his periods occasionally, with his manner, reminded men of Johnson. When meeting the defence of an advocate for a libel on the Prince Regent, that it had been provoked by the gross, and fulsome, and silly flattery of some corrupt panegyrist "What," said he, "An offence against the law of the land provoked by an offence against the laws of taste! How frail is the tenure by which men hold their reputation, if it may be worn.

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