sistent with the supposition of his having had a knowledge of the secret, and even been engaged in the copying of the letters, without being their author; and it must be added that the same supposition tallies also with the greater part, if not the whole, of the circumstances above detailed. In this belief it is upon the whole, perhaps, both most reasonable and most charitable to rest. If he felt the imputation of the authorship to be so grievous a charge against him, he has full right to plead the integrity and honour of his whole life in vindication from the main accusation, while his only being privy to the secret would imply no criminality at all, and his having had a merely mechanical share in the publication might be accounted for by private authority or by official or personal relationship. An opinion has been very generally prevalent that the authorship of Junius was known to George III. Certainly the Letters to Lord North make mention of Sir P. Francis several times; but with commendation which that prince was very little likely to bestow had he suspected him either of the authorship or of any connexion with the author. The interest shown in his appointment to India can hardly be supposed to arise from that promotion having silenced Junius, and the strong feeling against Hastings cannot be considered as arising from a partiality for his adversary as Junius.

From the purport of the preceding pages will be gathered an opinion upon the whole considerably lower of this distinguished individual than may be found embodied in the panegyrical portraiture of Mr. Burke's speech on the India Bill. It would not be correct to speak, even as regards Indian affairs, of "his deep reach of thought, his large legislative conceptions, his grand plans of policy," because the mind of Sir Philip Francis was not framed upon a model like this, which might serve for the greatest genius that ever shone upon state affairs. It is also an exaggeration for

Mr. Burke and his colleagues to affirm that "from him all their lessons had been learnt, if they had learnt any good ones." But the highest part of the eulogy rises into no exaggeration:-"This man, driven from his employment, discountenanced by the directors, had no other reward and no other distinction but that inward 'sunshine of the soul,' which a good conscience can always bestow on itself."

MR. HORNE TOOKE.

MENTION has been made of the enmity which Mr. Horne Tooke always bore towards Sir Philip Francis; and it is not to be forgotten, among the circumstances which tend to connect the latter with Junius, that a fierce controversy had raged between the author of the Letters and the great grammarian; a controversy in which, although no one now doubts that the former was worsted, yet certainly the balance of abuse had been on his side, and the opinion of the public at the time was generally in his favour. Another circumstance of the same description is the zeal with which Sir Philip Francis always espoused the quarrel of Wilkes, as vehemently as he made war on Lord Mansfield. Few who recollect the debates of 1817 can forget the violence with which he attacked a member of the House of Commons for having said something slighting of Wilkes, while the eulogy of Lord Mansfield that accompanied the censure did not certainly recommend it to Sir Philip's palate. "Never while you live, Sir, say a word in favour of that corrupt judge."—"It was only the eloquence of his judgment on Wilkes's case that was praised."- "But the rule is never to praise a bad man for anything. Remember Jack Lee's golden rule, and be always abstemious of praise to an enemy. Lord Mansfield was sold on the Douglas cause, and the parties are known through whom the money was paid. As for Wilkes, whatever may be laid to his charge, joining to run him down, is joining the enemy to hurt a friend." Sir P. Francis's instinctive rage on such subjects as

must most have moved the author of Junius was very remarkable. The last and greatest effort which that shallow, violent, and unprincipled writer made, was against the illustrious judge, and it was attended with a signal discomfiture, sufficient to account for his ceasing to write under a name thus exposed to contempt for an arrogance which no resources sustained. Hence the bitterness with which the name of Mansfield was recollected by Sir P. Francis, suited exceedingly well the hypothesis of his identity with Junius; and Horne Tooke's hatred of Francis seems to betoken a suspicion, on his part, of some connexion with the anonymous writer. His warfare with Wilkes, whom both Junius and Francis always defended, is as well known as his controversy with Junius.

No man out of office all his life, and out of parliament all but a few months of its later period, ever acted so conspicuous a part in the political warfare of his times as Horne Tooke. From his earliest years he had devoted himself to the cause of liberty, and had given up the clerical profession because its duties interfered with secular controversy, which he knew to be his proper element. element. With the pursuits of the bar he perhaps unjustly conceived that this kind of partizanship could be more easily reconciled; but the indelible nature of English orders prevented him from being admitted a member of the legal profession; and he was thus thrown upon the world of politics and of letters for an occupation. His talents in both these spheres were of a high order. To great perspicacity, uncommon quickness of apprehension, a ready wit, much power of application, he joined a cautious circumspection, and calm deliberation not often found in such company, and possessed a firmness of purpose not to be daunted by any danger, a steady perseverance not to be relaxed by difficulties, but rather to be warmed into new zeal by any attempt at opposition. That he was crafty, however, as well as sagacious and

reflecting, soon appeared manifest; and when he was found often to put others forward on the stage, while he himself prompted behind the scenes, or moved the wires of the puppet, a distrust of him grew up which enabled plain dealers, pursuing a more straightforward course, to defeat him when they happened to fall out, although their resources were in every respect incomparably less ample. Notwithstanding this defect, fertile in expedients, bold in council, confident of his own powers, his influence was very great with the popular party, to whom indeed he was largely recommended by the mere facility of writing when compositions were wanted on the spur of the occasion, and the power of attacking their adversaries and defeating their friends, through the press, now first become a great engine of political force. For many years therefore he was the adviser and partizan of greatest weight among the high liberty party, that body which numbers its supporters out of doors by the million, and yet is often almost unrepresented in either house of parliament; that body which regards the interests of the people, in other words its own interests, as everything, and the schemes, the tactics, the conflicts, of the regular parties, as nothing, except a proof of Party being a game played for the interests of a few under the guise of public principle.

Personal considerations, as well as strongly-entertained opinions, gave this view of Party a strong hold over Mr. Tooke's mind. He had never become acquainted with the Whig leaders, except in conflict. With those of the opposite faction of course he never could amalgamate. The aristocratic and exclusive nature of Whig society, the conviction then prevailing, and at all times acted upon, that the whole interests of the state are wrapt up in those of "The Party," while those of the party are implied by the concerns of a few great families, their dependents, and their favourites,—was sure to keep at an unpassable distance

H