Part 22

Upward of an hour elapsed before I could even half convince him that he was wrong; but at length I hit on the only argument that could make any impression on him, and extracted a promise that he would let the affair drop:—“Grattan,” said I, “recollect matters, and have consideration for _me_.” He started:—“Yes,” continued I, “you know it was solely on my account that you exposed yourself to any insult; and do you think I could remain an idle _spectator_, in a conflict whereof I was the _cause_?—If you do not promise me that you will go ‘no further in this business,’ I shall instantly make the thing personal with Giffard _myself_.”

For a moment he was silent, then smiling—“Coriolanus,” said he, “replied to his parent—‘_Mother!_ you have conquered!’—I _will_ go no further.”

“I humbly thank you,” said I, “for making an old woman of me!”—He then went away, as I conceived, tolerably satisfied.—He had come thus privately (for the curtains were drawn round his chair) to avoid suspicion being excited of his intentions, and the authorities consequently interfering to prevent the combat. My surprise may be imagined, when, at six o’clock the next morning, I was roused by the same announcement of a _gentleman_ in a _chair_! I knew it must be Grattan, and directed him to be brought in.

I had now the same game to play over again. He said he had not slept a wink all night, from thinking about “that Giffard;” and that he “_must_ have a shot at him.” Another course now suggested itself to me, and I told him I had, on consideration, determined, whether right or wrong, that, if he persevered, I would wait upon the sheriff and get him bound over to keep the peace. He was not pleased at this, but had no option: he strode about the room, taking long steps and frequently raising himself up, as was his custom whenever agitated.—I was peremptory; and ultimately he agreed not to revive the subject during the election.

Mr. Egan (one of the roughest-looking persons possible), being at one time a supporter of government, made virulent philippics, in the Irish House of Commons, against the French Revolution. His figure was coarse and bloated, and his dress not over-elegant withal; in fact, he had by no means the look of a member of Parliament.

One evening he fell foul of a speech of Grattan’s; and among other absurdities, said in his paroxysm, that the right honourable gentleman’s speech had a tendency to introduce the _guillotine_ into the very body of the House: indeed, he almost thought he could already _perceive_ it before him!—(“Hear him! hear him!” echoed from Sir Boyle Roche.) Grattan good-humouredly replied, that the honourable member must have a vastly sharper sight than he had. He certainly could see no such thing: “but though,” added Grattan, looking with his glass toward Egan, “I may not see the guillotine, yet methinks I can perceive the _executioner_!”

“Order! order!” shouted Sir Boyle Roche: “_Dis_order! _dis_order!” cried Curran:—a general laugh prevented any further observation.

Colonel Burr, who had been vice-president of America, and probably would have been the next president, but for his unfortunate duel with General Hamilton, came over to England, and was made known to me by Mr. Randolph, of Virginia, a gentleman with whom I was very intimate. He requested I would introduce him to Mr. Grattan, whom he was excessively anxious to see. Colonel Burr was not a man of prepossessing appearance—rough-featured, and neither dressy nor polished—but a well-informed, sensible man; and though not a particularly agreeable, yet an instructive companion.[63]

Footnote 63:

I see in the “American Review” of the former edition of this work, a remark that I was _mistaken_ in my picture of Colonel Burr.—They must know better than me; I only state what my _impression_ was on superficial knowledge.

People in general form extravagant anticipations regarding eminent persons. The idea of a _great orator_ and _Irish chief_ carried with it, naturally enough, corresponding notions of physical powers, elegance, vigour, and dignity. Such was Colonel Burr’s mistake, I believe, about Mr. Grattan, and I took care not to undeceive him.

We went to my friend’s house, who was to leave London next day. I announced that Colonel Burr (from America), Mr. Randolph, and myself, wished to pay our respects; and the servant informed us that his master would receive us in a short time, but was at the moment much occupied on business of consequence. Burr’s expectations were of course on the alert! Randolph also was anxious to be presented to the great Grattan; and both impatient for the entrance of this Demosthenes. At length the door opened, and in hopped a small bent figure,—meagre, yellow, and ordinary; one slipper and one shoe; his breeches’ knees loose; his cravat hanging down; his shirt and coat-sleeves tucked up high, and an old hat upon his head.

This apparition saluted the strangers very courteously:—asked (without any introduction) how long they had been in England, and immediately proceeded to make inquiries about the late General Washington and the revolutionary war. My companions looked at each other:—their replies were costive, and they seemed quite impatient to see _Mr. Grattan_! I could scarcely contain myself; but determined to let my eccentric, unconscious countryman take his course: he appeared quite delighted to see his visitors, and was the most inquisitive person in the world. Randolph was far the tallest, and most dignified-looking man of the two, gray-haired and well-dressed: Grattan, therefore, took _him_ for the late vice-president, and addressed him accordingly. Randolph at length begged to know if they could shortly have the honour of seeing Mr. Grattan!—Upon which, our host (not doubting but they knew him) conceived it must be his _son_ James for whom they inquired, and said, he believed he had that moment wandered out somewhere to amuse himself!

This completely disconcerted the Americans: they looked at each other, then at me, and were about to make their bow and their exit, when I thought it high time to explain; and, taking Colonel Burr and Mr. Randolph respectively by the hand, introduced them to the Right Honourable Henry Grattan.

I never saw people stare so, or more embarrassed! Grattan himself now perceiving the cause, heartily joined in my merriment:—he pulled down his shirt-sleeves, pulled up his stockings, and, in his own irresistible way, apologised for the _outré_ figure he cut, assuring them he had totally overlooked his toilet, in anxiety not to keep them waiting; that he was returning to Ireland next morning, and had been busily packing up his books and papers in a closet full of dust and cobwebs! This circumstance rendered the interview more interesting: the subject of colonial independence recommenced, and Grattan shone. The Americans were charmed with their reception; and, after a protracted visit, retired highly gratified: whilst Grattan returned again to his books and cobwebs, regretting very heartily that his immediate departure prevented him from having the pleasure of their further society.

Nobody lamented more than myself the loss of this distinguished man and true patriot, who, as every one knows, breathed his last in the British metropolis, after a long and painful illness; and the public papers soon after announced, to my astonishment and chagrin, the fact of preparations being on foot for his interment in Westminster Abbey! I say, to my astonishment and chagrin; because it was sufficiently plain that this affected mark of respect was only meant to restrain the honest enthusiasm which might have attended his funeral obsequies in his own country.

The subtle minister then ruling the councils of Britain, knew full well that vanity is the falsest guide of human judgment, and therefore held out that Westminster Abbey (the indiscriminate dormitory of generals and spies—of ministers, admirals, and poets,) was the most honourable resting-place for the remains of an Irish patriot. This lure was successful; and, accordingly, he who had made British ministers tremble in the cabinet—whose forbearance they had propitiated by a tender of the king’s best palace in Ireland[64]—and whose fame they had, nevertheless, endeavoured to destroy, and whose principles they had calumniated,—was escorted to the grave by the most decided of his enemies, and (as if in mockery of his country and himself) inhumed among the inveterate foes of Ireland and of Grattan! It is mean to say that Lord Castlereagh had latterly _changed his opinion_, and become _civil_ to his illustrious opponent:—so much the worse! he thereby confessed that, in 1797, and the two following years, he had laboured to destroy an _innocent_ man and to disgrace an Irish patriot, who, during a great portion of that period, lay on the bed of sickness.

Footnote 64:

See my “Historic Memoirs of Ireland,” (vol. ii.) where this curious incident is fully detailed. The offer was unexampled; the refusal (in my opinion) injudicious.

The Duke of Leinster, doubtless with the best possible motives, but with a view of the subject differing from my own, suggested that Ireland should do honour to her patriot son, by erecting a cenotaph to his memory. This, I must confess, appears to me (I speak of it merely as matter of opinion) to be nothing more than cold-blooded mockery—a compliment diminutive and empty. Toward _such_ a monument I would not subscribe one farthing:—but if the revered ashes of my friend could be restored to his country, there is no Irishman who (in proportion to his means) would go beyond myself in contributing to raise a monumental column which should outvie the pillars dedicated in Dublin to the glorious butcheries of _Trafalgar and Waterloo_: while _these_ are proudly commemorated, no national pile records the more truly glorious triumphs of 1782—nor the formation of that irresistible army of volunteers which (in a right cause) defied all the power of England! But my voice shall not be silent: and deeply do I regret the untoward fate by which this just tribute to national and individual virtues has devolved upon the feeble powers of an almost superannuated writer.

Ireland gave me birth and bread; and though I am disgusted with its present state, I love the country still. I have endeavoured to give (in a more important work) some sketches of its modern history at the most prosperous epochas, with gloomy anecdotes of its fall as an independent kingdom; and if God grants me a little longer space, I shall publish my honest ideas of the ruin to which the British Empire will not long remain blind, if she continue to pursue the same system (which seven hundred years have proved to be a destructive one) in that misgoverned country.

Extract of a letter from Sir Jonah Barrington to the present Henry Grattan, Esq., M.P.:—

“My dear Grattan,

“I regret your not receiving my letter, in reply to yours, written immediately after the lamented departure of my honoured friend. In that letter I proposed forthwith to publish the sequel of my character of Mr. Grattan, accompanied with his portrait and some additional observations. I had composed the sequel, much to my own satisfaction, as the continuation of his character promised in the number of my historical work where I say ‘his career is not yet finished.’

“Your last letter did not reach me for five months, and having received no reply to mine, I threw the manuscript into the fire, keeping no copy; it was scarcely consumed, however, before I repented the having done so.

“But now permit an old and sensitive friend to expostulate a little with you, in the simple garb of queries:—

“Why, and for what good reason,—with what policy, or on what feeling, are the bones of the most illustrious of Irishmen suffered to moulder in the same ground with his country’s enemies?

“Why suffer him to be escorted to the grave by the mock pageantry of those whose political vices and corruptions ravished from Ireland every thing which his talent and integrity had obtained for her?

“Why send his countrymen on a foreign pilgrimage, to worship the shrine of their canonised benefactor? Were not the cathedrals of Ireland worthy to be honoured by his urn,—or the youths of Erin to be animated by knowing that they possessed his ashes? Can it be gratifying to the feelings of his countrymen to pay the sexton of a British abbey a mercenary shilling for permission even to see the grave-stone of your parent?[65]

“You were deceived by the blandishments of our mortal enemy: he knew that political idolatry has great power, and excites great influence in nations. The shrine of a patriot has often proved to be the standard of liberty; and it was therefore good policy in a British statesman to suppress our excitements:—the mausoleum of Rousseau is raised in France—the _tradition_ of Grattan only will remain to his compatriots.

“He lived the life—he died the death—but he does not sleep in the tomb of an Irish patriot! England has taken away our constitution, and even the relics of its founder are retained through the duplicity of his enemy.

“You have now my sentiments on the matter, and by frankly expressing them, I have done my duty to you, to myself, and to my country.

“Your ever affectionate and sincere friend,

“JONAH BARRINGTON.”

Footnote 65:

I was myself once refused even admittance into Westminster Abbey, wherein his ashes rest!—the sexton affirming that the _proper hour_ was past!

HIGH LIFE IN NEWGATE.

Lord Aldborough quizzes the Lord Chancellor—Voted a libeller by the House of Peers—His spirited conduct—Sentenced to imprisonment in Newgate by the Court of King’s Bench—Memoirs of Mr. Knaresborough—His extraordinary trial—Sentenced to death, but transported—Escapes from Botany Bay, returns to England, and is committed to Newgate, where he seduces Lady Aldborough’s attendant—Prizes in the lottery—Miss Barton dies in misery.

Lord Aldborough was an arrogant and ostentatious man; but these failings were nearly redeemed by his firmness and gallantry in his memorable collision with Lord Chancellor Clare.

Lord Aldborough, who had built a most tasteful and handsome house immediately at the northern extremity of Dublin, had an equity suit with Mr. Beresford, a nephew of Lord Clare, as to certain lots of ground close to his lordship’s new and magnificent mansion, which, among other conveniences, had a chapel on one wing and a theatre on the other, stretching away from the centre in a chaste style of ornamental architecture.

The cause was in Chancery, and was not protracted very long. Lord Aldborough was defeated, with full costs: his pride, his purse, and his mansion, must all suffer; and meddling with either of these was sufficient to rouse his lordship’s spleen. He appealed, therefore, to the House of Peers, where, in due season, the cause came on for hearing, and where the chancellor himself presided. The lay lords did not much care to interfere in the matter; and, without loss of time, Lord Clare of the House of Peers confirmed the decree of Lord Clare of the Court of Chancery, with full costs against the appellant.

Lord Aldborough had now no redress but to write _at_ the lord chancellor; and without delay he fell to composing a book against Lord Clare and the system of appellant jurisdiction, stating that it was totally an abuse of justice to be obliged to appeal to a prejudiced man against his own prejudices,—and particularly so in the present instance, Lord Clare being notorious as an unforgiving chancellor to those who vexed him: few lords attending to hear the cause, and such as did not being much wiser for the hearing:—it being the province of counsel to puzzle not to inform noblemen, he had no chance.

Lord Aldborough, in his book, humorously enough stated an occurrence that had happened to himself when travelling in Holland. His lordship was going to Amsterdam on one of the canals in a trekschuit—the captain or skipper of which, being a great rogue, extorted from his lordship for his passage much more than he had a lawful right to claim. My lord expostulated with the skipper in vain: the fellow grew rude; his lordship persisted; the skipper got more abusive. At length Lord Aldborough told him he would, on landing, immediately go to the proper tribunals and get redress from the judge. The skipper cursed him as an impudent _milord_, and desired him to do his worst, snapping his tarry _finger-posts_ in his lordship’s face. Lord Aldborough paid the demand, and, on landing, went to the legal officer to know when the court of justice would sit. He was answered, at nine next morning. Having no doubt of ample redress, he did not choose to put the skipper on his guard by mentioning his intentions. Next morning he went to court, and began to tell his story to the judge, who sat with his broad-brimmed hat on, in great state, to hear causes of that nature. His lordship fancied he had seen the man before; nor was he long in doubt! for ere he had half finished, the judge, in a voice like thunder, (but which his lordship immediately recognised, for it was that of the identical skipper!) decided against him _with full costs_, and ordered him out of court. His lordship, however, said he would _appeal_, and away he went to an advocate for that purpose. He did accordingly appeal, and the next day his appeal cause came regularly on. But all his lordship’s stoicism forsook him, when he again perceived that the very same skipper and judge was to decide _the appeal_ who had decided _the cause_; so that the learned skipper first cheated, and then sent him about his business, with three sets of _costs_ to console him.

The noble writer having in his book made a very improper and derogatory application of this Dutch precedent to Lord Chancellor Clare and the Irish appellant jurisdiction, was considered by his brother peers as having committed a gross breach of their privileges, and was thereupon ordered to attend in his place, and defend himself (if any defence he had) from the charge made against him by the lord chancellor and the peers of Ireland. Of course the House of Lords was thronged to excess to hear his lordship’s vindication. I went an hour before it met, to secure a place behind the throne, where the commoners were allowed to crowd up as well as they could.

The chancellor, holding the vicious book in his hand, asked Lord Aldborough if he admitted that it was of his writing and publication? To which his lordship replied,—that he could admit nothing as written or published by him, till every word of it should be first truly read to their lordships aloud in the House. Lord Clare, wishing to curtail some parts, began to read it himself; but being rather short, and not quite near enough to the light, his opponent took a pair of enormous candlesticks from the table, walked deliberately up to the throne, and requested the chancellor’s permission to hold the candles for him whilst he was reading the book! This novel sort of effrontery put the chancellor completely off his guard: he was outdone, and permitted Lord Aldborough to hold the lights, whilst he read aloud the libel comparing himself to a Dutch skipper: nor did the obsequious author omit to set him right here and there when he omitted a word or proper emphasis. It was ludicrous beyond example, and gratifying to the secret ill-wishers of Lord Clare, who bore no small proportion to the aggregate numbers of the House. The libel being duly read through, Lord Aldborough at once spiritedly and adroitly said that he avowed every word of it to their lordships;—but that it was not intended as any _libel_ either against the House or the jurisdiction, but as a constitutional and just rebuke to their lordships for not performing their bounden duty in attending the hearing of the appeal: he being quite certain that if any sensible men had been present, the lord chancellor would only have had two lords and two bishops (of his own creation) on his side of the question.

This was considered as an aggravation of the contempt, though some thought it was not very far from matter-of-fact.—The result was, that after a bold speech, delivered with great earnestness, his lordship was voted guilty of a high breach of privilege toward the Irish House of Peers, and a libel on the lord chancellor, as chairman of the House.

His lordship was afterward ordered to Newgate for six months by the Court of King’s Bench (on an information filed against him by the attorney-general for a libel on Lord Clare); which sentence, he told them, he considered, under the circumstances, as a high compliment and honour. In fact, he never was so pleased as when speaking of the incident, and declaring that he expected to have his book recorded on the Journals of the Lords:—the chancellor himself (by _applying_ his anecdote of the Dutch skipper) having construed it into a regular episode on his own proceedings and those of the peerage.

Lord Aldborough underwent his full sentence in Newgate; and his residence there gave rise to a fresh incident in the memoirs of a very remarkable person, who, at that time, was an inmate of the same walls (originally likewise through the _favour_ of Chancellor Clare), and lodged on the same staircase; and as I had been professionally interested in this man’s affairs, I subjoin the following statement as curious, and in every circumstance, to my personal knowledge, matter-of-fact.

James Fitzpatrick Knaresborough was a young man of tolerable private fortune in the county of Kilkenny. Unlike the common run of young men at that day, he was sober, money-making, and even avaricious, though moderately hospitable; his principal _virtue_ consisting in making no _exhibition_ of his _vices_. He was of good figure; and, without having the presence of a gentleman, was what is called a handsome young fellow.

Mr. Knaresborough had been accused of a capital crime by a Miss Barton, (natural daughter of William Barton, Esq., a magistrate of the county of Kilkenny,) who stated that she had gone away with him for the purpose, and in the strict confidence, of being married the same day at Leighlin Bridge.—Her father was a gentleman, a magistrate, and of consideration in the county, and a warrant was granted against Knaresborough for the felony; but he contrived to get liberated on bail—the amount being doubled. The grand-jury, however, on the young woman’s testimony, found true bills against him for the capital offence, and he came to Carlow to take his trial at the assizes. He immediately called on me with a brief,—said it was a mere _bagatelle_, and totally unfounded,—and that his acquittal would be a matter of course. I had been retained against him; but introduced him to the present Judge Moore, to whom he handed his brief. He made so light of the business, that he told me to get up a famous speech against him, as no doubt I was instructed to do: that indeed I could not say too much; as the whole would appear, on _her own confession_, to be a conspiracy! nay, so confident was he of procuring his acquittal, that he asked Mr. Moore and myself to dine with him on our road to Kilkenny, which we promised.

On reading my brief, I found that, truly, the case was not over-strong against him even there, where, in all probability, circumstances would be exaggerated; and that it rested almost exclusively on the lady’s own evidence: hence, I had little doubt that, upon cross-examination, the prisoner would be acquitted.