Part 25

This nobleman had built a beautiful house (which he called Neptune) near Dublin, and walled in a deer-park to operate medicinally, by inducing him to use more riding exercise than he otherwise would take. Mr. Magee, printer of the Dublin Evening Post (who was what they call a little cracked, but very acute), one of the men whom his lordship had held to excessive bail, had never forgiven it, and purchased a plot of ground under my lord’s windows, which he called “_Fiat-hill_:” there he entertained the populace of Dublin, once a week, with various droll exhibitions and sports:—such, for instance, as asses dressed up with wigs and scarlet robes; dancing dogs, in gowns and wigs, as barristers; soaped pigs, &c. These assemblies, although productive of the greatest annoyance to his lordship, were not sufficiently riotous to be termed a public nuisance, being solely confined to Magee’s own field, which his lordship had unfortunately omitted to purchase when he built his house.

The earl, however, expected at length to be clear of his tormentor’s feats—at least for awhile; as Magee was found guilty on a charge of libel, and Lord Clonmel would have no qualms of conscience in giving _justice_ full scope by keeping him under the eye of the marshal, and consequently an absentee from “Fiat-hill,” for a good space of time.

Magee was brought up for judgment, and pleaded himself, in mitigation, that he was ignorant of the publication, not having been in Dublin when the libel appeared; which fact, he added, Lord Clonmel well knew. He had been, indeed, entertaining the citizens under the earl’s windows, and saw his lordship peeping out from the side of one of them the whole of that day; and the next morning he had overtaken his lordship riding into town. “And by the same token,” continued Magee, “your lordship was riding _cheek by jowl_ with your own brother, Matthias Scott, the tallow-chandler,[72] from Waterford, and audibly discussing the price of fat, at the very moment I passed you.”

Footnote 72:

Lord Clonmel and Matthias Scott vied with each other which had the largest and most hanging pair of cheeks—vulgarly called _jowls_. His lordship’s chin was a treble one, whilst Matthias’s was but doubled;—but then it was broader and hung deeper than his brother’s.

There was no standing this:—a general laugh was inevitable; and his lordship, with that address for which he was so remarkable, (affecting to commune a moment with his brother judges) said,—“it was obvious, from the poor man’s manner, that he was not just then in a state to receive definitive judgment; that the paroxysm should be permitted to subside before any sentence could be properly pronounced. For the present, therefore, he should only be given into the care of the marshal, till it was ascertained how far the state of his intellect should regulate the court in pronouncing its judgment.” The marshal saw the crisis, and hurried away Magee before he had further opportunity of incensing the chief justice.

Theophilus Swift, who, though an Irishman, practised at the English bar, gave rise to one of the most curious libel cases that ever occurred in Ireland, and which involved a point of very great interest and importance.

Theophilus had two sons. In point of figure, temper, disposition, and propensities, no two brothers in the whole kingdom were so dissimilar. Dean Swift, the elder, was tall, thin, and gentlemanly, but withal an unqualified reformer and revolutionist: the second, Edmond, was broad, squat, rough, and as fanatical an ultra-royalist as the king’s dominions afforded. Both were clever men in their way.

The father was a free-thinker in every respect;—fond of his sons, although materially different from either, but agreeing with the younger in being a professed and extravagant loyalist. He was bald-headed, pale, slender, and active—with gray eyes, and a considerable squint: an excellent classic scholar, and versed likewise in modern literature and belles lettres. In short, Theophilus Swift laid claim to the title of a sincere, kind-hearted man; but was, at the same time, the most visionary of created beings. He saw every thing whimsically—many things erroneously—and nothing like another person. Eternally in motion,—either talking, writing, fighting, or whatever occupation came uppermost, he never remained idle one second while awake, and I really believe was busily employed even in his slumbers.

His sons, of course, adopted entirely different pursuits; and, though affectionate brothers, _agreed_ in nothing save a love for each other and attachment to their father. They were both writers, and good ones; both speakers, and bad ones.

Military etiquette was formerly very conspicuous on some occasions. I well recollect when a man bearing the king’s commission was considered as bound to fight any body and every body that gave him the invitation. When the Duke of York was pleased to exchange shots with Colonel Lennox (afterwards Duke of Richmond), it was considered by our friend Theophilus as a personal offence to every gentleman in England, civil or military; and he held that every man who loved the reigning family should challenge Col. Lennox, until somebody turned up who was good marksman enough to penetrate the colonel, and thus punish his presumption.

Following up his speculative notions, Mr. Swift actually challenged Colonel Lennox for having had the arrogance to fire at the king’s son. The colonel had never seen or even heard of this antagonist; but learning that he was a barrister and a gentleman, he considered that, as a military man, he was bound to fight him as long as he thought proper. The result, therefore, was a meeting;—and Colonel Lennox shot my friend Theophilus clean through the carcase; so that, as Sir Callaghan O’Brallaghan says, “he made his body shine through the sun!”—Swift, according to all precedents on such occasions, first staggered, then fell—was carried home, and given over—made his will, and bequeathed the Duke of York a gold snuff-box! However, he recovered so completely, that when the Duke of Richmond went to Ireland as lord lieutenant, I (to my surprise) saw Swift at his grace’s first levee, most anxious for the introduction. His turn came; and without ceremony he said to the Duke, by way of a pun, that “the last time he had the honour of waiting on his grace, as Colonel Lennox, he received better entertainment—for that his grace had given him a _ball_!”

“True,” said the duke, smiling; “and now that I am lord lieutenant, the least I can do is to give you a _brace_ of them!”—and in due time, he sent Swift two special invitations to the balls, to make these terms consistent with his excellency’s compliments.

Swift, as will hence be inferred, was a romantic personage. In fact, he showed the most decisive determination not to die in obscurity, by whatever means his celebrity might be acquired.

A savage, justly termed _the monster_, had, during Swift’s career at the bar, practised the most horrid and mysterious crime we have yet heard of—namely, that of stabbing women indiscriminately in the street—deliberately and without cause. He was at length taken and ordered for trial: but so odious and detestable was his crime, that not a gentleman of the bar would act as his advocate. This was enough to induce Swift to accept the office. He argued truly, that every man must be presumed innocent till by legal proof he appears to be guilty, and that there was no reason why the monster should be excepted from the general rule, or that actual guilt should be presumed on the charge against him more than any other charge against any other person: that prejudice was a _primâ facie_ injustice; and that the crime of stabbing a lady with a weapon which was only calculated to wound, could not be _greater_ than that of stabbing her to the heart, and destroying her on the instant: that if the charge had been cutting the lady’s throat, he would have had his choice of advocates. This line of reasoning was totally unanswerable. He spoke and published his defence of the monster, who, however, was found guilty, and not half punished for his atrocity.

Theophilus had a competent private fortune; but as such men as he must somehow be always dabbling in what is called in Ireland “a bit of a law-suit,” a large per-centage of his rents never failed to get into the pockets of the attorneys and counsellors; and after he had recovered from the Duke of Richmond’s perforation, and the monster had been incarcerated, he determined to change his site, settle in his native country, and place his second son in the university of Dublin.

Suffice it to say, that he soon commenced a fracas with _all_ the fellows of the university, on account of their “not doing justice somehow,” as he said, “to the cleverest lad in Ireland!” and, according to his usual habit, he determined at once to punish several of the offenders by penmanship, and regenerate the great university of Ireland by a powerful, pointed, personal, and undisguised libel against its fellows and their ladies.

Theophilus was not without some plausible grounds to work upon; but he never considered that a printed libel did not admit of any legal justification. He at once put half a dozen of the fellows _hors de société_, by proclaiming them to be perjurers, profligates, impostors, &c. &c.; and printed, published, and circulated this his _eulogium_ with all the activity and zeal which belonged to his nature, working hard to give it a greater circulation than almost any libel published in Ireland, and that is saying a great deal!—but the main tenor of his charge was a most serious imputation and a very home one.

By the statutes of the Irish university, strict celibacy is required; and Mr. Swift stated “that the fellows of that university, being also clergymen, had sworn on the Holy Evangelists, that they would strictly obey and keep sacred these statutes of the university, in manner, form, letter, and spirit, as enjoined by their charter from the virgin queen. But that, notwithstanding such their solemn oath, several of these fellows and clergymen, flying in the face of the Holy Evangelists and Queen Elizabeth—and forgetful of morality, religion, common decency, and good example, had actually taken to themselves each one woman (at least), who went by the name of _Miss Such-a-one_, but who, in fact, had, in many instances, undergone, or was supposed to have undergone, the ceremony and consummation of marriage with such and such a perjured fellow and parson of Dublin university: and that those who had not so married, had done worse! and that, thereby, they had either perjured themselves or held out so vicious a precedent to youth, that he was obliged to take away his son, for fear of his morals becoming relaxed.”

It is easy to conceive that this publication, from the pen of a very gentlemanly, well-educated barrister, who had defended the _monster_ at the bar and the _Duke of York_ in Hyde Park, and showed himself ready and willing to write or fight with any man or body of men in Ireland, naturally made no small bustle and fuss among a portion of the university-men. Those who had kept out of the scrape by neither _marrying_ nor _doing worse_, were reported not to be in any state of deep mourning on the subject, as their _piety_ was the more conspicuous; and it could not hurt the feelings of either of them to reflect that he might possibly get a step in his promotion, on account of the defection of those seniors whose hearts might be broken, or removal made necessary, by the never-ending perseverance of this tremendous barrister, who had christened his son _Dean_ Swift, that he might appear a relative of that famous churchman, the patron and idol of the Irish people.

The gentlemen of the long robe were, of course, delighted with the occurrence: they had not for a long time met with so full and fair an opportunity of expending every sentence of their wit, eloquence, law, and logic, as in taking part in this celebrated controversy. I was greatly rejoiced at finding on my table a retainer _against_ the fellows and parsons of Trinity College, whom I formerly considered as a narrow-minded and untalented body of men, getting from 1000_l._ to 1500_l._ a year each for teaching several hundred students how to remain ignorant of most of those acquirements that a well-educated gentleman ought to be master of: it is true, the students had a fair chance of becoming good Latin scholars, of gaining a little Greek and Hebrew, and of understanding several books of Euclid, with three or four chapters of Locke on the Human Understanding, and a sixpenny treatise on logic written by the Rev. Dr. Murray, a very good divine, (one of the body,) to prove clearly that sophistry is superior to reason.[73] This being my opinion of them, I felt no qualms of conscience in undertaking the defence of Theophilus Swift, Esq., though most undoubtedly a gross libeller. It is only necessary to say, that Lord Clonmel, who had been (I believe) a sizer himself in that university, and, in truth, all the judges felt indignant (and with good reason) at Theophilus Swift’s so violently assailing and disgracing, in the face of the empire, the only university in Ireland—thus attacking the clergy though he defended a monster.

Footnote 73:

Nothing can so completely stamp the character of the university of Dublin as their suppression of the only school of eloquence in Ireland—“The Historical Society;”—a school from which arose some of the most distinguished, able, and estimable characters that ever appeared in the forum, or in the parliament of Ireland: this step was what the blundering Irish would call—“advancing backwards.”

An information was in due form granted against Theophilus; and as he could neither deny the fact nor plead a justification to the libel, of course we had but a bad case of it. But the worse the case the harder an Irish barrister always worked to make it appear a good one. I beg here to observe, that the Irish bar were never so decorous and mild at that time, as to give up their briefs in desperate cases, as I have seen done in England—politely to save (as asserted) public time, and conciliate their lordships: thus sending their clients out of court, because they _thought_ they were not _defensible_. On the contrary, as I have said, the _worse_ the case entrusted to an Irish barrister, the more zealously did he labour and fight for his client. If he thought it _indefensible_, why take a fee? but his motto was—While there is life there is hope. During the speeches of these resolute advocates, in obstinate cases, powder and perspiration mingled in cordial streams adown their features: their mouths, ornamented at each corner with generous froth, threw out half-a-dozen arguments, with tropes and syllogisms to match, while English gentlemen would have been cautiously pronouncing one monosyllable, and considering most discreetly what the next should be. In short, they always stuck to their cause to the very last gasp!—and it may appear fabulous to a steady, regular English expounder of the law, and conceder of cases, that I have repeatedly seen a cause which the bar, the bench, and the jury, seemed to think was irrevocably lost,—after a few hours’ rubbing and puffing, (like the exertions of the Humane Society,) brought into a state of restored animation; and, after another hour or two of cross-examination and perseverance, the judges and jury have changed their impressions, and sent home the cause quite alive in the pockets of the lawful owner and his laborious solicitor.

In making these observations, I cannot but mention a gentleman long at the very head of the bar, as prime serjeant of Ireland, Mr. James Fitzgerald.[74] I had a great friendship for him: I knew him in extensive practice, and never saw him give up one case while it had a single point to rest upon, or he a puff of breath left to defend it; nor did I ever see any barrister succeed, either wholly or partially, in so many cases out of a given number, as Mr. Fitzgerald: and I can venture to say (at least to think), that had that Right Honourable James Fitzgerald been sent ambassador to Stockholm in the place of the Right Honourable Vesey Fitzgerald, his _cher garçon_, he would have worked Bernadotte to the stumps, by treating him just as if he were a _motion_ in the court of exchequer. There was no treaty which the government of England might have ordered him to _insist_ upon, that he would not have carried, at all events to a degree, and pleaded for _costs_ into the bargain.

Footnote 74:

This is the Mr. James Fitzgerald who gave up the highest office of his profession rather than betray his country:—he opposed the Union zealously, and received and _deserved_ the most flattering address from the Irish bar.

This is a digression: but having been accustomed, for near forty years, to express my regard for that gentleman, and as this is probably the last time I shall ever have an opportunity of doing so, I was determined in my “last speech” not to be forgetful of my old, and, I really believe, sincere friend.

And now, reader! (I have in my preface stated my objections to the epithet _gentle_) we will go back to Theophilus Swift, and the college, and the King’s Bench. The trial at length came on, and there were decidedly more parsons present than I believe ever appeared in any court of justice of the same dimensions. The court set out full gallop against us: nevertheless, we worked on—twice twelve judges could not have stopped us! I cross-examined the most learned man of the whole university, Dr. Barret, a little, greasy, shabby, croaking, round-faced vice-provost: he knew of nothing on earth, save books and guineas—seldom went out, held but little intercourse with men, and none at all with women. I worked at him unsuccessfully for more than an hour; not one decisive sentence could I get him to pronounce: at length, he grew quite tired of me, and I thought to conciliate him by telling him that his father had christened me. “Indeed!” exclaimed he: “Oh!—I did not know you were a _Christian_!” At this unexpected repartee, the laugh was so strong against me, that I found myself silenced. My colleagues worked as hard as I: but a seventy-horse power could not have moved the court. It was, however, universally admitted that there was but one little point against us out of a hundred which the other side had urged: that point too had only three letters in it: yet it upset all our arguments: that talismanic word “_law_” was more powerful than two speeches of three hours each;—and, by the unanimous concurrence of the court and jury, Theophilus Swift, Esq., was found guilty of writing, publishing, (and undoubtedly _proving_,) that certain parsons, fellows of Dublin University, had been living (conjugally) with certain persons of an entirely different sex: and, in consequence, he was sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment in his Majesty’s close, called the “gaol of Newgate,” where he took up his residence with nearly two hundred and forty felons and handy pickpockets—exclusive of burglars, murderers, and United Irishmen, who were daily added to that select society.

My poor visionary friend was in a sad state of depression: but Heaven had a banquet in store for him which more than counterbalanced all his discomfitures:—an incident that I really think even the oracle of Delphos never would have thought of predicting.

The Rev. Doctor Burrows was, of all the parsons, the most inveterate enemy and active prosecutor of my friend Theophilus: he was one of those who, in despite of Queen Elizabeth, and the rules of the Holy Trinity, had fallen in love, and indulged his concupiscence by uniting his fortunes and person with the object of it in the holy bands, without a dispensation—and by that incontinent omission got within the circle of Swift’s anti-moralists. This reverend person determined to make the public hate Theophilus, if possible, as much as he did himself; and forgetting, in his zeal, the doctrine of libel, and the precedent which he had himself just helped to establish, set about to _slay_ the _slayer_, and write a _quietus_ for Theophilus Swift (as he supposed) during the rest of his days! Thus, hugging himself in all the luxury of complete revenge on a fallen foe, Dr. Burrows produced a libel nearly as unjustifiable against the prisoner, as the prisoner had promulged against him: and having printed, published, and circulated the same, his reverence and madam conceived they had executed full justice on the enemy of marriage and the clergy. But, alas! they reckoned without their host: no sooner had I received a copy of this redoubtable pamphlet, than I hastened to my friend Theophilus, whom, from a state of despondency and unhappiness, I had the pleasure, in half an hour, of seeing at least as happy and more pleased than any king in Europe. It is unnecessary to say more than that I recommended an immediate prosecution of the Rev. Doctor Burrows, for a false, gross, and malicious libel against Theophilus Swift, Esq. Never was any prosecution better founded, or more clearly and effectually supported; and it took complete effect. The reverend prosecutor, now culprit in his turn, was sentenced to one-half of Swift’s term of imprisonment, and sent off to the same _close_ and same company as Theophilus.

The learned fellows were astounded; the university so far disgraced; and the triumphant Swift immediately published both trials, with observations, and notes critical and historical, &c.

But, alas! the mortification of the reverend fellow did not end here. On arriving at his Majesty’s gaol of Newgate, (as the governor informed me,) the doctor desired a room as high up as could be had, that he might not be disturbed whilst remaining in that mansion. The governor informed him, with pungent regret, that he had not a pigeon-hole unoccupied at the time, there being upward of two hundred and forty prisoners, chiefly pickpockets, many of whom were waiting to be transported; and that, till these were got rid of, he had no room, nay, not even a _cell_, that would answer his reverence: but there was a very neat little chamber in which were only _two_ beds—one occupied by a respectable and polite gentleman; and if the doctor could manage in this way meanwhile, his reverence might depend on a preference the moment there should be a vacancy, by the removal of the pickpockets.

Necessity has no law; and the doctor, forced to acquiesce, desired, though with a heavy heart, to be shown to the chamber. On entering, the gentleman and he exchanged bows; but in a moment both started and stared involuntarily at sight of each other. On one was to be seen the smile of triumph, on the other the grin of mortification. But Swift (naturally the _pink_ of politeness) gave no reason for an increase of the doctor’s chagrin. On the contrary, after several obeisances, (looking steadily at his own nose with one eye, and fixing the other on the parson,) my friend Theophilus commenced a rapid and learned dissertation upon the Greek and Latin classics, natural philosophy, Locke on the Human Understanding, &c. &c. running on without stop or stay, until he perceived an incipient relaxation in the muscles of his reverence’s face.