of his misadventures in fishing. Being emulous of the fame of Isaac Walton, he had accompanied Lord Grosvenor to one of his country seats that was close to streams, the luxury of anglers. He bargained to be left alone, and have his hook properly baited. He remained stationary at the brink till the first dinner bell." Well! what have you brought ?" was the inquiry. "The fishing rod," was his quiet answer. "But where are the fish?" "In the pond, as they were not put out of their way in the least." In print the anecdote appears fâde and pointless, but it delighted the company, for they were charmed with the manner, the look, the voice, the play of feature, the italics of pleasantry which cannot be written down. The reported jest is in general no more than the empty mask and robe of the masquerade. Lord Stowell had not established a name in society by sudden bon mots*, or unexpected repartees, or lively sallies, but by qualities which diffuse more pleasure, though less susceptible of delineation, -the easy flow of narrative, the sly humour, the apposite illustration, the naïve story, and, what Englishmen appreciate so highly because they understand so well, the constant tone of a gentleman. The varied life of Lord Stowell may be divided into three epochs, each of them marked by characters of peculiar excellence and fraught with tokens of distinction. The first eighteen years were spent in classical pursuits at Oxford, in training the intellect of the aristocracy, in making philosophy teach by examples from the historian's chair. During the next fifteen years we trace through all the literary circles of London the "Dr. Scott of the Commons," the friend of Reynolds and Burke and Malone, the favourite of the Turk's Head Club, the oracle of the Consistory Court, delivering discourses on the regulation of the domestic forum, which Addison would have loved for their elegance and Johnson for their morality. In the next thirty years we behold him in the Admiralty chair He would sometimes make a sharp retort. When a late celebrated duchess bantered the Consistory Judge, and inquired, "How his Court would manage if he himself should be guilty of a faux-pas," he answered, with a gallantry becoming the question, "that the idea of such an embarrassing situation had only occurred to him since he had become acquainted with her Grace." forming a system of national law from the ill-fashioned labours of his predecessors, erecting a temple of jurisprudence, and laying its foundations not on fleeting policy or in occasional interests, but in universal and immutable justice. His name has vanished from the peerage; he has left no son to transmit his honours. He had outlived his generation, and the candidates for noisy notoriety concealed the retiring veteran from the stage. He has sunk into the grave, not unwept, indeed, nor unhonoured, nor unsung, but with a less vivid expression of regret than if he had not exceeded the common span of human life. This is the natural penalty which extreme old age must be content to pay, and it would be idle to complain of it. But he has left a name which the proudest transmitter of hereditary rank might envy. The name of Scott, the title of Lord Stowell, can never be forgotten."Quidquid amavimus quidquid mirati sumus, manet mansurumque est in animis." The honours he has won will be co-existent with the language, and require not for their preservation the blazoning of the Herald's Office. The piety of kinsmen has marked his head-stone: in the chapel of University College there was a vacant place near the statue of Sir William Jones, which the gratitude of relatives has filled with his name. But beyond the testimonies to departed worth of pious relatives and affectionate friends, there is a national tribute due from his country, which, for the sake of rising talent, and of those who shall come after, we hope to see at length bestowed. National wealth is never more profitably invested than in recompensing national virtue, and they are little apprecient of human sympathies who undervalue the honours of the tomb. In his cathedral church, where a splendid cenotaph has been erected to the memory of Cuthbert, Lord Collingwood, the like memorial should not be wanting to the merit of the great and good man who raised the character of our country for justice to the same height to which his schoolfellow had exalted it by his valour; nor will that country escape the imputation of ingratitude to her most distinguished jurist, should St. Paul's be defrauded of his monument. Note. The following is the beautiful Latin inscription which Lord Stowell wrote for the monument of his old tutor, the Rev. Mr. Moises, and which proves that he could have easily capped Latin epitaphs with Dr. Parr. We have omitted the formal parts. Juxta requiescit Reverendus HUGO MOISES, A. M. Postea, per longam annorum seriem, Vir erat ingenio eleganti et exculto. Indefessus ac felix. In regendis puerorum animis Omnium, quorum studiis dirigendis Commodis in omni genere promovendis Et in concionibus sacris Explicator diligens, doctus, disertus. CHAPTER VIII. THE LIFE OF LORD ELDON. "GREAT, good, and just," the commencing words of Montrose's beautiful eulogy on his sovereign, are the very epithets due of special right to the subject of this memoir. The son of a fitter, a small dealer in shipping coals, he filled, for a quarter of a century, the highest place of trust and power that can be filled by a subject; acting as public prosecutor in times of anger and faction, he had no private enemy; presiding for twenty years in the highest court of judicature, one only of his numerous and momentous judgments, involving millions of property, has been reversed! I rejoice to know that the memorable life of such a man, worthy to rank with Somers and Hardwicke, has been presented to the nation, whose inheritance it is, by one fully competent, and furnished with all appliances, to illustrate his character and recommend his example. But as eminent personages often sit to different artists for their likeness, that the favourite image may be seen under various aspects," another, yet the same; as accumulated resemblances of the wellknown countenance are often not unpleasing, and as this miniature was the first executed, however imperfectly, I shall proceed to finish a faithful and independent sketch, and complete this Gallery of Legal Worthies with the portrait of the righteous judge who would not have wished the tints to be too warmly coloured, nor disliked the picture because it had some shade. Unless the chronicler, free from malice as "honest Griffith," were permitted to discuss with freedom the merits and demerits of departed statesmen, and "nothing extenuate," biography would be as complaisant as a court calendar, but at the same time as wearisome. John Scott (Lord Eldon) was born in his father's house in Love Lane, Newcastle, June 4. 1751, a memorable anniversary in our national annals as the birth-day of the good old King George III. His kind master ascribed additional value to it from the circumstance of this coincidence. "Do not congratulate me," he said to his faithful Chancellor, "till I have paid my respects to you on this happy day." Mr. William Scott is described to have been a worthy, pains-taking man, but not remarkable above others in his calling. Mrs. Scott (talent is generally inherited from the mother) was distinguished for her shrewdness. A proud and happy mother, she just lived long enough to learn that her youngest and favourite son was ennobled, and then died in peace. Both William and John were fine-looking, clever lads; in high favour with their master, from their quickness of apprehension and strength of memory. John was the younger by six years, and of a less joyous temperament than his elder brother, but generally beloved for his kind and gentle disposition. He was well grounded in the classics for slender cost, as the son of a freeman, at that most valuable institution, the Newcastle Grammar School; of which the liberal and able head master, the Rev. Mr. Moises, survived to witness the splendid effects, and but for his native modesty and aversion to change, might have secured high preferment from a justly grateful pupil. The Chancellor had held the seals but a day or two before he gladdened the heart of his old preceptor by appointing him one of his chaplains. Lord Eldon's own sense of his obligations is expressed with much feeling in the following letter, written to the Rev. J. Brewster, of Egglescliff, in Durham, to acknowledge the copy of a Memoir which he had privately printed of that worthy man. "Dear Sir, "Pardon me if my engagements have made me too dilatory in acknowledging your kindness in sending me your Memoir of the late Master of the Grammar School in which we were both educated. It has highly gratified me to find that the public are in possession of such a record of that excellent person's merits and worth. I feel the obligation I owe you for the mention of my name in that work. Throughout a long life, in which it has pleased |