of the Great Seal, as guardian of his Majesty's conscience, as Lord High Chancellor of England —nay, even in that character alone in which the noble Duke would think it an affront to be considered as a MAN-I am at this moment as respectable-I beg leave to add, I am at this time as much respected as the proudest peer I now look down upon." The effect of this speech, both within the walls of Parliament and out of them, was prodigious. It gave Lord Thurlow an ascendency in the House which no Chancellor had ever possessed: it invested him, in public opinion, with a character of independence and honour; and this, though he was ever on the unpopular side in politics, made him. always popular with the people.-Butler's Reminis

cences.

IN

28.

N 1849, Baron Lionel Nathan de Rothschild was returned as one of the members for the city of London. None could question his return; no law affirmed his incapacity; then how was he excluded? By an oath designed for Roman Catholics, whose disabilities had been removed. He sat there for two sessions in expectation of relief from the legislature; but being again disappointed, he resolved to try his rights under the existing law. Accordingly, in 1850, he presented himself at the table for the purpose of taking the oaths. Having been allowed, after some discussion, to be sworn upon the Old Testament (the form most binding

upon his conscience), he proceeded to take the oaths. The oaths of allegiance and supremacy were taken in the accustomed form; but from the oath of abjuration he omitted the words, "on the true faith of a Christian," as not binding on his conscience. He was immediately directed to withdraw; when, after many learned arguments, it was resolved that he was not entitled to sit or vote until he had taken the oath of abjuration in the form appointed by law. In 1851 a more resolute effort was made to overcome the obstacle offered by the oath of abjuration. Mr Alderman Salomons, a Jew, having been returned for the borough of Greenwich, omitted from the oath the words which were the Jews' stumbling-block. Treating these words as immaterial, he took the entire substance of the oath, with the proper solemnities. He was directed to withdraw; but on a later day, while his case was under discussion, he came into the House and took his seat within the bar, whence he declined to withdraw until he was removed by the Serjeant-at-Arms. The House agreed to a resolution in the same form as in the case of Baron de Rothschild. In the meantime, however, he had not only sat in the house, but had voted in three divisions. . . . In 1858, the Lords, yielding to the persuasion of the Conservative Premier, Lord Derby, agreed to a concession. A bill passed by the

Commons at once removed the only legal obstacle to the admission of the Jews to Parliament. To

B

. . The

...

this general enfranchisement the Lords declined to assent; but they allowed either House, by resolution, to omit the excluding words from the oath of abjuration. The Lords' amendments found little favour with the Commons, but they were accepted under protest, and the bill was passed. House of Commons was indeed open to the Jew; but he came as a suppliant. Two years later the scandal was corrected, and the Jew, though still holding his title by a standing order of the Commons, and not under the law, acquired a permanent settlement.

29.

BOILEAU one day met the servant of a friend

who had been long and frequently afflicted

with the gout. On inquiring how his master was (whom he knew to be of a quick temper), the valet replied, that his master was then under a fit of his old complaint. "He swears a good deal, then," observed the poet. "Oh yes, sir," said the valet, with much simplicity, "it is the only comfort my poor master has in his illness."

A

30.

LADY, who had been invited to the consecra

tion of Cardinal de Retz, at the Sorbonne, perceiving a large circle of bishops attending the ceremony, exclaimed, "I feel myself in paradise.” "In paradise, madam,” replied a gentleman next to her; "do you think that there are so many bishops there?"

I

31.

REMEMBER Mr Wordsworth saying that he thought we had pleasanter days in the outset of life, but that our years glide on pretty even one with another, as we gained in variety and richness that we lost in intensity.-Hazlitt.

AN

32.

N Italian, who was very much addicted to gaming, very poor and very unlucky, used to exclaim in these unfortunate occasions, "O fortuna traditrice! tu mi poi ben far perdere ; ma pager no"-Fortune, thou vile traitress! it is true you can make me lose, but you cannot make me pay.

33.

WHAT a disgusting publication these five

volumes of Lady M. W. Montagu's Letters! Though generally shrewd, and sometimes witty, they have no grace of style, no enchantment of fancy. Sarcastic slander is their forte. On politics, on which they very seldom speak, the little they do say is more just than on any other theme, except that of impressing on the minds of parents the benefits of giving their daughters a taste for literature; yet if we were to trust their tasteless criticisms, nothing has been written worth reading. Libertine in principle, as licentious, by all accounts, she was in her conduct, Lady Mary W. M. seems to have been dead as an Egyptian mummy to all the various genius and learning which sprung up and bloomed in England during the period of her

existence. Looking back, with juster eyes than we look on the present epoch, it has long been the fashion to call, with truth, that period Augustan.

Her Ladyship provoked her once adoring friend Pope to abuse her unjustifiably, though perhaps not causelessly, and that by the neglect with which she received and the contempt with which she spoke of his immortal poetry. Thus it is to envy what we ought to admire! The abuse she incurred from his pen was, however, less atrocious than his mean disavowal of it was despicable. But there is no wondering that he was irritated, and grew to hate the being he had once too fondly admired; since, in the zenith of his admiration, it reached his ear that she had lyingly called him "the thing of sound without sense." Where was her own sense so to call the more than Horace of his time?

Lady Mary a lover of literature !-she! who is a contemner of history and of travels! a blasphemer of the intuitive glories of Richardson's mind—an universal "Smell-fungus!"

It was fit that she should so write of Richardson, on whose voluminous epistolary pages the name of Shakspeare cannot once be found; for Richardson, insensible as she was to his powers, is the Shakspeare of prose. Lady Mary was never resident at Bologna, and judged of the character of its inhabitants by that of the natives of the other Italian cities; but Richardson had received better information.-Seward.