was struck. In these respects the North Briton is as much inferior to him, as in strength, wit, and judgment. But while I expected in his daring flight his final ruin and fall, behold him rising still higher, and coming down souse upon both Houses of Parliament. Yes! he did make you his quarry,* and you still bleed from the wounds of his talons. Nor has he dreaded the terrors of your brow, Sir.† He has attacked even you; he has, and I believe you have no reason to triumph in the encounter. In short, after carrying our royal eagle in his pounces, and dashing him against a rock,‡ he has laid you prostrate. Kings, Lords, and Commons are but the sport of his fury.

"Were he a member of this House, what might not be expected from his knowledge, his firmness, and integrity? He would be easily known by his contempt of all danger, by his penetration, by his vigor. Nothing would escape his vigilance and activity. Bad ministers could conceal nothing from his sagacity; nor could promises, nor threats induce him to conceal any thing from the public."

The staid and even-tempered Lord North was not too fastidious to mention the terrific boar of the woods. He said of him, "When factious and discontented men have brought things to this pass, why should we be surprised at the difficulty of bringing libellers to justice? Why should we wonder that the great boar of the wood, this mighty JUNIUS has broke through the toils, and foiled the hunters? Though

* Quarry. Game flown at by a hawk; hence the phrase-he made game of him. The word is unknown among the people of America, where the royal sport of falconry is not yet introduced.

Sir Fletcher Norton, Speaker of the House of Commons, had remarkably large eyebrows jutting over his optics like a pent-house. This is a fair specimen of Burke's ordinary oratory, and of Lord North's also.

We know of no European bird large enough and strong enough to carry away a great man and dash him against a rock. Must not the orator have meant the American Condor? the largest and strongest fowl of the air; its wings being 18 feet from tip to tip.

there may be, at present, no spear that will reach him, yet he may be, some time or other, caught. At any rate, he will be exhausted with fruitless efforts; those tusks which he has been whetting, to wound and gnaw the constitution, will be worn out. Truth will at last prevail. The public will see and feel that he has either advanced false facts, or reasoned falsely from true principles; and that he has owed his escape to the spirit of the times, not to the justice of his cause."

These are timid sentiments, plaintive and childish notes, to come from the lips of a prime minister of Old England, the man who had the ignorance and presumption to declare out aloud, that he would bring humiliated America to his feet!

His

From the speeches just cited we learn Mr. Burke's opinion of the extraordinary powers, integrity, patriotism, and intrepidity bordering on temerity, of JUNIUS. It is evident that he regarded him, though invisible, with feelings of more than simple wonder, with astonishment approximating to dread. opinion corroborates the one which we have already advanced, that the English public in search of JUNIUS did not look high enough. It is apparent that Burke looked up at his terrific eagle.

As to " 'My Lord North," so everlastingly famous in this country, his speech betrays marks of trembling anxiety in every sentence. He moves softly, as if he were afraid of waking "the great boar of the woods," who had been whetting his terrible tusks before he went to sleep.* It is equally evident that Lord North did not look down upon JUNIUS. It is difficult to preserve that gravity which becomes our years, whenever we think of certain individuals to whom the authorship of those celebrated Letters has been, from time to time, attributed.

The deep solicitude of JUNIUS for the public welfare is strikingly apparent in his last private letter to Mr. Woodfall,

* We recommend this subject to some of the history painters in this new country, where they abound.

in which he said "If I saw any prospect of uniting the City once more, I would readily continue to labor in the vineyard. Whenever Mr. Wilkes can tell me that such an union is in prospect, he shall hear from me.

Quod si quis existimat me aut voluntate esse mutatâ, aut debilitatâ virtute, aut animo fracto, vehementer errat.* Farewell."

6

Here it seems, the "mighty Junius," so called by my Lord North, hung up his bow. The two missile darts sent after this date, seem thrown by an old and feeble arm and with a careless aim; like his Memoirs of Lord Barrington, every way unworthy his pen. His final private letter to Woodfall, of January 19, 1773, is more like himself; he says in it-"I have seen the signals thrown out for your old friend and correspondent.' Be assured that I have good reason for not complying with them. In the present state of things, if I were to write again, I must be as silly as any of the horned cattle that run mad through the city, or as any of your wise aldermen. I meant the cause and the public. Both are given up. I feel for the honor of this country, when I see that there are not ten men in it who will unite and stand together upon any one question. But it is all alike, vile and contemptible. You have never flinched that I know of; and I shall always rejoice to hear of your prosperity."

Here is a deliberate and solemn leave-taking, with ample reason why he should write no more; and this determination is handsomely acquiesced in by honest Woodfall, in his answer to his unknown but highly venerated correspondent. Yet what futile arguments have been, from time to time, obtruded on the public as to the cause of his ceasing from his labor. The cessation was natural and for sufficient reason; why then make a mystery of it, seeing his retreat was masterly, without loss, and facing the enemy to the very last manœuvre ?

*But if any one believes me to be changed in will, weakened in integrity, or broken in courage, he errs grossly.

CHAPTER III.

OF THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF THE EARL OF CHATHAM.

I AM aware that a favorite theory has a tendency to bias the judgment, and sweep us away, like a strong tide, from the anchorage of reason into the open sea of uncertainty; yet if our theory be the fruit of long reflection, and founded upon inferences drawn from independent sources of evidence, it is more satisfactory than an assumed hypothesis. After a thoughtful series of years on this subject of our inquiry, and reiterated examination of facts as they rose; and after disciplining speculation by internal as well as external evidence, I had concluded and settled down many years since in the opinion that WILLIAM PITT, EARL OF CHATHAM, was the author of the celebrated Letters under the signature of JUNIUS. Nay, furthermore, that no other man had feelings just like them, and moreover that no other man was capable of writing them; and as length of time, has, every year, added strength to this opinion, I am now to assign my reason for it. But this will lead me to give

A Sketch of the Life and Character of WILLIAM PITT, EARL OF CHATHAM.

Benigno Numine.*

THIS celebrated man was born in London, in the year 1708. He was esteemed at the University of Oxford a good scholar, a keen disputant, and by some a poet. But his ruling passion was the tented field, which he would have indulged had not a cruel hereditary gout, that seized on him even before

*By the favor of Providence. Motto of the noble house of CHATHAM.

he left Eton school, clipped the wings of his martial ambition, permitting him, however, to range the most fertile regions of ancient and modern literature. But for this hopeless disease, the world might have seen him a Hannibal, a Marlborough, or another Napoleon, and Britain deprived of the honor of rearing the second, nay the first orator on the records of fame.

Who can look into the seeds of time as it regards the destiny of man? Who will say that it was not all for the best, that young Pitt's energetic soul should be confined to a crazy case, unsuited to its warlike propensities, and that he, who otherwise would have blazed among the greatest of conquerors, was allowed only to shine the first of orators? The great and stern commander is, however, discernible throughout his eventful life. Quick-sighted, prompt, sagacious, fearless, haughty, and persevering, he never ceased to be a hero, a Hercules, a demi-god in wielding the powers of a great nation, and making the most powerful bend to his sway.

Among his most intimate companions at Eton school were Lord George Lyttleton, Henry Fox (afterwards Lord Holland), Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, and Henry Fielding.* There was an intimacy between Mr. Pitt, Mr. George Grenville, and Lord Lyttleton; for several years they always sat together in the House of Commons.

The gout drove young Pitt from the University before he could take a degree in the arts, and compelled him to travel on the continent in quest of health and mental improvement; and this so cultivated his mind, says Lord Chesterfield, that he acquired a great fund of premature and useful knowledge. His first speech in Parliament was in April, 1736. On his return to England, having kept his gout at bay by travelling, he accepted a cornet's commission in the horse-guards; and at the age of twenty-seven entered Parliament, where he shone a prodigy of manly eloquence, and virtuous independence, in

* Author of that masterly picture of the English character and manners, so well known by the title of Tom JONES.