perfect model of eloquence, and exhibits that style of devotion to the cause of him whom he supported which gave such peculiar interest to all he said. He did not plead for another in the cold, dispassionate manner of the hireling; he rushed into the very midst of the peril which surrounded his client; he felt with him, he thought with him, he proclaimed that he acted as he himself would have done, and, with that generous zeal which belonged to his character, he would have shared in his punishment if despotism and tyranny would have dared to inflict it. Not content with clearly showing the innocence of Stockdale, he threw his shield over Hastings, and with impetuous ardour and elegant words he spoke of the charges against him. He boldly expatiated on the striking absurdity exhibited by a power, itself the author of all the rapine and the oppression, in presuming to sit in judgment upon those to whom it had delegated its authority, and by whom its own tyranny had been exercised. He dwelt upon the ridiculous conduct of the nation that proceeded onwards in the most iniquitous career of plunder and rapacity, and then suddenly saying to the subordinate instruments of its usurpation, "Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther." The nation was responsible for the violation of human happiness in the exercise of her Eastern dominion. With that happy power of seizing every incident that occurred, observing some slight appearance of approbation of what he had said in one or two of the jurymen, he concluded the topic thus: "Gentlemen, you are touched by the way of considering the subject, and I can account for it. I have been talking of man and his nature, not as they are seen through the cold medium of books, but as I have seen them in climes

reluctantly submitting to our authority. I have seen an indignant savage chief surrounded by his subjects, and holding in his hand a bundle of sticks, the notes of his untutored eloquence. 'Who is it,' said the jealous ruler of the forest encroached upon by the restless foot of the English adventurer-'who is it that causes the mountains to lift up their lofty heads? Who raises the winds of the winter and calms them again in the summer? The same Being who gave to you a country on your side of the water, and ours to us on this.'" Of this, the most perfect speech ever pronounced by Erskine, the result was the triumph of Stockdale, of Warren Hastings, and of liberty over that party which ought to have disdained to prosecute for libel an individual who was nobly fighting intellectually against power, dominion, and a mighty array of talent.

Warren Hastings, as Governor of India, found from his masters at home that money was the chief object which they required from their delegate. He, too anxious to fulfil their commands, was regardless of the means he employed; and, though he himself was neither sordid nor rapacious, he lent all the faculties of his mind to the plunder and the rapine which rendered India a scene of desolation and of misery. The iniquities of his government were excusable in his eyes, for they were the result of stern necessity; there could be no check to his despotism, no limit to his avarice, but the helplessness to which he had reduced nations and the poverty to which he exposed them. Edmund Burke was the great leader who undertook to hold up to public detestation and to condign punishment the individual whom he believed to be guilty of the greatest enormities, and to have

trampled with unscrupulous cruelty upon the helpless beings with whom he was thrown into contact. He was supported by Sheridan, by Wyndham, and men whose names belong to the history of their country; but by no one more enthusiastically or more powerfully than by Sheridan.

It is deeply to be deplored that we possess such mutilated remains of his speech, which created throughout the whole of the country such an extraordinary sensation, that was listened to by the House with the most profound admiration, that elicited even from his adversaries expressions of their wonder at the mighty powers he displayed. Of the speech of February 7, 1787, before the House of Commons, a feeble outline only has been handed down to us. All the records of that day speak of it as one of the most magnificent displays of human intellect that had ever been exhibited. For five hours and a half he commanded the universal attention of a crowded House. When he had concluded a speech which had riveted his audience, a loud and long-continued burst of enthusiastic applause seemed to echo simultaneously from all quarters; the usual decorum was forgotten, all seemed carried away by the impulse they had received. Burke declared it to be "the most astonishing burst of eloquence, argument, and wit united of which there was any record or tradition." Fox pronounced a eulogium, and declared "all that he ever heard, all that he had ever read, when compared with it dwindled into nothing, and vanished like vapour before the sun." The debate was suspended, and after a short expression of the opinion of several members, who declared that, though they came prepossessed in favour of Hastings, a

miracle had been wrought upon their minds, whilst others wished time to cool before they were called to vote, the House adjourned, with the concurrence of Sheridan's great adversary, Pitt, who acknowledged that the speech surpassed all the eloquence of ancient or modern times, and possessed everything that genius or art could furnish to agitate and control the human mind.

Mr. Burke spoke of his address thus: "Of all the various speeches of oratory, of every kind of eloquence that had been heard either in ancient or modern times, whatever the acuteness of the bar, the dignity of the senate, or the morality of the pulpit could furnish, had not been equal to what that House had that day heard in Westminster Hall. No holy religionist, no man of any description as a literary character, could have come up in the one instance to the pure sentiments of morality, or, in the other, to the variety of knowledge, force of imagination, propriety and vivacity of allusion, beauty and elegance of diction, and strength of expression to which they had that day listened. From poetry up to eloquence, there was not a species of composition of which a complete and perfect specimen might not have been culled from one part or other of the speech to which he alluded, and which he was persuaded had left too strong an impression on the minds of that House to be easily obliterated." We learn from Moore, that there exists a copy of this speech, taken in shorthand by Mr. Gurney, which was sometime in the possession of the Duke of Norfolk, then in the hands of Sheridan, and afterwards in those of Moore himself. He has furnished us with some extracts, but it is a matter of regret that the public has not an opportunity of seeing it. We are now

dependent upon that which has been published in the debates, from which, of course, we can form but a superficial idea of its merits. Sheridan commenced by showing that "in truth the prosecution was not begotten in prejudice or nursed in error. It was founded on the clearest conviction of the wrongs which the natives of Hindustan had suffered through the maladministration of those in whose hands the country had placed extensive powers, which ought to have been exercised for the benefit of the governed, but which had been used by the prisoner at the bar for the shameful purposes of oppression.

"To convince their lordships that the British government-which ought to have been a blessing to the powers in India connected with it—had been a Scourge to the natives, and the cause of desolation to the most flourishing provinces in Hindustan, he had only to read a letter that had been received not long since from Lord Cornwallis, the present GovernorGeneral of Bengal. In that letter the noble lord stated he had been received by the Nabob Vizier with every mark of friendship and respect; but the honours he received at the court of Lucknow had not prevented him from seeing the desolation that overspread the face of the country, the sight of which had shocked his very soul. He spoke to the nabob on the subject, and earnestly recommended it to him to adopt some system of government that might restore the prosperity of his kingdom, and make his people happy. The nabob's answer was strikingly remarkable. That degraded prince said to his lordship, that as long as the demands of the English Government upon the revenue of Oude should remain unlimited, he (the nabob) could have no interest in establishing any system of economy;