of mixing up political prejudices discriminate hospitality, which we with the duties of your high station, have not seen since in Kildare. and I also forbear to enter into any justification of my principles; but permit me to ask your lordship, Where is the justice or equity of making them the ground for counteracting the humble wishes of a young nobleman, who, as a ward of your court, is peculiarly under your guardianship and protection? and why should you use my name in a manner calculated to excite his prejudices, and the prejudices of his family, against me, by attributing to me the disappointment of his hopes? "I am never ashamed to avow my political principles, and do not think them less respectable for differing from those of your lordship. I am deeply interested in the prosperity and happiness of my native country, and detest that narrowminded bigotry which destroys both. If you think you ought to punish me for this, you should confine that punishment to myself, and not visit it on an unoffending person. "Your hostility to me seems to have commenced from the following circumstances :-Soon after your appointment to the seals in Ireland, you removed Mr. Wogan Browne,1 my neighbour and friend, from the magistracy of two counties, leaving him that of a third, so that you either insulted him gratuitously, or you knowingly left an improper person in the commission. That he was undeserving of such treatment, every one who knew him will allow; he was the best magistrate, country gentleman, grand-juror, and landlord, whose loss we had to deplore for many years. "An accomplished scholar, kindhearted and liberal, he spent a large fortune by a profuse and almost in "His good sense and moderation checked the indignation which such an insult excited in every man of property in the country. The circumstance, however, was alluded to at a county meeting, and I could not help condemning such a proceeding of a stranger [the Chancellor], without property in the country, towards such a man as Mr. Browne. To this I attribute your marked hostility to me in every little matter when you have the power to show it; if confined to myself, I should treat it with utter indifference, but when brought to bear on others who happen to be connected with me, I feel myself called on to remonstrate against such injustice." The Chancellor, in reply, stated that he conceived Lord Cloncurry's letter extremely offensive, and a gross misrepresentation of facts, as far as Lord Milltown was concerned; and he denied that he ever heard of Lord Cloncurry's expressing any opinion on Mr. Wogan Browne's dismissal. Having so far explained, he thus concludes:-"I assure your lordship that your style of writing to me makes me perfectly indifferent to any opinion you may form or express upon my conduct on that or on any other occasion.-Your humble servant, "MANNERS," Lord Cloncurry then forwarded a copy of Mrs. Douglas's affidavit to the Chancellor, who denied that he had ever used the words attributed to him, and complained that "she should have made the supposed substance of a conversation, which was pressed upon him in his study, the subject of an affidavit. He then added that "he was abominably treated by Lord Cloncurry and Mrs. 1 Wogan Browne was the last of the Browne's of Castle Browne, an old family in the county of Kildare. In 1815, the illustrious order of the Jesuits purchased this noble mansion from its ancient proprietors, and changed its name to that of Clongowes Wood College, a college now remarkable for sending its pupils to the foremost ranks in the learned professions of engineering, of law, and of medicine. • Recollections of Lord Cloncurry, p. 258. Douglas. In 1817, Lord Talbot succeeded to the Viceroyalty, and one of his first acts was to grant to the Leeson family the privileges so much desired and so long withheld. Lord Manners continued to the end to be, as he had been in the commencement of his career, the supporter of the Prince of Wales. From his appointment to the Irish Bench to the year 1820 his name is not to be found even once amongst the speakers of the House of Lords. In that year, however, he was at his post during the memorable trial of the fallen and unfortunate Queen Caroline. And here let us look back on the early life of him who had been the cause of that fall. George IV. had loved another woman, whom he had married before he had completed his fiveand-twentieth year; but that marriage was celebrated by a minister of the Roman Church. It was performed by a priest in holy orders, and yet it was contrary to the laws of the land, for the unhappy lady (Mrs. Fitzherbert) was a Catholic. Thus, while the humblest of his father's subjects could give his hand and his heart to the woman he loved, the heir to the throne of England was debarred from acknowledging as his wife her to whom the laws of God, though not of man, had bound him for ever. Great was the excitement when it was rumoured abroad that the Prince of Wales had married a Roman Catholic, and that he had thereby incapacitated himself from succeeding to the Crown. Mr. Fox came to the House of Commons, and denied the fact in the most explicit manner, and further he stated, on direct authority, that no such marriage had ever taken place. He had been deceived. Mrs. Fitzherbert (for so we must call her) at first demanded a public retraction, and although she yielded this point, He yet would she never speak to Mr. Fox again, who, on his part, complained strongly of the duplicity to which he had been subjected. At length the Prince, in 1794, borne down by the load of debts, consented to the only terms on which his father would aid in relieving him from their burden-marriage; and thus forgetful of other vows he became, on the 8th of April, 1795, the husband of his first cousin, Caroline, daughter of the Duke of Brunswick. His Royal Highness had never before that time been in her society. knew nothing of her temper, her acquirements, or her tastes; he married her merely for the enormous fortune she possessed. Disgust and alienation followed. The birth of a daughter, the Princess Charlotte, was powerless to reconcile them. When too late, she found that she was united to a heartless voluptuary, who, treating her with contumely, at last renounced all right over her as a husband, and gave her a license to follow his example in forgetting that the conjugal relations had ever subsisted between them. Driven by his cruelty at last into doubtful society, the Princess Caroline became wholly indifferent to public opinion, and was guilty of countless levities which compromised her fair fame.1 Persecuted in England, the unfortunate princess took the ill-advised and fatal step of passing over to the Continent; but her husband's love accompanied her not in her travels. She proceeded to the north of Italy; and there, there was introduced into her household a menial servant whose name was Bergami. For the short space of three weeks did he hold the place that was assigned to him amongst his fellow-servants: what followed is well known to every reader of English history. He ac companied her Royal Highness to Milan, to Rome, to Naples, to Pales 1 Lord Campbell's Lives of the Lord Chancellors of Great Britain, vol. viii., p. 290. " Vide Allison's History of Europe, under date 1820. tine. But why proceed we farther in the relation of those incidents painful to remember? In 1819 it was known that a commission sent to Milan had been diligently employed in collecting evidence against the Princess. In the month of June in that year, Mr. Brougham, who had become her confidential adviser, proposed, with out her knowledge, that on condition of £35,000 a year being settled by Act of Parliament upon her for her life, that she would agree ever after to live abroad. The Prince of Wales was strongly opposed to this compromise: he strenuously contended for a divorce as not only justified but called for under the circumstances, which he maintained were such as would entitle any private subject to that remedy. The ministers, on the other hand, were advised that if the Princess had been faithless to her husband, that recriminations would follow, and that it would appear that he, too, had forgotten his marriage Vows, and that he who had been the cause of the fall of his unhappy wife, would himself fail in obtaining the dissolution of his marriage. They therefore accepted the compromise. Thus matters remained until the summer of the following year. On the 29th of January, 1820, George III. died, and the Prince Regent ascended the throne as George IV. The Princess, now Queen Caroline, became entitled to have her name inserted in that portion of the liturgy where petitions were offered up for "his most religious and gracious Majesty," the supreme head of the Church of England. The King's name had been inserted, but the Queen's was omitted. Indignant at this fresh insult, Queen Caroline returned to England on the 6th of June, when a bill was immediately brought into the House of Lords for divorcing and degrading her. To carry this measure through the House, it became requisite and necessary to establish the several accusations made in the preamble; and the measure then assumed the appearance, and, in common parlance, the name of "the trial of Queen Caroline." Witnesses were brought over from Italy and other countries to establish her guilt. Lord Manners took an active part against the accused. His virulent speech on that memorable trial reposes in decent obscurity, accessible to few, in the Parliamentary debates.' His lordship, having analysed the evidence, said, "That proofs so circumstantial as those which had been advanced in the case could not be doubted. He was of opinion that the evidence had substantiated the allegations in the Bill. There was no man who could regret more than he did that such a Bill should become necessary; but as it was necessary, their lordships were bound to do their duty. It was impossible to allow this woman to ascend the throne, after the establishment of the case against her. The arguments in support of the Bill he considered to be irresistible. He was perfectly satisfied in his mind that the preamble had been proved, and therefore he would give his consent to the second reading of the Bill." Lord Manners was followed by other speakers. The Ministry had expected a large majority in the Upper House; but some of their lordships wavered at the last hour, and on a division, the third reading was carried by so small a majorityonly nine votes-that all hope of success in the Commons was at an end. The Bill was accordingly withdrawn, and the people remembered how the Great Founder of the Christian faith had forbidden divorces in the old times before them, and how he said, "Whosoever shall put away his wife and marry another, commiteth adultery against her."2" 2 St. Mark xi. 2. St. Luke xvi. 18. We regret we are unable to lay before our readers the particulars of a trial which would force a smile from the young and a blush from the fair. Suffice it to say that the levity of Her Royal Highness caused much scandal at the Italian courts, and that on one occasion she was forced to retire in shame (if shame she had any) from a masked ball in Naples, where she was dressed (if we may use the expression) as "the genius of history." But these are subjects now forgotten, even by the licentious. The popularity of the King had rapidly declined during the trial of his Queen. The question irresistibly forced itself on the mind, was he not answerable for the conduct of her whom he had driven from beneath the shadow of his roof to be a helpless wanderer, surrounded by temptations, in distant countries? But his popularity soon returned in Ireland, which he visited in the following year-and never was sovereign received with greater enthusiasm. Then, for the first time since the Union, were the distinctions of Catholic and Protestant forgotten, and all parties vied in giving a hearty welcome to the first English king who came on a peaceful mission to the Irish shores. The dislike engrafted in his nature to the Roman faith prevented Lord Manners from coming much into contact with the Catholics, and he accordingly absented himself at this time as much as possible from court. During the six years following the visit of George IV. to Ireland, Lord Manners held the seals; but his decisions are not entitled to much weight, and receive but little attention from the judges of the Courts of Equity. At length the change of ministry, in 1827, caused his resignation, and he took his seat for the last time in the Court of Chancery on the 27th of July in that year. The business of the day having closed, the Attorney-General, Mr. Joy, rose amidst breathless silence, and in language,' it is said, of irony, thus addressed the retiring Chancellor : "MY LORD,-As your Lordship is about to retire from that high station which you have filled in this country, and as we see you now for the last time in this court, where you have presided more than twenty years, we cannot suffer the occasion to pass without endeavouring to express, though in very inadequate terms, some of those feelings with which we view your departure from amongst us. My brethren have done me the honour of selecting me as their organ to express our common feelings upon the occasion which has assembled us before you. When, my lord, we consider that during your continuance in office, no fewer than 4469 causes have been decided by you, and of these only fourteen have been reversed and seven varied in some particulars; when we revert to your lordship's inflexible rule never to close your sittings whilst a single cause remained undisposed of, we cannot but admire that distinguished ability, that strict impartiality, and that unremitting assiduity with which you have discharged the duties of your office. The anxiety which you have always evinced to elevate our profession, and to cherish in its members that purity of conduct for which they ought to be ever distinguished, has entitled you to our warmest regards; whilst the dignified urbanity and uniform courtesy which have always marked your intercourse with every individual of the Bar, whether in public or private, have so identified you with 1 Shiel's Legal and Political Sketches, vol., p. 275. 2 Before the establishment of the Court of Appeal in Chancery appeals were com. paratively few. our most gratifying recollections, that in losing you, we feel we are deprived not only of the judge whom we respect, but the friend whom we love. It would be foreign to the character in which we address you, to advert to those amiable qualities which distinguish you in private life, to enlarge on that charity which knows no bounds, or to describe the feelings of the widow and the orphan at your departure; but I may express the sincere sentiments of my brethren who surround me, and assure you that your memory will long remain associated with our kindest feelings, and that your retirement from office cannot and will not efface that affectionate attachment with which you are regarded by us, and which must must always make us deeply interested in your future happiness and welfare." The Chancellor having replied in the usual terms of gratitude to the bar, thanked them for the assistance they had afforded him, and then withdrew. He was subsequently honoured with a parting address from the Lord Mayor and Corporation of Dublin. Richard Lalor Shiel's picture of Lord Manners' farewell is amusing.1 But every word uttered by the Attorney-General he stamps with falsehood. Can it be that Mr. Joy would thus lend himself to a solemn mockery? Can it be that he lavished praises on the man whom he despised, and that, too, when he was descending from the bench?-Impossible ! Lord Manners returned immediately to England, and lived thenceforward near Bury St. Edmund's. His lordship appears to have but seldom taken any part in the parliamentary debates. His undying hatred, however, to the Church of Rome, called him to his place in the House of Lords in 1829, when the question of Catholic Emancipation was forced on the Government. That Act, which was introduced and prepared by Sir Robert Peel, contained neither the provision for the veto, nor that for bribing priests; but it was accompanied by a certain other Act, as fatal, perhaps, as either of those, namely, the disfranchisement of all the forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland. Sir Robert was determined, at least, not to yield this point. It was the forty-shilling freeholders, who had humbled the Beresford domination in Waterford, and destroyed the Foster monopoly in Louth; it was the forty-shilling freeholders who had carried O'Connell triumphantly to the head of the poll in Clare; and by destroying that whole class of voters, Peel hoped, very reasonably, not only to render the remaining voters more amenable to corrupt influences, but also to take away the motive, which had heretofore existed, for granting leases to small farmers, and thus, in good time, to turn those independent farmers into tenants-at-will. The debates on the Relief Bill were, as might have been expected, very violent and bitter. The fanatical section of English and Irish Protestantism was deeply moved. In the mind of those people, all was lost; and Sir Robert Peel and the Duke were almost directly charged with being agents of the Pope of Rome. However, the bill passed through its two first readings in the Commons; and the third reading was passed on the 30th of March, by a majority of thirty-six. day it was carried to the House of Lords; and on the 2nd of April, its second reading was moved by the Duke of Wellington, who made no scruple to urge its necessity, in order "to prevent civil war." Sir Robert Peel, in his argument for the law, had been less explicit and straightforward than the Duke- he had only said the measure was needful, 1 Shiel's Legal and Political Sketches. Next |