nist was now grinding him to powder. It was in vain that Horne pathetically pleaded his services as an agitator. "I have," exclaimed he, "regularly and indefatigably been the drudge of almost every popular election, prosecution, and public business. For three years past, my time has been entirely, and my income almost wholly, applied to public measures." But the public were hard-hearted. No tears were shed for the agonies of an overworked patriot. The partisans of Wilkes were furiously indignant at the revolt of one whom they ranked among the meanest of his followers; a bustling parson, a subsidiary in a black coat! The sounder portion of the community were amused by seeing two men, for whom they had an equal scorn, stripping each other naked to the world, lavishing mutual reproach, and instead of floating side by side on the popular stream, ludicrously struggling to sink each other into the most miry depths of ignominy. The quarrel left Horne all but undone; he was on the verge of despair. The outery was fully raised, and it was against him. He was hunted down with that utter contempt of right, truth, and reason, which characterises the deliberations of the multitude. Between the personal merits of the combatants there could be no comparison, for Wilkes had long since defied slander, yet Horne was now the universal victim. His name was mingled with every epithet of civic obloquy; he was libelled, caricatured, and insulted, while to burn him in effigy became at once a popular sport, and a grave exercise of popular justice.

Another man might have been shamed out of the absurdity of this worthless career, or have felt the degradation, of stooping to the tribunal of the streets, or have discovered that there were duties manlier and more honourable than the perpetual chase of a miserable name. But Horne was not of that school. He had bound himself to the wheel, and he was resolved to roll on with it through every rut and pool of the journey. He now recommenced his series of letters to Wilkes, and devoted himself to the dignified and productive task of blackening the man, whom he had employed years in

blazoning as a paragon to the world. Of those letters we shall give some extracts. To give the whole, would be but to copy some of the most tedious, feeble, and enigmatical epistles in the language; for, among the popular follies which have been idly transmitted to our time, was that of conceding to Horne Tooke the praise of a skilful use of the pen. His conceptions are singularly destitute of all that constitutes style, of all grace, animation, condensed pungency, or classic allusion. He is never betrayed into dignity of sentiment, or even into vigour of phrase; his manner is uniformly dry, desultory, and unimaginative; evidently endured in its own day only for its bitterness to his personal opponents, and endurable in ours only for its exposure of the arrogance, violence, and venom alike of the assailant and the defender.

In his first letter he had said to Wilkes : "It is not my intention here to open any account with you on the score of private character; in that respect the public have kindly passed an act of insolvency in your favour; you have delivered up your all, and no man can fairly now make any demand."

Wilkes's reply is expressive: "You say, it is not your intention to open any account with me on the score of private character, &c. I be lieve, indeed, you will not choose to open any account on the score of private character. A gentleman in holy orders, whose hand appears to testify his belief of the articles of the Church of England, the least moral, the least conscientious of men, whose life has passed in a constant direct opposition to the purity and precepts of the Gospel, whose creed, from the first article of it to the last, is known to be non credo! such a person, with wonderful prudence, chooses 'not to open any account on the score of private character!" He concludes by bidding him write his other letters before Midsummer-day, as “I may by that time be engaged in the discharge of the sheriff's oath, not that which you falsified!"

Horne had now obtained an excuse for talking of himself, and he employed it remorselessly. His reply was not a defence, the natural refuge of a man unjustly accused, but a recrimination. "In the year 1765, I re

paired to Italy; passing through Paris, I delivered some letters to you. Though this was the first time we ever saw each other, you exacted from me, with very earnest entreaty, a promise of correspondence. * * * * I wrote from Montpelier, and lest, from my appearance, you should mistake my situation, and expect considerable services from me, I thought it proper to inform you, I was a poor country clergyman, whose situation, notwithstanding his zeal, would never enable him to do any thing considerable either to you or the public. **** ** Receiving no answer, I did not repeat my folly; and upon a second visit to you at Paris, on my return from Italy to England, in 1767, I saw reasons sufficient never more to trust you with a single line; for I found that all the private letters of your friends were regularly pasted in a book, and read over indiscriminately, not only to your friends and acquaintance, but to every visitor.

"In this second visit at Paris, you reproached me for not keeping my promise of correspondence, and swore you had not received my letter. I was very well contented, though I did not believe your excuse, and hugged myself in the reflection that I had furnished you with only one opportunity of treachery. This letter you copied some months before, and shewed it about to numbers of people, with a menace of publication, if I dared to interrupt you." Yet scandalous as this conduct on the part of Wilkes was, this was the man whom he put forward as the most fitting representative for a great English county, the man whom he had "reason sufficient never to trust with a single line," whom he "hugged himself" with having empowered to commit "but one treachery," whom he did not believe on his word, whom he did not believe" though he swore." This man, whom he describes as base, mean, treacherous, a liar, profligate, and perjured,-this "insolvent in character," he acknowledges to have perpetually urged on the electors of Middlesex, and laboured with all his might to bring into the council of the nation. But let him speak for himself.

**

"I found you in the most hopeless state, an outlaw, plunged in the

deepest distress, overwhelmed with debt and disgrace, forsaken by all your friends, and shunned by every thing that called itself a gentleman! at a time when every honest man, who could distinguish between you and your cause, and who feared no danger, yet feared the ridicule attending a probable defeat. I leave you, by repeated elections, the legal representative of Middlesex, an alderman of London, and about thirty thousand pounds richer than when I first knew you." It was evident that Wilkes's original scorn of his correspondence had rankled in his breast in the midst of all his elec tioneering amity. Years of intercourse had passed since that very contemptuous treatment, but politics had skinned over the wound, only to leave it festering below. Such is the sincerity of patriot friendship. Wilkes's thirty thousand pounds were an equally distinguishing test of patriot sincerity.

So much for the principles of the two champions of popular opinion. We find the two graud renovators of political morality, the two flaming vindicators of the injured majesty of the laws, and the sullied integrity of government, describing each other as infamous in the deepest degree, as scandals to society, as willing to employ the most hideous, profane, and revolting means for "the Cause." But the cause of truth and honour, and just contempt and condemnation of such articles of Democratic belief, was to have an additional and indignant triumph, when the pecuniary part of those transactions came to be discussed. However, we must first give a specimen of the easy scorn which Wilkes scattered on his furious adversary.

"To the Rev. Mr Horne.--I thank you for the entertainment of your sixth letter. The idea of an unfaithful echo, although not quite new, is perfectly amusing; but, like Bayes, you love to elevate and surprise.' I wish you would give me the list of echoes of this kind, which you heard in your travels through France and Italy. I have read of only one such, in a neighbouring kingdom; which, if you ask,' How do you do? answers, Pretty well, I thank you.' The sound of your unfaithful echo can be paralleled only by Jack Home's

་

silence with a stilly sound, in the Tragedy of Douglas.

The torrent, rushing o'er its pebbly banks,

Infuses silence with a stilly sound.'

tion, however, was opened for your election expenses; this subscription amounted to L.1227, 3s. You were chosen for the county of Middlesex, and soon after, in this desperate situation of your private affairs, were sentenced to two years' imprisonment, and two fines of L.1000. Privilege gave some respite from your debts; but notwithstanding this, and the generosity of individuals, it was found exceedingly difficult to furnish you even a daily support.

"Most of those who were so generous to you at that time, have since been the objects of your bitterest resentment. The best method then found for a little knot of public-spirited men to procure you a necessary subsistence, was to have very frequent meetings at the King's Arms' tavern in Cornhill, where each paid a little more than the reckoning, and when the overplus amounted to about ten pounds, it was regularly sent to you!

I have heard of the babbling, the mimic, and the shrill echo; the discovery of an unfaithful echo was reserved for Mr Horne." He then reverts to a charge of his intending to put one of his dependents into a city office, which charge Horne had made on his own authority. " Every thing you have advanced relative to the town-clerkship and Mr Reynolds, you well know to be wholly a lying imposture of your own. I declare the whole of this accusation against me is one entire fulsehood. No courtier seems to me to enjoy the luxury of lying equal to the Minister of Brentford."

Wilkes thus gives a pledge of his own, which all the world know he afterwards completely falsified. "As to the chamberlainship, you and many others have warmly and frequently pressed me to offer my services in case of a vacancy. My answer has regularly been “I never will accept it!" Of course, he accepted it without hesitation, and enjoyed it to the end of his life. Horne's reply now opens the revolutionary budget, and explains the terms on which patriotism drives its trade. "Whilst you were candidate for the city of London, a subscription was opened on the 19th of March, 1768, for the payment of your debts, the trustees for which were Messrs Oliver, &c. The public cannot be said to have contributed. The whole amount of the subscription, up to Feb. 1769, was L.1116, 78. 7d. Your debts at that time were supposed to be about L.6000. Two shillings and sixpence in the pound were therefore offered to such as would accept a composition, with a promise, that, if the dividend should be greater, they who accepted the two and sixpence should receive their proportion. As fast as something was paid, something was likewise added daily to the list of your debts; and instead of increasing the dividend, it was discovered that two and sixpence was more than could be paid! Your best friends, even those who were most able and generous, despaired of the possibility of extricating you. Another subscrip

י!

To this eleemosynary existence was the proud patriot contented to submit. But the charge proceeds. Every day brought fresh difficulties and disgrace on Mr Wilkes, and yet he was the only person who all the while felt no distress, denied himself no expense, was neither sensible to, nor apprehensive of, any disgrace. * * * * The friends of the cause more anxious to cover, if possible, or to lessen the infumy, of which he was careless. The breach of trust! committed by him towards the Foundling Hospital began to make a noise; being found on enquiry to be too true, it demanded their earliest attention. Two gentlemen immediately advanced L.300 to the hospital, and engaged themselves to pay the remainder. The whole sum due from Mr Wilkes to the Foundling Hospital amounted to L 990, Is. 3d.

He then states that the Society for the support of the Bill of Rights originated in Wilkes's expulsion from Parliament; and as the loss of privilege was equivalent to leaving this hopeless debtor in prison for life, the first object of the club was to free him from his creditors. "His debts had now risen from L.6000 to L.14,000. Besides this there were two fines of L.1000 each, and, besides the expenses of repeated elections, support was to be provided for him

sway over the city of London. * * * *** The poor parson has been buffeted in the hustings, where he did not appear, and hissed out of playhouses which he never entered; he has been sung down in the streets, and exalted to a conspicuous corner with the Pope and the Devil in the print-shops; and finally, to complete the triumph over this mighty adversary, you have caused him to be burnt in effigy."

Those indignities had for the most part actually occurred; and Horne's mention of them shewed only how deep the sting had struck him. The contest was now at an end. The result of six months' scribbling on both sides was simply to exhibit both the combatants in the most contemptible point of view: the one, as insanely craving for notoriety at all risks; the other, as scandalously craving for money under all pretences: the one, a popularity-pauper; the other, a subscription-pauper: each equally ready to reveal the most confidential transactions; each equally unhesitating in the use of the most unmanly, contumelious, and repulsive charges; each dealing in language which is, by common consent, excluded from the intercourse of gentlemen; and each equally acknowledging his close intimacy with the other, at the moment while he privately pronounced him to be the meanest and most unprincipled of

mankind.

Here, for the present, we pause. Horne was, from this period, to commence a new career. He had hitherto fought under the shield of Wilkes; he was now to expose himself in bitter and angry nakedness to the law. His apprenticeship to disturbance was at an end. His quarrel with his master was but the breaking up of his indentures. He was now to plunge into speculation for himself. He was no longer to lurk in the rear of tumult, and live by picking up a paltry reputation among the hangers-on of party. He was now to start forward alone, and with the courage of rashness, and the wisdom of vanity, achieve his triumph in fine and imprisonment, live in the perpetual anxieties of public prosecution, and close his days a dependent on the bounty of his friends.

The portion of his life which we

have yet to trace, is still more pregnant with interest and example than that which we have given. It displays a more striking time, distinguished by higher displays of character, and rendered still more conspicuous by the superiority of the cause of truth and honour; the rise of those eminent men, whom the struggles of the period prepared, providentially prepared, for the sal. vation of the Empire in the fearful trials of the French Revolution.

In the quarrel with Wilkes, Horne was utterly defeated. He deserved his defeat, for his ignorance of human nature. He had attempted to overthrow the antagonist by a display of his personal vileness to the people. But this was an appeal to feelings that never existed, by arguments which partisanship has never understood. To declare Wilkes base and perfidious, a betrayer of private confidence, an offender against personal morals, a criminal against every principle of friendship, decency, and honour, was an utter waste of words. Party demanded to find in their champion, boldness, insolence, and tenacity; and they never demand more. No stain has power to avert their eyes from the man whom they discover to be fit for their purpose. An advocacy at once subtle and daring, fills up the whole measure of their choice; and the broadest outpouring of moral indignation upon his head, the keenest scorn of the whole family of honour and honesty, the deepest brand which contemptuous virtue can burn upon him, is recognised only as an additional claim on their allegiance. Horne should have had the sagacity to know that party thinks of nothing in a man but the use to which it can turn him; that it is proof against all moral disgust where it can discover devotion to its cause; that to blacken

a

demagogue, only gives him an increased hold on the popular heart; that to offer him up on the altar of manly scorn, only consecrates him in the popular confidence; that to shew him utterly unworthy of a place in society, only purchases for him a surer refuge in that mass of passion, envy, avarice, and revenge, which ferments into the politics of the multitude, and poisons the Commonwealth with osten tatious patriotism.