"Now, nothing could be more justifiable than Mr. Hunt's conduct. It was absolutely forced on him. He could not avoid producing the letter. Those who complain of unhandsomeness themselves laid on him the disagreeable necessity. What did they say of his not having the letter ready to produce? Why, that it was a proof of his being a liar, and a scoundrel. Of what was it a proof? Simply that Mr. Hunt had no previous intention to disclose that letter, that he was forcibly obliged to produce it to satisfy the clamour of the complaining party. If, after he had alluded to it, which might not be discreet, but which was not at all criminal because it was not on private, but public business—if after alluding to the letter, he had refused to produce it, let any man judge what would have been his treatment from the party. Their character demonstrates, to a certainty, that they would not have allowed the existence of such a letter, though fully conscious of it, and would have suffered Mr. Hunt to the end of time to be considered, what they called him, a liar, a Scoundrel, and a slanderer.
"This subject, which I had not anticipated when my last letter was written, and did not mean, before the appearance of the confused and timid letter in Cobbett's Register, to advert to, has occupied too much time to permit me to comprehend, in this communication, all the remarks which I announced. It must be granted me, who am of no party but that of truth, to pursue my way, at leisure, and as free as possible from the mere forms of detail. Meaning to resume my pen, I am, for the present, Sir, &c.
"LEONIDAS."
The reader will observe, that this letter was written in December, six months after the election; and I beg here to observe, that I never knew or spoke to the writer till some time after this letter was written; but I am proud to say, when I was introduced to him, that this fair advocate of truth, proved to be a gentleman and a man of the strictest honour, bred up and associating with the higher ranks of society, and who was a doctor (of divinity, I believe). He was altogether just such a man as I should have selected as an arbitrator to decide any dispute, a man of strict veracity and unimpeachable character. I have said thus much upon this affair, in order to clear myself from the imputation of unhandsome conduct, and the charge of cowardice which was so lavishly bestowed upon me by the whole of the corrupt, hireling, partial London press, the falsehoods vomited forth by which were re-echoed from shore to shore, by all the dastardly local press of the kingdom. This virulence arose from the following fact. In consequence of my exposure of the conduct of Sir Francis Burdett, not more than 500 hands were held up for him out of 20,000 persons present, when his name was put in nomination; and now, on the eighth or ninth day of the election, Sir Francis stood THIRD upon the poll, and ultimately he was returned only SECOND upon it—Sir Samuel Romilly standing several hundreds (three hundred) above him, and Sir Murray Maxwell only about four hundred below him. In fact, nothing but the foul play shown towards Sir Murray and his friends, together with the very bad management of his committee, prevented his being returned with Sir Samuel Romilly, and Sir Francis being rejected and thrown out altogether. This was what made the party so outrageously clamorous and vindictive against me. Independent of the wound which their pride suffered, from the dread of being defeated, they had another reason to abominate me. They were compelled to make no trifling sacrifices of a certain kind. About the eighth or ninth day of the election, a dreadful effort was made by the party, and money flew about in all directions; poor electors had their taxes paid up, others were paid for voting, public-houses were opened, and all the sources of corruption and bribery were resorted to, by the friends and supporters of Sir Francis Burdett, which were employed by the Ministerial faction for Sir Murray Maxwell. By these means there was at length an apparent spirit of enthusiasm revived for the Baronet. Hundreds, who had viewed his conduct in a similar light to that in which I had viewed it, and who had condemned him, and given him up, and who had actually stood neuter hitherto, not meaning to vote at all at the election, as their votes could not have rendered me any service, now came forward and voted for him, under the impression that it would be better to return him, bad and indolent as he was, than to return the rank Ministerial tool, Sir Murray Maxwell.
At the end of the election, the numbers were declared by the High Bailiff to be as follow:-Romilly 5,538, Burdett 5,239, Maxwell 4,808, Hunt 84. Upon the show of hands at the nomination by the High Bailiff, when the election commenced, Sir Francis stood third, below myself and Sir Samuel; at the end of the election Sir Francis stood second upon the poll, 300 below Sir Samuel Romilly. This was a sad blow to the Baronet's popularity, and a still more severe blow to the upstart gentry who formed the Rump Committee. When Lord Cochrane resigned his seat, at the dissolution of the Parliament, and I publicly offered myself as a candidate, if Sir Francis and the Committee had stood neuter, even I should have been returned with him without any opposition; but this did not suit him, or the Committee; they opposed me, and no one doubted their power to prevent my being elected, though, at the same time, they little dreamt that I had the power to endanger the election of their idol, Sir Francis, and by my exertions to cause the Whig candidate, Romilly, to be placed at the head of the poll 300 above him. Even all that, however, was easier to be borne than to have me in Parliament. Whether I acted right, or whether I acted wrong, in thus opposing and bringing down that man, who had but a few years before been returned at the head of the poll for Westminster (2,000 above all the other candidates), is a matter of great doubt with a number of good men; I can only say, if I erred, I erred from public and not from private motives. Sir Francis Burdett has, since I have been here, acted the most noble part towards me, and I have no doubt but he is convinced that I was actuated in my opposition to him solely by public views; and if I was then deceived and mistaken as to his public conduct, he has shown that he has the nobleness of soul that knows how to forgive my hostility to him, because he believes that I was his opponent, not to serve any selfish end, but from a sense of public duty.
A few days after I had been so grossly misrepresented by the press, with respect to Cleary's affair, another circumstance occurred. One of the gents belonging to the Observer newspaper, was a Mr. Spectacle Dowling, who appears to have written so many falsehoods upon the subject, that he actually believed at last that what he had written was true. I had, in one of my speeches, alluded to the evidence which this person had given, on behalf of the Crown, upon the trial of Watson. The next morning, when I entered the hustings, a person at the door spoke to me, and while I was looking back to answer him, I felt the stroke of a small whip upon my hat, and, on turning hastily round to see what it meant, there was Mr. Spectacle Dowling flourishing a small jockey whip in a violent manner. I dashed up to him, and had just reached him a slight blow in the chin, when I was seized by the constables; but in his flight he received a blow in the mouth from my brother, and another from my son Henry, a lad of eighteen. We were all three held by the constables, who were all prepared to favour his escape.
Mr. Dowling immediately summoned my brother before Sir Richard, then Mr. Birnie, for the assault. I attended to give bail for him, and I certainly never saw a person who more resembled "raw head and bloody bones" than Mr. Dowling did, for he was bleeding at every pore; the marks of the three blows he had received were very evident upon his forehead, his mouth, and his chin. It appeared that Mr. Dowling's object was, not so much to get my brother held to bail, as it was to get himself bound over to keep the peace towards me; and Mr. Birnie, who had learned that Mr. Dowling was the first aggressor, urged me to prefer the complaint, and he would hold him to bail for the assault, as Dowling bravely protested before the Magistrates that he should have given me a good horsewhipping if the constables had not interfered. I, however, positively declined to make any charge against the gentleman, as I had resolved that the first time I met him I would give him an opportunity of taking a belly-full. I own that I walked the streets many an hour afterwards, in hopes of meeting him, and I carried a good cane in my hand, in order to lay it smartly about his shoulders. It was, however, many months before I met the gentleman. At length, one day, I was standing in Mr. Clement's shop, talking with Mr. Egan, the gentleman who at that time was the fashionable slang reporter of all the pitched battles and prize fights of the day, and who has since produced from his pen those characters which have made such a noise at the Adelphi and other theatres, namely, Tom and Jerry. While I was conversing with Mr. Egan, Mr. Dowling opened the door and walked in. I immediately addressed him, and said, "The last time I had the honour to meet you, Mr. Dowling, I believe was at Bow-street, when you stated to Mr. Birnie that you had struck me upon the Westminster hustings with a whip, and if you had not been prevented by the constables you would have given me a good horsewhipping." "Sir, (said he) I do not wish to have anything to say to you." "But, (replied I) there is a little account to settle between us; you struck me a blow with a whip, and I gave you a slap on the chin, so far we were equal; but you informed the Magistrates, that, if you had not been prevented by the constables, you would have given me a good thrashing; now, Sir, there are no constables present to interfere, and I will give you an opportunity to carry your threat into execution." "Sir, (he again repeated) I do not wish to have any thing to say to you;" and he was making out of the shop as fast as he could shuffle; but as soon as he opened the door, and stepped upon the pavement, I said, "Protect yourself," and at the same time I gave him a slight blow in the face with my flat hand, which knocked off his spectacles. The gallant reporter picked them up very coolly, and putting both hands before his face, he sued for mercy, saying, that if I persisted he should take the law of me. He kept his word, and I was indicted at the Middlesex sessions, and fined five pounds.
So ended the horse-whipping affair and the Westminster election, with the exception of a trifling after-clap or two, such as the High Bailiff sending me in a bill for my third share of the hustings, amounting to upwards of two hundred and fifty pounds (I think that was the sum). I refused the payment of it, and he commenced an action for the amount, and obtained a verdict for a great part of his charge. This brought me for the first time in contact with Mr. Counsellor Scarlett, he having been employed by the High Bailiff against me. I at once discovered, that this worthy Barrister, although a very clever fellow, was cursed with a very irritable, waspish disposition, of which I always took advantage afterwards, as often as we met in the Courts, which, unfortunately for me, was much too frequently for my pocket.
About this time an action had been brought against me, in the name of my landlord, Parson Williams, of Whitchurch, of whom I had rented Cold Henly Farm for three years, at a loss of about two thousand pounds, which I sunk in cleaning and improving the estate. When Mr Cobbett fled from England to go to America, in 1817, some of the Winchester attorneys and parsons openly said that they "had driven Cobbett out of the country, and they would try hard to make me follow him." They were as good as their words, for they tried all sorts of ways to injure my credit, and not succeeding to their wishes, an action was commenced against me, by a man who is clerk to the Magistrates, a Mr. Woodham, an attorney at Winchester, in the name of Mr. Williams, for breaches of covenants while I occupied Cold Henly Farm. I called on Mr. Williams, who denied having ever given any orders to Woodham to commence the action; he said that Woodham had urged him to do it, but that he refused to do so, and he wished every thing to be settled amicably. I relied upon the word of the old parson, who said he would write and stop any further proceedings; but my confidence was very soon betrayed, as I had notice that I had suffered judgment to pass by default, and a writ of inquiry was to be held at the next assizes to assess the damages. The writ of inquiry was executed at Winchester, and a verdict was obtained against me for, I believe, 250_l_. The breaches of covenant were easily proved, although they had been assented to by the parson, which assent I had carelessly and confidingly neglected to obtain from him, either in writing or before witnesses. Mr. ABRAHAM MORE, an eminent barrister upon the Western Circuit, was employed, and conducted the inquiry for Mr. Attorney Woodham. Mr. More was esteemed the best special pleader, and, after Mr. Sergeant Pell, he was certainly the best advocate upon the Western Circuit. But I take leave to ask, what is become of Mr. More? Mr. More has quitted the circuit and the bar, and fled from his country, since I came to this Bastile. I believe Mr. More was the Recorder of Lord Grosvenor's rotten borough of Shaftesbury, and he was, I am told, his lordship's steward, and suddenly left England under such circumstances as would have been blazoned forth in every newspaper in England, if he had been a poor Radical. I bear no personal hostility to Mr. More, therefore I shall not say any thing to wound the feelings of those of his relatives and friends who are left behind. But it is a remarkable fact, that the learned barrister, the Recorder of Shaftesbury, and the once learned and honest attorney, Mr. Richard Messiter, of Shaftesbury, should have left their country, and both have fled to America, under such peculiar circumstances.
On the 22d of July the son of Napoleon was created Duke of Reichstadt by his grandfather, the Emperor of Austria. On the 15th of August, very considerable disturbances took place at Manchester, amongst the manufacturing poor, who were suffering great privations and misery, in consequence of the high price of provisions, and the ruinous low prices given for manufacturing labour. On the 29th of September, the Emperors of Russia and Austria, and the King of Prussia, held a congress at Aix-la-Chapelle, assisted by ministers from England and France. On the 2d of October, the convention of Aix-la-Chapelle was signed. At the same period it was publicly announced by the Americans, that their navy consisted of six ships of the line, eleven frigates, and twenty-two sloops. On the 21st, Lord Ellenborough resigned the office of Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench.