"Lamenting," says Lord Campbell, "the great difficulty he had in disposing of a high legal situation, he described himself as long hesitating between the intemperance of A. and the corruption of B., but finally preferring the man of bad temper. Afraid lest he should have been supposed to have admitted the existence of pure moral worth, he added, 'Not but that there was a d——d deal of corruption in A.'s intemperance.' Happening to be at the British Museum, viewing the Townley Marbles, when a person came in and announced the death of Mr. Pitt, Thurlow was heard to say, 'a d——d good hand at turning a period!' and no more.
"The following anecdote (continues his lordship) was related by Lord Eldon:—
"After dinner, one day, when nobody was present but Lord Kenyon and myself, Lord Thurlow said, 'Taffy,[P] I decided a cause this morning, and I saw from Scott's face he doubted whether I was right.' Thurlow then stated his view of the case, and Kenyon instantly said, 'Your decision was quite right.' 'What say you to that?' asked the Chancellor. I said, 'I did not presume to form a judgment upon a case in which they both agreed. But I think a fact has not been mentioned, which may be material.' I was about to state the fact, and my reasons. Kenyon, however, broke in upon me, and, with some warmth, stated that I was always so obstinate, there was no dealing with me. 'Nay,' interposed Thurlow, 'that's not fair. You, Taffy, are obstinate, and give no reasons; you, Jack Scott, are obstinate, too; but then you give your reasons, and d——d bad ones they are!'"
"In Thurlow's time, the habit of profane swearing was unhappily so common, that Bishop Horsley, and other right reverend prelates, are said not to have been entirely exempt from it; but Thurlow indulged in it to a degree that admits of no excuse. I have been told by an old gentleman, who was standing behind the woolsack at the time that Sir Ilay Campbell, then Lord Advocate, arguing a Scotch appeal to the bar in a very tedious manner, said, 'I will noo, my lords, proceed to my seevent pownt.' 'I'll be d——d if you do,' cried Lord Thurlow, so as to be heard by all present; 'this house is adjourned till Monday next,' and off he scampered. Sir James Mansfield, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, used to relate that, while he and several other legal characters were dining with Lord Chancellor Thurlow, his lordship happening to swear at his Swiss valet, when retiring from the room, the man returned, just put his head in, and exclaimed, 'I von't be d——d for you, Milor;' which caused the noble host and all his guests to burst out into a roar of laughter. From another valet he received a still more cutting retort. Having scolded this meek man for some time without receiving any answer, he concluded by saying, 'I wish you were in hell.' The terrified valet at last exclaimed, 'I wish I was, my lord! I wish I was!'
"Sir Thomas Davenport, a great nisi prius leader, had been intimate with Thurlow, and long flattered himself with the hopes of succeeding to some valuable appointment in the law; but, several good things passing by, he lost his patience and temper along with them. At last he addressed this laconic application to his patron: 'The Chief Justiceship of Chester is vacant; am I to have it?' and received the following laconic answer—'No! by God! Kenyon shall have it.'
"Having once got into a dispute with a bishop respecting a living, of which the Great Seal had the alternate presentation, the bishop's secretary called upon him, and said, 'My lord of —— sends his compliments to your lordship, and believes that the next turn to present to —— belongs to his lordship.' Chancellor.—'Give my compliments to his lordship, and tell him that I will see him d——d first before he shall present.' Secretary.—'This, my lord, is a very unpleasant message to deliver to a bishop.' 'You are right, it is so, therefore tell the bishop that I will be damned first before he shall present.'"[Q]
Lord Campbell concludes his records of the Chancellor's jusjuration (if we may coin a word for a precedent so extraordinary), by frankly extracting into his pages the whole of a long damnatory ode, which was put into the judge's mouth by the authors of the once-famous collection of libels called Criticisms on the Rolliad, and Probationary Odes for the Laureateship,—the precursor, and very witty precursor, though flagrantly coarse and personal, of the Anti-Jacobin Magazine and the Rejected Addresses. They were on the Whig side of politics, and are understood to have been the production of Dr. Lawrence, a civilian, and George Ellis, the author of several elegant works connected with poetry and romance. We shall notice the book further when we come to speak of Mr. Ellis himself. Lord Thurlow is made to contribute one of the Probationary Odes; and he does it in so abundant and complete a style, that bold as our "innocence" makes us in this particular, yet not having the legal warrant of the biographer, we really have not the courage to bring it in as evidence. The reader, however, may guess of what sort of stuff it is composed, when he hears that it begins with the comprehensive line,
"Damnation seize ye all;"
and ends with the following pleasing and particular couplet:—