* * * * *
A few days before he was called to the bar, a friend came and invited him to accompany him to dine at the villa of a wine merchant, a few miles from London. The allurements were a good dinner, and wine not to be procured but by a dealer, who could cull his own stock from thousands of pipes, and they were not to be resisted
by a young man fond of pleasure, to whom such luxuries must come gratuitously, if they come at all. Economy, which was important to Erskine, was not quite beneath the regard of his friend, and after many proposals of several modes of conveyance, which were all rejected, either for their expense, or their humbleness, they agreed to walk; I have heard playful exertions of the mind or body attributed to what was denominated an excessive flow of animal spirits, a phrase that sounds significantly in the ear, but gives no information to the understanding. Those who use it, mean, I suppose, to express that when the body has received more nutriment than is necessary to promote its growth, or maintain it the redundancy is thrown off in almost involuntary exertions of the limbs or of mind. If this physiology be just, Erskine had an extraordinary surplus of supply,—that regular discharge like the back water of a mill, and it found vent in various gambols and effusions of humour on the way to the wine merchant’s. While Erskine, buoyed by high health and ardent hope, scarcely felt the ground that he trod, the sight of a ditch by the side of the road, tempted him to exercise his agility. The impulse, and obedience to the impulse, were the same. He made the attempt, but the ditch was too wide for his spring, and he leaped a little short of the opposite bank. His dress above was splashed with foul water, and his legs booted in mud. Nothing was to be done on his part but to return, and his companion with a kindness that does him honour, would have returned with him, but this, Erskine was too generous to allow; and while his friend continued his journey to the wine merchant’s house and sumptuous dinner, Erskine solitary and in pain (for he had severely sprained his leg) returned to
town; on reaching his lodgings Mrs. Erskine proposed a change of dress, and urged him yet to go to dinner at the wine merchant’s. He objected his lameness from the sprain, which she answered by proposing a coach and the expense, which he hinted, was not to be weighed against the benefit he might derive from the friends which his manners and spirits were likely to make him in the mixed and numerous company he would meet there. This was a consideration so important to a young man on the verge of the bar, that Erskine’s disinclination was overcome by these reasonings of his wife. A coach was procured, and he again set out, but he did not arrive till dinner was half over, and found himself placed by this accident by the side of Captain Bailey, of Greenwich Hospital. With the modesty which is always united with true genius, Lord Erskine always spoke of this event as the greatest instance of good fortune which ever befel him. But for this, he said to me, “I might have waited years for an opportunity to show that I had any talent for the bar; and when it occurred I should not have pleaded with such effect, depressed and mortified as I might have been by long expectation, and its attendant evils, instead of seizing it with all the energy and confidence of youth elated with hope.” I record this to show how little he was actuated by arrogance or presumption; I by no means assent to his opinion, on the contrary, I think he would have waited a very short time for occasion to exert his prominent talents. He slipt from high ground into the profession. His rank would have drawn notice upon him, and he had friends full of eagerness, and not altogether without power. No more is the partiality which, it is said, was manifestly shown him by Lord Mansfield, to be deemed a main
cause of his success. On the contrary I am so little inclined to attribute such an effect to it, that I believe even the hostility of the bench could not have kept Erskine from rising. His mind was not of the ordinary mould,—he was excited by obstacles. Such was his temperament, that the damp slight of discouragement which would have quenched common spirits, by the ardour of his mind would have been converted into fuel, and have increased the splendour with which he burst forth at once at the English bar. How was the delay of opportunity, or the frown of the judge to suppress the eloquence whose first essay excelled, both in matter and delivery, the latest efforts of the most experienced speakers in our courts? when he rose Dunning, Bearcroft, Wallace and others, were in the height of their reputation as speakers in Westminster Hall. They were even eloquent, according to the judgment of the day gazed at as the luminaries of the profession; but, brilliant as they were, they were combust in the splendour of Erskine, on his first appearance as an orator. This considered, it is in vain to pretend, that, but for favourable conjunctions which have happened to him and not to others, the prosperous and devious career on which he immediately entered, could have been prevented or even long delayed.—[Alas, no more!]
bridge street banditti, v. the press.
REPORT OF THE TRIAL
of
MARY-ANNE CARLILE,
for publishing a new year’s address
to the
reformers of great britain;
written by
RICHARD CARLILE;
at the instance of the constitutional association:
before
mr. justice best, and a special jury,
at the
Court of King’s Bench, Guildhall, London, July 24, 1821.
with the noble and effectual speech of
MR. COOPER,
in defence, at large.
LONDON:
printed and published by r. carlile, 55, fleet street.
1821.