readily adopt the tactics best fitted for those of an opposing general, in his speeches against Lord North expatiated into a very wide field. The closeness of a future opponent has since lessened his expatiation, and by contracting its direction, strengthened his eloquence, as I shall afterwards have occasion to mention. Fox, during the American war, was a more informed and more energetic speaker than before; and now is a more informed, more compacted, more energetic speaker than during his political campaigns against Lord North, though still often too expatiatory.

Among many extraordinary excellencies in the eloquence of Fox is his power of simplification. However intricate or complicated

a subject may be, he unravels and unfolds it so perfectly as to make it intelligible to the most ordinary hearer. He strips Truth of every dress, that, from either artifice or negligence, might conceal her real form; and displays her naked nerves and sinews. Like Demosthenes, the excellence of his

speeches consists in essentials; in clearly stating important facts, in adducing and impressing forcible arguments. His orations are addressed almost exclusively to the understanding. In imagery he frequently. deals; but his are the images of illustration more than of embellishment. Like Demosthenes, he can call in humour and wit ; but they are called in as auxiliaries, and not suffered to act as principals. So extensive and variegated is his knowledge, that he overcomes professional men, not only in the principles, (for that, in such a man as Fox, would not be surprising) but in the technical details of their peculiar knowledge. His arrangement is evidently not studied; thoughts rise so rapidly in his mind that it would be impossible for him to adhere to any preconceived order. His disposition is, however, the result of a mind that is comprehensive, as well as rapid and energetic: it is sufficiently luminous to convey to his hearers the different parts and relations of the most complicated subjects. His style is that which a powerful understanding, and

a thorough knowledge of the language, without any affectation, produces. He courts neither elegance nor harmony; but is not deficient in those secondary qualities. The primary qualities of language, clearness, force, and appropriation, characterize his speeches. Without rhetorical flourishes and gaudy ornaments, his language is merely a vehicle of feeling and thought.

American affairs occupied the principal attention of Ministry and Opposition during the session of 1774. In all the colonies the landing of the tea had been resisted; so that all shared in the criminality for which the port of Boston had been blocked. The Bostonians, on hearing of the resolutions of the British Parliament, were at first alarmed; but on finding that their neighbours were resolved to support them, became more firm and determined in their opposition to the mother country. The assembly of Virginia set the example of making the cause of Boston a common cause of the colonies." They represented the parliamentary mea

sures as in truth an attack on all the colonies, and as of a tendency destructive to the rights and liberties of all, unless effectually resisted. To inflame the minds of the people, they appointed the first of June, the day on which the bill was to commence, as a day of

fast and humiliation, to implore the Divine. interposition to avert the heavy calamity which threatened destruction to their civil rights, with the evils of civil war, and to give one heart and mind to the people, firmly to oppose every injury to the American rights. The other colonies coinciding in sentiment, and adopting the measures of Massachuset and Virginia, committees of correspondence were established between the several provinces, and a plan was proposed for holding a general congress to deliberate on such measures as the common interest of America might require.

The congress was held at Philadelphia, consisting of delegates chosen from all the other colonies, except Georgia. Although the colonies were not all equally violent in

every particular, they all agreed in condemning the Boston-port bill, the consequent laws respecting Massachuset's Bay, and in denying the right of Britain to tax the colonies. They published a declaration on the state of the affairs in Massachuset, declaring their approbation of the conduct of the Bostonians, recommending perseverance in the plan of conduct they had hitherto pursued, and contributions to compensate for the evils they had already suffered from their spirit of resistance. They published also a petition to the King, an address to the People of Great Britain, and an address to the Colonies, all breathing the same spirit of repugnance to the authority of Parliament; also a declaration of rights and grievances, claiming, as a most important privilege, the exclusive power of legislating for

themselves in all cases whatsoever,

These were the resolutions made public; but it appeared, from the measures adopted in the several colonies, after the breaking up of the congress, that hostilities were already