while Lord Norbury rated himself at his real value, and did not "set his life at a pin's fee."

After this affair, which mainly contributed to the making of his fortunes, the minister determined to turn the principal talent which he appeared to possess, and of which he had given so conspicuous a proof, to farther account. In the Irish House of Commons, the government party, when hard pressed, converted the debate into a sort of sanguinary burletta, in which Lord Norbury, then Sergeant Toler, and Sir Boyle Roche, of blundering memory, were their favorite performers.

* Sir Boyle Roche was an Irish Baronet, who had a seat in Parliament, and was the droll of the House. He was famous for his bulls-which, though the expression might be incorrect, generally involved aphorisms of sound sense. He was of respectable family—with a claim to the title of Viscount Fermoy, but never urging it. Once, when it was stated, on a money-grant, that it was unjust to saddle posterity with a debt incurred to benefit the present generation, Sir Boyle rose up and said, "Why should we beggar ourselves to benefit posterity? What has posterity done for us?" The laugh which followed rather surprised him, as he was unconscious of his blunder. He explained: "Sir, by posterity I do not mean our ancestors, but those who come immediately after them." -Arguing in favor of a harsh Government measure, he urged that it would be better to give up not only a part, but even the whole of the constitution, to preserve the remainder."-On another occasion, as a free translation of

"Tu no cede malis, sed contra audentior ito,"

he said "The best way to avoid danger, is to meet it plump."-Complaining of the smallness of wine-bottles, he suggested that a bill should be passed enacting that every quart-bottle should hold a quart.- He married Sir John Cave's eldest daughter, and boasted that if he had an older one, Sir John would have given her to him. Fearing the progress of revolutionary opinions,he drew a frightful picture of the future, remarking that the House of Commons might be invaded by ruffians who, said he, "would cut us to mince-meat and throw our bleeding heads on that table, to stare us in the face."-Arguing in favor of the Union of Ireland with England, he said (rather wittily) that" there was no Levitical degrees between nations, and, on this occasion, he saw neither sin nor shame in marrying our own sister."-He brought in a bill for the improvement of the Dublin police, who were in the habit of sleeping on their post, at night, and introduced a clause to the effect that "every watchman should be compelled to sleep in the daytime." On this, another member arose and begged to be included in that clause, by name, "as he was troubled with the gout and sometimes could not sleep by night or day."-He assisted in preparing a bill to provide for the erection of a new jail in Dublin, and stated that the new prison should be built on the site and with the materials of the old one, and that the prisoners should

When Grattan had ignited the House of Commons, and succeeded in awakening some recollections of public virtue in that corrupt and prostituted assembly, or when Mr. Ponsonby, the leader of the Whig aristocracy, had, by his clear and simple exposition of the real interests of the country, brought a reluctant conviction of their duty to those who were most interested in shutting it out, finding themselves unequal to cope in eloquence with the one, or in argument with the other, the government managers produced Sir Boyle Roche and Sergeant Toler upon the scene.

On Grattan the experiment of bullying was not tried, for his firmness was too well known. Sir Boyle was, therefore, appointed to reply to him, as his absurdities were found to be useful in restoring the House to that moral tone, from which the elevating declamation of the greatest speaker of his time had for a moment raised them. Under the influence of Sir Boyle's blunders, which were in part intended, the Irish legislators recovered their characteristic pleasantry, and “made merry of a nation's woes;" while Sergeant Toler, who almost equalled Sir Boyle in absurdity, and was more naturally, becontinue to reside in the old prison until the new one was completed! - Barrington states that the postillion of Lord Lisle having been mulcted in damages for crim. con. with Lady Lisle, and imprisoned in default of payment, and an applicant for relief as an Insolvent Debtor, which the Legislature resisted, Sir Boyle Roche argued for him (and with much plausibility) that "Lady Lisle, and not Dennis M'Carthy, must have been the real seducer," and concluded by asking "Mr. Speaker, what was this poor servant's crime?- Sure, only doing his master's business by his mistress's order."-Curran used to say that Sir Boyle Roche had a rival in an Irish Judge, who sagely contended, in an argument on the construction of a will, that "it appeared to him that the testator meant to keep a life interest in the estate to himself." Curran answered, "True, my Lord; testators do generally secure a life interest for themselves, but in this case, I rather think you take the will for the deed." Sir Boyle Roche's bulls illustrated what may be called arguing wrongly from right premises. To illustrate this, let me add a bull by another. Two Irishmen met, after a long separation, and to an inquiry after the health of a third person, the reply was, Oh, he's been ill. He's had the fever. It has worn him down, as You are thin, and I am thin, but he is thinner than

i

thin as a thread-paper.

was

both of us put together." Here the idea is fully conveyed, but, in the hurry of clothing the thought with language, the mode of expression is incorrect. And such is that amusing thing—an Irish Bull.-M.

cause he was involuntarily extravagant, played his part, and was let loose upon Mr. Ponsonby, whose nerves were of a delicate organization, with singular effect. That eminent statesman had made a speech, recommending Catholic Emancipation, and other collateral measures, as the only means of rescuing Ireland from the ruin which impended over her. He was always remarkable for the dignified urbanity of his manners, and in the speech to which Sergeant Toler replied, scarcely any man but Toler could have found materials for personal vituperation.

The English reader will be able to form some idea of the system on which the debates of the Irish House of Commons were carried on, and to estimate Lord Norbury's powers of minacious oratory, from the following extract from the parliamentary debates: "What was it come to, that in the Irish House of Commons they should listen to one of their own members degrading the character of an Irish gentleman by language which was fitted but for hallooing a mob? Had he heard a man uttering out of those doors such language as that by which the honorable gentleman had violated the decorum of Parliament, he would have seized the ruffian by the throat, and dragged him to the dust! What were the House made of, who could listen in patience to such abominable sentiments? sentiments, thank God! which were acknowledged by no class of men in this country, except the execrable and infamous nest of traitors, who were known by the name of United Irishmen, who sat brooding in Belfast over their discontents and treasons, and from whose publications he could trace, word for word, every expression the honorable gentleman had used."Irish Parliamentary Debates, Feb., 1797.

Of this fragment of vituperation Mr. Ponsonby took no notice; and the object of the orator was attained, in securing himself a new title to the gratitude of those who kept a band of bravoes hired in their service, and could not have selected a more appropriate instrument than Lord Norbury for the purposes of intimidation. To his personal courage, or rather

recklessness of the lives of others as well as his own, he is chiefly indebted for his promotion. It was the leading trait

of his character, and, prevailing over his extravagance, invested him with a sort of spurious respectability. In the manifestations of that spirit, which had become habitual, he has persevered to the last; and even since he has been a Chief-Justice has betrayed his original tendency to settle matters after the old Irish fashion, at the distance of twelve paces. He has more than once intimated to a counsel, who was pressing him too closely with a Bill of Exceptions, that he would not seek shelter behind the bench, or merge the gentleman in the ChiefJustice; and, when a celebrated senator charged him with having fallen asleep on a trial for murder, he is reported to have declared that he would resign, in order to demand satisfaction, as "that Scotch Broom (Brougham) wanted nothing so much as an Irish stick."

In the year 1798, Lord Norbury was his Majesty's SolicitorGeneral. His services to Government had been hitherto confined to the display of ferocious rhetoric in the House of Commons, of which I have quoted a specimen. The civil disturbances of the country offered a new field to his genius, and afforded him an opportunity of accumulating his claims upon the gratitude of the Crown, which could not have found a more zealous, and, I will even add, a more useful servant during the rebellion. If the juries before whom the hordes who were charged with high treason were put upon their trial, had been either scrupulous or reluctant, if any questions of effectual difficulty could have arisen, and the forms of the law could have been used with any chance of success in the defence of the prisoners, if Justice had not rushed with eagerness through every impediment, and broken all ceremony down, such a Solicitor-General as Lord Norbury would have been an inapplicable and inefficient instrument; but the evidence of informers was generally so direct and simple, and so strong was the impatience of juries to precipitate themselves to a conviction, all niceties and technicalities of the law were so utterly disregarded, and it was so little requisite that the conductors of Government prosecutions should possess either acuteness or knowledge, that Lord Norbury's faculties were quite equal to the discharge of his official duty, while they were in happy

to those immortal records of judicial wisdom, a report of Lord Manners's last judgment upon himself) to preserve some account of his lordship's final adjudication upon his own merits, and to commemorate the tear that fell upon that pathetic occasion from the "Outalissi" of the Four Courts

"The first, the last, the only tear

That Peter Henchey shed:"

66

but I find that the first of the incidents to which I have referred, together with an account of the progress of Lord Norbury through the various parts which he performed in the political theatre, from his first entrance as an Irish gentleman" in the House of Commons, to his exit as a jester from the bench, will occupy so much space, that I must confine myself to the biography of his Lordship; which, however little it may be instructive, will not, I think, be found unamusing, and falls within the scope of the articles on the Irish Bar.

In the account given by Sir Pertinax Macsycophant of his rise and progress in the world, he states that his only patrimony was a piece of parental advice, which stood him in lieu of an estate. I have heard it said, that Lord Norbury, in detailing the circumstances which attended his original advancement in life, generally commenced the narrative of his adventures with a death-bed scene of a peculiarly Irish character. His father, a gentleman of a respectable Protestant family in the county of Tipperary, called him in his last moments to his side, and after stating that, in order to sustain the ancient and venerable name of Toler in its dignity, he had devised the estate derived from a sergeant (not at law) to his eldest son, the old Cromwellian drew from under his pillow a case of silver-mounted pistols, and, delivering this "donatio mortis causâ," charged him never to omit exhibiting the promptitude of an Irish gentleman, in resorting to these forensic and parliamentary instruments of advancement.

* Lord Norbury made frequent, if not good, use of his pistols-"barkers,” as they were called in fighting parlance. He fought with several persons, one of whom was the ruffianly "Fighting Fitzgerald" who was finally hanged for murder. In those days a duel was necessary to fix a man's character. When a young man entered society, the first word was, "What family does he come