laugh was long and loud; but it was turned against Burke, by Dundas intimating that in the changes which seemed impending, the warming-pan might possibly be Irish instead of Scotch-alluding to Burke's expectation of office. A "CHIP OF THE OLD BLOCK." When on the motion for the second reading of Burke's first Bill of Economical Reform, in 1781, William Pitt, just returned for Appleby, surprised and delighted the House by - his speech in favour of the measure, delivered with all the copiousness and self-command of a practised orator, Burke, forgetting his antipathy for Lord Chatham's memory, exclaimed exultingly to the friends beside him: "This is not merely a chip of the old block; but the old block itself." 1 Burke was accustomed to speak in most enthusiastic praise of young William Pitt-as not only possessing "the most extraordinary talents, but as gifted by nature with the judgment which others acquire by experience. Though judgment," he added, "is not so rare in youth as is generally supposed, I have commonly observed that those who do not possess it early, are apt to miss it late.” THE TOMB IN BEACONSFIELD CHURCH. Sir Bernard Burke has appended to his picturesque and eloquent work, Vicissitudes of Families, a chapter upon "The Double Sojourn of Genius at Beaconsfield," made famous by the two great Edmunds-Waller and Burke. "Waller was a courtier and a wit, a gay frequenter of the coffee-houses and taverns, and a rich exquisite of his time; yet he preferred to all else in the world the seat of Hall Barn at Beaconsfield, its verdant seclusion, its domestic comforts, and its rural pleasures. Like what we shall tell directly of Burke, Waller loved to see friends around him, and he entertained hospitably. Like Burke, he had many of the great people of the day among his guests. Lords and ladies of the Commonwealth, and of King Charles's Court, were welcomed in their turn. Among men of literary note, Evelyn, Ros common, and Dryden were his friends: and at Waller's table, Cromwell, his relative, would unbend, and lay aside all Puritan restraint. . . . Beaconsfield, through Waller's choice, first became a place of note. Its earliest fame was Waller, and his memory hangs round it still. The visitor will find many a mark and memorial of Waller there. T poet's magnificent seat of Hall Barn at Beaconsfield, built b himself, but improved by his son, still remains. The Wal family left it only a few years ago, when it became the pr perty of another distinguished man, whose sojourn was also:! sojourn of genius at Beaconsfield, the late Sir Gore Ousele Bart., at whose demise it passed into other hands. In is, now uninhabited condition, dismantled of its furniture, signi of the past may be discovered on the premises, and in th picturesque domain adorned with classic temples and obelisks and the armorial ensigns of the Wallers-the walnut-tre crest, with the royal escutcheon of France belonging to itmeet one everywhere.' Waller sleeps in Beaconsfield churchyard, where a stately tomb, in graceful Latinity, tells that he was of the poets of his time easily the prince; that when an octogenarian, he did not abdicate the laurel he had won in his youth, and that his country's language owes to him the possible belief that if the Muses should cease to speak Greek and Latin, they would love to talk in English. This tomb was the tribute of filial affection, having been raised by Waller's son at a considerable cost. Passing over some seventy years, we come to the greater and later repute of Beaconsfield, as the retreat of genius in the person of Edmund Burke, as narrated in many of the foregoing pages. "Here," says Sir Bernard Burke, “he died of a broken heart in 1797; and though some sixty years have passed since then, Beaconsfield bears still visible marks of that incurable sorrow. The mansion of Gregories was sold from the family by his widow. What was an hereditary *Vicissitudes of Families, and other Essays. By Sir Bernard Burke, Ulster King of Arms. 4th edition. 1860. house to him who in his grief refused a peerage, with the itle of Lord Burke of Beaconsfield? An accidental fire has since destroyed the dwelling, and one can scarcely trace, with no other landmark than a few ruined offices, the site of the mansion in the now deserted but still beautiful grounds. A decayed stable alone remains, with the very stall in it where Windham, when he rode down, big with the fate of nations, would put up his white horse. "Burke's Grove, a noble plantation, remains in the rear of the site of the mansion, as when Edmund used it as his favourite walk; and there are some at Beaconsfield who can remember his sad and stately figure gliding there to and fro, and pondering, no doubt, over the loss he had sustained. This is elegantly alluded to in a poem recently written by a Beaconsfield author: Oft to this sweet secluded spot he came, To hope and joy. Ambition's course was run, "The humble tablet in the church at Beaconsfield marks Burke's burial there; but such a memorial ill bespeaks the estimation in which his genius and patriotism are held." (See Appendix, page 385.) BURKE'S FORTUNES. The common calumny upon Burke that he entered political life almost penniless, has been met by a passage in the introduction prefixed by his executors to the celebrated pamphlet, Observations on the Conduct of the Minority in the Session of 1793, which was first published in an authentic form immediately after his death. This passage is as follows: "He was daily vilified as an obscure and needy adventurer, yet he did not tell what he had in his hands the means of substantiating, that he was sprung from a family eminently ennobled in several of its branches, and possessing an ample BB acquaintance with the springs of political machinery, which no man could possess unless actively engaged in politics. Again, Burke was fond of chemical studies; now chemical similes are frequent in Junius. "Again, Burke was an Irishman; now Junius, speaking of the Government of Ireland, twice calls it 'the Castle,' a familiar phrase amongst Irish politicians, but one which an Englishman in those days would never have used. "Again, Burke had this peculiarity in writing, that he often wrote many words without taking the pen from the paper. The very same peculiarity existed in the manuscripts of Junius, although they were written in a feigned hand. 66 'Again, it may be said that the style is not Burke's. In reply I would say, that Burke was master of many styles. His work on Natural Society, in imitation of Lord Bolingbroke, is as different in point of style from his work on the French Revolution as both are from the Letters of Junius. 66 'Again, Junius speaks of the King's insanity as a Divine visitation; Burke said the very same thing in the House of Commons. 66 Again, had any one of the other men to whom the Letters are, with any show of probability, ascribed, been really the author, such author would have had no reason for disowning the book, or remaining incognito. Any one of them but Burke would have claimed the authorship and fame -and proud fame. But Burke had a very cogent reason for remaining incognito. In claiming Junius, he would have claimed his own condemnation and dishonour, for Burke died a pensioner. Burke was, moreover, the only pensioner who had the commanding talent displayed in the writings of Junius. "Now, when I lay all these considerations together, and especially when I reflect that a cogent reason exists for Burke's silence as to his own authorship, I confess I think I have got a presumptive proof of the very strongest nature, that Burke was the writer." JUNIUS DESCRIBED BY BURKE. Burke's speech in the House of Commons, upon the ecution of Almon for reprinting Junius's famous Letter e King, occurred the following celebrated description of us: How comes this Junius to have broke though the cobof the law, and to range uncontrolled, unpunished ugh the land? The myrmidons of the court have been , and are still, pursuing him in vain. They will not spend time upon me, or upon you, when the mighty boar of forest that has broke through all their toils is before n. But what will all their efforts avail? No sooner has wounded one, than he strikes down another dead at his For my own part, when I saw his attack upon the g, I own my blood ran cold. I thought he had ventured far, and that there was an end of his triumphs; not that ad not asserted many bold truths. Yes, Sir; there are hat composition many bold truths by which a wise prince ht profit. It was the rancour and venom with which I struck. But while I expected from this daring flight final ruin and fall, behold him rising still higher and ing down souse upon both Houses of Parliament. Yes, made you his quarry, and you still bleed from the effects his talons. You crouched, and still crouch beneath his rage. r has he dreaded the terrors of your brow, Sir-(the Speaker, Fletcher Norton, remarkable for his large eyebrows)— he has attacked even you, and I believe you have no son to triumph in the encounter. Not content with carry; away our royal eagle in his pounces and dashing him ainst a rock, he has laid you prostrate, and King, Lords, d Commons thus become the sport of his fury. Were he a mber of this House, what might not be expected from his owledge, his firmness, and his integrity? He would be sily known by his contempt of all danger, by his penetran, and by his vigour. Nothing would escape his vigilance d activity. Bad ministers could conceal nothing from hi |