“Not to you,” quoth I, returning his accent pretty fully,
“Why, true,” answered he very candidly; “there may be something in that.”
“How is it all to be?” cried James. “Is the defence to go on long, and are they to have any evidence; or how?”
“We don’t know this part of the business,” said Mr. Windham, smiling a little at such an upright downright question “it is Mr. Hastings’s affair now to settle it: however, I understand he means to answer charge after charge as they were brought against him, first by speeches, then by evidence: however, this is all conjecture.”
MR. LAW’S SPEECH DISCUSSED.
We then spoke of Mr. Law, Mr. Hastings’s first counsel, and I expressed some dissatisfaction that such attackers should not have had abler and more equal opponents “But do you not think Mr. Law spoke well?” cried he, “clear, forcible?”
“Not forcible,” cried I. I would not say not clear.
“He was frightened,” said Mr. Windham, “he might not do himself justice. I have heard him elsewhere, and been very well satisfied with him; but he looked pale and alarmed, and his voice trembled.”
“I was very well content with his materials,” quoth I, “which I thought much better than the use he made of them; and once or twice, he made an opening that, with a very little skill, might most adroitly and admirably have raised a laugh against you all.”
He looked a little askew, I must own, but he could not help smiling. . . I gave him an instance in point, which -was the reverse given by Mr. Law to the picture drawn by Mr. Burke of Tamerlane, in which he said those virtues and noble qualities bestowed upon him by the honourable manager were nowhere to be found but on the British stage.
Now this, seriously, with a very little ingenuity, might have placed Mr. Burke at the head of a company of comedians. This last notion I did not speak, however; but enough was understood, and Mr. Windham looked straight away from me, without answering; nevertheless, his profile, which he left me, showed much more disposition to laugh than to be incensed.
Therefore I proceeded; pointing out another lost opportunity that, well saved, might have proved happily ridiculous against them; and this was Mr. Law’s description of the real state of India, even from its first discovery by Alexander, opposed to Mr. Burke’s flourishing representation, of its golden age, its lambs and tigers associating, etc.
Still he looked askew; but I believe he is truth itself, for he offered no defence, though, of course, he would not enter into the attack. And surely at this critical period I must not spare pointing out all he will submit to hear, on the side of a man of whose innocence I am so fully persuaded.
“I must own, however,” continued I, finding him still attentive, though silent, “Mr. Law provoked me in one point — his apologies for his own demerits. Why should he contribute his humble mite to your triumphs? and how little was it his place to extol your superior talents, as if you were not self-sufficient enough already, without his aid.”
‘Unless you had heard the speech of Mr. Law, you can hardly imagine with what timid flattery he mixed every exertion he ventured to make in behalf of his client; and I could not forbear this little observation, because I had taken notice with what haughty derision the managers had perceived the fears of their importance, which were felt even by the very counsel of their prisoner. Mr. Windham, too, who himself never looks either insolent or deriding, must be sure what I meant for his associates could not include himself. He did not, however, perfectly welcome the remark; he still only gave me his profile, and said not a word,-so I went on. Mr. Hastings little thinks what a pleader I am become in his cause, against one of his most powerful adversaries.
“There was still another thing,” quoth I, “in which I felt vexed with Mr. Law: how could he be so weak as to beg quarter from you, and to humbly hope that, if any mistake, any blunder, any improvident word escaped him, you would have the indulgence to spare your ridicule? O yes, to be sure! when I took notice at the moment of his supplication, and before any error committed, that every muscle of every face, amongst you was at work from the bare suggestion.”
He could not even pretend to look grave now, but, turning frankly towards me, said, “Why, Mr. Fox most justly observed upon that petition, that, if any man makes a blunder, a mistake, ’tis very well to apologize: but it was singular to hear a man gravely preparing for his blunders and mistakes, and wanting to make terms for them beforehand.”
“I like him for this,” cried James again bonnement, “that he seems so much interested for his client.”
“Will you give me leave to inquire,” quoth I, “one thing? You know my old knack of asking strange questions.”
He only bowed — archly enough, I assure you.”
Did I fancy, or was it fact, that you were a flapper to Mr. Burke, when Mr. Law charged him with disingenuity, in not having recanted the accusation concerning Devy Sing? He appeared to me in much perturbation, and I thought by his see-saw he was going to interrupt the speech: did you prevent him?”
“No, no,” he answered, “I did not: I did not think him in any danger.”
He rubbed his cheek, though, as he spoke, as if he did not much like that circumstance. O that Mr. Burke — so great, so noble a creature — can in this point thus have been warped MR. WINDHAM ON THE FRENCH NATIONAL ASSEMBLY.
I ran off to another scene, and inquired how he had been amused abroad, and, in particular, at the National Assembly?
“Indeed,” he answered, “it was extremely curious for a short time; but there is little variety in it, and therefore it will not do long.”
I was in a humour to be just as sincere here, as about the trial; so you democrats must expect no better.
“I understand,” quoth I, “there is a great dearth of abilities in this new Assembly; how then should there be any variety?”
“No, I cannot say that: they do not want abilities; but they have no opportunity to make their way.”
“O!” quoth I, shaking my wise head, “abilities, real abilities, make their own way.”
“Why, that’s true; but, in that Assembly, the noise, the tumult—”
“Abilities,” again quoth I, “ “have power to quell noise and tumult.”
“Certainly, in general; but not in France. These new legislative members are so solicitous to speak, so anxious to be heard, that they prefer uttering any tautology to listening to others; and when once they have begun, they go on with what speed they may, and without selection, rather than stop. They see so many ready to seize their first pause, they know they have so little chance of a second hearing, that I never entered the Assembly without being reminded of the famous old story of the man who patiently bore hearing a tedious harangue, by saying the whole time to himself, ‘Well, well, ’tis his turn now; but let him beware how he sneezes.”’
“A BARBAROUS BUSINESS!”
James now again asked some question of their intentions with regard to the progress of the trial. He answered, “We have nothing to do with its present state. We leave Mr. Hastings now to himself, and his own set. Let him keep to his cause, and he may say what he will. We do not mean to interfere, nor avail ourselves of our privileges.”
Mr. Hastings was just entered; I looked down at him, and saw his half-motion to kneel; I could not bear it, and, turning suddenly to my neighbour, “O, Mr. Windham,” I cried, “after all, ’tis, indeed, a barbarous business!” This was rather further than I meant to go, for I said it with serious earnestness; but it was surprised from me by the emotion always excited at sight of that unmerited humiliation.
He looked full at me upon this solemn attack, and with a look of chagrin amounting to displeasure, saying, “It is a barbarous business we have had to go through.”
I did not attempt to answer this, for, except through the medium of sport and raillery, I have certainly no claim upon his patience. But, in another moment, in a tone very flattering, he said, “I do not understand, nor can any way imagine, how you can have been thus perv
erted!”
“No, no!” quoth I, “it is you who are perverted!”
Here Mr. Law began his second oration, and Mr. Windham ran down to his cell. I fancy this was not exactly the conversation he expected upon my first enlargement. However, though it would very seriously grieve me to hurt or offend him, I cannot refuse my own veracity, nor Mr. Hastings’s injuries, the utterance of what I think truth.
Mr. Law was far more animated and less frightened, and acquitted himself so as to merit almost as much `eloge as, in my opinion, he had merited censure at the opening. It was all in answer to Mr. Burke’s general exordium and attack.
DEATH OF SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.
Upon the day of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s death(355) I was in my bed, with two blisters, and I did not hear of it till two days after. I shall enter nothing upon this Subject here; our current letters mentioned the particulars, and I am not desirous to retrace them. His loss is as universally felt as his merit is universally acknowledged, and, joined to all public motives, I had myself private ones of regret that cannot subside. He was always peculiarly kind to me, and he had worked at my deliverance from a life he conceived too laborious for me as if I had been his own daughter; yet, from the time of my coming forth, I only twice saw him. I had not recovered strength for visiting before he was past receiving me. I grieve inexpressibly never to have been able to make him the small tribute of thanks for his most kind exertions in my cause. I little thought the second time I saw him would be my last opportunity, and my intention was to wait some favourable opening Miss Palmer is left heiress,(356) and her unabating attendance upon her inestimable uncle in his sickroom makes everybody content with her great acquisition. I am sure she loved and admired him with all the warmth of her warm heart. I wrote her a few lines of condolence, and she has sent me a very kind answer. She went immediately to the Burkes, with whom she will chiefly, I fancy, associate.
March.-Sad for the loss of Sir Joshua, and all of us ill ourselves, we began this month. Upon its 3rd day was his funeral.(357) My dear father could not attend; but Charles was invited and went. All the Royal Academy, professors and students, and all the Literary club, attended as family, mourners. Mr. Burke, Mr. Malone, and Mr. Metcalf, are executors. Miss Palmer has spared nothing, either in thought or expense, that could render the last honours splendid and grateful. It was a very melancholy day to us; though it had the alleviation and softening of a letter from our dear Charlotte, promising to arrive the next day.
MR. WINDHAM TWITTED ON His LACK OF COMPASSION.
April 23. — I thought myself equal to again going to the trial, which recommenced, after six or seven weeks’ cessation, on account of the judges going the circuit. Sarah went with me: I am now so known in the chamberlain’s box that the door-keepers and attendants make way for me without looking at my ticket. And to be sure, the managers on one side, and Mr. Hastings’s friends and counsel on the other, must pretty well have my face by heart. I have the faces of all them, most certainly, in full mental possession; and the figures of many whose names I know not are so familiar to my eyes, that should I chance hereafter to meet them, I shall be apt to take them for old acquaintances.
There was again a full appearance of managers to accompany
Mr. Burke in his entry; and again Mr. Windham quitted the procession, as it descended to the box, and filed off to speak with me.
He made the most earnest inquiries after the health of my dearest father, as well as after my own. He has all the semblance of real regard and friendship for us, and I am given to believe he wears no semblance that has not a real and sympathetic substance couched beneath. His manner instantly revived in my mind my intent not to risk, with him, the loss of making those poor acknowledgments for his kindness, that I so much regret omitting to Sir Joshua Reynolds. In return to his inquiries about my renovating health, I answered that I had again been very ill since I saw him last, and added, “Indeed, I believe I did not come away too soon.”
“ And now,” cried I, “I cannot resist giving myself the pleasure of making my acknowledgments for what I owe to you upon this subject. I have been, indeed, very much obliged, by various things that have come round to me, both to you and Sir Joshua. — O what a loss is that!”
“What a wretched loss!” cried he: and we then united our warmest suffrages in his favour, with our deepest regret for our deprivation. Here I observed poor Mr. Hastings was brought in. I saw he was fixing him.
“And can you,” I cried, fixing him, “can you have so much compassion for one captive, and still have none for another?”
“Have you, then, still,” cried he, “the same sentiments?”
“Have you,” cried I, “heard all thus far of the defence, and are you still unmoved?”
“Unmoved?” cried he, emphatically; “shall I be moved by a lion? You see him there in a cage, and pity him; look back to when you might have seen him with a lamb in his claws!”
I could only look dismayed for a moment. “But, at least,” I said, “I hope what I hear is not true, though I now grow afraid to ask?”
“If it is anything about me,” he answered, “it is certainly not true.”
“I am extremely glad, indeed,” cried I, “for it has been buzzed about in the world that you were to draw up the final charge. This I thought most cruel of all; You, who have held back all this time—”
“Yes! pretty completely,” interrupted he, laughing “No, not completely,” I continued; “but Yet YOU have made no direct formal speech, nor have come forward in any positive and formidable manner; therefore, as we have now heard all the others, and — almost enough—”
I was obliged to stop a moment, to see how this adventurous plainness was taken; and he really, though my manner showed me only rallying, looked I don’t know how, at such unexampled disrespect towards his brother orators. But I soon went quietly on: “To come forth now, after all that has passed, with the eclat of novelty, and,-for the most cruel part of all, — that which cannot be answered.”
“You think,” cried he, “’tis bringing a fresh courser into the field of battle, just as every other is completely jaded?”
“I think,” cried I, “that I am very generous to wish against what
I should so much wish for, but for other considerations.”
“O, what a flattering way,” cried he, “of stating it! however, I can bear to allow you a little waste of compliments, which you know so well how to make; but I cannot bear to have you waste your compassion.”
A POINT OF CEREMONIAL.
May.-The 1st of this month I went again to Westminster Hall, with our cousin Elizabeth. Evidence was brought forward by the counsel for Mr. Hastings, and Lord Stormont was called upon as a witness. This produced some curious debating among the Lords, and with the chancellor. They spoke only for the ears of one another, as it was merely to settle some ceremonial, whether he was to be summoned to the common place where the witnesses stood, or had the claim of a peer to speak in his place, robed. This latter prevailed: and then we expected his speech; but no, a new debate ensued, which, as we gathered from the rumour about us, was that his lordship should have the prayer book, for his oath, belonging to the House of Peers. Here, also, his dignity was triumphant, though it cost the whole assembly a full quarter of an hour; while another prayer book was officially at hand, in the general post for plebeian witnesses.
Well! aristocrat as I am, compared with you, I laughed heartily at all this mummery, and yet it was possibly wise, at this period of pulling down all law and order, all privilege and subordination, however frivolous was its appearance. His testimony was highly favourable to Mr. Hastings, with regard to authenticating the intelligence he had received of an opening war with France, upon which hung much justification of the measures Mr. Hastings had pursued for raising supplies.
MRS. SCHWELLENBERG AND MLLE. JACOBI.
Thence I went to the Queen’s house, where -I have a most cordial general invitation from Mrs. Schwellenberg to go by all opportunit
ies; and there is none so good as after the trial, that late hour exactly according With her dinner-time.
She is just as she Was with respect to health; but in all other respects, how amended! all civility, all obligingness, all courtesy! and so desirous to have me visit her, that she presses me to come incessantly.
During coffee, the princess royal came into the room. She condescended to profess herself quite glad to see me; and she had not left the room five minutes before, again returning, she said, “Mrs. Schwellenberg, I am come to plague you, for I am come to take away Miss Burney.” I give you leave to guess whether this plagued me.
May 2.-The following week I again went to Westminster Hall. Mlle. Jacobi had made a point of accompanying me, that she might see the show, as James called it to General Burgoyne, and I had great pleasure in taking her, for she is a most ingenuous and good creature, though — alas! — by no means the same undaunted, gay, open character as she appeared at first. Sickness, confinement, absence from her friends, submission to her coadjutrix, and laborious watching have much altered her.
The trial of this day was all written evidence in favour of Mr. Hastings, and violent quarrelling as to its admissibility on the part of Mr. Burke. Mr. Windham took his place, during some part of the controversy, and spoke ably and clearly as to the given point in dispute, but with the most palpable tremor and internal struggle.
A LONG TALK WITH THE KING AND QUEEN.
I attended Mlle. Jacobi to the Queen’s house, where I dined; and great indeed was my pleasure, during coffee, to see the Princess Elizabeth, who, In the most Pleasing manner and the highest spirits, came to summon me to the queen. I found her majesty again with all her sweet daughters but the youngest. She was gracious and disposed to converse.
We had a great deal of talk upon public concerns, and she told me a friend Of mine had spoken very well the day before, and so had Mr. Burke. She meant Mr. Windham. It was against the new associates, and in favour of the proclamation.(358) Mr. Burke, of course, would here come forth in defence of his own predictions and opinions; but Mr. Windham, who had rather abided hitherto with Charles Fox, in thinking Mr. Burke too extreme, well as he loves him personally, was a new convert highly acceptable. He does not, however, go all lengths with Mr. Burke; he is only averse to an unconstitutional mode of reform, and to sanctioning club powers, so as to enable them, as in France, to overawe the state and senate.(359)
Complete Works of Frances Burney Page 617
