some of those meetings, he was in the habit of witnessing very amusing scenes. One, which was held monthly in the north of London, was particularly prolific of ludicrous incidents and of rich exhibitions of human character. This monthly meeting was held for the purpose of carrying out the schemes of a body of persons calling themselves the "Association of North London Liberals." These political meetings were always very numerously attended. Taking their own word for it, the persons who played the part of orators at these meetings, were all patriots of the first order. They cared not for themselves at all: their solicitudes and anxieties-so unselfish was their patriotism-were wholly reserved for their country. Its sufferings they wept over; for its degradation by a tyrannical Government, they deeply blushed; and they were willing any day, should the necessity ever arise, to submit to martyrdom for their principles. Energetically and often did one and all of these selfelected redressers of their country's wrongs,

declare their willingness to die, rather than compromise their principles in the slightest degree, or forego one particle of their indefeasible and inalienable rights. The majority of the usual speakers at these meetings, were a set of desperate men, severally affording, in their own persons, one more illustration, in addition to the countless number previously given, of the truth of Dr. Johnson's remark, that "every scoundrel takes refuge in patriotism." There was one exception to the justice of the remark. Mr. Frederick Freeman, in becoming one of the regular speakers at the monthly meeting of the North London Liberal Association, was actuated by no more unworthy motive than that of seeking an opportunity of displaying his fancied oratorical powers.

Of his talents as a public speaker he was exceedingly vain. He considered himself the Demosthenes of the nineteenth century; and cherished the comfortable conviction that, had Fortune been sufficiently considerate towards

him to give him a seat in either branch of the Legislature, he would have immeasurably outshone the most distinguished of our Lords and Commons. It was, no doubt, very unkind of Fortune not to raise him to the distinction of a legislator, and he never forgave her ladyship, not even in his dying hour. As Mr. Freeman was thus denied the opportunity of shining in what he himself always called his proper sphere, he was compelled, unless he chose to hide his light altogether, to shine in whatever sphere was accessible to him. He preferred the North London Liberal Association to any other arena which was open to him at the time; and accordingly gave its members, and the mixed multitudes that used to attend its monthly meetings, the exclusive privilege of listening to his eloquence.

Frederick invariably wrote his speeches at full length, and then committed them, verbatim, to memory. On one occasion, when the public mind was worked up to a pitch of extraordi

nary political excitement, and when the general meeting, appointed to take place in two days afterwards, was consequently expected to be unusually numerous, the committee met to make the necessary preliminary arrangements. Frederick gave sundry hints, too broad and too often repeated to be mistaken, that he was prepared to make an oratorical display which would excite no little sensation among the audience, and which would surpass any exhibition he had ever before made. He was accordingly solicited by the committee to address the meeting. He expressed a wish to have the moving of one of the most important of the resolutions to be proposed for its adoption. He was asked to make his choice: he chose the third resolution. Mr. Murphy, a clever Irishman and a wag, who was also to take part in the proceedings of the day, observed a roll of manuscript peeping out of Frederick's pocket. It at once occurred to him, that this was the crack speech with which

Frederick intended to electrify the meeting. Mr. Murphy abstracted the manuscript from Frederick's pocket with a care and dexterity which would have done no discredit to the most experienced pickpocket in the metropolis. It was precisely as he supposed. "He held in his hands"—to use a parliamentary phrase-Mr. Freeman's speech, written in a style of penmanship, as far as regarded legibility, which would have added to the reputation of the most renowned copying clerk in London. What was more-all the more important passages, those which Frederick thought were most likely to tell, and consequently to draw forth plaudits from the audience, were marked on the margin with a score, and the word "emphatic;" meaning that they were to be delivered with peculiar emphasis. Mr. Murphy instantly bethought himself of having a joke at Frederick's expense. He resolved to commit the whole of his speech to memory, not neglecting to obey the instructions given on the margin, as to the passages