giving me the premium, which, as best answerer, I undoubtedly merited, awarded it to another," &c. It is right here to observe, that this is a common complaint, and though by some unusual combination of accidents it might happen, it is with such exception always false: it is easy to understand how the very ignorance that causes false answering, may prompt obstinacy in error, and the assumption of being wronged. Something of this runs throughout the history of Mr Tone. However, this matter really was, it gave an unhappy recoil to the vain and irritable mind of Tone. He urged his father to equip him as a volunteer for the American war. "He refused me as before; and, in revenge, I would not go near the college, or open a book that was not a military one. In this manner we continued for above a twelvemonth, on very bad terms as may well be supposed, without either party relaxing an inch from their determination." The full merit of these records cannot be sufficiently appreciated, unless the reader will bear in mind, that they are the deliberate records, written sixteen years later, for the amusement of his own children. In whatever degree he may have attained the honours of strictly academic industry, it is certain that the charms of his conversation were acknowledged by his youthful associates. We have been assured, by some of the most eminent of his college contemporaries, that his wit was unrivalled by any of those eminent persons of his time, whose names are still currently associated with this quality. And this may, to some extent, be perceived in the style of his diary, in which, at times, under different humours and excitements, grave or gay, his fancy overflows in playful extravagances, pouring out, without the ordinary stimulus of hearers, a profuse stream of sarcasm, humour, fun, and levity, not often equalled. With this qualification, and a light, seemingly careless, and accommodating good nature, he made friends of all who approached him. And it was to these, and to the recollection of these times, that he was afterwards indebted for serious obligations in after years, when the course into which he soon deviated was such as to make it hard to comprehend how he could be so warmly befriended by such men.

Of the remainder of his college course, it will be enough to say, that, though he had the firmness not to give way to affection or duty, Tone was brought back to his college studies by the flattering influence of his friends; and that his progress was accompanied by the ordinary result of great talent and small attention; he obtained a scholarship and three premiums. He was, perhaps, more characteristically distinguished by being second in a duel in which the antagonist of his principal was shot dead.-Tone was not prosecuted.

In 1785, he became acquainted with a young lady, not sixteen years of age, who lived in Grafton street with her grandfather, a rich old clergyman, of the name of Fanning." He contrived an introduction, and soon won her affections. The following is the edifying example he records for his "boys:"-" My affairs now advanced prosperously; my wife and I grew more passionately fond of each other; and, in a short time, I proposed to her to marry me, without asking consent of any one, knowing well it would be in vain to expect it; she accepted the proposal as frankly as I made it; and one beautiful morning in July, we ran off together and were married."

The step was soon forgiven on all sides. But the thoughts of the fellowship were in consequence abandoned, and the bar was adopted in its stead. Tone graduated in 1786, and resigned his scholarship. Among the honours which his habits had permitted him to obtain, we should have mentioned his medals in the historical society-in which he had risen to the dignity of auditor, which was a post tantamount to the conduct of all its proceedings, and the highest of any permanence, as it lasted for the term. A still higher distinction was the appointment to close the annual session with a speech from the chair.

From the house of his wife's family he represents himself to have been driven by ill treatment to the home of his father, whose affection seems to have withstood every shock. Here, in 1786, an incident occurred, which sets in a very high point of view the courage and affection of his wife. The house was broken into in the night by six armed men: they tied the whole family, and proceeded to pillage for two hours, till a servant maid, having escaped, gave the alarm, and the ruffians made their escape. Tone, who had been tied in the court-yard, with a sentinel over him, was all this time listening in silent horror to the devastation within. When the robbers fled, he recovered his feet; and in his first attempts to ascertain the safety of his wife, he was horror-struck at receiving no answer to his calls. The family, in the distraction of their terrors, had also made their escape, and had gone a considerable distance before they thought of him. His wife returned alone in the darkness of the night-found him, and cut his bonds. "This terrible scene," he says, "besides infinitely distressing us by the heavy loss we sustained, and which my father's circumstances could very ill bear, destroyed in a great degree our domestic enjoyments. I slept continually with a case of pistols under my pillow, and a mouse could not stir, that I was not on my feet," &c.

Notwithstanding the extreme depression of his circumstances, Tone's father contrived to scrape together a sum of money to enable his son to pursue his studies at the Temple. And there could not be a more urgent case of imperative necessity to call forth every feeling of affection and every sentiment of rightful duty, and to give strenuous exertion its utmost impulse, than the situation in which Tone now stood. He was now no more a mitching schoolboy, who might be (under circumstances at least) excused-whose want of consideration could be resolved into want of thought-he was a husband, a father, and an educated man. The only similarity of circumstances was the distress and parental affection from which the means for his present object was wrung. The sacrifice was, indeed, needful, and might be fairly accepted under the trust and hope of a due return, such as every good mind ever feels in such a case, and with a due sense also of the interests of those for whom it had now become his first duty to provide. With this preface we shall make Tone the relator of his own story:-"I set off for London, leaving my wife and daughter with my father, who treated them during my absence with great affection. After a dangerous passage to Liverpool, wherein we ran some risk of being lost, I arrived in London in January, 1787, and immediately entered my name as a student at law, on the books of the Middle Temple; but

this I may say was all the progress I ever made in that profession.” Passing some sentences, he goes on to the nearly incredible declaration—“I was, likewise, amenable to nobody for my conduct; and, in consequence, after the first, I never opened a law book," &c. Tone was, as we have stated at the outset, a man of kindly affections and amiable manners: his wife and he lived many years in happiness together; but we think it fully apparent that no sense of duty or obligation-no just regard to any consideration of right and wrong, had the slightest place in his mind. His goodness was the result of strong impulse, but he was inconsiderate, and like all inconsiderate men, was careless, and could be both unjust and cruel in cold detail. Exceeding levity is prominent throughout, and makes him appear better and worse than the reality.

Anxious to extend his resources, and to maintain the appearance of a gentleman, Tone now exerted his talents for the purpose, and continued to extract some pounds by contributions to the magazines, during the two years of his London sojourn. He was still more indebted to the generosity of some of his associates, from one of whom, John Stevenson Hall, he acknowledges to have received £150 in some pecuniary difficulty. We shall not delay to extract from this fact some very obvious reflections, which might go to aggravate the strictures already pronounced.

But under all these circumstances, neither the life of pleasure that Tone was leading, nor the essential levity of his nature, could conceal from him that something must be done to save a poor man from penurya vain man from utter shame. In the intervals of dissipation, he, perhaps, recollected the claims of his family, and the expectations of his friends. He determined upon a great stroke, worthy of his genius, and which might place him, per saltum, upon the stage of prosperous exaltation. He formed and drew up proposals for a scheme, for the government to establish a colony in one of Cook's islands in the South Seas, “in order to put a bridle on Spain in time of peace, and to annoy her grievously in that quarter in time of war":-in arranging this plan he read all books which could throw light on the subject, "and especially the Buccaniers, who were my heroes, and whom I proposed to myself as the archetypes of the future colonists." We have only to add, that he intended himself to play the hero after these classical models of his selection. Could we within our limits convey to our readers all that such a plan and such a design imply, we should have a much simpler task in laying bare the spirit of Tone's life. But the history of the Buccaniers is not now much known-it is a fearful illustration of all the worst parts of human nature, and cannot be studied without disgust or contamination. But we should add, there are ample indications that the wild and lawless freedom, and the reckless spirit of adventure, was the real charm for Mr Tone's mind.

Having reduced his plan to a memorial drawn up with great care and talent, he sent it to Mr Pitt. Mr Pitt took no notice of it; and we are thus conducted to the next point of moment in this memoir. "It was," says Tone, "my first essay in what I may call politics, and my disappointment made such an impression on me, as is not yet quite obliterated. In my anger, I made something like a vow, that if I ever

had the opportunity, I would make Mr Pitt sorry, and perhaps fortune may yet enable me to fulfil that resolution." When the after circumstances of Tone's life are remembered, there is something strangely solemn in a diary, which some evil genius would seem to have whispered to his breast.

About this time, he received a letter from his father, filled with complaints, "which he afterwards found were much exaggerated." The immediate effect was a fit of ungovernable resentment, and his vindictive feelings against Mr Pitt were for a moment forgotten, in his rage against his father whose love he had so basely betrayed. He resolved in the vindictive fury of his heart to cast away all ties, and sacrifice all prospects, for the satisfaction of wounding the breast which had cherished his wayward youth, and would still protect him from himself. He resolved to enlist in the India service. Unfortunately-for it had been better for him-he met with a disappointment. On his arrival at the India house, he ascertained that he had come too late for that year, but might be received and sent out on the next.

He returned home and was called to the bar, with the purest ignorance of law; but as £500 of his wife's fortune was now paid, he laid out £100 in law books, and for some time was assiduous in his attention to the courts. It is unnecessary to detail the incidents of his legal career; it was short and unproductive; though his natural talent, address and manner, and the extended acquaintance which he had among the members of the profession, were the means of obtaining him more, both of notice and employment, than could fall to most beginners.

Feeling a very reasonable despair of professional success, and a still increasing hatred to the study of law, he now decidedly turned his thoughts to politics, and tried his hand upon a pamphlet in defence of the whig club, of which he observes in his diary, "though I was very far from entirely approving the system," and that he yet agreed with them so far as they went, "though my own private opinions went infinitely farther." His pamphlet had some success, for the Northern Whig Club reprinted it for distribution, and afterwards discovering the author, elected him one of their body. Another consequence was, his being retained in a heavy suit by the Ponsonbys, one of whose political connexions made very promising overtures to him, and led him to hope for great advantages. In consequence, he attached himself to the whig club for a little time. But he soon found that his expectations were likely to lead to nothing beyond the fee of eighty guineas, which he had received. Mr George Ponsonby was very civil to him whenever they met, but never said a word on politics. He therefore resolved to abandon this party as hopeless. "But," he adds, "my mind had now got a turn for politics, I thought I had at last found my element, and I plunged into it with eagerness.' This was, indeed, a discovery for one whose views had already gone "infinitely farther" than the whigs, and may help to illustrate the great care, study, and deliberation, which had been employed in the formation of those views. We are not, indeed, long left in further doubt as to their nature and extent: he mentions on the same page, "I made speedily what was to me a great discovery, though I might have found it in Swift and

Molyneux, that the influence of England was the radical vice of our government, and consequently, that Ireland would never be either free, prosperous, or happy, until she was independent, and that independence was unattainable, whilst the connexion with England existed." "This theory," he adds, "has ever since directed my political conduct." This was the virtual commencement of Mr Tone's career, and the germ of many woes to him and to his country. It was about the year 1790. The reasonings by which the delusion of his life was maintained, drop out from page to page; but demand no repetition, as they consist entirely of those popular notions-true or false, or falsely understood,— in which democratic factions are entirely conversant.

We have now traced Tone to the full-grown stature and maturity of his theory; and, though it is to be admitted, that there is to be found no great indication of the power or labour with which the ultimate theories of great statesmen are formed; yet it will be remarkably exemplified in the dexterity, address, practical talent, and constancy, with which he adhered to it, how much talent and efficiency may coexist with so little true wisdom. The secret of his strength lay in the superficial texture of his reasons, and the ignorance of his associates. With his newly acquired theory, Tone's character seems to change the folly and insignificance which glitter like froth over the previous pages of his diary, seem to be lost in the consciousness of a great congenial purpose. Ireland rose on his imagination in place of the South Sea islands, and his favourite Buccaniers found a captivating place in the long perspective of an Irish revolution. Those who had slighted his plans, or his abilities, were now, he thought, to learn by experience, the man they had lost. But we may be thought to anticipate events, while thus tracing out the fast blowing tendencies, not obscurely indicated in the preceding pages.

"An occasion soon offered," writes Mr Tone, "to give vent to my new opinions. On the appearance of a rupture with Spain, I wrote a pamphlet to prove, that Ireland was not bound by the declaration of war; but might, and ought, to stipulate for a neutrality. In examining this question, I advanced the question of separation, with scarcely any reserve, much less disguise." The blow was evidently well meant and heartily given; and it cannot be admitted, that the author expected no result. But," he adds, "the public mind was by no means so far advanced as I was, and my pamphlet made not the smallest impression." The pamphlet was, nevertheless, read by many persons of known public character, and Tone heard some unpalatable truths in his bookseller's shop. We may here, in passing, recall to the reader's recollection, that this very pamphlet was in a high degree adapted for the suggestion of some of those apprehensions which are said to have led to the union. And by indicating the views of an extreme party, which soon after began to make its appearance, it certainly offered no slight probability of the verification of such fears. And this, more especially, when there afterwards appeared to exist in the public mind of this country an indefinite and growing spirit of requisition, plentifully accompanied by such indications as the language and publication here mentioned.

At this period he formed a close friendship with a gentleman of the