orable introduction, Wilde's talent and energy soon made themselves appreciated. "We were no sooner acquainted with him," says Denman, "than our prejudices vanished. He thought of nothing but success, and contributed most largely towards it. Extremely able and acute, generally very judicious, always active and persevering in the highest degree, his habits as an attorney qualified him for many things to which counsel are incompetent." From this point we will again follow for a time the text of the personal narrative:

"Our circuits now took us from London, and we left the Queen to the care of Dr. Lushington, and occasionally of Wilde, who did not travel the whole round. The circuits were important objects to Brougham and myself, who now first went as leaders from the rank given us by Her Majesty. Brougham made a wonderful harvest at York, and I kept my ground on my little theatre (the Midland) very fairly. It may seem trifling to advert to the bodily fatigue caused by these various exertions, but I never lost sight of the profession as the principal object of my hopes. On Tuesday, travelling all night, I went from London to the Northampton assizes: on their termination I returned to London on Wednesday or Thursday. On the Saturday I had the conduct of an important action at Guildhall, brought by Colonel De Bosset against Sir Thomas Maitland, for oppressively cashiering him at Corfu, in which I had the good fortune to obtain a verdict, with 100/. damages. Vizard (solicitor for the Queen) was the defendant's attorney, and I well remember taking him to my house in Russell Square' to luncheon, when, after the labor of the day, in the hottest weather, I was so dog-tired that I not only sate down to eat, but actually set off on my journey to Lincoln assizes, without either washing or changing my linen. I had flattered myself with a comfortable bed on the road, but found all engaged, and was obliged to travel all night and sleep in the carriage as I could.

"The circuit was laborious, and concluded (for me) with my making a two hours' speech for the defendants in the

1 Denman had moved from Queen Square to No. 50 Russell Square about two years before this.

silly prosecution against Major Cartwright and others for their foolish mock election of a 'legislatorial attorney' for Birmingham. The next day I was obliged to go across the country to a dinner given in honor of our election at Nottingham, where, arriving a few minutes before the appointed hour, I found that both Lord Holland and Birch declined the chair, and was under the necessity of taking it at a moment's notice. The party consisted of near 500, and the exertions attending the office of President were great and entirely new to me. These circumstances very naturally explain the attack of jaundice which was visible and confirmed when I came to London."

On returning to London Denman hastened to pay his respects to the Queen, who had then moved to Brandenburgh House, Hammersmith, which he describes as "rather pleasantly seated on the Thames, but a strange, dilapidated, half-furnished, foreign-looking mansion.' He was personally extremely well received, but he found the Queen's distrust and dislike of Brougham if possible even increased. On Sunday, August 13, only four days before the commencement of the trial, in compliance with an anxious summons from Dr. Parr, he went to Brandenburgh House, when the Doctor entered into an earnest discourse with him on the propriety of dismissing Brougham! "The Queen also," he says, "walking with me in the garden, complained of Brougham. If he had come over to me at Geneva,' she exclaimed, 'I should have been spared all this trouble: ' and Lady Ann Hamilton," he adds, "told me that one of the very few occasions upon which the Queen was entirely overwhelmed by her feelings was the visit of the Usher of the Black Rod, announcing that the Bill of Pains and Penalties was brought in. She walked about the room in extreme agitation, repeatedly exclaiming, 'If my head is upon Temple Bar, it will be Brougham's doing.' It is needless to point out how pitiably unjust this was to the man who had from the first dissuaded her from coming to England, and to whose splendid exertions, after she had once taken that step, the defeat of her enemies was mainly owing.

The day of trial-Thursday, August 17-was now at

hand. On that day, and on the 18th counsel were heard against the principle of the Bill, in other words, against its being read a second time. On the 18th Denman delivered a very powerful speech against the second reading, remarkable for the boldness of its attacks on real prosecutor, the King, and concluding with the following emphatic declaration, which made him extremely popular with the Queen's supporters out-of-doors :

"I beg to say, my Lords, that whatever may be enacted -whatever may be done by the exertions of any individual, by the perversion of truth or by the perjury of witnesses, whatever may be the consequences which may follow, and whatever she may suffer-I will for one never withdraw from her those sentiments of dutiful homage and respect which I owe to her rank, to her situation, to her superior mind, to her great and royal heart; nor, my Lords, will I ever pay to any one who may usurp Her Majesty's station that respect and duty which belong alone to her whom the laws of God and man have made the consort of his present Majesty and the Queen of these kingdoms."

Denman, in the personal narrative, thus speaks of the effects of his speech against the second reading:

"I had the satisfaction of learning that my speech against the second reading of the bill had acted forcibly on many of the peers. The Queen entered the House on that occasion while I was speaking, and remained to the conclusion. She came afterwards and found me alone in her apartment, where she greeted me with this compliment, My God, what a beautiful speech!' was reposing, much fatigued, on one of the sofas, and had thrown my wig on the other. When she entered, I expressed great distress at having taken so great a liberty with her room, and she answered me laughing, with an allusion to what I had been saying about the preamble of the bill, 'Indeed, it is a most unbecoming familiarity.'"

It having been decided that the Bill should be proceeded with, the Attorney-General, Sir R. Giffard, on August 19, commenced opening the case for the Crown.

On August 21 the examination of witnesses began,

1

and lasted till September 7, including those two great masterpieces of forensic skill-the cross-examinations of Theodore Majocchi by Brougham, and of Louise Demont by Williams.

On September 7 Copley (then Solicitor-General) summed up the case for the Crown with consummate ability, after which, on September 9, it was resolved that the Bill should stand adjourned till October 3, in order, as Ministers stated, to give the Queen's advisers time to prepare their defence; as their opponents surmised, to let the unanswered and uncontradicted evidence for the Crown produce a prejudice against the queen throughout the country.

"To enter into any details of the detestable proceeding [writes Denman in the personal narrative] would be to open an endless volume. All the world knows all about it. Our royal client was in a state of considerable agitation at first, which is the only account to be given of her strange exclamation at the apparition of Theodore Majocchi. [When this witness was introduced the Queen exclaimed, "Theodore! no, no!" and rising from her seat, abruptly quitted the House, followed by Lady Ann Hamilton.] She was copiously bled that night, and when she took her seat the following day in the House of Lords I never saw a human being so interesting. Her face was pale, her eyelids a little sunken, her eyes fixed on the ground, with no expression of alarm or consciousness, but with an appearance of decent distress at being made the object of such revolting calumnies, and a noble disdain of her infamous accusers. We did not think it proper for her to give her attendance during the whole investigation, but advised her to be absent except when required for any particular reasons.

"In the middle of the proceedings we had a three weeks' holiday [from September 9 to October 3, as already stated] and I went and washed away my jaundice at Cheltenham. My entrance into that town was a striking proof of the state of public feeling. My carriage having been waylaid for many hours, and my name being discovered, I know not how, long after it was dark the people took out the horses, drew the carriage near a mile, and surrounded the house with loud shouts of Queen!

Queen!' with which I had been so often surfeited in Portman Street. Ill as I was I had serious thoughts of leaving the place again on the instant, but at length resolved to muster up voice and spirits for a speech at the window, and finding myself opposite to a brilliant star, I told the multitude that the Queen could no more be plucked from her throne than that beautiful star from the heavens. They were in great good-humor with me, and at my earnest solicitation left me alone, but betook themselves to breaking some of my neighbor's windows, particularly the parson's, who had very imprudently refused them permission to ring the bells on my arrival. One of the magistrates called to request my interference to prevent further violence, and going among the mob I prevailed upon them to disperse and spare the few of his windows that remained unbroken.'

The following passages from a letter written by Denman while at Cheltenham to his old friend Merivale may be inserted here:

"Cheltemham: September 24, 1820.

My dear Merivale,—It is neither my wife's fault nor mine that I have not written to you sooner; the entire occupation of the mornings in engagements, and of the evenings in prepense idleness, has prevented it. Before I left London the jaundice had worn itself from pure gold to counterfeit silver, and Baillie has sent me here to wash away the last remains of gilt. I love the place, and find the waters most beneficial. We ride every day, and hear Miss Stevens sing in the Comedy of Errors to-night. Mackintosh is here, and Dwarris.' Lushington has come over from Malvern, and Cradock, of Jesus, has been just the sort of society that was required under existing circumstances.

"You heard of our triumphant entry-the most unexpected tribute to the innocency and honor of my royal mistress-and how the mob proceeded to break the parson's windows because he would not suffer the bells to

be rung for me. That ungracious divine, however, has not mentioned in his newspaper account that I made a

1 Afterwards Sir Fortunatus Dwarris, one of the Masters of the Court of Queen's Bench.