1817.

CHAP. II. during which Thornton remained in prison. The court ought probably, according to the old law, to have ordered battle, and if the appellant refused, awarded that he should be hanged. To relieve the court and country from such monstrosities, the judgment was postponed, and an Act of Parliament passed to abolish both the wager of battle and the appeal; which some of my Radical city friends thought a wrong proceeding, by depriving the people of one of their means of protection against a bad Government; for the King cannot pardon in appeal of murder, and the Ministry may contrive the murder of a friend to liberty.

Mrs. Bar

bauld.

Tindal and Chitty argued the case very learnedly, and much recondite and worthless black -letter and French lore were lavished for the last time. This recourse to an obsolete proceeding terminated in Thornton's acquittal.

November 19th.—This being the day of the funeral of the Princess Charlotte, all the shops were shut, and the churches everywhere filled with auditors.

November 23rd.-I walked to Newington, which I reached in time to dine with Mrs. Barbauld. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Aikin were there. The afternoon passed off without any dulness or drowsiness. We had matter for conversation in Mrs. Plumptre-a subject on which I talk con amore, in the wager of battle, and in the Princess's death.

November 25th.-This was to me an anxious day. I had received from Naylor a brief to speak in mitigation of punishment for one Williams, at Portsea, who had sold in his shop two of the famous Parodies, one of the

The First Parody Prosecution.

Litany, in which the three estates, King, Lords, and Commons, are addressed with some spirit and point on the sufferings of the nation, and the other of the Creed of St. Athanasius, in which the Lord Chancellor, Lord Castlereagh, and Lord Sidmouth are, with vulgar buffoonery, addressed as Old Bags, Derry-Down Triangle, and the Doctor, and the triple Ministerial character spoken of under the well-known form of words.

These parodies had been long overlooked by the late Attorney-General, and he had been reproached for his negligence by both Ministerialists and Oppositionists. At length prosecutions were begun, and the subject was talked of in Parliament. Hone and Carlisle had both been prosecuted, and by their outrageous conduct had roused a strong sense of indignation against them. Unhappily this poor Portsea printer was the first brought up for judgment. Applications in his behalf had been made to the Attorney-General, who did not conduct the case with any apparent bitterness. In his opening speech on the Litany, he with considerable feeling, though in a commonplace way, eulogized the Litany, but he admitted to a certain extent the circumstances of mitigation in defendant's affidavit, viz. that he had destroyed all the copies he could, after he had heard of the prosecution.

I then addressed the Court, saying that the AttorneyGeneral's speech was calculated to depress a man more accustomed to address the Court than I was; but that I thought it appeared, even from the Attorney-General's own words, that there were no circumstances of aggravation arising out of the manner in which the crime

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CHAP. II.

1817.

Examiner on H.C.R's speech.

H. C. R.'s Speech in Mitigation for Williams.

was committed. I then dwelt, and I believe impressively, on the hardship of the case for the defendant, who, though the least guilty, was the first brought up for punishment, and deprecated the infliction of an exemplary punishment on him. This was the best part of my speech. I then repeated and enforced the ordinary topics of mitigation.

The Attorney-General then brought on the Creed information, and was rather more bitter than at first, and he was followed by Topping.

I replied, and spoke not so well as at first, and was led, by an interruption from Bayley, to observe on the Athanasian Creed, that many believed in the doctrine who did not approve of the commentary. At least my remarks on the Creed were sanctioned by the judgment, which sentenced the defendant, for the Litany, to eight months' imprisonment in Winchester Gaol, and a fine of £100, and for the Creed to four months' imprisonment.

I stayed in court the rest of the afternoon, and at half-past four dined with Gurney. No one but Godfrey Sykes, the pleader, was there. He is an open-hearted frank fellow in his manner, and I felt kindly towards him on account of the warm praise which he gave to my friend Manning, and of the enthusiasm with which he spoke of Gifford.

December 3rd.-Hamond called and chatted on law with me. I walked home with him. He lent me the last Examiner. In the account of my law case, there is a piece of malice. They have put in italics, “Mr. Robinson was ready to agree with his Lordship to the

Wordsworth in Town.

fullest extent;" and certainly this is the part of my speech which I most regret, for I ought to have observed to the Court, that the libel is not charged with being against the doctrines of Christianity. I lost the opportunity of saying much to the purpose, when Bayley observed that the libel was inconsistent with the doctrines of Christianity.

December 4th.-I breakfasted early, and soon after nine walked to Dr. Wordsworth's, at Lambeth. I crossed for the first time Waterloo Bridge. The view of Somerset House is very fine indeed, and the bridge itself is highly beautiful; but the day was so bad that I could see neither of the other bridges, and of course scarcely any objects.

I found Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth and the Doctor at breakfast, and I spent a couple of hours with them very agreeably. We talked about poetry. Wordsworth has brought MSS. with him, and is inclined to print one or two poems, as it is the fashion to publish small volumes. now. He means then to add them to the "Thanksgiving Ode," &c., and form a third volume. He read to me some very beautiful passages.

December 6th.-I dined with the Colliers, and in the evening Hundleby called on me, and we went together to Covent Garden. I have not been so well pleased for a long time. In "Guy Mannering" there were four interesting performances. First, Braham's singing, the most delicious I ever heard, though I fear his voice is not so perfect as it was; but in this piece I was particularly delighted, as he sang in a style of unstudied simplicity. Second, Liston's Dominie Sampson, an

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CHAP. II,

1817.

Wordsworth.

Braham and Liston in Guy Manner

ing.

1817.

CHAP. II. absolutely perfect exhibition. His terror when accosted by Meg Merrilies was the most amusing and correctly natural representation I ever witnessed. Emery's representation of Dandie Dinmont also most excellent; and, though not equal to the other attractions of the piece, Mrs. Egerton gave great effect to Meg Merrilies. But the piece itself is worth nothing.

Hone's first

trial.

December 18th.-I spent the greater part of the morning at the King's Bench sittings, Guildhall. Hone's first trial took place to-day. It was for publishing a parody on the Church Catechism, attacking the Government. Abbott sat for Lord Ellenborough. Hone defended himself by a very long and rambling speech of many hours, in which he uttered a thousand absurdities, but with a courage and promptitude which completely effected his purpose. Abbott was by no means a match for him, and in vain attempted to check his severe reproaches against Lord Ellenborough for not letting him sit down in the King's Bench, when he was too ill to stand without great pain. Hone also inveighed against the system of special juries, and rattled over a wide field of abuses before he began his defence, which consisted in showing how many similar parodies had been written in all ages. He quoted from Martin. Luther, from a Dean of Canterbury, and a profusion of writers, ancient and modern, dwelling principally on Mr. Reeves and Mr. Canning.t

* Afterwards Lord Tenterden, Lord Chief Justice of King's Bench.

+ Hone's defence was that the practice of parodying religious works, even parts of the Holy Scriptures and the Book of Common Prayer, had been adopted by men whose religious character was above suspicion. Examples were adduced from Martin Luther, Dr. John Boys, Dean of Canterbury in