ible patriot. He was devoted to the cause of liberty, not because he was haughty and intractable, but because he was beneficent and humane. Let his successors, who from this house behold this monument, reflect that their conduct will make it their glory or their reproach. Let them be persuaded that similarity of manners, not proximity of blood, gives them an interest in this statue.

"REMEMBER-RESEMBLE-PERSEVERE.”

On Lord Rockingham's death, the secretary of state, William second Earl of Shelburne (afterwards Marquess of Lansdowne) was appointed his successor as first lord of the treasury. The condition of the Earl's call to the premiership was that the American colonies should not be entirely severed from the mother country. This gave umbrage to Burke (who personally disliked Lord Shelburne), to Fox, Cavendish, and Sheridan: they resigned, and fell once more into the ranks of the opposition. William Pitt became chancellor of the exchequer. The administration had soon to give up the undertaking which made Shelburne premier. The 30th November, 1782, provisional articles of peace were signed at Paris between Great Britain and the United States of America on the basis of a full acknowledgment of the independence of the latter. In the following January, preliminaries of peace were also entered into with France and Spain. Thus virtually ended the American war, by Edmund Burke himself pronounced "an era of calamity, disgrace, and downfall, which no feeling mind will ever mention without a tear for England.” Nevertheless, pride has since wiped that tear away-the pride of a subsequent mighty contest, whose glorious ending made the nation herself again. It should be ever borne in mind that in the one war the genius of Burke was antagonistic―assenting in the other.

BURKE'S DOMESTIC LIFE-HIS ACQUISITION OF A COUNTRY-HOUSE AT BEACONSFIELD-HIS AGRICULTURAL PURSUITS-HOSPITALITY AT GREGORIES -BURKE'S MANNERS AND HABITS-ANECDOTES-MARIE ANTOINETTEBURKE IN SCOTLAND - THE LITERARY CLUB BARETTI'S TRIALBURKE'S BROTHER RICHARD-BURKE'S SON RICHARD-WILLIAM BURKE -JOHN BOURKE-BURKE'S SISTER, MRS. FRENCH-DEATH OF GOLDSMITH JOHNSON'S VISIT TO BEACONSFIELD-ABRAHAM SHACKLETONMRS. LEADBEATER'S POETRY-LORD NORTH-GARRICK-MISS BURNEY -BURKE'S PHILANTHROPY-BARRY THE PAINTER-CRABBE THE POET.

LET us now, for a time, turn from the confusing and calamitous politics of the period at which the last chapter ends, and view the statesman's private life, so good, so graceful, and so happy. Let us see him in that home, the centre of his pleasures and affections, where his cares would vanish, and where he lived the idol of his family and the charm and delight of friends, whose numerous roll included all people, the humble and the lofty, from the peasant to the prince, from the poor struggling son of genius to the mightiest possessor of fortune's favours. Burke's society had irresistible attraction; childhood in its innocence loved to be with him: manhood, in its wisdom and learning, found a match in Burke, and relished his encounter. The meritorious, in their hour of distress, while shrinking from other exposure and solicitation, feared not to crave aid from him: his well-known character gave confidence, and the applicant,

Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed.”

His benevolence would extend to common mendicants. When walking in the streets he generally disposed of all his loose pence, and even sixpences, in indiscriminate charity. This amiable weakness he had in common with his friend Dr. Johnson; and, as with the doctor, the beggars used to waylay him to take advantage of his generosity. On being blamed for the habit, Burke said, “I impute inattention to the petitions of these poor people not to the policy of discouraging beggars, but to unwillingness to part with money." "That old fellow," observed a friend one day to Burke, "will no doubt spend the sixpence you have given him in gin." "Well," replied Burke, "if he even do so, the poor wretch seems to have had so few of the enjoyments of this life, that it would be churlish to grudge him this chance of an occasional pleasure."

In one of his letters, Burke, in allusion to the subject of charity, makes the following observation: "Whatever one gives ought

PURCHASE OF A SEAT AT BEACONSFIELD.

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to be from what one would otherwise spend, not from what one To spend little and give much is the

would otherwise pay.

highest glory a man can aspire to."

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Edmund Burke always preferred a rural life, and dwelt in the country whenever he could. At one time he resided with his family at Parson's Green, then a place far more rural than now, and the favourite sojourn of Dr. Johnson's friend, Richardson, the author of "Clarissa Harlowe." Burke afterwards went to live at Plaistow in Essex; and eventually, in the year 1768, he purchased, for 23,0007., an estate in Buckinghamshire, called Gregories, or Butler's Court, situated about a mile from the markettown of Beaconsfield. His address from it, as he used to give it himself, was simply " Beaconsfield," or Beconsfield," and consequently it became known and alluded to frequently by such designation only. How Burke obtained the funds necessary for this landed acquisition has been the subject of much question and surmise. This arose, not from any doubt of his honour or conduct in the transaction, but from the complete secrecy he always adopted in any matters relating to himself personally. The solution of the affair is simple enough. In the first place, by his father's death and by that of his eldest brother Garrett, unmarried, in 1765, the parental lands in Ireland had come to him: the sale of these gave him some of the money; the rest he undoubtedly owed to the munificence of Lord Rockingham, who, when he heard that further funds were to have been procured on mortgage, voluntarily offered to lend the sum necessary to complete the purchase. It is even said that his lordship proposed a yet greater loan, which was declined by Burke; he would accept no more than was absolutely indispensable for his purpose, and that, upon a perfect understanding of its being a loan to be returned with the first opportunity. Nevertheless, the money was never reclaimed, nor ever really intended to be so by the marquess; a generous act, no doubt, on his part; but it should also be considered that he was under great obligations to Burke, both of a public and private

nature. Politically, Burke was the making and the mainstay of his party; in domestic matters Burke had also served him by valuable advice and assistance in the management of some of his lordship's extensive estates. John Lee, a barrister of eminence, at one time solicitor-general, the legal adviser of Lord Rockingham, and the trustee of his will, has confirmed this account of the transaction, by a statement he made to the following effect. When the marquess was near his death, Mr. Lee was summoned to the sick room. On seeing him, the peer expressed much pleasure, and desired they might be left alone. After a few words on some other subject, "My dear Lee," said the marquess, “there is a piece of business I wish you to execute immediately, as there is no time to be lost. Pecuniary transactions have passed between me and my admirable friend, Edmund Burke. To the best of my recollection, I have added the fullest discharges to bonds or other documents; but, lest my memory should have failed me, I, a dying man, but in the full use of my reason, desire you, as a professional man, will make out a codicil of my will, cancelling every paper that may be found containing any acknowledgement of a debt due to me from Edmund Burke." Mr. Lee drew up the codicil to the desired effect. This fact is further proved by no claim having ever been made on Mr. Burke by the marquess's representatives. With Earl Fitzwilliam, the marquess's nephew and heir, Mr. Burke continued through life on terms of the warmest and most intimate friendship.

The sojourn of Edmund Burke in his early youth near Kilcolman, allied him, as it were, nearer to one with whom he boasted ancestorial association-Edmund Spenser. His purchase of the lands of Gregories brought him in union with another poetic remembrance-Edmund Waller. In the century previous to the time of Burke, his acres at Beaconsfield had formed a portion of the estate of the poet Waller, who, although a slippery politician, was a bard of fair repute. The family of this poet possessed the whole manor of Beaconsfield, which at one time belonged to