Page:Biographia Hibernica volume 1.djvu/340

CURRAN. 329 by his marked opposition to the regeney question, under Lord Buckingham's vice-royalty, recommended him to the vacant seals and woolsack; and he changed his office of diaholus regis for that of custos conscientia On taking leave of the bar, he marked his respect for the talents of Mr. Ponsonby, a strong political opponent, by presenting that gentleman with his bag of briefs; but he carried with him to the chancery bench all his hostility to Mr. Curran, who, from the notoriety of this faet, soon felt its effects in the rapid decay of his chancery business which had been by far the most luerative branch of his practice. For this misfortune there was no practical re- medy, because, if even Mr. Curran had not been too proud for conciliatory remonstrance, or obsequious humility, the chancellor was of too unrelenting a disposition to relax his old resentments-the ear of the judge was to Curran, like the Dull cold ear of death." The chancery solicitors observed this marked hostility; the client participated in the disfavour of his counsel, whose practice was soon reduced exclusively to Nisi Prius. "I made," said he, in a letter to Mr. Grattan twenty years afterwards, "no compromise with power; I had the merit of provoking and despising the personal malice of every man in Ireland who was known to be the enemy of the country. With out the walls of the courts of justice, my character was pursued with the most persevering slander; and within those walls, though I was too strong to be beaten down by judicial malignity, it was not so with my clients; and my consequent losses in professional income have never been estimated at less, as you must have often heard, than thirty thousand pounds a year." While Mr. Curran smarted under the rapid extenuation of his chancery practice, a ludicrous occasion occurred for marking his cool and contemptuous feeling for the noble author. Lord Clare, who, when off the bench, assumed as proud a disregard for the decorous formalities of his station, as for his importance in it, generally walked to his court, accompanied by a large favourite Newfoundland dog,