Reminiscences of Lord Thurlow. received by the Chancellor with more than ordinary courtesy. " The first poem you sent me, sir," said Thurlow, " I ought to have noticed; and I heartily forgive the second." They breakfasted together, and at parting his lordship put a sealed paper into Crabbe's hand, saying, " Accept this trifle, sir, and rely on my embracing an early opportunity to serve you more substantially when I hear you are in orders." The paper contained a bank-note for one hundred pounds. The promise Thurlow made at that time he soon performed. When Crabbe was qualified to hold church preferment, he received an invi tation to dine with the Chancellor. After dinner, addressing the poet, his lordship told him that, " by G—, he was as like Parson Adams as twelve to a dozen," and that he should give him two livings in Dorsetshire that had just become vacant. As Speaker of the House of Lords, Thur low was distinguished for the dignity with which he enforced the rules of debate. Upon one occasion he called the Duke of Grafton to order, who, incensed at the inter ruption, insolently reproached the Chancel lor with his plebeian origin and recent ad mission into the peerage. Previous to this time, Thurlow had spoken so frequently that he was listened to by the House with visible impatience. When the Duke had concluded his speech, Thurlow rose from the woolsack, and advanced slowly to the place from whence the Chancellor generally addresses the House; then fixing upon the Duke the look of Jove when he grasps the thunder, he began, in a level voice, that famous speech so familiar to every schoolboy : " I am amazed at the attack which the noble lord has made upon me. Yes, my lords, I am amazed at his grace's speech. The noble Duke cannot look before him, behind him, or on either side of him, without seeing some noble peer who owes his seat in this House to his successful exertions in the pro fession to which I belong," etc. " The effect of this speech," says Mr. Butler, " both within the walls of Parliament and without
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them, was prodigious. It gave Lord Thurlow an ascendancy in the House which no chan cellor had ever possessed; it invested him in public opinion with a character of inde pendence and honor; and this, although he was ever on the unpopular side of pol itics, made him always popular with the people. There is one anecdote recorded of Lord Thurlow which reflects the highest credit upon him. In 1782, when Lord North re signed, the King determined to withhold from him the pension usually granted to a retiring Prime Minister. Thurlow, then Chancellor, represented to his Majesty that Lord North was not opulent, that his father was still living, and that his sons had spent a great deal of money. The King answered, "Lord North is no friend of mine." "That may be," replied Thurlow; " but the world thinks otherwise, and your Majesty's char acter requires that Lord North should have the usual pension." The King, convinced that his Chancellor was right, at last gave way. This conduct was not forgotten by Lord North. When the coalition ministry came into power in 1783, Lord North be came Secretary of State for the Home De partment. Fox having resolved to get rid of Thurlow, North received the King's com mands to write to the Chancellor, desiring him to surrender the Great Seal. North positively refused to comply with this or der, saying, " When I retired last year, Lord Thurlow was the man who prevented my retreat from being inconvenient to me; shall the first act of my return to office be to give Lord Thurlow pain? I will not do it!" The King was amused at Lord North's pertinacity, and observed that while he kept secretaries he certainly was not bound to write his own letters. Lord North persist ing, Mr. Fox was at last obliged to under take the matter himself, although it did not come within his department. Fox discharged this duty, it is said, in a very harsh manner; which is strange, for harshness was foreign to Fox's character, and Thurlow, it is known,
