ceed (as you must, to bring this measure into effect,) by
decimation; place the country under martial law; depopulate and lay
waste all around you, and restore Sherwood Forest as an acceptable gift
to the crown in its former condition of a royal chase, and an asylum for
outlaws? Are these the remedies for a starving and desperate populace?
Will the famished wretch who has braved your bayonets be appalled by
your gibbets? When death is a relief, and the only relief it appears
that you will afford him, will he be dragooned into tranquillity? Will
that which could not be effected by your grenadiers, be accomplished by
your executioners? If you proceed by the forms of law, where is your
evidence? Those who refused to impeach their accomplices, when
transportation only was the punishment, will hardly be tempted to
witness against them when death is the penalty. With all due deference
to the noble lords opposite, I think a little investigation, some
previous enquiry, would induce even them to change their purpose. That
most favourite state measure, so marvellously efficacious in many and
recent instances, _temporising_, would not be without its advantage in
this. When a proposal is made to emancipate or relieve, you hesitate,
you deliberate for years, you temporise and tamper with the minds of
men; but a death-bill must be passed off hand, without a thought of the
consequences."

In reference to his own parliamentary displays, and to this maiden
speech in particular, I find the following remarks in one of his
Journals:--

"Sheridan's liking for me (whether he was not mystifying me, I do not
know, but Lady Caroline Lamb and others told me that he said the same
both before and after he knew me,) was founded upon 'English Bards and
Scotch Reviewers.' He told me that he did not care about poetry, (or
about mine--at least, any but that poem of mine,) but he was sure, from
that and other symptoms, I should make an orator, if I would but take to
speaking, and grow a parliament man. He never ceased harping upon this
to me to the last; and I remember my old tutor, Dr. Drury, had the same
notion when I was a _boy_; but it never was my turn of inclination to
try. I spoke once or twice, as all young peers do, as a kind of
introduction into public life; but dissipation, shyness, haughty and
reserved opinions, together with the short time I lived in England
after my majority (only about five years in all), prevented me from
resuming the