ly call you to order.' Lord Grey, who
expected from his air something more hostile, merely said, 'My
Lord, your Lordship will do perfectly right, and whenever I am
out of order I hope you will.' Last night old Eldon got a
dressing again from the Chancellor.

[Page Head: O'CONNELL AT DINNER.]

April 9th, 1829 {p.202}

Met O'Connell at dinner yesterday at William Ponsonby's. The only
Irish (agitators) were he and O'Gorman Mahon; ----, he said, was
too great a blackguard, and he would not invite him. O'Connell
arrived from Ireland that day; there is nothing remarkable in his
manner, appearance, or conversation, but he seems lively, well
bred, and at his ease. I asked him after dinner 'whether
Catholics had not taken the oath of supremacy till it was coupled
with the declaration;' he said, 'in many instances in the reigns
of Elizabeth, James, and Charles, because at that time it was
considered to apply to the civil supremacy of the Pope only, and
that the Government admitted of that interpretation of it, but
that no Catholic could take it now, because that construction is
never given to the oath.' Duncannon told me that O'Connell has no
wish to be in Parliament, that he makes so much money by his
profession that it is a great loss to him to attend Parliament at
all. What they want is a compromise with Vesey Fitzgerald, by
which he may be admitted to take his seat in this Parliament on
an understanding that he will not oppose Vesey in the next; not
that I see how that is to be done, except by an Act of Parliament
(which would never pass) in his favour. Besides, the Duke detests
him, and Vesey likewise. They cannot forgive him for all he has
done and all he has made them do. O'Gorman, the secretary of the
Catholic Association, appears a heavy, civil, vulgar man. I sat
next to Stanley, who told me a story which amused me. Macintosh,
in the course of the recent debates, went one day to the House of
Commons at eleven in the morning to take a place. They were all
taken on the benches below the gangway, and on asking the
doorkeeper how they happened to be all taken so early, he said,
'Oh, sir, there is no chance of getting a place, for Colonel
Sibthorpe sleeps at a tavern close by, and comes here every
morning by eight o'clock and takes places for all the saints.'

April 13th, 1829 {p.203}

On Friday last the Catholic Bill was read a third time, after a
very dull debate. Lord Eldon attempted to rally, and made a long