.

But the mere official routine of a chancellor's life is tremendous. Lord
Eldon's account of one of his days, shows at what a price the honour of
the Seals must be purchased. In one of his letters he says--"Mine has
been no easy life. I will tell you what once happened to me. I was ill
with the gout, it was in my feet, and so I was carried into my carriage,
and from it was carried into court. There I remained all the day, and
delivered an arduous judgment. In the evening, I went straight from my
court to the House of Lords. There I sat until two in the morning, when
some of the lords came and whispered to me, that I was expected to
speak. I told them that I really could not, that I was ill, and could
not stand. It was an important question, (the peace of Amiens,) I forgot
my gout, and spoke for two hours. Well, the House broke up, I was
carried home, and at six in the morning I prepared to go to bed. My poor
left leg had just got in; when I recollected that I had important papers
to examine; so I put on my clothes, and went to my study. I examined the
papers; they related to the Recorders' Report, which had to be heard
that day. I was again carried into court, where I had to deliver another
arduous judgment. Again went to the House of Lords, and it was not till
the middle of the second night that I got into bed!" Such desperate
performances do not occur every day in the life even of lord
chancellors; but the judicial labours, combined with the political, are
too heavy a task for the body or the mind of any man.

The Whigs are never destined to a long supremacy. They have never come
into power but in some perverted state of the public feelings. There
must be some terror, or some infatuation, in the public mind, before it
calls in the quack; but the moment that sees quiet succeed to
disturbance, and the nation has recovered its composure, always sees the
Whigs driven out of office. The death of Fox, in 1806, unquestionably
deprived the party of a great popular name, but the whole strength of
Whiggism survived. It was in full possession of power, and the late
dissolution had filled Parliament with its adherents; still its old fate
prevailed. Like ships floating over the land only by the help of an
inundation, when the waters return to their channel the ships remain,
only to be broken in pieces, the Whig government was broken up never to
be restored, until a new convulsion in France, producing a corresponding
convulsion