and your vote
whithersoever you please. And now, as I have a great deal of occupation,
perhaps you will do me the favour to retire.' So saying, he raised his
hand lazily to the bell, and bowed me out; asking blandly if there was
any other thing in the world in which he could oblige me.

I went home in a fury which can't be described; and having Lord Crabs to
dinner that day, assailed his Lordship by pulling his wig off his head,
and smothering it in his face, and by attacking him in that part of the
person where, according to report, he had been formerly assaulted by
Majesty. The whole story was over the town the next day, and pictures
of me were hanging in the clubs and print-shops performing the operation
alluded to. All the town laughed at the picture of the lord and the
Irishman, and, I need not say, recognised both. As for me, I was one of
the most celebrated characters in London in those days: my dress, style,
and equipage being as well known as those of any leader of the fashion;
and my popularity, if not great in the highest quarters, was at least
considerable elsewhere. The people cheered me in the Gordon rows, at
the time they nearly killed my friend Jemmy Twitcher and burned Lord
Mansfield's house down. Indeed, I was known as a staunch Protestant, and
after my quarrel with Lord North veered right round to the Opposition,
and vexed him with all the means in my power.

These were not, unluckily, very great, for I was a bad speaker, and the
House would not listen to me, and presently, in 1780, after the Gordon
disturbance, was dissolved, when a general election took place. It came
on me, as all my mishaps were in the habit of coming, at a most unlucky
time. I was obliged to raise more money, at most ruinous rates, to face
the confounded election, and had the Tiptoffs against me in the field
more active and virulent than ever.

My blood boils even now when I think of the rascally conduct of my
enemies in that scoundrelly election. I was held up as the Irish
Bluebeard, and libels of me were printed, and gross caricatures drawn
representing me flogging Lady Lyndon, whipping Lord Bullingdon, turning
him out of doors in a storm, and I know not what. There were pictures of
a pauper cabin in Ireland, from which it was pretended I came; others in
which I was represented as a lacquey and shoeblack. A flood of calumny
was let loose upon me, in which any man of less spirit would have gone
down.

But though I met my acc