and
greatness of his progenitors, of their splendid housekeeping, their
loyalty, and their valor. On one bright summer day, the boy, then just
seven years old, lay on the bank of the rivulet which flows through the
old domain of his house to join the Isis. There, as threescore and ten
years later he told the tale, rose in his mind a scheme which, through
all the turns of his eventful career, was never abandoned. He would
recover the estate which had belonged to his fathers. He would be
Hastings of Daylesford. This purpose, formed in infancy and poverty,
grew stronger as his intellect expanded and as his fortune rose. He
pursued his plan with that calm but indomitable force of will which was
the most striking peculiarity of his character. When, under a tropical
sun, he ruled fifty millions of Asiatics, his hopes, amidst all the
cares of war, finance, and legislation, still pointed to Daylesford. And
when his long public life, so singularly checkered with good and evil,
with glory and obloquy, had at length closed forever, it was to
Daylesford that he retired to die.

When he was eight years old, his uncle Howard determined to take charge
of him, and to give him a liberal education. The boy went up to London,
and was sent to a school at Newington, where he was well taught but ill
fed. He always attributed the smallness of his stature to the hard and
scanty fare of this seminary. At ten he was removed to Westminster
school, then flourishing under the care of Dr. Nichols. Vinny Bourne, as
his pupils affectionately called him, was one of the masters. Churchill,
Colman, Lloyd, Cumberland, Cowper, were among the students. With Cowper,
Hastings formed a friendship which neither the lapse of time, nor a wide
dissimilarity of opinions and pursuits, could wholly dissolve. It does
not appear that they ever met after they had grown to manhood. But forty
years later, when the voices of many great orators were crying for
vengeance on the oppressor of India, the shy and secluded poet could
image to himself Hastings the Governor-General only as the Hastings with
whom he had rowed on the Thames and played in the cloister, and refused
to believe that so good-tempered a fellow could have done anything very
wrong. His own life had been spent in praying, musing, and rhyming among
the water-lilies of the Ouse. He had preserved in no common measure the
innocence of childhood. His spirit had indeed been severely tried, but
not by temptations w