referable to a motive different from the actual one, might have entitled each of them to a place in the Romish Calendar. The origin of this, together with the circumstances of it, cannot have been a secret to those, who were in convivial habits with him. It was my care not to hear on the subject anything more than what had thus been spontaneously communicated. Long, I afterwards heard, had been the number of years, which they had passed in this uncomfortable state. Another eminent friend of mine, Arthur Young, for much about the same length of time, laboured under the same misfortune. To me she seemed a very sensible and intelligent woman, both worthy of a better fate. Tantæne animis cœlestibus iræ? During my stay at Hatton, we made several little excursions; one was to Guy's Cliff, the mansion of Mr. Greathead, who, at that time, was among the personages placed at Verdun in a state of detention by Buonaparte: another was, I believe, to Warwick: of the Castle, circumstances limited our view to what was visible from the road.

Amongst Lind's acquaintances was Governor Johnstone. Johnstone, he told me, was to such a degree delighted with the Fragment on Government, that he used to go about with it in

*[A celebrated and now very scarce work by Mr. Bentham, of which the full title is, A Fragment of Government, being VOL. II.

D

his pocket, boring people with it. This was not long before his departure for the revolted Colonies, as one of the three Commissioners for sparing the lives of between two and three millions of human beings, on condition of universal penitence. Hearing of this, and having an ardent desire for seeing a little of the world, and more particularly of the political world, it seemed to me a good opportunity for taking my chance of doing so in the capacity of that Commissioner's Secretary. Lind, at my desire, mentioned this to Johnstone: the answer was, much regret at not having heard of it sooner, he being engaged to Ferguson, the Scotch Professor, author of Roman History, and some book on Morals, I forget the title of it.* The examples of Greece and an Examination of what is delivered on the Subject in Blackstone's Commentaries, Lond. 1776. 8vo. E. H. B.]

*[Dr. Adam Ferguson was Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, author of An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Edinb. 1767. 4to. Lond. 1814. 8vo. ed. 7th; 2. Institutes of Moral Philosophy, for the use of Students, Edinb. 1769, 1770. 12mo; 3. Answers to Dr. Price's Observations on Civil and Religious Liberty, 1776; 4. The History of the Progress and Termination of the Roman Republic, illustrated with Maps, Lond. 1783. 3 vols. 4to. 5 vols. 8vo; 5. The Principles of Moral and Political Science, being chiefly a Retrospect of Lectures delivered in the College of Edinburgh. Lond. 1792. 2 vols. 4to; 6. Lectures on Select Subjects; with Notes and an Appendix, by David Brewster. Edinb. 1805. 2 vols. 8vo. E. H. B.]

Rome had not been lost upon Ferguson. During the voyage, he was urgent with the Commissioners, as I learnt afterwards from good Government-authority, to put to death man, woman, and child, as many as they could catch, as an inducement to the rest to take the benefit of the proffered grace!

His

As to Lind, that work of his, which brought him into favour with Lord North and Lord Mansfield, has been already mentioned. When I began this Letter, I had not received it back from a friend, to whom I had lent it. It bears date 1775: the plan of it he had from me. design had originally embraced the whole of the Acts of the Parliament of that year, and eventually those of succeeding years. But the interest produced by those Acts, which laid the foundation of the American War, absorbed all other interests. The plan of the argument he had from me. Upon his mentioning the American part of his design, his plan not being as yet formed, I told him I had written two or three pages on the subject, which, such as they were, he was welcome to do what he pleased with ; they were my own private thoughts without any view to publication. When he had made some little advance, my surprise was not small at finding this page or two of scattered thoughts had been set in front of his work, and constituted

the plan, on which he was operating. They form pages xv, and xvi in the printed book.* Different parts of it fell incidentally under my revisal, and received additions and alterations, These pages contain these words:

I. " AS TO THE POINT OF RIGHT:

1. "As to the Crown alone, what is the power, with which the constitution invests that branch of the legislature over countries conquered, or otherwise acquired?

2. "As to the whole body of the legislature, whether its operations can be restrained by any acts of the aforenamed branch of it?

3. "Again, as to the whole body of the legislature, whether on the particular point of taxation, there be any other principle in the constitution to restrain its operations?

II." AS TO THE POINT OF FACT:

1. "What were the privileges originally granted by the Crown to the Colonies?

2. "What power preceding Parliaments exercised over them?

"When these questions are fairly discussed, and not before, we may venture to give our opinions.

III. "ON THE MERITS OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE LAST PARLIAMENT :

1. "Whether they were consistent with the spirit of the constitution?

2. "Whether they were consistent with the dictates of sound policy?

"To enter on the two last subjects of enquiry, before the other points are fully settled, would at least be preposterous. It would be to begin where we ought to end.

"If the power vested in the Crown, over conquered or acquired countries, be circumscribed within certain bounds, by certain acknowledged rules, all acts done in the exercise of

of which all memory has long been lost. One thing there is, and no more, of which I have something like a specific recollection, which is the section, that commences at p. 120, and has for title "Abstract of the Charters of Connecticut and Rhode Island." This I remember had more or less of mine in it: for aught I know, the whole; but neither time nor eyes allow of my attempting to draw a line anywhere.

He would gladly have let me write on, as long as I chose he had a sort of Epicurean nonchalance about him, the result of so many years he had been living in the grande monde. My opi

that power, must be measured by those rules, on their conformity to which, their validity will depend.

"If the acts done in the exercise of that power do not bind or restrain Parliament, it is in vain to cite those acts. On this supposition, charters are useless parchments, because ineffective.

"If there be any principle in our constitution, by which the Americans can claim an exemption from Parliamentary Taxation, then, too, charters will be found but useless parchments, because unnecessary.

"If there be no such principle, then allowing to charters their utmost force, the Colonists can plead no exemption from thence, till they have shewn it to be there, either specified, or of necessity implied.

"If different interpretations be put on the same grants by the contending parties, we must then appeal to usage to decide between them.

"If the proceedings of the last Parliament be questioned, we must exactly know the situation, in which the preceding Parliament had left it."