Part 49 (1/2)

'I do not knohat to think of this plan,' said the Baronet 'I find your flowery speakers are no more to be depended upon, in the present day, than the oldest drudges in corruption!

'You know, cousin, how I hate corruption It is undoing us all, It will undo the nation! The influence of the crown is raded by annual batches of us and parch about our ears The old English spirit is dead The nation has lost all sense and feeling

The people are so vile and selfish that they are bought and sold like swine; to which, for my part, I think they have been very properly co now as public virtue No, no! That happy tiet; and as for theabout the; and, to own the truth, dadohts and liberties, about which so many people that you and I know pretend to bawl!'

'This is a severe supposition indeed It implicates your dearest and most intimate friends Only recollect, Sir Barnard, ould your feelings be, if the sa should be asserted of you?'

'Of me, truly! No, no, cousin Evelyn; I think I have been pretty tolerably tried! The Minister knows very well he could move the Monument sooner than me I love the people; and am half mad to see that they have no love for themselves Why do not they e the throne with their clamors? They are no better than beasts of burthen! If they were any thing else, the whole kingdoant upstart from the helm I say, Mr Evelyn, I love the people; I love my country; I love the constitution; and I hate the swarms ofin upon us, to overturn it'

Was it weakness of otism? Or was it inordinate stupidity, that Sir Barnard should forget, as he constantly did, that his father had been a common porter in a warehouse, had raised an ihs which descended to his son, and had hiht with the title of Baronet by a foro, that Sir Barnard, with such a swell of conscious superiority, should begin to talk of the antiquity of his family? But, above all, how did he happen not to recollect that the disappointment which now preyed upon and cankered his heart was the refusal of a peerage?

I really can give no satisfactory answer to these questions I can only state a fact: which daily occurs in a thousand other instances

Mr Evelyn brought the Baronet back to the point; and remarked to him that, at the present period, when the Minister was so powerful in nu in a mere yes and nothe country, the constitution, and the people, whom he so dearly loved; that the safety which is derived froe; and that he thought himself very certain I was as dear, nay and as incorruptible, a lover of old England, or at least of the welfare of mankind, as Sir Barnard himself

'Shew me such a man, cousin,' exclaimed the Baronet, 'and I orshi+p him! I orshi+p him, Mr Evelyn! I orshi+p him! But I am persuaded he is not to be found I have learned, from too fatal experience, that I am certain of nobody but myself! Small as the number in Opposition is, if they were but all as sound-hearted as I am, and would set their shoulders to the wheel and lay theood of their country as I do, I say it, Mr Evelyn, and take my word for it I say true, we should overturn the Minister and his corrupt gang in six ly persuaded of the soundness of the gentleman's principles whom you recommend, let me see him, and talk to him; and then I will tell you more of my opinion'

'There is one point, Sir Barnard, on which I suppose I need not insist; it is so obvious'

'What is that, cousin?'

'You being as you state a ainst what you conceive to be the good of the nation, you must expect that every man, who resembles you in patriotism and fortitude, will act from himself, and will resist any attempt to control hi about it Those things are never mentioned, now-a-days: they are perfectly understood But who is your young friend? Is he a eable, thought Sir Barnard

'Where will he get a qualification?'

'I will provide hientleman'

'As I understand the term, he certainly is: for, in addition to thoseto the world, he not only possesses a good education but a sense of justice which ard every man as his brother; and which will neither suffer hihty nor traht I myself will crouch to no man

And, as for modesty and humility, in the youth of the present day, why they are very rarely found: and so I shall be happy to meet with them'

'Nay, but Mr Trevor delivers his sentiuarded freedoy, or indeed he would be ill qualified to rise in the assembly of which I wish to see hiant assertions that are there daily ant! G---- confound me, Mr Evelyn, if I am not sometimes struck dumb, hat I hear in that house! There is that Scotchet up, after our allies have been defeated, our troops driven like sheep from swamp to swamp, where they die of the rot, and our shi+ps carried by hundreds into the ene these facts are as notorious as his own political profligacy, that our victories are splendid, our ar beyond all former example! He makes my hair stand on end to hear him! And when I look in his face, and see the broad fahs at me and all of us, for our astonishment, why, as I tell you, damn me if I am not dumb-founded! I am struck all of a heap! I have not a word! I ae, and amazement!

Compared to him your brothel-keeper is a modest person! Were but our fortresses as impenetrable as his forehead, curse me if they would ever be taken He is bomb-proof The returns that lie on the table can make no ih if they are pointed to in the course of an argument