volume, but which, in its condensed form and sparkling positiveness of expression, was all the more efficient. To the Whig party as well as to the Whig Review, such an ally had claims which could not be disre garded; and in 1830, through the interest of Lord Lansdowne, he was elected a member of Parliament for the borough of Calne. His reputation was sc well established that no idea of patronage entered into this arrangement; and he could afterwards boast, with honest pride, that he was as independent when he sat in Parliament as the nominee of Lord Lansdowne as when he represented the popular constituencies of Leeds and Edinburgh. As an orator, he won a reputation second only to his reputation as a man of letters. From all accounts he owed little to his manner of speaking. "His head," we are told, "was set stiff on his shoulders, and his feet were planted immovable on the floor. One hand was fixed behind him across his back, and in this rigid attitude, with only a slight movement of his right hand, he poured forth, with inconceivable velocity, his sentences." His first speech was on the Jews' Disabilities Bill, on the fifth of April, 1830, followed in December by one on Slavery in the West Indies. Both evinced the broad views of the statesman as well as the generous warmth of the reformer. He threw himself with characteristic ardor into the great struggle for Parliamentary Reform, and his speeches on that measare, not only drew forth unbounded applause from his party and unwilling admiration from his opponents, but, as read now, after the excitement of the occasion as subsi led, justify in a great degree the enthusiastic praise of those who heard them delivered. Clear and ogical in arrangement, abundant in precedents and arguments, fearless in tone, and animated in movement, they are particularly marked by that fusion of intelli gence and sensibility which makes passion intelligent and reason impassioned. The rush of the declamation is kept carefully within the channels of the argument; they convince through the very process by which they kindle. Their style is that of splendid and animated conversation; though carefully premeditated they have the appearance of being spontaneous; and indeed were not, as is commonly supposed, originally written out and committed to memory, but thought out and committed to memory. Without writing a word, he could prepare an hour's speech, in his mind, carefully attending even to the most minute felicities of expression, and then deliver it with a rapidity so great that no reporter could follow him. The effect on the House of these declaimed disquisitions can perhaps be best estimated by quoting a passage from one of his political opponents, whose pen, in the heat of faction, was unrestrained by any of the proprieties of controversy. In the number of the Noctes Ambrosiance, for August, 1831, Macaulay is sneered at as a person whom it is the fashion among a small coterie to call "the Burke of the age." After admitting him to be" the cleverest declaimer on the Whig side of the House," the account thus proceeds: "He is an ugly, cross-made, splay-footed, shapeless little dumpling of a fellow, with a featureless face, too except indeed a good expansive forehead sleek, puritanical, sandy hair, large glimmering eyes and a mouth from ear to ear. He has a lisp and burr, moreover, and speaks thickly and huskily for several minutes before he gets into the wing of his discourse; but after that nothing can be more dazzling than his whole execution. What he - - volume, but which, in its condensed form and sparkling positiveness of expression, was all the more efficient. To the Whig party as well as to the Whig Review, such an ally had claims which could not be disre garded; and in 1830, through the interest of Lord Lansdowne, he was elected a member of Parliament for the borough of Calne. His reputation was sc well established that no idea of patronage entered into this arrangement; and he could afterwards boast, with honest pride, that he was as independent when he sat in Parliament as the nominee of Lord Lansdowne as when he represented the popular constituencies of Leeds and Edinburgh. As an orator, he won a reputation second only to his reputation as a man of letters. From all accounts he owed little to his manner of speaking. "His head," we are told, "was set stiff on his shoulders, and his feet were planted immovable on the floor. One hand was fixed behind him across his back, and in this rigi attitude, with only a slight movement of his righ hand, he poured forth, with inconceivable velocity, hi sentences." His first speech was on the Jews' Dis in abilities Bill, on the fifth of Apr 1830, followed iust December by one on Slavery in t Test Indies. Bo evinced the broad views of th generous warmth of the re with characteristic ard view indinuch time e became a es on Sad Hampden, le, the elder of Johnson, War of the speeches can se articles in ichness of dicelivered as Secly 1833, on the ent. Few perwho was in Lonents in regard to He made the this session on Inre judge, says he ver heard." in Parliament on is in comprehen. It justified his r, of member and of India. Shiel, om the sneers of ties, thus alluded r! Don't attempt leverest man in speeches on the ? Think of that, he salary, nearly nited States, was rement to accept says is substantially, of course, stuff and nonsense; but it is so well-worded, and so volubly and forcibly delivered there is such an endless string of epigram and antithesis such a flashing of epithets such an accumulation of images and the voice is so trumpetlike, and the action so grotesquely emphatic, that you might hear a pin drop in the House. Even Mannera Sutton himself listens." - - In the Reformed Parliament, which met in January, 1883, Macaulay took his seat as member for Leeds. He was soon after made Secretary of the Board of Control. An economist of his reputation, he did not speak often, but reserved himself for those occasions when he could speak with effect. Throughout his parliamentary career he showed no inclination to mingle in strictly extemporaneous debate, though it seems difficult to conceive that a man of such intellectual hardihood as well as intellectual capacity, and who in conversation was one of the most fluent and well-informed of human beings, lacked the power of thinking on his legs. It is probable that he disliked the drudgery of practical political life, and was incapable of the continuous party passion which sustains the professional politician. An ardent Whig partisan, his partisanship was still roused by the principles of his party rather than by its expedients. Literature and the philosophy of politics had more fascination for him than the contentions of the House of Commons; and he has repeatedly expressed contempt for the sophisms and misstatements which, though they will not bear the test of careful perusal, pass in the House for facts and arguments when volubly delivered in excited de pate. Indeed, from 1830 to 1834, the period when he was most ambitious for political distinction and prefer |