would be there accounted no less new than extravagant to hear a counsel pathetically reminding the presiding judge of the convivial meetings of their early days, or enlivening his arguments on a grave question of law by humorous illustration. * Yet was all this listened to in Ireland with favor and admiration. It had, indeed, little influence upon the decisions of the bench. The advocate might have excited the smiles or tears of his hearers, but no legal concessions followed. The Judges who showed the most indulgence and sensibility to these episodes of fancy were ever the most conscientious in preserving the sacred stability of law. Into the Counsel's mirth or tenderness, no matter how digressive, they entered for the moment more pleased than otherwise with irregularities that gratified their taste and relieved their labour; but with them the triumph of eloquence was but evanescent-the oration over, they resumed their gravity and firmness, and proved by their ultimate decision, that if they relaxed for an instant, it was from urbanity, and not from any oblivion of the paramount duties of their station. The effects, however, which such appeals to the passions produced (as they still continue to do) upon juries, was very different; and when the advocate transferred the same style into his addresses to the bench, it was not that his judgment had selected it as the most appropriate, but * See Mr. Curran's apostrophe to Lord Avonmore, chap. iv.-C. + Of these examples without number might be produced from Mr. Curran's law arguments. His published speech in the Court of Exchequer, on Mr. Justice Johnson's case, is full of them. Equally striking instances occur in his argument on the same question before the Court of King's Bench. "The minister going to the House of Commons might be arrested upon the information of an Irish chairman, and the warrant of a trading justice. Mr. Pitt might be brought over here in vinculis. What to do? to see whether he can be bailed or not. I remember Mr. Fox was once here-during the lifetime of this country-so might he be brought over. It may facilitate the intercourse between the countries, for any man may travel at the public expense; as, suppose I gave an Irishman in London a small assault in trust, when the vacation comes, he knocks at the door of a trading justice, and tells him he wants a warrant against the counsellor. What counsellor? Oh, sure every body knows the counsellor. Well, friend, and what is your name? Thady O'Flannigan, please your honour. What countryman are you? An Englishman, by construction. Very well, I'll draw upon my correspondent in Ireland for the body of the counsellor."-C. because he found it impossible to avoid relapsing into those modes of influencing the mind, which he had been long habituated to employ with so much success in another quarter. In accounting for this adoption at the Irish bar, of a style of eloquence so much more fervid and poetical than the severer notions of the English Courts would approve, something must be attributed to the influence of the national character. From whatever cause it has arisen, the Irish are by temperament confessedly more warm and impetuous than their neighbours: their passions lying nearer the surface, their actions are more governed by impulse, and their diction more adorned by imagination, than it would be reasonable to expect in a colder, more advanced, and philosophic people. In addressing persons so constituted, the methods most likely to prevail are sufficiently obvious. The orator, who knows anything of his art, must be aware that frigid demonstration alone is not the best adapted to men who take a kind of pride in regulating their decisions by their emotions, and that a far more certain artifice of persuasion must be to fill their minds with those glowing topics by which they habitually persuade themselves. It may be observed, too, that although the habits of mind. which must be cultivated, in order to succeed in such a style of eloquence, are altogether different from those involved in the study of the law; yet in Ireland they have never been deemed incompatible with legal occupations. The preparation for the bar there has never been so entirely technical as it usually is in England: a very general taste for polite literature and popular acquirements has been united with the more stern and laborious attainments of professional knowledge, and it is to this combination of pursuits, that invigorate the understanding with those which exercise the imagination and improve the taste, that must be attributed that mass of varied and effective talent, which has so long existed among the members of the Irish bar. But the immediate cause of that animated style of eloquence that has of late years prevailed there, appears to have been the influence of the Irish House of Commons. It was principally in the productions of the eminent leaders in that house, that originated the modern school of Irish oratory. In Ireland this popular style made its way from the senate to the bar; though at first view such a transition may not seem either necessary or natural. In England it has not taken place. At the time that the first Mr. Pitt, the pride of the English senate, was exalting and delighting his auditors by the majesty of his conceptions and the intrepid originality of his diction, Westminster Hall remained inaccessible to any contagious inspiration. At a later period, upon the memorable trial of Warren Hastings, the contrast is brought more palpably to view. While the celebrated. prosecutors in that cause were soaring as high as imagination could find language to sustain it, while they were "shaking the walls that surrounded them with those anathemas of super-human eloquence," "* which remain among the recorded models of British oratory, the lawyers, who conducted the defence, were in general content to retaliate with tranquil argument and uninspired refutation. Introduction, therefore, of the parliamentary manner into the courts of Ireland, is to be accounted for by some circumstances peculiar to the country. During that period when eloquence flourished most in the Irish Parliament, that is, for the last forty years of its existence, the number of barristers in the House of Commons bore a much * Erskine's defence of Stockdale. This celebrated advocate may be adduced in refutation of some of the above opinions, and it must be admitted that in some degree he forms an exception; yet, without inquiring now, whether his was a style of eloquence peculiar to the individual, or characteristic to the English bar, it may be observed, that it differed essentially from that which prevailed at this time in the British parliament, and to a still greater extent in the Irish senate and at the Irish bar. If he had produced many such passages as that of the American savage, it would have been otherwise; but his general strength did not lie in the fervour of his imagination; it was by the vigour of his ethics and his logic, enforced by illustrations rather felicitious than impassioned, that he brought over the judgment to his side. It is not intended by these remarks to assign a superiority to either style-it is to be supposed that the eminent advocates of the two bars adopted the manner that was best suited to their respective countries.-C. greater proportion to the whole than has been at any time usual. in England. In those days the policy by which Ireland was governed being in the utmost degree unpopular, the whole patronage of the Irish administration was necessarily expended in alluring supporters of the measures against which the nation exclaimed. A majority of numbers in the House of Commons could then be easily procured, and for a long time such a majority had been sufficient for every purpose of the government; but at that period in question, the increasing influence and talent of the minority rendered it necessary to adopt every method of opposing them (if possible) with a predominance of intellect. The means of doing this, it would appear, were not to be found in that body which ruled the country, and recourse was had to the expedient of enlisting the rising men of the bar in the service of the Administration.* Accordingly, every barrister who had popular abilities enough to render his support of any moment, found a ready admission into Parliament, upon the condition of his declaring for the Viceroy; and in the event of his displaying sufficient talent and constancy, was certain of being rewarded with the highest honours of his profession. But independent of those who were thus introduced to the senate, the bar was the profession most generally resorted to by the members or dependents of the highest families; as one in * Such was the commencement of (among others) the late Lord Clonmel's fortune. "The Marquis of Townshend had expressed his wishes to Lord Chancellor Lifford, for the assistance of some young gentleman of the bar, on whose talent and fidelity he might rely, in the severe parliamentary campaigns then (1769) likely to take place. Lord Lifford, recommended Mr. Scott, who was accordingly returned to parliament, to oppose the party led on by the celebrated Flood."-Hardy's Life of Lord Charlemont. The necessity of calling in such aid gives us but a poor idea of the education and talents of the Irish aristocracy of the time. Mr Grattan, in 1797, thus mentions the great improvement in the intellect of his country that he had witnessed. "The progress of the human mind in the course of the last twenty-five years has been prodigious in Ireland; I remember when there scarcely appeared a publication in a newspaper of any degree of merit, which has not been traced to some person of note, on the part of government or the opposition; but now a multitude of very powerful publications appear, from authors entirely unknown, of profound and spirited investigation."-Letter to the citizens of Dublin-C. which, without any claim of merit, they could, through the influence of their patrons, obtain situations of professional emolument, and where, if they possessed such a claim, the road was so open to legal preferment and to political distinction; and consequently all of the latter description, recommended by their talents, and supported by the power of their connexions, found access to the House of Commons, long before that period of standing and of professional reputation, at which the successful English barrister is accustomed or deems it prudent to become a senator. These circumstances alone would in a great degree account for the number of lawyers in the Irish Parliament; but it should be farther observed, that it was not any particular class that looked to or obtained a seat in that assembly: the ambition of appearing there was very general at the Irish bar; it was the grand object upon which every enterprising barrister fixed his eye and his heart. This was the age of political speculation; it was "Ireland's lifetime." Great original questions were daily in her Parliament: the struggle between popular claims and ancient prerogatives was a scene where much seemed likely to be gained -by the venal for themselves, by the honest for their country; but whether considered as a post of honour or of profit, it was one to which men of colder temperaments than the Irish might be easily moved to aspire. The consequence of this intermixture of political with legal pursuits was, that the talents most suited to advance the former were much cultivated and constantly exercised; and from this difference in the objects and habits of the bars of the two countries appear to have principally resulted the different styles of oratory displayed by the members of each, both in their parliamentary and forensic exertions. The English barrister, long disciplined to technical observances, having passed the vigour of his intellect in submissive reverence to rules and authorities, brings into the House of Commons the same subtle propensities, and the same |