The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume Ii Part 27

No;" he protested he knew not.

Mrs. Crewe, again a little surprised, I believe, at this second opposition acquaintance, began questioning how often I had attended this trial.

Mr. Windham, with much warmth of regret, told her very seldom, and that I had lost Mr. Burke on his best day.

I then turned to speak to Mr. Burke, that I might not seem listening, for they interspersed various civilities upon my peculiar right to have heard all the great speeches, but Mr.

Burke was in so profound a reverie he did not hear me.

I wished Mr. Windham had not either, for he called upon him aloud, "Mr. Burke, Miss Burney speaks to you!"

He gave me his immediate attention with an air so full of respect that it quite shamed me.

"Indeed," I cried, " I had never meant to speak to Mr. Burke again after hearing him in Westminster Hall. I had meant to keep at least that " geographical timidity."

I alluded to an expression in his great speech of "geographical morality" which had struck me very much.

He laughed heartily, instantly comprehending me, and a.s.sured me it was an idea that had occurred to him on the moment he had uttered it, wholly without study.

A little general talk followed; and then, one of the lords rising to question some of the evidence, he said he must return to his committee and business,-very flatteringly saying, in quitting his post, "This is the first time I have played truant from the manager's box."

However I might be obliged to him, which sincerely I felt, I was yet glad to have him go. My total ill will to all he was about made his conversation merely a pain to me.

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I did not feel the same With regard to Mr. Windham. He is not the prosecutor, and seems endowed with so much liberality and candour that it not Only encourages me to speak to him what I think, but leads me to believe he will one day or other reflect upon joining a party so violent as a stain to the independence of his character.

Almost instantly he came forward, to the place Mr. Burke had vacated.

"Are you approaching," I cried, "to hear my upbraidings?"

"Why--I don't know," cried he, looking half alarmed.

"Oh! I give you warning, if you come you must expect them; so my invitation is almost as pleasant as the man's in 'Measure for Measure,' who calls to Master Barnardine, 'Won't you come down to be hanged?'"

"But how," cried he, "have I incurred your upbraidings?"

By bringing me here," I answered, "only to disappoint me."

"Did I bring you here?"

"Yes, by telling me you were to speak to-day."

He protested he could never have made such an a.s.sertion. I explained myself, reminding him he had told me he was certainly to speak before the recess; and that, therefore, when I was informed this was to be the last day of trial till after the recess, I concluded I should be right, but found myself so utterly wrong as to hear nothing but such evidence as I Could not even understand, because it was so uninteresting I could not even listen to it.

"How strangely," he exclaimed, "are we all moulded, that nothing ever in this mortal life, however pleasant in itself, and however desirable from its circ.u.mstances, can come to us without alloy-- not even flattery; for here, at this moment, all the high gratification I should feel, and I am well disposed to feel it thoroughly in supposing you could think it worth your while to come hither in order to hear me, is kept down and subdued by the consciousness how much I must disappoint you."

"Not at all," cried I; "the worse you speak, the better for my side of the question."

He laughed, but confessed the agitation of his spirits was so great in the thought of that speech, whenever he was to make it, that it haunted him in fiery dreams in his sleep.

"Sleep!" cried I; "do you ever sleep?"

He stared a little, but I added with pretended dryness, "Do any of you that live down there in that prosecutor's den ever sleep in your beds? I should have imagined that, had you

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even attempted it, the antic.i.p.ating ghost of Mr. Hastings would have appeared to you in the dead of the night, and have drawn your curtains, and glared ghastly in your eyes. I do heartily wish Mr. Tickell would send You that 'Antic.i.p.ation' at once!"

This idea furnished us with sundry images, till, looking down upon Mr. Hastings, with an air a little moved, he said, "I am afraid the most insulting thing we do by him is coming up hither to show ourselves so easy and disengaged, and to enter into conversation with the ladies."

"But I hope," cried I, alarmed, "he does not see that."

"Why your caps," cried he, "are much in your favour for concealment; they are excellent screens to all but the first row!"

I saw him, however, again look at the poor, and, I sincerely believe, much-injured prisoner, and as I saw also he still bore With my open opposition, I could not but again seize a favourable moment for being more serious With him.

"Ah, Mr. Windham," I cried, "I have not forgot what dropped from you on the first day of this trial."

He looked a little surprised. "You," I continued, "probably have no remembrance of it, for you have been living ever since down there; but I was more touched with what you said then, than with all I have since heard from all the others, and probably than with all I shall hear even from you again when you mount the rostrum."

"You conclude," cried he, looking very sharp, "I shall then be better steeled against that fatal candour?"

"In fact," cried I, "Mr. Windham, I do really believe your steeling to he fact.i.tious; notwithstanding you took pains to a.s.sure me your candour was but the deeper malice; and yet I will own, when once I have heard your speech, I have little expectation of ever having the honour of conversing with you again."

"And why?" cried- he, starting back "what am I to say that you denounce such a forfeit beforehand?"

I could not explain; I left him to imagine; for, should he prove as violent and as personal as the rest, I had no objection to his previously understanding I could have no future pleasure in discoursing with him.

"I think, however," I continued, with a laugh, "that since I have settled this future taciturnity, I have a fair right in the meanwhile to say whatever comes uppermost."

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He agreed to this with great approvance.

"Moliere, you know, in order to obtain a natural opinion of his plays, applied to an old woman: you upon the same principle, to obtain a natural opinion of political matters, should apply to an ignorant one--for you will never, I am sure, gain it down there."

He smiled, whether he would or not, but protested this was the severest stricture upon his committee that had ever yet been uttered.

MISS BURNEY'S UNBIASED SENTIMENTS.

I told him as it was the last time he was likely to hear unbiased sentiments upon this subject, it was right they should be spoken very intelligibly. " And permit me," I said, " to begin with what strikes me the most. Were Mr. Hastings really the culprit he is represented, he would never stand there."

"Certainly," cried he, with a candour he could not suppress, "there seems something favourable in that; it has a Pod look; but a.s.sure yourself he never expected to see this day."

"But would he, if guilty, have waited its chance? Was not all the world before him? Could he not have chosen any other place of residence ?"

"Yes--but the shame, the disgrace of a flight?"