e his first speech in the English
Commons, it was for some minutes doubtful whether to laugh at or cheer
him. The _debut_ of his predecessor, Flood, had been a complete failure,
under nearly similar circumstances. But when the ministerial part of our
senators had watched Pitt (their thermometer) for the cue, and saw him
nod repeatedly his stately nod of approbation, they took the hint from
their huntsman, and broke out into the most rapturous cheers. Grattan's
speech, indeed, deserved them; it was a _chef-d'oeuvre_. I did not hear
_that_ speech of his (being then at Harrow), but heard most of his
others on the same question--also that on the war of 1815. I differed
from his opinions on the latter question, but coincided in the general
admiration of his eloquence.

"When I met old Courtenay, the orator, at Rogers's, the poet's, in
1811-12, I was much taken with the portly remains of his fine figure,
and the still acute quickness of his conversation. It was _he_ who
silenced Flood in the English House by a crushing reply to a hasty
_debut_ of the rival of Grattan in Ireland. I asked Courtenay (for I
like to trace motives) if he had not some personal provocation; for the
acrimony of his answer seemed to me, as I had read it, to involve it.
Courtenay said 'he had; that, when in Ireland (being an Irishman), at
the bar of the Irish House of Commons, Flood had made a personal and
unfair attack upon _himself_, who, not being a member of that House,
could not defend himself, and that some years afterwards the opportunity
of retort offering in the English Parliament, he could not resist it.'
He certainly repaid Flood with interest, for Flood never made any
figure, and only a speech or two afterwards, in the English House of
Commons. I must except, however, his speech on Reform in 1790, which Fox
called 'the best he ever heard upon that subject.'"

For some time he had entertained thoughts of going again abroad; and it
appeared, indeed, to be a sort of relief to him, whenever he felt
melancholy or harassed, to turn to the freedom and solitude of a life of
travel as his resource. During the depression of spirits which he
laboured under, while printing Childe Harold, "he would frequently,"
says Mr. Dallas, "talk of selling Newstead, and of going to reside at
Naxos, in the Grecian Archipelago,--to adopt the eastern costume and
customs, and to pass his time in studying the Oriental languages and
literature." The excitement of the tri