determined to again risk the flow of rivers of blood. This he shrank
from, and abdicated the throne a second time. And then the barbarous,
crimeful story began.

Sir Hudson Lowe's appointment was a national calamity, but he was the
nominee of Wellington's coadjutors, and carried out their wishes with
a criminal exactitude, and they should have stood by him in his dire
distress, instead of which they allowed him to die in poverty, broken
in spirit, and a victim to calumny which they ought to have been manly
enough to share.

Whatever may be said in exculpation of them and him, _they_ were
undoubtedly too seriously involved to enter upon a fight that would
have ended disastrously for all of them, and so, with unusual wisdom,
they never got further than threats.

Sir Hudson was dead something like nine years before Forsyth burst
upon the public with his eccentric vindication of the unamiable and
unfortunate ex-Governor. The zealous biographer's research for
material favourable to his deified hero caused him to ransack prints
that were written by unfriendly authors and vindictive critics of the
great captive. Even the State Papers, the most unreliable of all
documents on this particular subject, were used to prove the goodness
of Sir Hudson, and when quotations were unavailing, the author
proceeded to concoct the most amazing ideas in support of the task he
had set himself to prove.

Writers of anti-Napoleonic history who take in the St. Helena period
are filled with wonder and contempt of the Emperor, who, according to
their refined and accurate judgment of the fitness of things, should
have been eternally grateful to the British Government that they did
not have him shot. Why should he complain in the fretful way he does
of his treatment and his condition? A great man would have shown his
appreciation of all the money that was being spent on the needs for
his existence and for the better security of his person. It ill
becomes him to complain of improper treatment after all the trouble
and commotion he has caused at one time and another. Indeed, a great
man would bear the burden of captivity with equanimity and praise the
men who gave him the opportunity of showing how a great soldier could
carry himself in such unequalled adversity.

This in effect is what these high-minded men of letters say should
have been the attitude of England's guest. He should have received his
treatment, harsh and arbitrary though it was,