e of Lords, and
of a letter he wrote in great bitterness of spirit, in which he
said, 'Do you mean to deprive me of my lead in the House of
Lords? Why don't you say as you did when you took the Great Seal
from me, 'God damn you, I tell you I can't give you the Great
Seal, and there's an end of it'?'

[Page Head: ANECDOTES OF CURRAN.]

They spoke of Curran, his wit, and of his quarrel with Ponsonby.
When the Whigs came in in 1806, Ponsonby was made Irish
Chancellor.[8] There had been some previous communication with
Curran, who had assented to Ponsonby's being promoted to the
highest place; but he expressed his expectation that he should
have the next, and he wanted to be Attorney-General. Fox was very
desirous of making him Attorney, but Lord Grenville would not
hear of it; he had been so concerned with the rebels that it was
thought impossible, besides that it led directly to the Bench,
for which he was disqualified by temper and character. When
Ponsonby became Chancellor, Curran wrote to him to know if he was
to be Attorney; and Ponsonby sent him a pompous answer, that 'his
lips were sealed with the seals of office;' which affronted
Curran. Eventually, they determined to buy out the Master of the
Rolls and put Curran in his place, and they arranged with the
Master that he should have L600 a year out of the place (a
monstrous job). Accordingly Curran was informed that he was to be
the Master of the Rolls, but _after_ this notification (as he
asserted), it was intimated to him that he was to have this rider
upon his place. He said, he had been no party to such an
agreement and he would not pay it, nor did he. Ponsonby was
highly indignant, said Curran was a great rogue, and never would
speak to him again; and he paid the L600 a year out of his own
pocket as long as Curran lived. As a specimen of Curran's wit,
one day when Lord Moira had been making a speech in his usual
style full of sounding phrases and long words, Curran said, 'Upon
my word his lordship has been airing his vocabulary in a very
pretty style to-day.'

[8] [Right Hon. George Ponsonby, who resigned the office in
the following year. Curran held the office of Master of
the Rolls in Ireland from 1806 to 1814, when he retired
on a pension of L3,000 a year. He died in 1817.]

Lord Holland gave me an account of Fox's death, with all the
details of the operations (he was thrice tapped), and his
behaviour; and till then