e brain
gave way under the pressure. Editors and publishers soon find out the
man who is dependent upon them for support, and 'since the abolition of
West India slavery the world has known no more severe servitude than
his.' 'Can a man of your age,' he asks, 'have the accumulated capital
of knowledge necessary to stand such a periodical expenditure?' 'What I
have read of your writing seems to me to be singularly unequal. At times
it is excellent in style and in conception, and evidently flowing from
springs pure, copious, and active, and giving promise of great future
eminence. At other times the marks of haste, of exhaustion, and being
run out of breath, are perceptible to an eye so sensitive as mine is on
this subject. I see no reason why you should not become a great writer
and one of the teachers of your country-folk, if you will resolve never
to write except from a full mind--which is just as essential to literary
success as it is to success in singing never to sing but out of well
inflated lungs.' He ends by the practical application of an entreaty to
make use of the family purse.

The reference to a law-book is explained by a correspondence which is
going on at the same period in regard to various literary proposals. My
father sketches several plans; he disapproves of a technical treatise,
in which he thinks that Fitzjames would be at a disadvantage from the
inevitable comparison with his uncle, the serjeant; but he advises some
kind of legal history, resembling Hallam's history inverted. In the
proposed book the legal aspect should be in the foreground and the
political in the background. He expounds at length a scheme which has
not been executed, and which would, I think, be exceedingly valuable. It
was suggested by his own lectures on French history, though it must be
'six times longer and sixty times more exact and complete.' It is to be
a history of the English administrative system from feudal times
downwards, giving an account of the development of the machinery for
justice, revenue, ecclesiastical affairs, war, trade, colonies, police,
and so forth. Each chapter should expound the actual state of things,
and trace the historical development of one department, and would
involve a variety of parenthetical inquiries, which should be carefully
subordinated to the main purpose. Various hints are given as to the
course of investigation that will be necessary. Fitzjames began to work
upon this scheme; and his op