nell, who had already contrived to make two speeches
since the Session began, rose for a third time to call attention to
words uttered during the recess by Mr. Hill, the Member for Hull. That
gentleman, for want of something better to say to his constituents, had
told them that he happened to know "that an Irish Member, who spoke
with great violence against every part of the Coercion Bill, and voted
against every clause of it, went to Ministers and said: 'Don't bate a
single atom of that Bill, or it will be impossible for any man to live
in Ireland."' O'Connell called upon Lord Althorp, as the representative
of the Government, to say what truth there was in this statement. Lord
Althorp, taken by surprise, acted upon the impulse of the moment, which
in his case was a feeling of reluctance to throw over poor Mr. Hill to
be bullied by O'Connell and his redoubtable tail. After explaining that
no set and deliberate communication of the nature mentioned had been
made to the Ministers, his Lordship went on to say that he "should not
act properly if he did not declare that he had good reason to believe
that some Irish Members did, in private conversation, use very different
language" from what they had employed in public.

It was chivalrously, but most unwisely, spoken. O'Connell at once gave
the cue by inquiring whether he himself was among the Members referred
to, and Lord Althorp assured him that such was not the case. The
Speaker tried to interfere; but the matter had gone too far. One Irish
representative after another jumped up to repeat the same question with
regard to his own case, and received the same answer. At length Sheil
rose, and asked whether he was one of the Members to whole the Noble
Lord had alluded. Lord Althorp replied: "Yes. The honourable and learned
gentleman is one." Sheil, "in the face of his country, and the presence
of his God," asserted that the individual who had given any such
information to the Noble Lord was guilty of a "gross and scandalous
calumny," and added that he understood the Noble Lord to have made
himself responsible for the imputation. Then ensued one of those
scenes in which the House of Commons appears at its very worst. All the
busybodies, as their manner is, rushed to the front; and hour after
hour slipped away in an unseemly, intricate, and apparently interminable
wrangle. Sheil was duly called upon to give an assurance that the affair
should not be carried beyond the walls of th