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Protestant divine would, as Dudley had rightly conjectured, render him an excellent keeper of the royal conscience, when a warrant was to be extorted from young Edward for the execution of his uncle Somerset. The Bishop therefore became Chancellor. He acted as Chancellor also to Lady Jane Grey-but resigned the Seal with such alacrity to Queen Mary, the moment Jane's cause was desperate, and also recanted his Protestantism with such exemplary readiness, that he was pardoned and continued in his See. Dying before Elizabeth's accession, he died also of course in the communion of Rome.

We need not dwell on Lord Campbell's next subject—for he was a great man, and though it is strange enough that we have never had a separate biography of him, the principal events in his life are part and parcel of the History of England. Lord Campbell gives in full detail the procedure in Parliament, arranged and conducted by Lord Chancellor Stephen Gardyner, Bishop of Winchester, when the English government and nation were to be formally reunited to the Roman church. This precedent, he observes, will probably be studied by those who at the present time wish to bring about a similar reconciliation.' It is a very curious procedure.

Gardyner was succeeded as Chancellor by Heath, Archbishop of York, whose earlier life is not without its inconsistencies, and who persevered in Gardyner's Smithfield policy, but whose memory is redeemed by his honourable conduct at and after the death of his patroness Mary. Elizabeth would willingly have continued him both as Chancellor and as Archbishop, if he would have gone into her and Cecil's plans for the revival of the reformed religion. But Heath was steadfast. Sir Nicholas Bacon was made Lord Keeper-and refusing, in his place of Parliament, to take the oath of Supremacy, the Archbishop was deprived forthwith of his See.

'He retired to a small property of his own at Cobham, in Surrey, where he devoted the rest of his days to study and devotion. He was here compared to Abiathar, sent home by Solomon to his own field, and he was said to have found himself happier than he had ever been during his highest elevation. Queen Elizabeth herself, remembering how promptly he had recognised her title when he was Lord Chancellor, and believing that he afterwards acted from conscientious motives, was in the frequent habit of visiting him in his retreat, and, with a certain hankering after the old religion, she probably, in her heart, honoured him more than she did Archbishop Parker, whom she found living splendidly at Lambeth, with a lady whom she would neither call his "mistress" nor his "wife."-Heath survived till the year 1566, when he died deeply lamented by his friends, and with the character of a good, if not of a great man.

'Great

'Great reproach was brought upon the two Chancellors, Gardyner and Heath, for the furious religious persecution which they prompted or sanctioned; but the former gained much popularity by his resistance to the Queen's matrimonial alliance with Philip of Spain, and the latter was respected for the general moderation of his character and his personal disinterestedness. They issued writs, under the Great Seal, for the election of representatives to the House of Commons to fourteen new places (generally very small towns) which had not before sent members to parliament,-imitating the conduct of Edward's Chancellors, who, to strengthen the Reformation, had enfranchised no fewer than twenty-two similar boroughs. None of their judicial decisions have been handed down to us.'-vol. ii. p. 86.

We must quote here a note which may perhaps edify some of the legal personages destined to figure at her Majesty's next Fancy Ball:

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'During Mary's reign the lawyers devoted much of their attention to the regulation of their own dress and personal appearance. To check the grievance of "long beards," an order was issued by the Inner Temple "that no fellow of that house should wear his beard above three weeks' growth on pain of forfeiting 20s." The Middle Temple enacted "that none of that society should wear great breeches in their hose made after the Dutch, Spanish, or Almain fashion, or lawn upon their caps, or cut doublets, under a penalty of 3s. 4d., and expulsion for the second offence." In 3 and 4 P. and M. it was ordained by all the four Inns of Court," that none except knights and benchers should wear in their doublets or hose any light colours, save scarlet and crimson, nor wear any upper velvet cap, or any scarf or wings in their gowns, white jerkins, buskins, or velvet shoes, double cuffs in their shirts, feathers or ribbons in their caps, and that none should wear their study gowns in the city any farther than Fleet Bridge or Holborn Bridge, nor, while in Commons, wear Spanish cloaks, sword and buckler, or rapier, or gowns and hats, or gowns girded with a dagger on the back.'-Ibid.

We avoid Sir Nicholas Bacon, as the great father of a greater son' is well known to all. Nor do we find any novelties to tempt us in the sketch of his successor Bromley, who is sufficiently damned to all ages by his proceedings at the trial of the Queen of Scots. The sudden rise and brief Chancellorship of the 'dancing' Sir Christopher Hatton are most amusingly told-we cannot add without scandal against Queen Elizabeth ;-on the contrary, Lord Campbell takes pains to prove that the arrangements of the royal apartments within four and twenty hours after the leader of the brawl first attracted her notice in Gray's Inn Hall, were about as suspicious as those of his own Queen Caroline and her friend Bergami at Naples;-but all this and the Keepership of Puckering also we must pass over.

The next that ascended the marble chair might well detain us; but we have given so much space to the mummies' that we can afford

afford little to the immortals. Lord Campbell has done the life of the illustrious Ellesmere in a manner worthy of such a subject -traced the long, arduous, dignified career with diligent research and recorded it with clearness and elegance-the theme, as well it might, evidently tempting him to unusual care, and inspiring a more than common warmth as well as grace of expression. In one paragraph Lord Campbell seems to invite a commentarybut we beg to be excused.

'From the beginning he afforded the example of a consummate judge. He was not only courteous in his manner, but quiet, patient, and attentive-waiting to be instructed as to the facts and law of the case by the counsel who had been studying them-never interrupting to show quickness of perception, or to anticipate authorities likely to be cited, or to blurt out a jest-yet venturing to put a question for the right understanding of the points to be decided, and gently checking wandering and prolixity by a look or a hint. He listened with undivided attention to the evidence, and did not prepare a speech in parliament or write letters to his correspondents under pretence of taking notes of the arguments addressed to him. Nor did he affect the reputation of great despatch by deciding before he had heard both parties, or by referring facts and law to the Master which it was his own duty to ascertain and determine. When the case admitted of no reasonable doubt, he disposed of it as soon as the hearing was finished. Otherwise, he carried home the papers with him-not throwing them aside to moulder in a trunk, till, driven by the importunity of counsel asking for judgment, he again looked at them, long after the arguments he had heard were entirely forgotten and he could scarcely make out from his "breviate book " the points that had been raised for his decision,-but within a short time spontaneously giving judgment in a manner to show that he was complete master of the case, and never aggravating the anguish of the losing party by the belief that if the Judge had taken more pains the result would have been different.'

The great Chancellor is thus summed up:

'Considering the times in which Lord Ellesmere lived, and comparing him with his contemporaries who reached high office, we are bound greatly to respect his memory. Neither he nor any other mortal man could deserve the panegyric upon him by a contemporary historian who knew him well, "Nihil in vitâ nisi laudandum aut fecit, aut dixit, aut sensit;" but in thought, word, and deed, his errors were venial. We may pardon his enmity to Sir Edward Coke, who had tried to cover him with disgrace when he was supposed to be upon his death-bed. With all his other rivals and political opponents he seems to have lived on terms of courtesy if not of kindness. He never betrayed a friend.

'As a politician he always stood up for the extension of the prerogative, and his doctrines were often inconsistent with our notions of a free constitution; but we must remember that precedents might then be cited for almost every exercise of arbitrary power; and the great patriot Sir Edward Coke, with other eminent men as late as the Revolution of

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1688, laid it down for law, that an Act of Parliament to abolish the dispensing power would be inoperative, as the King could first dispense with the abolishing act, and then with the penalty to be dispensed with. While Lord Ellesmere was Chancellor the few state prosecutions which were instituted took a milder and more regular form; and if the Somersets were improperly pardoned, he was not accessory, like many of his predecessors, to the unjust shedding of noble blood.

'His great natural abilities had been assiduously cultivated, and he was one of the best public speakers who had yet appeared in England. His apprehension was keen and ready, his judgment deep and sound, and his elocution elegant and easy. "He was a grave and great orator, and best when he was provoked."

'As an Equity Judge he gained more applause than any one who had sat before him in the marble chair. With a knowledge of law equal to Edward III.'s lay Chancellors, Parnyng and Knyvet, so highly eulogised by Lord Coke, he was much more familiar with the principles of general jurisprudence. Not less noted for despatch and purity than Sir Thomas More, he was much better acquainted with the law of real property, as well as the practice of the court in which he had long practised as an advocate; and exhibiting all the patience and suavity of Sir Nicholas Bacon, he possessed more quickness of perception and a more vigorous grasp of intellect. Many ecclesiastical holders of the Great Seal were to be admired as statesmen and scholars, but none had been competent, without assistance, satisfactorily to preside in the judg

ment-seat.

'Ellesmere, while in his vigour, had himself disposed of the whole business of the Court of Chancery. In his declining years he required assistance; but to the last, every case of magnitude he heard and decided in person. During the whole of his time, there seems to have been an entire cessation of all impeachment of the Court of Chancery either for delay or corruption; and the only complaint against him that he exceeded his jurisdiction, was decided in his favour.

'He was very solicitous for the honour of the bar, which then seems to have had members much given to lying, quarrelling, making fraudulent bargains with their clients, and, when it suited their purpose, to insulting the Judge. During the hearing of the case of Ranolph Crew, 9 Jac. I., according to an accurate reporter, "Le Seignior Chancellor dit, Benedictus Dominus Deus justitiæ! et il exhort les Lawyers destre veriloqui, pacidici, et nemy de pticipater en le benefit dascun suit; ut gratiose se gerant et Judici in judicio ne prejudicent."

The practice of the King interfering with suits by writs of Privy Seal, under pretence that one of the suitors was in the royal service, still continued; but there is no reason to suppose that Ellesmere was influenced by these beyond granting delay,-and all members of parliament were considered entitled to the like privilege.

When any cause was depending before him in which a Peer was concerned, he gave him notice, by a missive under his hand, of the time appointed for hearing it; but he never was suspected of unduly leaning in favour of the aristocratic party-any more than of seeking

vulgar praise by becoming counsel for the poor; and he had the rare good fortune to be, at the same time, the favourite of the Court and of the people.

Ellesmere is particularly to be commended for the exercise of his patronage. Unlike Cecil the father, and Cecil the son, to whom it is imputed by Bacon, their kinsman, that out of jealousy they wished to depress all rising men of merit, he was eager to befriend and bring forward all who were likely to be able to serve their country with credit and advantage. He strongly supported Bacon's claim to the offices of Solicitor and Attorney General; and recommended him as his successor. As another example, I may mention that having heard Williams, afterwards Bishop of Lincoln and Lord Keeper, when a tutor at Cambridge, preach a sermon which displayed great talent, although a stranger to him, he made him his chaplain, and advanced him in the King's service, so that he afterwards attained the highest honours in the church and state.

In making Judges (a most important part of the duty of a Lord Chancellor, for by a bad judicial appointment no one can calculate the aggregate amount of evil inflicted on the community) Ellesmere deserves particular credit. His anxiety on this subject appears from a letter he wrote on the accession of King James, recommending a new call of Serjeants, "consideringe that moost of the Judges are aged, and the Serjeantes at Lawe now servinge at the barre not so sufficyent to supplye judiciall places as were to be wyshed (ne quid dicam durius);"of that venerable Court very different from what we have constantly seen in our time, when if, by a new gunpowder plot exploding at the Chancellor's levee the first day of term, all the Judges should suddenly be swept off,-the benches of the different Courts in Westminster Hall might well be replenished from the order of the coif.

—a state

His great church patronage, likewise, he dispensed with a single view to the public weal. "Livings," said he, "rather want learned men than learned men livings, many in the Universities pining for want of places. I wish, therefore, some may have single coats before others have doublets; and this method I have observed in bestowing the King's benefices."

'He was a remarkably handsome and athletic man, and in his youth was much addicted to the sports of the field. He retained his personal beauty in his old age, insomuch that many went to the Court of Chancery to gaze at him ; "and happy were they," says the facetious Fuller,

"who had no other business there!"

'Although he always lived in a style suitable to his station, he left entirely of his own conquest landed estates to the value of 80007. a year -equal to the wealth of the high hereditary nobility of that time.

The Grandeur of the Law" shows that many distinguished noble houses owe their origin to Westminster Hall; but I do not recollect any instance of the family of a lawyer who had raised himself from obscurity being so soon associated with the old aristocracy, or rising so

*Lord Ellesmere was a natural son of a gentleman of very ancient family and large estates in Cheshire. The present male representative of that old house of Egerton is Sir Philip de Malpas Grey Egerton, Bart.

rapidly

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