1830.] on Affairs in General. 703 



their own grasping or invidious propensities ? Would not those five 

 hundred pounds have been like a change from death to life to almost as 

 many hundred human beings ? Are there not the hungry to be fed, and the 

 houseless to be sheltered, and the struggling to be helped, and the wounds 

 of the broken heart to be healed ? But what good can be done to man 

 by throwing away this sum for miserable shreds and patches of mon- 

 grel and obsolete volumes ? We know that personal indulgence may 

 claim the first share of our opulence, and that a man of wealth is not re- 

 quired to think in the first instance of the suffering multitudes round him. 

 But still, needless expenditure is a crime, the waste of money on a jea- 

 lous and capricious propensity is a crime, the purchase of useless books 

 for the mere purpose of exclusive possession is a crime, ay, and as great a 

 one as if we flung the money of the poor and orphan into the sea. 



A few nights ago a polished-looking person presented himself as a visiter 

 to Lady Strong (the whipper-in's wife). From his appearance the ser- 

 vant took him for one of those gentlemen who are in the habit of dis- 

 cussing arrangements of all kinds, public and private, with the whipper- 

 in. The name assumed, too, was fond and familiar to the lackey's ear ; 

 it was Grant, a " parliamentary grant" of course ; and as nothing under 

 that engaging title could be capable of a repulse, the gentleman was 

 ushered in. He called for a pen and ink, to send up what the footman 

 may have conjectured to be his opinion on the present state of majorities ; 

 and on his being left alone, vanished with a saltspoon ; thus depriving 

 the excellent whipper-in of his whole service of plate. We hope that so 

 meritorious a public servant will not be left to sink under a loss, which 

 may be said to have been incurred on public grounds ! 



Colonel Berkeley, a gentleman so perfectly well known that we are 

 hopeless of adding to his fame, is now struggling for a peerage. His 

 success will add to the ornaments of the house, already ornamented as it 

 is ; and we only hope that Lord Ellenborough will not be jealous of a 

 man so calculated to rival his distinctions. 



The Lords have had some sittings as a Committee of Privileges on the 

 subject of the Berkeley peerage. The peculiarity of this case is, that the 

 claim is vested in the foundation of a tenure of land ; Colonel Berkeley 

 relying, in support of his claim, solely on his having the freehold in his 

 possession, and the castle and barony of Berkeley, the possessors of which 

 had, in very early times, been, in virtue of their tenure, called by summons 

 to attend the King in his Council and Parliament. 



Titles of this kind are not uncommon in France, and are every-day- 

 work in Italy. There the man who cleans boots or curls wigs to-day 

 may to-morrow figure before mankind as the Baron of Thundertentronk, 

 or my Lord Duke of Dunderhead. A marriage to some old wfdow or 

 enamoured maiden of seventy, or the disposal of the wages of a lucky 

 speculation in human hair, may erect the most miserable devil on earth 

 into My Lord ! But here such things have not been hitherto ; and we 

 confess that our admiration for the personal character of the gallant and 

 galant colonel is not exactly of that height which makes us anxious to 

 see the change commence in his person, 



Lord Eldon is clearly against the .claim ; and the objections which 

 have started up in the sagacious mind of that first of lawyers are too 

 striking to be easily set aside. They are a very curious *spccimen of 



