[479] 



LEAVES THEY HAVE TOUCHED; 



BEING A REVIEW OF SOME HISTORICAL AUTOGRAPHS. 



Br HENRT SCADDING, D.D. 



(Continued from page 3U7.) 

 XL— BRITISH AND EUROPEAN GENERALLY.— ConimwecZ. 



Curiously, it was on the poiat of truthfulness that "Wellington 

 dwelt when he pronounced his eidogy on Peel in the House of Lords, 

 just after the fatal accident. "Your Lordships must all feel," he 

 said, "the high and honourable character of the late Sir Kobert Peel. 

 I was long connected with him in public life. "We were both in the 

 Councils of our Sovereign together, and I had long the honour to 

 enjoy his private friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance 

 with him I never knew a man in whose truth and justice I had 

 greater confidence, or in whom I saw a more invariable desire to 

 promote the public service. In the whole course of my communica- 

 tion with him I never knew an instance in which he did not show 

 the strongest attachment to truth ; and I never saw in the whole 

 course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated 

 anjrfching which he did not fii'mly believe to be the fact." Of course, 

 Peel's hand, too, as well as "Wellington's, has rested on the little 

 sheet whose contents I transcribed above. 



I add next a note, copied from the original of Lord Broughanot's, 

 written when yet Mr. Brougham. It will explain itself : " Hill 

 Street, Tuesday. Mr. Brougham presents his best compliments to 

 Sir "W. Congreve, and returns him many thanks for the very inter- 

 esting tract which he has just received, and from which he expects to 

 derive much iustniction. He will lose no time in perusing it, as well 

 as the other upon a different matter. He hopes Sir "W. C.'s health 

 is improving." This Sir "W. Congreve was the inventor of the 

 " Congi-eve rocket," and author of many scientific treatises, one of 

 them, "A Short Account of a New Principle of a Rotative Steam 



