victim was not of the passive kind: they were soon obliged to conclude a treaty of peace and close alliance with this rebel, at the gates of Madras.

Both before and since that treaty, every principle of policy pointed out this power as a natural alliance; and, on his part, it was courted by every sort of amicable office. But the cabinet council of English creditors would not suffer their nabob of Arcot to sign the treaty, nor even to give to a prince, at least his equal, the ordinary titles of respect and courtesy. From that time forward, a continued plot was carried on within the divan, black and white, of the nabob of Arcot, for the destruction of this Hyder Ali. As to the outward members of the double, or rather treble government of Madras, which had signed the treaty, they were always prevented by some overruling influence (which they do not describe, but which cannot be misunderstood) from performing what justice and interest combined so evidently to enforce.

When, at length, Hyder Ali found that he had to do with men who either would sign no convention, or whom no treaty and no signature could bind, and who were the determined enemies of human intercourse itself, he decreed to make the country, possessed by these incorrigible and predestinated criminals, a memorable example to mankind. He resolved, in the gloomy recesses of a mind capacious of such things, to leave the whole Carnatic an everlasting monument of vengeance, and to put perpetual desolation, as a barrier, between him and those against whom the faith which holds the moral elements of the world together was no protection.

He became at length so confident of his force, and so collected in his might, that he made no secret whatever of his dreadful resolution. Having terminated his disputes with every enemy and every rival, who buried their mutual animosities in their common interest against the creditors of the nabob of Arcot, he drew from every quarter what

ever a savage ferocity could add to his new rudiments in the art of destruction; and, compounding all the materials of fury, havoc, and desolation, into one black cloud, he hung for a while on the declivities of the mountains. Whilst the authors of all these evils were idly and stupidly gazing on this menacing meteor, which blackened all the horizon, it suddenly burst, and poured down the whole of its contents upon the plains of the Carnatic.

Then ensued a scene of woe, the like of which no eye had seen, nor heart conceived, and which no tongue can adequately tell. All the horrors of war, before known or heard of, were mercy to that new havoc. A storm of universal fire blasted every field, consumed every house, destroyed every temple. The miserable inhabitants, flying from their flaming villages, in part were slaughtered; others, without regard to sex, to age, to the respect of rank, or sacredness of function, fathers torn from their children, husbands from wives,-enveloped in a whirlwind of cavalry, and amidst the goading spears of drivers, and the trampling of pursuing horses, were swept into captivity, in an unknown and hostile land. Those who were able to evade this tempest, fled to the walled cities; but, escaping from fire, sword, and exile, they fell into the jaws of famine.

For eighteen months, without intermission, this destruction raged from the gates of Madras to the gates of Tanjore; and so completely did these masters in their art, Hyder Ali and his more ferocious son, absolve themselves of their impious vow, that, when the British armies traversed, as they did, the Carnatic for hundreds of miles in all directions, through the whole line of their march they did not see one man, not one woman, not one child, not one four-footed beast of any description whatever! One dead, uniform silence reigned over the whole region.

LESSON CXLI.

Canning and Brougham.

ANONYMOUS.

THOUGH they resembled each other in standing foremost and alone in their respective parties, they were in every other respect opposed as the zenith and nadir, or as light and darkness.

This difference extended even to their personal appearance. Canning was airy, open, and prepossessing; Brougham seemed stern, hard, lowering, and almost repulsive. The head of Canning had an air of extreme elegance: that of Brougham was much the reverse; but still, in whatever way it was viewed, it gave a sure indication of the terrible power of the inhàbitant within. Canning's features were handsome; his eye, though deeply ensconced under his eyebrows, was full of sparkle and gayety. The features of Brougham were harsh in the extreme: while his forehead shot up to a great elevation, his chin was long and square; his mouth, nose, and eyes, seemed huddled together in the centre of his face- the eyes absolutely lost amid folds and corrugations; and while he sat listening, they seemed to retire inward, or to be veiled by a filmy curtain, which not only concealed the appalling glare which shot away from them when he was roused, but rendered his mind and his purpose a sealed book to the keenest scrutiny of man.

Canning's passions appeared upon the open campaign of his face, drawn up in a ready array, and moved to and fro at every turn of his oration, and every retort in that of his antagonist: those of Brougham remained within, as in a citadel which no artillery could batter and no mine blow up; and even when he was putting forth all the power of his eloquence, when every ear was tingling at what he said, and while the immediate object of his invective was writhing in helpless and indescribable agony, his visage retained its

cold and brassy hue, and he triumphed over the passions of other men by seeming to be wholly without passion himself. The whole form of Canning was rounded, and smooth, and graceful; that of Brougham angular, long, and awkward. When Canning rose to speak, he elevated his countenance, and seemed to look round for the applause of those about him, as an object dear to his feelings; while Brougham stood coiled and concentrated, reckless of all but the power that was within himself. From Canning there was expected the glitter of wit and the flow of spirit, — something showy and elegant. Brougham stood up as a being whose powers and intentions were all a mystery · whose aim and effect no living man could divine. You bent forward to catch the first sentence of the one, and felt human nature elevated in the specimen before you; you crouched and shrank back from the other, and dreams of ruin and annihilation darted across your mind. The one seemed to dwell among men, to join in their joys, and to live upon their praise; the other appeared a son of the desert, who had deigned to visit the human race merely to make them tremble at his strength.

The style, and the eloquence and structure of their orations, were equally different. Canning chose his words for the sweetness of their sound, and arranged his periods for the melody of their cadence; while, with Brougham, the more hard and unmouthable, the better. Canning arranged his words like one who could play skilfully upon that sweetest of all instruments, the human voice; Brougham proceeded like a master of every power of reasoning and of the understanding. The modes and allusions of the one were always quadrated by the classical formula: those of the other could be squared only by the higher analysis of the mind; and they rose, and ran, and pealed, and swelled, on and on, till a single sentence was often a complete oration within itself; but still, so clear was the logic, and so close the connection, that every member carried the weight of all

that went before, and opened the way for all that was to follow after.

The style of Canning was like the convex mirror, which scatters every ray of light that falls upon it, and shines and sparkles in whatever position it is viewed; that of Brougham was like the concave speculum, scattering no indiscriminate radiance, but having its light concentrated into one intense and tremendous focus. Canning marched forward in a straight and clear track; every paragraph was perfect in itself, and every coruscation of wit and genius. was brilliant and delightful; it was all felt, and it was all at once. Brougham twined round and round in a spiral, sweeping the contents of a vast circumference before him, uniting and pouring them onward to the main point of attack. When he began, one was astonished at the wideness and obliquity of his course; nor was it possible to comprehend how he was to dispose of the vast and varied materials which he collected by the way; but as the curve lessened, and the end appeared, it became obvious that all was to be efficient there.

Such were the rival orators, who sat glancing hostility and defiance at each other during the early part of the session of 1823-Brougham as if wishing to overthrow the secretary by a sweeping accusation of having abandoned all principle for the sake of office; and the secretary ready to parry the charge, and attack in his turn. An opportunity at length offered; and it is more worthy of being recorded, as being the last terrible and personal attack previous to that change in the measures of the cabinet, which, though it had been begun from the moment that Canning, Robinson, and Huskisson came into office, was not at that time perceived, or at least not admitted and appreciated. Upon that occasion, the oration of Brougham was at the outset disjointed and ragged, and apparently without aim or application. He careered over the whole annals of the world, and collected every instance in which genius had degraded itself at the