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Rh for the removal of Jewish disabilities, and once again on some other occasion; but he spoke no more; "doing more," as Mr. Trevelyan observes, "for future success in Parliament by silence, than he could have effected by half a dozen brilliant perorations." The time was at hand which was to give far greater occasions for his eloquence; and we do not know that any circumstance in Macaulay's career was more fortunate, than the accident which placed him in Parliament on the eve of the Reform agitation, but before it had begun. The Reform Bill was brought into the House by Lord John Russell on March 1, 1831. On the following day Macaulay delivered the first of his great speeches. It placed him at once in the first rank of Parliamentary orators. The excitement of the House knew no bounds. Men compared him to Fox, Burke, Canning, and Plunket—to the greatest masters of language and the noblest champions of liberty. And in the heat and fury of that great conflict, which was destined to regenerate by reform the constitution and the monarchy of England, none bore a more vigorous part than the young member from Calne. But we have here to speak less of his political achievements than of their personal results to himself.

We can assure Mr. Trevelyan, though he expresses an opposite opinion, that there was a vast deal more of the "exclusiveness of fashion" in 1831 than there is in 1876, for the sway of Lady Jersey, Lady Cowper, and Princess Lieven was an absolute despotism compared with the anarchy of the post-Reform period. Macaulay never aspired to be a man of fashion; he had too much pride and not enough vanity to be gratified by the flattery of people whom he despised. But it is curious to learn how far apart he had lived, even till he had passed his thirtieth year, from what is called the best society of London. Hence it was that whilst he remained singularly free from the levity and indifference of a man of the world, he never acquired the ease of manner, the lightness of touch, or the graces which accompany high breeding.

Macaulay had been well received in the character of an Edinburgh Reviewer, and his first great speech in the House of Commons at once opened to him all the doors in London that were best worth entering. Brought up, as he had been, in a household which was perhaps the strictest and the homeliest among a set of families whose creed it was to live outside the world, it put his strength of mind to the test when he found himself courted and observed by the most distinguished and the most formidable personages of the day. Lady Holland listened to him with unwonted deference, and scolded him with a circumspection that was in itself a compliment. Rogers spoke of him with friendliness and to him with positive affection, and gave him the last proof of his esteem and admiration by asking him to name the morning for a breakfast-party. He was treated with almost fatherly kindness by the able and worthy man who is still remembered by the name of Conversation Sharp. Indeed, his deference for the feelings of all whom he liked and respected, which an experienced observer could detect beneath the eagerness of his manner and the volubility of his talk, made him a favourite among those of a generation above his own. He bore his honours quietly, and enjoyed them with the natural and hearty pleasure of a man who has a taste for society, but whose ambitions lie elsewhere. For the space of three seasons he dined out almost nightly, and spent many of his Sundays in those suburban residences which, as regards the company and the way of living, are little else than sections of London removed into a purer air.

The descriptions of his new social relations, written for the amusement of his sisters, are entertaining enough, and will be read with the interest which always clings to such reminiscences. But, inasmuch as the writer could paint every portrait but his own, even the conversation of Holland House loses much of its brilliancy when Macaulay's voice takes no part in it. Yet we must borrow one or two sketches.

My dear Sister,—Since I wrote to you I have been out to dine and sleep at Holland House. We had a very agreeable and splendid party; among others the Duke and Duchess of Richmond, and the Marchioness of Clanricarde, who, you know, is the daughter of Canning. She is very beautiful, and very like her father, with eyes full of fire, and great expression in all her features. She and I had a great deal of talk. She showed much cleverness and information, but, I thought, a little more of political animosity than is quite becoming in a pretty woman. However, she has been placed in peculiar circumstances. The daughter of a statesman who was a martyr to the rage of faction may be pardoned for speaking sharply of the enemies of her parent: and she did speak sharply. With knitted brows, and flashing eyes, and a look of feminine vengeance about her beautiful mouth, she gave me such a character of Peel as he would certainly have had no pleasure in hearing.

In the evening Lord John Russell came; and, soon after, old Talleyrand. I had seen Talleyrand in very large parties, but had never been near enough to hear a word that he said.