Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/120

 Stuart, possessed of power to perpetrate with impunity crimes such as the murder of Alexander Ruthven and his brother the Earl of Gowrie, of whom it has been said:—

"Unhappy boys! to perish by such a fate, and to leave behind them, though perishing so young, a blackened memory!

The English and Scottish nobility were in as bad a condition as the Roman nobility during the latter years of Tiberius, when that monster had retired to hide himself and his crimes amid the rocks of Caprese; and sent forth his emissaries to select his victims from the noblest houses of Rome, with power to employ force if necessary to effect their purpose.