shall not be kept in deliberation longer than twelve hours, unless at the end of that period they unanimously concur to apply for further time, which in that case shall be granted; and that at the expiration of the twelve hours, or such prolonged time for deliberation, if any nine of them concur in giving a verdict, such verdict shall be entered on record, and shall entitle the party in whose favour it is given to judgment; and in failure of such concurrence, the cause shall be a remanet."

It is very justly observed in the Report, that it is of great importance to ensure deliberation and discussion among the ́jury, when their opinions differ, and that a verdict should not be immediately determined by show of hands or casting up of votes. This advantage is secured by the new plan; and we can hardly suppose that any one can think the period of twelve hours too short for the purpose. Our impression is, that it is considerably too long; and that after a jury have been locked up six or eight hours, it is not very likely that discussion will produce any change of opinion. Besides, it is obvious that by any unnecessary extension of time, we incur, pro tanto, some of the worst consequences of the present ystem.

The number of concurrent opinions which will still be required is nine at least; that is to say, every verdict must have a majority of at least nine to three (or three to one) in its favour. Here, again, the only question with us is, whether the Commissioners do not err through extreme caution, and whether a majority of eight to four (or two to one) should not be deemed sufficient to determine the verdict. In all civil cases, and to those alone the new plan extends, two to one is a preponderance which, we think, ought to content any man; it certainly furnishes a much higher degree of assurance than he considers himself entitled to look for in most of the business of life. With respect to criminal cases, the mischiefs resulting from the conviction of the innocent are so very serious, (notwithstanding Paley's ingenious argument upon the subject) and the difficulty of redressing the injury inflicted by an erroneous conviction is always so great, and often so completely insuperable, that we certainly think it desirable to require the concurrence of a larger majority in a verdict of

guilty, than we should deem it necessary to insist upon in a mere question of civil rights between plaintiff and defendant.

These, however, are questions upon which we cannot now enter. Each of them may naturally give rise to differences of opinion. The first step towards improvement is to point out the existing evil; the second, to adapt a remedy. It is to the former and the humbler of these tasks that we have applied ourselves in the present article. For the performance of the latter, the more arduous and the more honourable, we have a right to look to others.

B.

ART. III-LIFE OF LORD THURLOW.

(Concluded from Vol. VI. p. 395.)

IN private as well as in public, Lord Thurlow was equally above the wretched and contemptible feeling, which so often prompts men to deny or gloss over the obscurity of their origin. His parents had been of that class in life which, in the literal as well as in the more commonly received acceptation of the term, is well entitled to the designation of respectable; but they had no title to illustrious descent, and he had too much spirit or too much sense, or both, to claim any dignity from his ancestry. It is told of him that, when one of his acquaintance was endeavouring to make out how he could claim kindred with the secretary of Cromwell, whose family had been settled in the county adjoining Suffolk, he interrupted the obsequious genealogist by telling him, in a tone and manner that would have befitted his contemporary, Johnson,-"Sir, there were two Thurlows in that part of the country: Thurloe the secretary, and Thurlow the carrier. I am descended from the last." It would have been well had he entertained on all points the same sound and healthy feeling which dictated this rebuke. But it was not always thus where his personal interest was involved. Superficial observers were wont to be misled in his case, as in

many others, by the affected bluntness, or (to speak plainly) the downright bearishness of his manner, which such persons are apt to consider a certain indication of honesty and straightforwardness of purpose; as if sincerity and politeness were so wholly incompatible, that the want of the one must necessarily ensure the possession of the other. Whe ther all his coarseness were natural to him, or whether he exaggerated it for the sake of humouring this vulgar prejudice, it is very certain that he was considerably the gainer by it, in point of popularity. The poet of all ages, writing two centuries before Thurlow was born, has depicted this peculiarity of his as accurately as if he had sat for the portrait; and the application is too obvious not to have been often made." This is some fellow who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect a saucy roughness, and constrains the garb quite from its nature. He can't flatter- he; an honest mind and plain: he must speak truth; an they will take it, so if not, he's plain."

Among the many who suffered themselves to be won over by this saucy roughness, was one very worthy and excellent man,-more famous, however, for his merits as a virtuous husband and a skilful farmer, than for acuteness in the discrimination of character,—namely, George the Third. The moral monarch even went so far as to overlook in Thurlow irregularities which he could never pardon in Fox, so much was he captivated by a virtue that, like charity, could cover a multitude of sins. Other courtiers had their smiles, and their bows, but they were not the exclusive property of His Majesty; whereas in the royal presence alone was the Chancellor's usual ruggedness softened down into something like suppleness and amenity. We take no account of the caresses of a spaniel that licks the hand of all alike; but the fondness of the mastiff for his master is valued because it is lavished on him alone, and forms a striking contrast with the surly growl bestowed on all besides him.

This personal favour of the sovereign, Lord Thurlow turned to the account of his own interest, by affecting to class himself among those persons, numerous enough in his time, who were wont to style themselves the king's friends, and thought there could be no better mode of evincing their

friendship than that of stedfastly retaining their offices through all changes of measures or of ministry. "A new system," wrote Junius in those days," has not only been adopted in fact, but professed upon principle. Ministers are no longer the public servants of the state, but the private domestics of the sovereign. One particular class of men are permitted to call themselves the king's friends: as if the body of the people were the king's enemies; or as if his majesty looked for a resource or consolation in the attachment of a few favourites, against the general contempt and detestation of his subjects." The chancellor, it is true, did not go the whole length of Lord Barrington, and certain other political vicars of Bray, whose favourite doctrine was, that every thing like opposition to the king's government for the time being, was nothing less than faction, if not downright rebellion. But if it was the king's good pleasure that he should remain in office, a change of party he did not by any means consider an insuperable obstacle to the fulfilment of the royal will. This he very fully proved on the resignation of Lord North in March, 1782. The Rockingham party, who then reaped the benefit of their long and arduous opposition, might well have expected that . the seals would be at their disposal. They, however, found it otherwise. The king insisted that Lord Thurlow should be suffered to remain where he was; and shewed himself so resolutely bent upon carrying this point, however easily he might cede others, that the leaders of the party had no alternative but compliance. The man, therefore, whose political existence was identified with unflinching advocacy of the war against America (only to mention one measure of the North administration), was now seen occupying a place in a cabinet which owed its birth to the failure of that war, and was under the most solemn obligation to make the entire discontinuance of it one of its first ministerial acts.

The manner in which Lord Thurlow chose to act up to his assumed character of the king's friend, was certainly not calculated to render him a very valuable ally to the whig party. He seemed, indeed, to consider that he was placed in the cabinet rather in the capacity of a check upon their measures, than an active promoter of them; and that the part he had to play was, not a supporter of his colleagues, but

simply the guardian and the champion of royal prerogative, against all its enemies, whether in the ranks of his colleagues or elsewhere. Thus, while the two ministerial bills (the one for preventing contractors from sitting in parliament, and the other for prohibiting persons employed in the customs and excise from voting at elections) were passing through the upper house, Lord Mansfield himself, and the other avowed leaders of the opposition were not a whit more strenuous than he in their endeavours to throw them out. There were some persons foolish and ignorant enough to dignify this sort of conduct with the name of independence. But men of sense could never fall into so gross a delusion. They might very well understand the independence of one who resigns office, power and emolument rather than retain them under a set of ministers against whom his whole political career had been marked by uncompromising opposition; nay, they might even go so far as to admit that, after having once consented to enlist among them, he might still claim some pretensions to the title of independent by quitting their ranks and his own office so soon as he found them pledged to a course he could not conscientiously, or at least consistently, approve; but they very naturally laughed at the notion of bestowing the appellation on one who, with all his show of consistency in opinion, held no opinion so firmly as the very common one, that all sacrifices were to be preferred to the sacrifice of office. As to the ministers themselves, whose plans were thus thwarted by an enemy in their own camp, it may well be supposed the reluctance they had originally felt to admit him there, was not likely to be dispelled by the line of conduct he thought fit to pursue. Indeed, when the coalition was formed between Fox and Lord North, the year after the birth of the Rockingham administration, (February 1783), the members of the new alliance agreed one and all that it was wholly out of the question for them to think of retaining so treacherous an ally in their body. The king, who was guided entirely by the counsels of Lord Thurlow, insisted on the other hand that whatever changes might take place, (and he was ready to concede every other point,) the chancellor should remain at his post; and as this was an arrangement to which no inducement could pre.. vail on them to give their consent, a considerable delay took