any difficulty or any responsibility, if he can but serve, or have a reasonable expectation of serving, the good cause; he must shut his ears to the babble of human tongues, and give up his life to one object,—the lawful attainment of those reforms which, in his opinion, are needful for his country. In a word, he must forget himself, nor hesitate for a moment to run any risk which simply involves his own comfort, his own profit, even his own "fame, name, and reputation," in this world.

This is the path and this the honour to which any one worthy of the name of a Reformer must aspire, but more especially the Law Reformer; and this is the path which all eminent Law Reformers have run, or have attempted to run; but to such an honour, assuredly, Lord Langdale can have no proper claim, and such a path, repeatedly presented to him, he as often avoided. On most occasions, as we shall show, he shrunk from action; he failed not only in seizing the helm when it was offered to him; but when it was forced upon him, he failed to guide the ship with zeal or firmness. He repeatedly set aside the great opportunities in his power of effecting great reforms, and he did not even use the lawful powers placed in his hands; not only did he not go out of his way to gain greater strength, but he would not employ his ordinary ability; he refused the larger means offered him of accomplishing the objects to which he professed to devote his life, and often tied his own hands into the bargain. Not once, but four or five times in his life, might he have greatly served the cause of Law Reform by undertaking lawful and reasonable responsibilities; as many times did he neglect and refuse to serve it, justifying this conduct, now by some fancied slight, now by supposed ill health; this time having too little power given him to fulfil his wishes, another time having too great responsibility and too little inclination. Selfishness we are bound to consider the predominant feature of Lord Langdale's character. He saw clearly that great reforms were necessary; he saw further what the alterations should be, and how they might be effected; he felt he had the power to accomplish them; all this repeatedly he saw and knew, but as the time drew nigh

for action he grew quite sick and faint. To talk of all that should be done,—to hint that he could do it, — to show that he had suggested it, -to lecture others on their duty, — all this he could do, but the thing itself he could not or he would not. How eloquently would he discourse over his tea and toast of all that should be done; how vigorous he was in South Street at breakfast; how valorous after dinner at Roehampton'; but in the House of Commons he never ventured to take a seat, although repeatedly pressed, and offered one without trouble or expense; and in the House of Lords, when he took his seat, how languid, how inactive, how ineffective!

We are most unwilling to speak thus strongly, although we give only a faint view of the true state of the case; but when Mr. Hardy makes this feeble attempt to decry all other law reformers, living and dead, (for he does not even mention the name of ROMILLY, father or son,) and to exalt Lord Langdale as the light and landmark of Law Reform, we are bound to show the true value of his services, and it becomes our duty to say that if he had not lived at all this cause would have been practically just where it is. Thus much has Mr. Hardy, by his injudicious volume, forced from us. We shall now compress the facts which they contain and endeavour to justify, as well our praise as our censure, by giving a sketch of the life of this truly amiable and very estimable man.

Henry Bickersteth was born at Kirkby Lonsdale on the 18th of June, 1783, and was the third son of Mr. Henry Bickersteth of that place, surgeon, by Elizabeth, daughter of Mr. John Barry, of Kirkby Lonsdale. Another son, Edward, was the late eminent clergyman of this name.

1 This warmth did not arise from any artificial source. Indeed Falstaff's advice might have been useful to the late Master of the Rolls::— 66 The second property of your excellent sherries is the warming of the blood, which before cold and settled left the liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherries warms it, and makes it course from the inwards to the parts extreme."— Hen. IV. act 4. sc. iii. We think, indeed, that it was a public misfortune that Lord Langdale took so much to thin potations. For many years before his marriage his chief delight, we apprehend, was taking tea with old ladies.

Young Henry had the inestimable advantage of a good mother', who implanted in his mind that regard for truth and integrity which was conspicuous in his life. This lesson was taught in small as in great things, as we shall see.

"As Henry and his brother John, when mere children, were returning one evening from a visit to their grandmother, they found in the road a large log of wood, which they dragged home with considerable difficulty, thinking it would make an excellent plaything.

"Where did you get it?' asked their mother, as they triumphantly showed their prize.

"We found it in the road,' was the reply. 'Then it is not yours,' she said; so you must take it back again, and replace it where you found it.""

"This lesson was never forgotten: Lord Langdale often related it in after years, and it probably passed through his mind when he adopted the significant and appropriate motto of 'suum cuique."" (Vol. i. p. 5.)

He was not only a truthful boy and man, but all his actions and letters show him to have been a tender and affectionate son and brother.

He was educated at the free grammar school of his native place under the tuition of the Rev. John Dobson. He was what is commonly called a popular boy.

“Though he was always (?)" says Mr. Hardy, "diligent in his studies and exact in his duties, yet he generally found time to enter into all the games and sports of his schoolmates: one of his favourite summer amusements was bathing in the picturesque river Lune, and he became so expert and daring a swimmer, that more than one boy was indebted to him for his life. In after days he used to talk of his school days, when football was a favourite game, and often gave occasion to broken shins. At the end of the field where they played football, was a railing, and on the other side of the railing was a precipitous descent to the river, and he

1 An old Scotch woman gave the following advice to her son as to his choice of a partner in life: -" Jock, your gaun into toon, an ye'll be looking oot for a joe; noo, my lad, ye may bring me the lass you like, but tak care of ae thing. Let her mither be an honest woman, and I don't care though her faither is the deil himsel !"

said, to see the boys jump over the railing and roll down the descent after the ball was astonishing." (Vol. i. p. 9.)

He left school in the year 1797, and was apprenticed to his father, who had decided that he should be brought up to the medical profession, or, as he terms it, "enter the shop." After remaining at home a little more than a twelvemonth, his father sent him to London to finish his medical studies. He was accustomed to say to his sons, "Remember, boys, I shall not be able to leave you much worldly wealth, but I can give you a good education." If young Henry had a conscientious and sagacious mother, he also had, it must be admitted, a kind and indulgent father.

It now became desirable that Henry should determine for himself which branch of the medical profession he intended to pursue, and he was urged to do this by his father. This he professed himself unable to do, but resigned himself to his father's and mother's wishes. It is pretty obvious that he never had any relish for the medical profession. He was willing, however, to do his best to acquire a knowledge of it. On December 29th, 1800, writing to his father, he says, that the

"Satisfaction felt on the recovery of a patient is by no means equal to the anxiety, nay even misery which a feeling mind may have previously experienced during his sickness; but this disproportion between pleasure and inconvenience appears nothing when we have added to the latter, the inconvenient hours at which a medical man is liable to be called,-the danger of catching infectious diseases (although it be small),-inadequate payment, the difficulty of rising to any eminence in the profession, the almost perpetual quarrels and jealousy of the professors, who frequently possess pedantry and self-sufficiency in proportion to their ignorance and want of experience."

The practice of the profession was evidently distasteful, the theory endurable :

"For what reason," he says,

can be given why a man should not be an excellent physiologist without being either a physician or a surgeon?”

Not content with this, he thus cautions his younger brother, who was also about to enter the profession :

"Before Robert enters on the profession ask him if he could endure to have it said that he killed his patient after he had been taking every proper pains, and using every endeavour to save him, or to receive the praises of having saved his life when he was conscious of having used measures directly opposite to those which would have been right. Ask him if he can bear the idea of being chained down to his business every moment of his life, not an instant of time belonging to himself—not an hour in which several lives are not in absolute dependence on the clearness of his intellect, and the acuteness of his penetration."

These doubts are freely communicated, and they show the kind and easy footing on which he stood with his father; but he still worked on, looking forward to the time when, in spite of all these difficulties, he might "receive pleasure in the actual dispensation of health."

It was at this period of his life that some doubt seems to have existed in his mother's mind as to his religious opinions, which according to Mr. Hardy, were the subject of "much misconstruction all his life long," (p. 25.) In the letter to his mother, in answer to her anxious inquiry, he admits that he" has not very frequently the advantage of being able to go to church," (why he does not say), but he adds:

"I see how beneficent and good the Creator has been to mankind, and I cannot but learn from this, as far as my nature will enable me, to be beneficent and good to my fellow creatures. I cannot, it is true, on all occasions profit by direct rules for my conduct, but I thank God and my parents that I have engrafted on my heart the golden rule of the Redeemer of the world; so long as this is uppermost in my thoughts (which I trust will be always) I can commit no moral wrong, nor at all deviate from the strict rule of right." (P. 27.)

After this we think no one need doubt Lord Langdale's orthodoxy. We certainly could have wished, however, that he had shown his displeasure at the letter sent to him by Sir F. Burdett (printed vol. i. p. 329.), and which Mr. Hardy, with his accustomed want of taste, prints without a word of