on the black, black sea of printer's ink. With a fortune to sustain, or a profession to stand by, it may still be bad enough; but without one or the other it is as foolish as alchemy, as desperate as suicide. Having, however, brought prominent persons into my canvas, I must leave off descanting on incidental topics, and endeavour to entertain and interest readers with some traits and descriptions belonging to the earlier years of my pre-eminent London associates. The impressions of slight affairs are vivid still, and one matter is of sufficient importance to require a marked place in any autobiography of mine. Let me preface the next anecdotical chapter by observing that we lived much together, partook of the same amusements, joined in the same inquiries for our evening exhibitions, and indulged generally in the same moderate symposia after the conflict was over, and a keen encounter of our wits, satirical remark, humorous quizzing, and jocular caricature succeeded to the really grave and instructive exercises of the well-spent hours. It was upon one of these occasions that the event alluded to occurred, with the curious particulars of which I am about to make my readers acquainted. The discussion run upon the subject of secret cyphers, which hardly ever having heard of before, I asserted must be very easily invented, and maintained that I could myself frame a system which nobody on earth could decypher and read. This piece of provincial impertinence was punished by the not unusual test of a wager, in this instance with T. Wilde, a dinner to the little party, that I could accomplish no such feat. I fancied it so easy and was so sure of winning, by some nonsensical transposition of the alphabet, that I was thunderstruck when the "Cyclopædia" was handed from the library shelf, and I was invited to peruse the many schemes which had been devised for this purpose, and the means by which the most complicated and mysterious of them had been unravelled, and made as patent as a round text hand. I felt the ninnyship of my ignorance and presumption, and when I retired to rest was on no very pleasant terms with myself, for I had looked very like what I had no chance of inventing-a Cypher. The old axiom, however, proclaims it to be a wise thing to consult your pillow on weighty occasions, and whether it proceeded from my pillow or myself, between sleeping and waking, I cannot tell; but I arose in the morning with a secret cypher concocted in my brain, which I knew it to be impossible for any human being to make out. It was a simple thought; but there could be no mistake about it. Mr. Jackson called in to congratulate me, ironically, on my good luck in making so enviable a bet, and ask when and where we were to dine. To him I communicated my Secret, and at once found a proselyte and ally. He pointed out the vast importance of the matter, and spoke of the absurdity of wasting it upon a frivolous difference of opinion. It ought to be laid before the Government, and I cannot tell how immense a reward I was to reap for my wonderful discovery! No castle in the air was ever more stupendous and gorgeous than mine. Well, the first thing to do was to consult with my astute opponent, Wilde, and he also gave in his adherence instanter. Thus was the affair set in a proper light and put into a likely train; and I do not think a plum would have purchased my expectations from me. Yet did they dissolve in thin air as visionary as the dream from which they were hatched, and "Like the baseless fabric of a vision Left not a wrack behind." CHAPTER VI. THE CYPHER CONTINUED. Ex nihilo, nihil fit. Whole rows of cyphers just for nothing stand, WILDE and I were now all agog for an audience of the Prime Minister, to put him in possession of the good fortune which had befallen his government, and ourselves in the way of wealth and promotion. My county member, Sir George Douglas, gave letters of introduction, and we had the honour of an interview with Mr. Sarjeant, the private secretary of Lord Sidmouth. To him we candidly explained the mode according to which we held the decyphering of secret despatches to be impossible, and were dismissed from a polite reception with an appointment for another day, when the question should be more fully treated. about a week we attended and again saw the secretary, who, at first, did not seem to recollect anything about us or our momentous affair; but on having his obliviousness refreshed, did" remember the secret cypher of which he had a copy in his drawer," waving his hand towards that receptacle of our treasure, or its counterfeit resemblance. Other correspondence and conferences took place, when, from severe illness, my time came to depart for Scotland, In and I left my partner in negotiation with the minister; the result of which I never heard! It may appear strange that, after my removal, I did not pay greater attention to this so lately absorbing speculation; but fever had so far erased it from my brain, and engaging in a novel course, and not hearing anything of it, my volatile genius concluded that it had failed, and for years a thought of it hardly ever. crossed my mind, even as a passing shadow or reminiscence. It was, however, singularly restored by an accidental circumstance which happened in 1813, or 1814, when I was editor of the "Sun " newspaper, and in constant and familiar communication with the Treasury and Secretary of State's departments. One day I went into Mr. Under Secretary Rolleston's room in the Foreign Office, Downing Street; and finding that he had gone out for a few minutes, casually seated myself by the table at which he had been writing. My eye was immediately caught by the hieroglyphics and figures with which I saw his paper overspread, and I went near to examine the scroll. Mr. Rolleston soon returned, and observing me thus employed, told me, with a laugh, that I was welcome to detect the secrets of that despatch, and make what use of them I liked. I confessed that although I certainly could not read it, because I had not the key, yet I was perfectly acquainted with the mode of its construction, and was indeed the inventor of the design. This surprised him much, and he acknowledged that the principle and method I described were truly the elements of his composition, and in use wherever secrecy was required in the Foreign Office. I have thus reason to believe that my cypher has been, and is still, the lock up of diplomatic correspondence, which none except the party addressed can understand, and is a sealed book to all the world beside. But the striking curiosity of the business is, that the first personal acquaintance of the future Lord Chancellor of England with any official personage connected with the government should have arisen out of a sportive juvenile bet, and the suggestion of the writer of this biography. How far it was, if ever farther cultivated, I have no means of knowing, but it was an introduction to a superior class, and might have been turned to advantage by a young and able man entering upon the busy scene of professional life. I have noticed that he had much greater difficulties to contend against than his schoolfellow, F. Pollock; because, in the first place, his father did not move in so respectable a circle; in the second place he had not the advantage of a University education; in the third place he began with a lower branch of legal practice; and in the last place he was affected by an impediment in his speech. Wilde, senior, was an attorney in a limited sphere, with a still inferior partner, and resided in one of the small houses in Warwick Square, Newgate Market, and had a rural retreat in one still smaller at Holloway, at the foot of Highgate Hill. There was one window in the parlour and two on the first courtesy we will call the drawing-room. Yet thither have. the Lord Chancellor Truro, the Lord Chief Baron and I been well pleased to repair for recreation on a summer Sunday, and regale ourselves on the be-knighted joint of prime roast beef, which was a Sir long, long before any of those who ate of it could dream that similar and greater honours awaited their onward triumph in the grand competition of English society. From among the people to the judge's ermine and the coronet of the peer is a glorious stride. Who could have imagined it possible at the humble little cottage at Holloway! But talent, persistence, and energy are engines to accomplish any and every thing in this land of equal freedom, in which the course is clear and floor, which by |