iterary tastes into all subjects whatever."
The vigour and literary ability of the editor attracted
14 LEIGH HUNT.
notice from the beginning, and by the November of
1808 its circulation had reached 2,200, with every pro-
spect of increase. It is calculated that The Examiner at
this time secured to each of the brothers an income of
eight or ten guineas a week, and, with the additional
^100 a year received from the War Office, Leigh Hunt
felt justified in thinking of marriage. To Marianne he;
now writes: — "I can anticipate what your love might:
prompt you to say, — that we could live on little, — but 1.
have seen so much of the irritabilities or rather the:
miseries arising from want of a suitable income, and the:
best woman of her time " (his mother, of course) " was:
so worried, and finally worn out with the early negligence:
of others in this respect, that if ever I was determined in
anything, it is to be perfectly clear of the world, and
ready to meet the exigencies of a married life before I
do marry, for I will not see a wife, who loves me and is
the joy of my existence, afraid to speak to me of money
matters ; she shall never tremble to hear a knock at the
door, or to meet a quarter-day ; she will tremble, I hopCj
with nothing but love and joy in the arms of her hus-
band." Principles, however, must not be sacrificed,
even to prudence so well founded ; and in the course of
the next month we find him resigning his position at the
War Office in order to give more time to his editorial
duties, and to gain the sense of political independence
which he conceived to be essential.
He was married July 3, 1809, and from that date the
outer course of his life presents but little variation. He
was now established as a journalist and a man of letters,
BIOGRAPHY. 15
subsisting mainly on the former profession, but with
his heart in the latter. Of himself and his brother he
writes : — " We had absolutely no views whatever, but
those of a decent competence and of the public good ;
and we thought, I dare afifirm, a great deal more of the
latter than of the former. Our competence we allowed
too much to shift for itself. Zeal for the public good
was a family inheritance, and this we thought ourselves
bound to increase. As to myself, what I thought of
more than either was the making of verses. I did
nothing for the greater part of the week but write verses
and read books. I then made a rush at my editorial
duties ; took a world of superfluous pains in the writing ;
sat up late at night, and was a very trying person to
compositors and newsmen. I sometimes have before
me the ghost of a pale and gouty printer whom I speci-
ally caused to suffer, and who never complained. I
think of him and of some needy dramatist, and wish they
had been worse men."
In spite of the great number of affairs which passed
through his hands, Leigh Hunt was never business-like,
and his married life was from the beginning a comfortless
scramble. But he possessed, to a marked degree, the
family genius for ignoring the grave and enjoying the
trivial, snatching pleasures as they flew, and supporting
days of trouble by his innocent enjoyment of the
passing hour. " Those who knew him best," says
his son, " will jiicture him to themselves clothed in a
dressing-gown, and bending his head over a book or
over the desk. At some periods of his life he rose early,
1 6 LEIGH HUNT.
in order that he might get to work early; in other periods
he rose late, because he sat over the desk very late. For
the most part, however, he habitually came down ' too
late ' for breakfast, and was no sooner seated sideways at
the table than he began to read. After breakfast he
repaired to his study, where he remained until he went
out to take his walk. He sometimes read at dinner,
though not always. At some periods of his life he would
sleep after dinner, but usually he retired from the table to
read. He read at tea-time, and all the evening read or
wrote. In early life, his profession took him, as a critic,
to the theatres, and the same employment took him
there at later dates. In the earlier half of his existence
he mixed somewhat in society, and his own house
was noted, among a truly selected circle of friends, for
the tasteful ease of its conversation and recreation,
music usually forming a staple in both the talk and
diversion."
From the early chapters of the Autobiography we get
some charming glimpses of this circle. There were the
handsome Du Bois, editor of the Monthly Mirror, who
" had no faculty for gravity " ; Thomas Campbell, "with
a consciousness of authorship upon him " ; " the merry
jongleur" Theodore Hook ; Matthews the comedian,
who " looked like an irritable in-door pet " ; and the
authors of The Rejected Addresses, James and Horace
Smith. With the Lambs he was already intimate, and
at the table of Mr. Hunter, the bookseller who had
married ]Mrs. Kent, he met a somewhat less distinguished
group : the ferocious Fuseli, Bonnycastle, and Kinnaird,
BIOGRAPHY. 17
who listened to "God save the King" "as if his soul
had taken its hat off."
One fancies that his friends must sometimes have been
in doubt about finding him at home, for I have traced
him to seventeen addresses during fifty years without
being able to account for the whole period. He lived
principally, however, in the Vale of Health, Hampstead,
and in Upper Cheyne Row, a few doors from the Car-
lyles ; more temporary homes being established at High-
gate, Kensington, and Hammersmith.
The period immediately following the foundation of
the Examiner was probably the most prosperous of his
life. In four years " he firmly established for the first
time/' says Mr. Cosmo Monkhouse, in his Life of Leigh
Hunt, " a paper which fought, and fought effectively, with
prejudice and privilege, with tyranny and superstition,
which was a beacon of light to all men of Liberal principles
in the country, and set the example of that independent
thought and fearless expression of opinion which has
since become the very life and power of the press."
No small share of this notable achievement must be
undoubtedly attributed to his brother John, of whom
Albany Fonblanque, Leigh's editorial successor, has en-
thusiastically written. " He was a man of rare stamp ;
an honester never breathed. His own sufferings were
the only sufferings to which he could be indifferent.
There never was a question in John Hunt's mind as to
the side to be taken in any discussion, but the question
of justice, which he determined to the best of his judg-
ment, and acted upon the conclusion at all risks. He
B
r8 LEIGH HUNT.
fought tlie battle in the front ranks when the battle was the
hottest, but he passed into retirement in the very hour of
victory, as if he had done nothing and deserved nothing
of the triumphant cause."
It was not to be expected that such a reforming organ
should escape the notice of those in power, and three
attempts had already been made to prosecute The
Examiner, when, on the 22nd of March, 181 2, there
appeared an article on the Prince Regent, which stood
little chance of escape. The Morning Post, " which then
affected to be the organ of the Court," had indulged in
a column of fulsome flattery to the Regent, whose name
had recently been received with hisses at an Irish
banquet. The Examiner went into the facts at consider-
able length with unsparing frankness, and thus con-
cluded : —
"The same page (of The Morniny Post) contained also a set of
wretched commonplace lines in French, Italian, Spanish, and
English, UteraUy addressing the Prince Regent in the following
terms, among others: — 'You are the 'jlory of the peoi^le. You
are the pi'Otector of the arts. You are the Maecenas of the age.
Wherever you appear you conquer all hearts, wipe away tears, ex-
cite desire and love, and win beauty towards you. You breathe
eloq^ience, you inspire the graces, you are Adonis in loveliness.
'Thus gifted,' it proceeds in English —
" Thus gifted with each grace of mind,
Born to dehght and bless mankind ;
Wisdom, with Pleasure in her train,
Great Prince ! shall signalise thy reign :
To Honour, Virtue, Truth allied —
BIOGRAPHY. 19
The nation's safeguard and its pride ;
With monarchs of immortal fame
Shall bright renown enrol thy name.
" What person, unacquainted with the true state of the case, would
imagine, on reading these astounding eulogies, that this glory of the
people was the subject of millions of shrugs and reproaches ; that
this protector of arts had named a wretched foreigner for his
historical painter, in disparagement or in ignorance of the merits of
his own countrymen ; that this Ma'cenas of the age patronised not
a single deserving writer ; that this breather of eloquence could not
say a few decent extempore words, if we are to judge, at least,
from what he said to his regiment on its embarkation for Portugal ;
that this conqueror of hearts was the disappointer of hopes ; that
this exciter of desire (bravo ! Messieurs of the Post!), this Adonis in
loveliness, was a corpulent gentleman of fifty ; in short, that this de-
lightful, blissful, luise, pleasurable, honourable, virtuous, true and
immortal prince was a violator of his word, a libertine over head
and ears in disgrace, a despiser of domestic ties, the companion of
gamblers and demireps, a man who has just closed half a century
without one single claim on the gratitude of his country, or the
respect of posterity?
" These are hard truths f but are they not truths, and have we not
suffered enough?— are we not now suffering bitterly from the dis-
gusting flatteries of which the above is a repetition ? The ministers
may talk of the shocking boldness of the press, and may throw out
their wretched warnings about interviews between Mr. Perceval and
Sir Vicary Gilibs, but let us inform them that such vices as have
just been enumerated are shocking to all Englishmen who have a
just sense of the state of Europe ; and that he is a bolder man who,
in times like the present, dares to afford reason for the description.
Would to God The Examiner could ascertain that difficult, and
perhaps undiscoverable, point which enables a public writer to keep
clear of an appearance of the love of scandal while he is hunting out
the vices of those in power. Then should one paper, at least, in
this metropolis help to rescue the nation from the charge of silently
20 LEIGH HUNT.
encouraging \That it must publicly rue ; and the Sardanapalus, who
is now afraid of none but informers, be taught to shake in the
midst of his minions, in the very drunkenness of his heart, at the
voice of honesty. But if this be impossible, still there is one benefit
which truth may derive from adulation — one benefit which is favour-
able to the former in proportion to the grossness of the latter, and
of which none of his flatterers seem to be aware — the opportunity of
contradicting its assertions. Let us never forget this advan-
tage, which adulation cannot help giving us ; and let such of our
readers as are inclined to deal insincerely with the great from a false
notion of policy, and of knowledge of the world, take warning from
what they now see of the miserable effects of courtly disguise, palter-
ing, and profligacy. Flattery in any shape is unworthy a man and
a gentleman ; but political flattery is almost a request to be made
slaves. If we would have the great to be what they ought, we must
find some means or other to speak of them as they are."
"This article, no doubt," wrote its author in later
years, "was very bitter and contemptuous; therefore, in
the legal sense of the term, very libellous ; the more so
inasmuch as it was very true." Though the truth of a
libel may serve to establish a man's legal guilt, it does
not of necessity prove him morally innocent, and there
was a considerable amount of folly, we had almost
said of selfishness, in this furious plain dealing. Leigh
Hunt was perfectly sincere, but a little reflection should
have taught him that, by indulging in reproaches against
a careless prince, he was running at least a very good
chance of hampering his own powers for reform without
weakening in any way the position of the enemy. His
anger was righteous, but he gave way to it, and had to
suffer the consequences.
It may be further noticed that this article was by no
BIOGRAPHY. 21
means the first in which he had treated the subject. He
began the attack in February 23, and continued it
almost without intermission, and with increasing vigour,
from week to week. Nor was this all, for after the prose-
cution had been announced, and while proceedings were
being delayed by the non-attendance of special jurors, he
published two letters in The Examiner, well calculated to
add fuel to the flame. On November 29 he addressed
the Prince Regent in a tone of mingled sarcasm and
compassion, declaring, with an affected seriousness
scarcely intended to be convincing, that " he is egregi-
ously deceived if he supposes that a favourable verdict
will be of the least service to him, either then or here-
after," and that, by persisting in the action, he will create
" a tenfold diffusion of the libel, with all the comments
of a pro-and-con arguing." On the other hand, imprison-
ment will give the writer double leisure to polish his
weapons.
" The question is not between a prince and a mere libel ; it is
not between the sovereign dignity and a popular piece of presump-
tion ; it is, a5 1 have already stated, between the licentious example
of a court and the voice of public virtue ; it is a question how far
those vices, which do not come under the cognisance of the laws, are
to be subject to the control of the public spirit ; it is a question how
far the chief magistrate or his representative is to violate the first
and most exemplary duties of his station, and not to be told of the
violation ; it is a question, in short, how far the petty comfort of
one man is to be preferred to the vital interest of millions, and to
the last security of national existence. Anything short of the im-
portance of such a question should never have induced us to waste
our time in speaking of individuals, whom, in private life, we should
not have condescended to notice. . . . Your brothers, sir, will ])e
22 LEIGH HUNT.
neither more or less noliced in this paper than they have been,
whatever may be the result of cm- trial ; it is extremely disagreeable
to us to be obliged to notice them at all, and the Duke of Cumber-
land in particular has a good chance of being as exempt as possible
from our handling, if it be only from a more than ordinary distaste.
As long as he behaves well. ... I shall not meddle with him.
Would to God I could say as much for your Royal Highness ; but
the question of which I have just spoken, and that only, makes you
important enough for animadversion ; and till you cease to be in-
volved in it, you may as well think to shake off the atmosphere
that surrounds you, or the consciousness of all you know of yourself
in private, as the presence and watchfulness of The Examiner."
This was followed on December 6 by a still more
outspoken epistle to the judge, Lord Ellenborough, ex-
horting him not to lose his temper.
It is improbable, however, that these letters affected the
result of the trial, which was indeed a foregone conclusion
from the first, despite the powerful eloquence of Lord
Brougham's judicial irony for the defence. After de-
scribing, with friendly zeal, the private character of Leigh
Hunt, and the circumstances by which he had been ex-
cited to this intemperate expression of opinion, the
learned counsel maintained that all responsibility was
vested in the Post for "covering that exalted and illus-
trious character, under the name of panegyric, with the
vilest and most abominable ridicule — a ridicule which, I
know, cannot attend that illustrious Prince ; but if not,
that is to his praise, for it shows him to be so exalted as
to be above ridicule, but which, in my mind, would sub-
ject to the most severe ridicule any inferior or subordin-
ate character. It is impossible for any private man, or
BIOGRAPHY. 23
indeed any man, except his Royal Higliness himself, to
have these things written and published of him, without
his being the subject of the most insufferable ridicule."
The aim of The Examiner, he contended, was to expose
this gross flattery, and certain allusions to melancholy
facts could scarcely have been avoided. By saying that
the Prince was " over head and ears in debt," it is im-
plied only that " one branch of the revenue is in arrear ; "
his Royal Highness may be called "a despiser of domestic
ties," because the nation had been taxed for the mainten-
ance of a separate establishment ; and the favourites at
court are fit subjects for discussion, '^'for they cannot
have all their little merits basking in the sunshine of
notoriety, and have all their little failings protected in
the shade of obscurity."
Lord Brougham, however, did not maintain this biting
satire to the end. His final appeal to the jury was based
on the broad principles of national morality : —
"Are you, tlien, I ask, prepared to say — and if you are, convict !
— but are you prepared to say, that vices the most shameless in their
public exhibition, and most dangerous in tlieir example, if they only
reign in a court, shall from henceforth be alcove all manner of reproof,
as they are already above legal control ? You know the laws do not
reach them — for I am speaking of immoralities which public justice
knows not how to deal with, and which yet are practised by the
most public characters, with the widest influence of example. I
am speaking of persons above the check of legal visitation — and
who, if not controlled by the public voice, are not controlled at all ?
Are you, then, prepared to say that henceforth every check upon them
shall be withdrawn ? For if their conduct may no longer be can-
vassed, there is no earthly check remaining to curb them. Are you
24 LEIGH HUNT.
prepared to say that the defendant must be viewed as a harmless,
l)ut visionary moralist — a misguided, though amiable fanatic — an
innocent young man, ignorant of the endearing vices which sweeten
and embellish fashionable life ? Will you tell me that he is an out-
rageous lover of domestic virtue — an observer of domestic ties — a
despiser of libertines — to Puritanical and ridiculous excess? Will
you — dare you say — it is your duty, as twelve honest men, married
to virtuous wives, and the fathers of English children — to pronounce
this writer a poor, mistaken, bewildered, uncourtly Puritan? Will
you tell me that we must no more talk of the morals of our ancestors,
or of their decorum — that we must begin to scoff at their prudence —
and unable to imitate their virtue, throw off even the covering of
decency? Are we no longer to hate where we find vice— to pity
where we find effeminacy — to laugh where we see foppery — to despise
where we find cowardice ? Are we really come to this stage of im-
provement ? Are these the inventions of this our age ? And is it,
indeed, in England that these things have come to pass? But tell
me, I beseech you, the date of this new era — let us, at least, know
the period from which we are to calculate our ruin. Let me only
know the time when it was first determined in England, that an
honest, manly, ardent, hazardous, even an incautious exposure
of NOTORIOUS VICES IN PUBLIC MEN, of OSTENTATIOUS IMMORAL-
ITY IN THE HIGHEST STATIONS, is a criine, and not a duty, in those
who instruct the people ! If you abidi by such principles, if you
are resolved to annihilate, in an instant, all the control by which the
great are restrained, if you are desirous to open the floodgates that
have heretofore stemmed the current of courtly vices, to break down
the only fences that guard the land, and to see all decency as well
as virtue overwhelmed in the flood, if you would let loose upon after
ages (for in the present day the purity of the late reign may avert
such a visitation), if upon after ages you would let loose a race,
compared with whom the first Charles was wise — the second honour-
able — and prodigies of ancient tyranny compassionate and chaste —
then pronounce a verdict of guilty ! And God forbid that any of
yourselves should live to gather its fruit; but may our posterity, who
miLst see it ripen, know to whom they owe it ! But I am fancying
BIOGRAPHY. 25
impossible things — I am terrifying myself and you with unreal
dangers. The country's highest interests are safe in your honest
hands. We have endured long — we have suffered much — we have
been severely visited— we have been variously wronged— but this
worst of degradations we must escape — for the appeal has been
made to justice, and it cannot, it may not fail."
Sir William Garrow's reply was comparatively brief,
being based on the obvious contention that the article
was maliciously designed to create ill-feeling against the
Prince ; and Lord EUenborough drove home the pro-
secution by a grossly partial charge. He first begged
the question by stating the issue to be " whether we are
to live under the dominion of libellers, or under the
control and government of law," and after dealing, in
equally violent language, with the terms of the article
itself, exhorted the jury to pronounce it "a foul,
atrocious, and malignant libel."
The brothers Hunt were found guilty, fined ^^5°° ^'
piece, and sentenced to two years' imprisonment in
separate gaols.
Leigh Hunt throws a strange light on the nature of
his moral indignation by declaring that " a free and
noble waving of the punishment would have bowed our
hearts into regret. We should have found in it the
evidence of that true generosity of nature paramount
to whatsoever was frivolous or appeared to be mean,
which his flatterers claimed for him, and which would
have made us blush for' the formal virtues to which we
seemed to he attached, when, in reality, nothing ivould have
26 LEIGH HUNT.
better pleased us than such a combination of the gay and
the magnanimous." The readers of The Examiner, per-
haps, would not have been quite so ready to forgive and
forget. With the Prince Regent himself, indeed, the
editor had no personal quarrel — " Could I meet him in
some odd corner of the Elysian fields, where charity had
room for both of us, I should first apologise to him for
having been the instrument in the hand of events for
attacking a fellow-creature, and then expect to hear him
avow as hearty a regret for having injured myself, and un-
justly treated his wife."
In The Examiner, Leigh Hunt assured his readers
that, so far from being downcast, he was just then
actually recovering in health and spirits from " a sickness
which luckily attacked him when he had no idea of
going to prison," and that, " not having been guilty of
any of the actions that make people unable to bear ad-
versity, he could not consent to be more uncomfortable
than the ordinary casualities of sickness or worldly
trouble might render him." The Autolnography contains
a very full account of his life in prison, coloured with
the kindly optimism of after years, and it is certain that
he obtained many compensations for his sufferings.
His wife and children were allowed to join him, and, by
the insistence of the doctor, he secured fairly comfort-
able quarters.
" The infirmary was divided into four wards, with
as many small rooms attached to them. The two
upper wards were occupied, but the two on the floor
had never been used ; and one of these, not very pro-
BIOGRAPHY. 27
vidently (for I had not yet learned to think of money),
I turned into a noble room. I papered the walls with a
trellis of roses ; I had the ceiling coloured with clouds
and sky ; the barred windows I screened with Venetian
blinds ; and when my bookcases were set up with their
busts, and flowers and a pianoforte made their appearance,
perhaps there was not a handsomer room on that side
the water. I took a pleasure, when a stranger knocked
at the door, to see him come in and stare about him.
The surprise on issuing from the borough, and passing
through the avenues of the gaol, was dramatic. Charles
Lamb declared there was no other such room, except in
a fairy tale.
" But I possessed another surprise, which was a garden.
There was a little yard outside the room, railed off from
another belonging to the neighbouring ward. This yard
I shut in with green palings, adorned it with a trellis,