With Pitt, the whole event was a fortunate diversion of the enemy, a relief from the restless assaults of a Whig opposition, a perpetual drain on Whig strength, and by a result more effective still, a fruitful source of popular ridicule on the lingering impotence of Whig labours. On the acquittal of Hastings, Burke wrote several letters to Addington as Speaker, which have a tone of the deepest despondency. He writes in the impassioned anguish of a man to whom the earth exhibited but one aspect of despair. They were letters such as Priam might have indited on the night when his Troy was in a blaze. It was evident that the powerful genius of Burke was partially bewildered by the bent of his feelings. He raised an imaginary sepulchre for England on the spot where he had contemplated the erection of a dungeon for Indian crime through all ages to come. The Indian directors voted Hastings, an annuity of five thousand pounds, which he enjoyed to a very advanced age: yet his acquittal has not received the seal of posterity. A calmer view has regarded him as the daring agent of acts fitter for the meridian of Hindoo morality than European. To serve the struggling interests of the Company seems to have been his highest motive, and there can be no doubt that he served them with equal sagacity and success. That he was a vigorous administrator, an enterprising statesman, and a popular governor, is beyond denial; that he was personally unstained by avarice or extortion, is admitted. But history demands higher proofs of principle; and no governor since his time has ever attempted to imitate his example, or ever ventured to excuse his own errors, by alleging the conduct or the acquittal of Hastings. There are some men, whom no position can render ridiculous, and there are some quite the reverse: of the latter class was Ferguson of Pitfour. Ferguson's notion of the essential quality of a Lord Advocate was tallness. "We Scotch members," said he, "always vote with the Lord Advocate, and we therefore require to see him in a division. Now I can see Mr Pitt, and I can see Mr Addington, but I cannot see the Lord Advocate." His lordship evidently not rising to Ferguson's regulation size of a statesman. One evening as Ferguson was taking his dinner in the coffee-room, some one ran in, to say, that "Pitt was on his legs." Every one rose to leave the room, except Ferguson. "What!" said they, "won't you go to hear Mr Pitt?" "No," he replied, "Why should I? do you think Mr Pitt would go to hear me?" At a dinner given by Dundas, at Wimbledon, where Addington, Sheridan, and Erskine were present, the latter was rallied on his not taking so prominent a part in the debates as his fame required. Sheridan said (with a roughness unusual with him,) "I tell you how it happens: Erskine, you are afraid of Pitt, and that's the flabby part of your character."