“Macaulay, as it clearly appears from his own letters, was irritated beyond measure by Croker; he grew to ‘detest’ him. Then he began casting about for some means of revenge. This would seem incredible if he had not, almost in so many words, revealed the secret. In July, 1831, he wrote thus: ‘That impudent, leering Croker congratulated the House on the proof which I had given of my readiness. He was afraid, he said, that I had been silent so long on account of the many allusions which had been made to Calne. Now that I had risen again he hoped that they should hear me often. _See whether I do not dust that valet’s jacket for him in the next number of the Blue and Yellow._ I _detest him_ more than cold boiled veal.’ From that time forth he waited impatiently for his opportunity to settle his account with Mr. Croker. “In the previous month of March he had been looking out eagerly for the publication of the ‘Boswell.’ ‘_I will certainly review Croker’s “Boswell” when it comes out_,’ he wrote to Mr. Napier. He was on the watch for it, not with the object of doing justice to the book, but of ‘dusting the jacket’ of the author. But as his letters had not yet betrayed his malice to the world, he gravely began the dusting process by remarking, ‘This work has greatly disappointed us.’ What did he hope for, when he took it up, but precisely such a ‘disappointment?’ ‘Croker,’ he wrote, ‘looks across the House of Commons at me with a leer of hatred, which I repay with a gracious smile of pity.’ He had cultivated his animosity of Croker until it became a morbid passion. Yet it is conceivable that he did not intend posterity to see him in the picture drawn by his own hand, spending his time in the House of Commons straining his eyes to see if there was a ‘leer’ on Croker’s countenance, and returning it with gracious smiles of pity.”