This, however, seemed to disturb him but little, and he turned his attention to politics; for at the Literary Club he had made many political friends, including Fox, and he proposed going into Parliament as an independent member, though he believed that "either ministry or opposition would be happy to engage him." He found a seat at Stafford, and freely promised employment in Drury Lane Theatre to those who voted for him; while the necessary money for the election, which of course Sheridan did not possess, was provided by a gentleman in return for a share in the Opera House. His first speech was not a success, but though disappointed he was not daunted. "It is in me, however," he declared, "and it shall come out." Within a very short time the House of Commons listened to him as it would listen to no one else. By constant practice he had trained himself to speak perfectly and true to his Irish blood, he had a rich store of language, a fund of wit and humour, and the power of handling every emotion. His great speech in the Warren Hastings case lasted six hours, during the whole of which time he held the House in the hollow of his hand, and when he continued his attack in Westminster Hall, people paid twenty guineas a day to hear him. "I cannot tell you," wrote his devoted wife to her sister, "the adoration that he has excited in the breasts of every class of people. Every party prejudice has been overcome by such a display of genius, eloquence, and goodness." Sheridan indeed was at the height of his glory; but fame is a dangerous pinnacle for the strongest of men, and Sheridan had no foundation-stones of strength or stability. His wife’s death was the beginning of his fall, debt and drink did the rest. All sense of honour seems to have left him where money was concerned. His actors could get no payments save in fair words; he kept the money which resulted from special benefits; he borrowed where he could, and then plunged the more deeply into debt, but he never curbed his extravagances, or went without anything he desired, no matter to what means he had to resort. His buoyancy never failed him. Even when his theatre was burnt to the ground with a loss to him of £200,000, his ready wit did not desert him. He sat drinking his wine in a coffee-house from where he could see the flames, merely remarking to a sympathetic friend, "A man likes to take a glass of wine by his own fireside." All the latter part of his life is painfully sad; debt, poverty, and dishonour hemmed him in, and excessive drinking brought on his last illness. A few days before his death he was discovered almost starving in an unfurnished room. Even then the bailiffs were about to carry him away to the debtors’ gaol, and only the doctor, who stayed and nursed him to the end, prevented this last disgrace. The news of his destitution horrified those who remembered him in the days of his dazzling triumphs, and in one paper an eloquent