Note 76 — PULPIT, BAR, AND PARLIAMENTARY ELOQUENCE.

I had an opportunity of knowing that Mr. Sheridan was offered 1000l. for that speech by a bookseller, the day after it was spoken, provided he would write it out correctly from the notes taken, before the interest had subsided; and yet, although he certainly had occasion for money at the time, and assented to the proposal, he did not take the trouble of writing a line of it! The publisher was of course displeased, and insisted on his performing his promise: upon which Sheridan laughingly replied in the vein of Falstaff:—“No, Hal!—were I at the strappado, I would do nothing by compulsion!” He did it at length—but too late! and, as I heard, was (reasonably enough!) not paid.