presumption in me; because I follow the example of Sir Walter Raleigh and
many other patriotic and eminent men who have gone before me. I am not
much of a copyist, but I am not ashamed of being accused of endeavouring
to imitate the brave and persecuted Napoleon, who is writing his Memoirs
during his imprisonment on the barren rock of St. Helena. Napoleon I
esteem the most illustrious and eminent man of the present age, both as a
profound statesman and a brave and matchless general. Although he never
appeared to evince so sincere a desire as could be wished, to promote the
universal liberty of man to the extent that I contend, and have always
contended for, yet, when I reflect upon the period in which his energetic
mind was allowed to have its full scope of action, and when I recollect
the powerful armies and fleets that he had to contend with, and the
phalanx of tyrants who were at various times leagued together against him,
I am disposed not to examine too nicely and with too critical an eye the
means that he used to defend himself against their unceasing endeavours to
destroy him, and to restore the old tyranny of the Bourbons. He is, like
myself, a prisoner, and imprisoned by the same power; only in his case
they have not even the _forms_ of law to justify them in his detention. He
is a prisoner upon a barren rock, but I have not the least hesitation in
pronouncing him to have been, both in the cabinet and the field, as to
talent and courage, unrivalled in the pages of modern or ancient history.
Neither the reformers nor the people of England had any share in sending
him to St. Helena, nor ought they in fairness to participate in the
disgrace of his detention.

In my humble judgment, the greatest fault he ever committed was, in having
too good an opinion of the justice of the boroughmongers, and relying upon
the liberality of their agents, so far as to be betrayed into that net
which now surrounds him. He always appeared to admire our courts of
justice; but he knew nothing of our system of packing SPECIAL JURIES.