could extract from Burke the definite sentence (November 24, 1771):—­“I now give you my word and honour that I am not the author of Junius, and that I know not the author of that paper, and I do authorise you to say so.”  Nor was this the only kind of annoyance to which he was subjected.  His rising fame kindled the candour of the friends of his youth.  With proverbial good-nature, they admonished him that he did not bear instruction; that he showed such arrogance as in a man of his condition was intolerable; that he snapped furiously at his parliamentary foes, like a wolf who had broken into the fold; that his speeches were useless declamations; and that he disgraced the House by the scurrilities of the bear-garden.  These sharp chastenings of friendship Burke endured with the perfect self-command, not of the cold and indifferent egotist, but of one who had trained himself not to expect too much from men.  He possessed the true solace for all private chagrins in the activity and the fervour of his public interests.

In 1772 the affairs of the East India Company and its relations with the Government had fallen into disorder.  The Opposition, though powerless in the Houses of Parliament, were often able to thwart the views of the ministry in the imperial board-room in Leadenhall Street.  The Duke of Richmond was as zealous and as active in his opposition to Lord North in the business of the East Indies, as he was in the business of the country at Westminster.  A proposal was made to Burke to go out to India at the head of a commission of three supervisors, with authority to examine the concerns of every department, and full powers of control over the company’s servants.  Though this offer was pressed by the directors, Burke, after anxious consideration, declined it.  What his reasons were there is no evidence; we can only guess that he thought less of his personal interests than of those of the country and of his party.  Without him the Rockingham connection would undoubtedly have fallen to ruin, and with it the most upright, consistent, and disinterested body of men then in public life.  “You say,” the Duke of Richmond wrote to him (November 15, 1772), “the party is an object of too much importance to go to pieces.  Indeed, Burke, you have more merit than any man in keeping us together.”  It was the character of the party, almost as much as their principles, that secured Burke’s zeal and attachment; their decorum, their constancy, their aversion to all cabals for private objects, their indifference to office, except as an instrument of power and a means of carrying out the policy of their convictions.  They might easily have had office if they would have come in upon the king’s terms.  A year after his fall from power Lord Rockingham was summoned to the royal closet, and pressed to resume his post.  But office at any price was not in their thoughts.  They knew the penalties of their system, and they clung to it undeterred.  Their patriotism was deliberate and considered.  Chalcedon