“When the steam is on,
  And languid Johnny glows to glorious John.”

His speeches, if they had not the animated, flowing reasonableness of Cobden’s, resembled them in this, that they belonged to that class of oratory which aims at convincing the reason rather than at persuading the emotions.  Lord John had, however, one quality likely to make him widely popular—­his pluck; at bay he was formidable.  If there was a trace of injustice or unreasonableness in his adversaries, though their case might be overwhelmingly plausible, it was ten to one he routed them in confusion.  He was ready in retort.  One example of this readiness Gladstone was fond of quoting:  Sir Francis Burdett had made a speech against the Whigs, in which he spoke of the “cant of patriotism.”  “There is one thing worse than the cant of patriotism,” retorted Lord John, “and that is the recant of patriotism.”  Again, when the Queen once asked him, “Is it true, Lord John, that you hold that a subject is justified, in certain circumstances, in disobeying his sovereign?” his answer to this difficult question could not have been better:  “Well, speaking to a sovereign of the House of Hanover, I can only say that I suppose he is.”

One more characteristic must be mentioned.  Like most men scrupulous and slow in determining what to do, his confidences often were withheld from others till the last moment, and sometimes beyond the moment, when it would have been wisest to admit his colleagues to his own counsel.  In consequence he often appeared disconcertingly abrupt in decision.

In 1808 he accompanied Lord and Lady Holland to Spain and Portugal, and on his return he was sent by his father to Edinburgh University, the Duke having little confidence in the education then procurable at either Oxford or Cambridge.  At Edinburgh he took part in the proceedings of the Speculative Society, read essays to them and debated; and he left the University still tending more towards literature than politics.  There is no doubt that Edinburgh helped to form him.  His mind was one naturally open to influences which are summed up as “the academic spirit”; dislike of exaggeration, impatience with brilliancy which does not illuminate, and distrust of enthusiasm which is not prepared to show its credentials at every step.  His own style is marked by these qualities, and in addition by a reminiscence of eighteenth-century formality, more likely to please perhaps future than present readers; accurate, a little distant, it pleases because it conveys a sense of modesty and dignity.  When he speaks of himself he does it to perfection.

After leaving the University he served in the Bedford militia.  In 1814 he went to Italy, and crossed to Elba, where he saw Napoleon.  Lord John was always a most authentic reporter.  His description of the Emperor, written the next day, besides its intrinsic interest, is so characteristic of the writer himself that it may be quoted here.  It is as matter-of-fact as one of Wellington’s dispatches and as shrewd as a passage from one of Horace Walpole’s letters.