’The debate on the first proposal of the Union was protracted to an unusual length, and when he rose to speak, it was late at night, or rather it was early in the morning—­two o’clock—­the House had been so wearied that many of the members were asleep.  It was an inauspicious moment.  No person present, not even the Speaker, who was his intimate friend, could tell on which side he would vote.  Curiosity was excited:  some of the outstretched members were roused by their neighbours, whose anxiety to know on which side he would vote prompted them to encourage him to proceed.  This curiosity was kept alive as he went on; and when people perceived that it was not a set speech, they became interested.  He stated his doubts, just as they had really occurred, balancing the arguments as he threw them by turns into each scale, as they had balanced one another in his judgment; so that the doubtful beam nodded from side to side, while all watched to see when its vibrations would settle.  All the time he kept both parties in good humour, because each expected to have him their own at last.  After stating many arguments in favour of what appeared to him to be the advantages of the Union, he gave his vote against it, because, he said, he had been convinced by what he had heard in that House this night, that the Union was at this time decidedly against the wishes of the great majority of men of sense and property in the nation.  He added that if he should be convinced that the opinion of the country changed at the final discussion of the question, his vote would be in its favour.

’One of the anti-Unionists, who happened not to know my father personally, imagined from his accent, style, and manner of speaking, that he was an Englishman, and accused the Government of having brought a new member over from England, to impose him upon the House, as an impartial country gentleman, who was to make a pretence of liberality by giving a vote against the Union, while, by arguing in its favour, he was to make converts for the measure.  Many on the Ministerial bench, who had still hopes that, on a future occasion, Mr. Edgeworth might be convinced and brought to vote with them, complimented him highly, declaring that they were completely surprised when they learned how he voted; for that undoubtedly the best arguments on their side of the question had been produced in his speech.  Lord Castlereagh found the measure so much against the sense of the House that he pressed it no further at that time.

’This session my father had the satisfaction of turning the attention of the House to a subject which he considered to be of greater and more permanent importance than the Union, or than any merely political measure could prove to his country, the education of the people.  By his exertions a select committee was appointed, and they adopted the resolutions drawn up by him.  When the report of this committee was brought up to the House, my father spoke at large upon the subject.