"
"Is the Duke so very poor as to be forced to this desperate mode
of getting a livelihood?"
"It is his."
"I thought to relieve my old bed-ridden mother by part of my share
of this whale."
"It is his."
"Won't the Duke be content with a quarter or a half?"
"It is his."
In a word, the whale was seized and sold, and his Grace the Duke of
Wellington received the money. Thinking that viewed in some particular
lights, the case might by a bare possibility in some small degree
be deemed, under the circumstances, a rather hard one, an honest clergyman
of the town respectfully addressed a note to his Grace, begging him
to take the case of those unfortunate mariners into full consideration.
To which my Lord Duke in substance replied (both letters were published)
that he had already done so, and received the money, and would be obliged
to the reverend gentleman if for the future he (the reverend gentleman)
would decline meddling with other people's business. Is this the still
militant old man, standing at the corners of the three kingdoms,
on all hands coercing alms of beggars?
It will readily be seen that in this case the alleged right of the Duke
to the whale was a delegated one from the Sovereign.
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