THE CLAIMS OF SIR PHILIP FRANCIS AND LORD GEORGE SACKVILLE COMPARED. Look here! upon this picture! and upon this The counterfeit. Hamlet. Zounds! I am afraid of this gunpowder PERCY, though he be dead. How if he should counterfeit too, and rise? I am afraid he would prove the better counterfeit. Falstaff. CHAPTER XIII. - Remarks on the present state of the controversy.-The different bearings of the objections to each claim pointed out.—The internal evidence afforded by the letters of "Veteran” particularly examined. The probabilities of the whole case shewn to be against the claim of Sir Philip Francis, and in favour of Lord George Sackville.-The evidence adduced in support of each claimant, shortly stated and compared.— Mr. Butler's summing up of the evidence.—Conclusion that Lord George Sackville was Junius, and Sir Philip Francis his amanuensis.-This hypothesis shewn to reconcile all apparent contradictions, and clear up all difficulties.—The progress of public opinion respecting the claim of Lord George Sackville stated.-Character of Junius as a man and an author. THE CLAIMS OF SIR PHILIP FRANCIS AND LORD GEORGE SACKVILLE COMPARED. The scales are equally poised. It is not the printer's fault, if the greater weight inclines the balance. Junius. IF the reader be not convinced that Junius has been identified, by what we have already advanced, he may at least rest satisfied that every suspected individual has been fairly hunted down, and that another name cannot be mentioned at the present day, to which a shade of suspicion is attached. When Ford, instigated by 'the green-eyed monster,' commenced his search for Falstaff, he declared that “lest the devil that guides him should aid him, I will search impossible places." A chase equally keen has now been in progress for seventy years after Junius, and can we suppose that the pursuit of such accomplished literary sportsmen as Messrs. Wilkes, Butler, Coventry, and Barker; and Doctors Good, Parr, and Waterhouse, have been wholly unsuccessful and fruitless? This we cannot credit on the contrary, we believe that they have all, by their labours, more or less assisted in tracking the great Boar of the forest to his lair; and in conclusion, we shall endeavour to make this clear, by shortly recapitulating the evidence, and comparing the proofs adduced on behalf of Sir Philip Francis and Lord George Sackville (the two favourite Candidates) with each other, and inquiring how far they respectively agree with the requisite characteristics of Junius. But before entering on this task we have to remark, that whenever several competitors are found all eagerly contending for some honorary distinction, and each admitting, that with the exception of himself, one particular candidate is clearly entitled to the prize, we may be pretty sure that the individual to whom all his compeers unanimously award the second place, is in reality entitled to the first. Such is the position in which Lord George Sackville stands with regard to this controversy; for not only the investigators, but even the advocates, of the other claimants, either directly or indirectly, expressly or by Ximplication, award to him, at least the second place. Before the subject was much canvassed, Dr. Good could not help remarking upon the private note respecting Swinney, that: "Such letter was in fact one of the most curious in the whole collection, and if written by Lord George Sackville, settled the point of the authorship at once." And Mr. Butler says: "Supposing the evidence in favour of Lord George Sackville to rest entirely upon the circumstances which have been mentioned, it must be pronounced to be defective. On this supposition, however, it might have been observed that the evidence in his favour was stronger than the evidence in favour of any other person." In the course of Mr. Barker's argument on behalf of |