And thus ended my connexion with the original _Westminster_.

The last article which I wrote in it had cost me more labour than any previous; but it was a labour of love, being a defence of the early French Revolutionists against the Tory misrepresentations of Sir Walter Scott, in the introduction to his _Life of Napoleon_.

The number of books which I read for this purpose, making notes and extracts--even the number I had to buy (for in those days there was no public or subscription library from which books of reference could be taken home)--far exceeded the worth of the immediate object; but I had at that time a half-formed intention of writing a History of the French Revolution; and though I never executed it, my collections afterwards were very useful to Carlyle for a similar purpose..