LLUSTRATED
 
 
 
 Horace Greeley's early Studies in his Mother's Cottage.
 
 FAMOUS BOYS; 
 
 AND 
 
 %g kante (Sttat 
 
 DEDICATED TO 
 
 YOUTHS AND YOUNG MEN, 
 
 AS A 
 
 STIMULUS TO EARNEST LIVING. 
 
 "IHUIH 18 STBANGB, STBANGBB THAW FICTION." 
 
 LONDON : 
 WARD, LOCK, AND TYLER, 
 
 WARWICK HOUSE, PATERNOSTER ROW.
 
 " BOYS, did you ever tninK tnat this world, with all its wealth 
 and woe ; wun aH its mines and mountains, oceans, oeas, ana 
 rivers ; with all its shipping, its steamboats, railroads, and 
 magnetic telegraphs; with all its millions of grouping ninn, 
 and all the science and progress of ages, will soon be given 
 over to boys of the present age boys like you ? Believe it, 
 and look abroad upon your inheritance, and get ready to enter 
 upon its possession. The presidents, kings, governors, states- 
 men, philosophers, ministers, teachers men of the future all 
 hre boys now."
 
 CONTENTS, 
 
 PAG*. 
 HORACE GREELEY .... \ 
 
 JAMES GORDON BENNETT - 26 
 
 GEOKGK STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT, THE 
 
 RAILWAY KINGS ...... 39 
 
 LORD BROUGHAM "" , 67 
 
 JOHN KITTO ... . 81 
 
 HUGH MILLER .... . 107 
 
 SAMUEL DREW . . 127 
 
 THOMAS COOPER ..... 153 
 
 WILLIAM JAY - .... 167 
 
 JOHN PHILPOT CUREAN . - 180 
 
 SAMUEL CEOMPTON . . . . -189 
 
 ELIHU BURRITT .... 201 
 
 DOUGLAS JERROLD . . . . . -216 
 
 DAVID LIVINGSTONE . . . 237 
 
 JAMES MORRISON .... 262 
 
 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY .... 269 
 JOSEPH STURGE ....... 283 
 
 2000019
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Horace Greeley's Earl) Studies in his Mother's Cottage 6 
 
 George Stephenson Constructing his First Steam Engine 41 
 
 Dr. Kitto making Shoes in the Plymouth Workhouse M 
 
 Samuel Drew's Perilous Adventure with the Smugglers 138 
 
 William Jay, the Boy-preacher, Delivering his First Discourse to ft Rustic 
 
 Congregation 178 
 
 Samuel Crompton Inventing his celebrated Mule 191 
 
 Dr. Livingstone Studying while working in the Cotton Factory ... 42 
 
 Morrison resolves to proceed to London to push his Fortunes 264
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 LOUD STANLEY said at Accrington, " I believe that 
 oue of the most important volumes that could pos- 
 sibly be written and when it is written it ought to 
 find a place in every hamlet, almost in every cottage 
 would be a biographical record of a few selected in- 
 stances of those eminent and illustrious persons who, 
 in various occupations and departments of life, have 
 raised themselves from the ranks." The reason is 
 obvious. Biography serves the excellent purpose of 
 informing the irresolute and desponding how the 
 true man has not repined but worked. If his social 
 position has been low the first round on the ladder 
 the greater need to work in order to ascend. Has 
 his education been neglected ? does he find himself, 
 when he wakes up to his real position in life, ignorant 
 of the mere rudiments of knowledge ? nil desperan- 
 dum, others have been like him, and by dint of dili- 
 gence and patience greater difficulties have be n 
 overcome ; he will also gird himself right manfully 
 for the fight. Biography has no truer lesson to teach
 
 Tl PEEFACE. 
 
 than this : that as sure as any object is pursued with 
 diligence, with industry, with unfaltering perse- 
 verance, whether it is mental improvement, the 
 attainment of honourable independence, or progress 
 in any good and useful work, the end desired is cer- 
 tain to be attained. There is no law so infallible, 
 there is no end so sure, as that industry is certain to 
 meet with its just reward. 
 
 Every youth, doubtless, in his first start in life, 
 proposes to himself an object intending to make life 
 practical and real. In such an epoch of personal his- 
 tory, good intentions and earnest resolves are 
 embraced ; a strict line of conduct is marked out, 
 and, as it is supposed, an undeviating life entered 
 upon. But there come the blandishments and seduc- 
 tions of ease and pleasure, and the numberless 
 excitements which drive away purposes and resolu- 
 tions to dare nobly and act truly. Subsequently, it 
 may be, a review of the past may show the pathway 
 of life strewn with good intentions, with the wrecks 
 and waifs of purposes uncompleted and promises un- 
 fulfilled. At such a time there is no refuge in the 
 belief that circumstances have been adverse. Cir- 
 cumstances and opportunities are not needed to make 
 great men ; great men make opportunities. The 
 strong, resolute man, the courageous determined 
 youth, are not swayed by obstacles or unforeseen 
 difficulties ; these hindrances, which turn away the 
 timid and less courageous, only serve to make them
 
 PREFACE. Vil 
 
 more energetic and resolute. How many youths are 
 there who will pass through life with the keenest 
 mental capabilities, but, lacking purpose and deter- 
 mination, will achieve nothing dying as though they 
 had not lived ! More than every other thing action 
 is the one thing needed. A purpose once formed, 
 and then death or victory. It is in these respects 
 that the lives of Famous Boys, and the hiography of 
 great men, serve for examples and encouragement to 
 those vacillating between desire and execution- the 
 intention and the fulfilment of a noble purpose.
 
 FAMOUS BOYS; 
 
 AND 
 
 Ijjofo %2 tocame (feat Him 
 
 HORACE GREELEY: 
 
 IllE MODERN FRANKLIN ; EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR OP 
 
 THE "NEW YORK TRIBUNE." 
 
 " FAMOUS BOYS ; and how they became great men 1 " 
 of all subjects, that is one of the most interesting. 
 ".How they became great?" That is their secret, 
 well worth knowing and understanding ; and, if we 
 mistake not, so interesting in the relation, as to put 
 fiction in the shade, and give another proof, if proof 
 were needed, that " truth is stranger than fiction." 
 The antecedents of some of the greatest men were 
 so humble, so lowly, as not only furnishing matter 
 for astonishment, but incentives to any youth 
 with a spark of determination and perseverance 
 in his breast, that he also will make an effort 
 to rise above slothful dispositions, adverse circum- 
 stances, and any and everything which may tend
 
 2 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 to keep him poor, ignorant, and unknown. It is not 
 necessary, either, that we should go into any past age 
 for examples ; there are men now living, famous men, 
 whose lives will be read ages hence by generations 
 unborn, with as much interest and delight as we now 
 read the lives of Franklin, of Milton, or Bunyan. 
 Let us cite one instance. 
 
 We are standing in the printing-office of the " New 
 York Tribune," opposite one of the miraculous print- 
 ing machines that is adding its quota to the hundred 
 thousand newspapers printed in New York every 
 morning. We are impressed with the marvellous 
 exactness and rapidity of the machine ; we listen to 
 accounts of the number of hands employed in pro- 
 ducing one newspaper ; the list of editors, reporters, 
 readers, messengers, compositors, and machine-men ; 
 the admirable arrangements for telegraphing news in 
 the briefest time from the most distant places ; the 
 plans for anticipating information by the English 
 steamer, so that the news is frequently circulated 
 through the Union before the steamer arrives at the 
 wharf : impressed with all this, we vent our astonish- 
 ment in one word wonderful ! But true as this un- 
 doubtedly is, it is not more wonderful not so won- 
 derful as the life of the man who owns the machine, 
 and who is the life and vitality of the whole concern 
 the world-famed Horace Greeley. It is his glory 
 and honour that his position has been won from 
 poverty and obscurity, and that it is maintained in
 
 EARLY DAY8. 3 
 
 the strictest honour and integrity. His boyhood, as 
 the boyhood of all worthy and great men, must be 
 marked with some peculiarity ; but, if we mistake 
 not, it is a peculiarity that any boy may stamp his 
 early days with the spirit and purpose of industry. 
 
 Horace was born in the year 1811, under difficulties, 
 it is said, " as he was black as a coal." Twenty 
 minutes elapsed after his birth, before it was quite 
 certain whether he was to live or not ; at the end of 
 that time, he lay a smiling infant in his mother's 
 arms. His mother, who of course was Horace's first 
 instructor, was tall, muscular, well-formed, and had 
 the strength of a man without any other masculine 
 quality ; she was very active in her habits, had a per- 
 petual flow of spirits, an exhaustless store of songs, 
 and possessed a boundless good-will to every human 
 being. She hoed in the garden, laboured in the field, 
 and, while doing more than the work of an ordinary 
 man, would joke and sing all day long ; and then in 
 the evening she would pass the hours in reading, or 
 reciting stories to those about her. Horace, in after 
 years, has borne testimony to the effect of these 
 evenings. " These stories," he has said, " served to 
 awaken in me a thirst for knowledge, and a lively 
 interest in learning, and in the incidents of history." 
 The first result was an expressed desire to go to 
 school in his third year, where he made such good 
 use of his time, that he soon learned to read. This 
 
 B 2
 
 4 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 reading capability was a marvellous power in his 
 hands, which, in his fourth year, he turned to good 
 account. In that year he commenced the habit of 
 book reading, or, more properly, book devouring ; 
 jvhich habit never left him during all his youthful 
 years. In his fifth and sixth years it was his custom 
 to lie on his face under a tree reading ; hour after 
 hour would thus be passed, completely absorbed in 
 his book ; and if no one stumbled over him or roused 
 him, he would read on unmindful of dinner-time or 
 sunset. This absorbing passionate delight in books 
 was the reason of determining him to become a 
 printer ; this conclusion was arrived at while he was 
 yet a child ; his reason was quite conclusive : " They 
 made books." A gentleman who knew him relates 
 that, " one day Horace and I went to a blacksmith's 
 shop; Horace watched the process of horse-shoeing 
 with much interest. The blacksmith, observing how 
 intently he looked on, said, ' You'd better come with 
 me and learn the trade.' ' No/ said Horace, in his 
 prompt decided way, ' I'm going to be a printer.' ' J 
 He was then only six years old, and is described as 
 Tery small for his age ; no wonder that the choice of 
 a trade by so diminutive a piece of humanity should 
 mightily amuse the bystanders. The blacksmith in 
 after years, when Horace was a printer, and a printer 
 of some note, used to tell the story with great glee. 
 
 Horace learned to love books to so great an extent, 
 that from his sixth to his ninth year it almost
 
 PASSION FOR LEARNING. 5 
 
 amounted to a passion. The stock of books belong- 
 ing to his father was very small, and not very inte 
 resting to a boy of his years ; consisting of a Bible, a 
 " Confession of Faith," and about twenty old volumes, 
 chiefly on religious subjects. But there was an oasis 
 even in this desert. A weekly newspaper came from 
 the neighbouring village of Amherst, which had, no 
 doubt, with the exception of his mother's tales, more 
 to do with the opening of Horace's mind and the 
 formation of his opinions than any other thing. His 
 eagerness to possess the coveted sheet is well remem- 
 bered. An hour before the post-rider was expected, 
 Horace would walk down the road to meet him, bent 
 on having the first read; and when he had got pos- 
 session of the precious paper, he would hurry with it 
 to some secluded place, lie down on the grass, and 
 greedily devour its contents ; and this when only in 
 his ninth year ! We are assured that at this period 
 there was not one readable book within seven miles 
 of his father's house which he had not read. He was, 
 in fact, never without a book. As soon, says his 
 sister, as he was dressed in the morning, he flew to 
 his book ; every moment of the day which was not 
 employed at school, or any of the duties set him to 
 perform on the farm, was spent with his book. He 
 was usually so absorbed, that when he was wanted, 
 it was like rousing a deep sleeper from a heavy slum- 
 ber. When he went to the cellar and the wood-pile 
 his book was in his hand ; he read when he went to
 
 6 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 the garden, or on visits to his neighbours. For his 
 evening studies, he kept in a secure place an ample 
 supply of pine-knots ; as soon as it was dark he would 
 light one of these cheap and brilliant illuminators, 
 put it on the back log in the spacious fire-place, make 
 a pile of his school and reading books on the floor, 
 lie down on the hearth with his head to the fire, his 
 feet coiled away out of the reach of stumblers, read- 
 ing the whole of the long winter evening, silent and 
 motionless dead to all the world around him, alive 
 only to the world to which his book had transported 
 him. 
 
 While Horace was thus acquiring knowledge, a 
 cloud was gathering round his home. It is said the 
 way to thrive in New Hampshire was to work very 
 hard, keep the store (or shop) bill small, stick to the 
 farm, and be no man's security. Of these four things 
 Horace's father did only one he worked hard. He 
 was a good workman, methodical, skilful, and perse- 
 vering. But he speculated, and lost money by his 
 speculations. He was " bound," as they say in the 
 country, for another man, and had to pay the money 
 which that other man failed to pay. He had a free 
 and generous nature, lived well, liberally treated the 
 men whom he employed, and in various ways swelled 
 the account at the store. The sad result was an exe- 
 cution from the sheriff, and a sale of Greeley's home. 
 At this juncture Horace was not ten years old ; to 
 his honour it is recorded, that thirty years afterwardi
 
 TEMPERANCE. 7 
 
 lie discharged some of the debts then unpaid. His 
 father, after this break-up and destruction of his 
 prospects, removed to Westhaven, and obtained a 
 scanty livelihood for his family as a day labourer. 
 Here, as at Amhurst, Horace roamed far and wide in 
 pursuit of books ; he read all the ordinary round of 
 common histories, romances, and novels, and every- 
 thing that came in his way. 
 
 About his eleventh year, Horace thought it time 
 to do something towards being that which he had 
 always resolved to be a printer. His father rather 
 damped his courage by telling him that no one would 
 take an apprentice so young ; but he was not thus to 
 be diverted from his purpose. To solve his doubts, 
 he one morning trudged to Whitehall, a town about 
 nine miles distant, to make inquiries. The only 
 printer in the place told him he was too young ; there 
 was nothing for it, therefore, but to trudge home 
 again. 
 
 The part of the town of Westhaven in which Horace 
 and his parents resided was celebrated for the drink- 
 ing habits of the inhabitants. It is a singular fact, 
 and much to the honour of Greeley, although both 
 his parents were accustomed to a liberal use of in- 
 toxicating drinks, neither he nor his brother could 
 be induced to partake of them, or to use tobacco. 
 One day, on the occasion of a neighbour dining with 
 the family, a bottle of rum was produced. Horace, 
 either disgusted at the taste or smell, said earnestly :
 
 8 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 " Father, what will you give me if I do not drink a 
 drop of drink until I am twenty-one ? " His father, 
 who took the question as a joke, answered, " Fll give 
 you a dollar." " It's a bargain/' said Horace. And 
 it was a bargain. Many attempts were then and 
 subsequently made to induce him to change his reso- 
 lution ; but from that day to the present time Horace 
 has never taken any intoxicating drinks as beverages. 
 
 Time wore on when, in his thirteenth year, Horace 
 saw an advertisement in the " Northern Spectator/' 
 for an apprentice on the paper. He sought his father 
 at once, who replied to his importunities : " I haven't 
 time to go and see about it, Horace ; but if you have 
 a mind to walk over to Poultney, and see what you 
 can do, why, you may." We may be sure that 
 Horace had a'mind. 
 
 It was a fine spring morning, in the year 1826, 
 when one of the owners of the " Northern Spectator " 
 might have been seen in his garden planting potatoes. 
 He heard the gate open behind him, and without 
 turning or looking round was conscious of the pre- 
 sence of a boy. Mr. Bliss, however, continued his 
 planting, and quickly forgot that he was not alone. 
 In a few minutes he heard a voice close behind him 
 a strange, high-pitched, and whining voice it said : 
 "Are you the man that carries on the printing- 
 office ? " On looking round, he saw standing before 
 him a boy apparently about fifteen, of a light, tall, 
 and slender form, dressed in the plain farmer's cloth
 
 CHOICE OF A TRADE. 9 
 
 of the time cut, as a matter of course, with a total 
 disregard to appearance or fit. His trowsers were 
 very short, and he was without stockings ; he had on 
 an old felt hat that seemed much like an inverted 
 quart measure ; his hair was white, and was tinged 
 with orange at the ends. The excellent man had 
 much difficulty to restrain himself from laughing out- 
 right at the odd figure hefore him; he answered, 
 however, " Yes, Fm the man." Horace for it was 
 he next asked : " Don't yon want a boy to learn the 
 trade ? " " Well," said Mr. Bliss, " we have been 
 thinking of it. Do you want to learn to print?" 
 " I've had some notion of it," was the reply. The 
 newspaper proprietor was both astonished and 
 puzzled astonished that such a fellow, as the boy 
 looked to be, should ever have thought of learning the 
 art of printing ; and puzzled how to convey to him 
 an idea of the absurdity of the notion. With an ex- 
 pression in his countenance, such as that which a 
 tender-hearted draper might be disposed to assume if 
 a hod-man should apply for a place in the lace de- 
 partment of his establishment, he said : " Well, my 
 boy but, you know, it takes considerable learning to 
 be a printer. Have you been to school much ? " 
 " No," said Horace, " I hav'n't had much chance at 
 school. I've read some." " What have you read ?" 
 " Well, I've read some history, and some travels, and 
 a little of most everything." 
 
 Fortunately for Horace, Mr. Amos Bliss had been
 
 10 HORACE OEEELEY. 
 
 for three years a school inspector, and had acq\\ired 
 by practice considerable facility as an examiner. He 
 could not, therefore, resist the temptation to try his 
 hand upon this queer subject. He first commenced 
 with a few easy questions, but immediately advanced 
 to the hard ones, with which he had been accustomed 
 to puzzle candidates for the office of schoolmaster. 
 Horace was a match for him. He answered every 
 question promptly, clearly, and modestly. In Mr. 
 Bliss's own account of the interview, he said : " On 
 entering into conversation and a partial examination 
 of the qualifications of my new applicant, it required 
 but little to discover that he had a mind possessed of 
 no common order, and an acquired intelligence far 
 beyond his years. He had had but little opportunity 
 at the common school, but he said 'he had read 
 some,' and what he had read he well understood and 
 remembered. In addition to the ripe intelligence 
 manifested in one so young, and whose instruction 
 had been so limited, there was a single-mindedness, 
 a truthfulness and common sense in what he said, 
 that at once commanded my regard." 
 
 The result was, that Mr. Bliss consented to take 
 Horace, and allowed him to go into the office at once. 
 At the close of the day, one of the apprentices said : 
 " You're not going to hire that tow-head, Mr. Bliss, 
 are you ? " "I am/' was the reply ; " and if you boys 
 are expecting to get any fun out of him, you'd better 
 get it quick, or you'll be too late. There is something
 
 INSTALLED IN A PRINTING OFFICE. 11 
 
 in that tow-head, as you will find out before you're 
 a week older." 
 
 The arrangements were soon settled with Horace's 
 father, when he arrived at the object of his ambition 
 by having a place assigned him in the office, " copy " 
 and a composing-stick placed in his hand, and a few 
 words of instruction given him by the foreman. This 
 was all the assistance given, and indeed all the assist- 
 ance needed : he seemed to comprehend intuitively 
 the mystery of the craft. In perfect silence, without 
 looking to the right hand or to the left, heedless of 
 the sayings and doings of the other apprentices, 
 though they were bent on mischief, and tried to at- 
 tract and distract his attention, Horace worked on, 
 hour after hour, all that day ; and when he left the 
 office at night, could set type better and faster than 
 many an apprentice who had had a month's practice. 
 The next day he worked with the same intensity. 
 The boys in the office were puzzled. They thought it 
 absolutely incumbent on them to perform an initiat- 
 ing rite of some kind ; but the new boy gave them no 
 handle, excuse, or opportunity. He committed no 
 " greenness," he spoke to no one, looked at no one, 
 and seemed utterly oblivious to everything, save only 
 his copy and type. Towards the close of the third 
 day, however, the oldest apprentice took one of the 
 large black balls with which printers used to dab the 
 ink upon the type, and, remarking that in his opinion 
 Horace's hair was of too light a hue for so black an
 
 12 HORACE CBEELEY. 
 
 art, applied the well-inked ball to his head. All the 
 men in the office stood still to observe the effect. 
 They were astonished. Horace neither spoke nor 
 moved, but went on with his work as though nothing 
 had happened. That was all the fun got out of him. 
 In a few days all were excellent friends. 
 
 During Horace's stay in East Poultney there were 
 a number of intelligent men residing there the 
 editor of the paper, the village doctor, a county judge, 
 a clergyman or two, some two or three persons of 
 political eminence, a few well-informed mechanics, 
 and others. The gentlemen had formed themselves 
 into a society, under the name of " The Lyceum," 
 which had become so famous as to attract to its 
 meetings persons who lived nine and ten miles away: 
 as a matter of course, Horace became a member, and, 
 young as he was, became, according to one of his 
 early admirers, " a real giant at the debating society." 
 His strength lay in his memory. Everything he had 
 read he remembered, because he had read attentively ; 
 his mind was stored with the most minute details of 
 important events. In the society he was never treated 
 as a boy ; his opinions were received with as much 
 deference as those of the sheriff. This is the 
 more wonderful, when his appearance is remem- 
 bered : he never made the slightest preparation 
 for the meetings. In the summer he only wore 
 two garments, a shirt and a pair of trowsers; the 
 shirt sleeves were rolled up above his elbows, and
 
 STERLING HONESTY AND FILIAL PIETY. 13 
 
 the trowsers were so short that his legs seemed thrust 
 through them. He was often jeered and laughed at 
 by the boys for his homely dress. Once, when a very 
 interesting question was to be debated at the society, 
 one of the members, noted for the elegance of his 
 dress, and his unpaid tailors' bills, advised Horace to 
 get a new " rig out" for the occasion, he having un- 
 dertaken to lead one of the sides in the debate. "No," 
 said Horace; "I guess I'd better wear my old clothes 
 than run in debt for new ones." But the reader may 
 ask, why run in debt at all ? He had forty dollars a 
 year; this surely ought to have kept him in good and 
 substantial clothing. And so it would have done if 
 he had not sent every dollar that he could save by the 
 most rigid economy to his father, who was at the time 
 struggling with the difficulties of a new farm in the 
 wilderness. This pious custom, which will ever re- 
 dound to his honour, Greeley continued during all 
 the years of his apprenticeship, and for years after- 
 wards; in fact, so long as his father's land, buildings, 
 and stock were unpaid for. 
 
 During the four years that Horace lived at East 
 Poultney, he boarded, a commom custom in America, 
 in the tavern. How he conducted himself, and 
 what he was thought of there, we learn from an 
 anecdote related by a distinguished New York phy- 
 sician, who chanced to dine at the Poultney Tavern. 
 " Did I ever tell you how and where I first saw my 
 friend Horace Greeley? Well, thus it happened, It
 
 14 HOEA.CE GltEELEY. 
 
 was one of the proudest and happiest days of my life. 
 I was a country boy then, a farmer's son; we lived a 
 few miles from East Poultney. On the day in ques- 
 tion I was sent there to sell a load of potatoes. This 
 was the first time I had been intrusted with so impor- 
 tant a piece of business. After I had sold the pota- 
 toes, I put up the horses at the tavern and went in to 
 dinner. There were a good many people at dinner, 
 the sheriff of the county and an ex-member of Con- 
 gress among them. I felt considerably abashed at 
 the first; but I had scarce begun to eat when my 
 eyes fell upon an object so singular, that I could do 
 little else than stare at it all the while it remained in 
 the room. It was a tall, pale, white-haired, ' gawky ' 
 boy, seated at the further end of the table. He was 
 in his shirt sleeves, and was eating with a rapidity and 
 awkwardness tljat I never saw equalled before or since. 
 He neither looked up or around, or appeared to pay 
 the least attention to the conversation. My first 
 thought was, ' This is a pretty sort of tavern, to let 
 such a fellow as that sit at the table with all these 
 gentlemen; he ought to dine with the ostler/ I 
 thought it strange that no one seemed to notice him. 
 And so I sat, eating little myself. At length the 
 conversation at the table became quite animated, 
 turning upon some measure of an early Congress; 
 and a question arose how certain members had voted 
 on its final passage. There was a difference of opin- 
 ion, and the sheriff, a very finely dressed personage,
 
 " ON THE ROAD." 15 
 
 to my boundless astonishment referred the matter to 
 the unaccountable boy, saying, f Ain't that right, 
 Greeley?' 'No,' said the unaccountable, without 
 looking up ; ' you're wrong/ ' There ! ' said the ex- 
 member ; ' I told you so.' e And you're wrong too/ 
 said the still devouring mystery. Then he laid down 
 his knife and fork, and gave a history of the measure, 
 explained the state of parties at the time, stated the 
 vote in dispute, named the leading advocates and op- 
 ponents of the bill, and, in short, gave a complete 
 exposition of the whole matter. A moment after, 
 and he had left the dining-room. I saw him no more, 
 until years after I met him in the streets of New York." 
 
 The printing-office at East Poultney closing, was 
 ihe signal for Horace to start upon his wanderings. 
 He had arrived at his twentieth year when he ap- 
 peared equipped for the road, his jacket on, and his 
 bundle and stick in his hand. His landlord, desiring 
 to give him some token of remembrance, addressed 
 one of the boarders thus: "Now, there is that brown 
 over-coat of yours. Horace is poor, and his father is 
 poor; you are owing me a little, as much as the old 
 coat is worth ; and what I say is, let us give the poor 
 fellow the over-coat, and call our account settled." 
 This feeling proposition was at once acceded to, the 
 landlady giving him also a pocket Bible. Thus, with 
 their united good wishes, he started upon his long 
 journey home. 
 
 By a lift in the canal boat, and walking the rest of
 
 16 HORACE GBEELEY. 
 
 the way, he arrived, tired enough, at the end of his 
 six hundred miles' journey. After resting a little 
 while, he obtained employment at Jamestown, which 
 was twenty miles away from home; but, as lie could 
 obtain no wages, he walked back again. The next 
 place he tried was Lodi, fifty miles away, but found 
 at the end of his work no wages : he returned at the 
 end of six weeks, as poor as when he first started. 
 In a few days he made another start this time to 
 Eric, thirty miles away, in the same rustic style 
 slouched hat, red cotton handkerchief, &c. After 
 being taken for a runaway apprentice, he was em- 
 ployed by Judge Sterritt on the "Eric Gazette." 
 He stayed here seven months. The judge tried 
 several times to induce him to "dress up a bit;" 
 but his unvarying reply was, " You see, my father 
 is on a poor place, and I want to help him all I can." 
 All his personal expenses, during the seven months, 
 were six dollars; the rest, with the exception of 
 fifteen dollars, kept as a reserve, he proudly handed 
 over to his father. 
 
 His engagement at Eric coming to an end, he 
 determined to try his fortune, as others had done 
 before him, in New York. After a journey, marked 
 with difficulty and deprivation, he arrived there on 
 the 18th of August, 1831. He was not troubled 
 with much property. He had ten dollars in cash, 
 the clothes on his back, the few things in his bundle, 
 and his stick ; altogether, cash and clothes, on the
 
 AT NEW YORK. 17 
 
 morning of his entrance into the great city he was 
 worth ten dollars and seventy-five cents ! He was a 
 perfect stranger : there was not one human being 
 that he could call upon for sympathy or advice ; and, 
 to make matters worse, he had all the appearance, 
 with his timid and bashful air, of an overgrown boy. 
 It certainly was not a very cheering prospect. After 
 taking breakfast at the boarding-house where he re- 
 solved to stay, he found his way to the office of the 
 "Journal of Commerce;" and was surveyed by the 
 late David Hale, one of the proprietors, who replied 
 to his application for work : " that, in his opinion, he 
 was a runaway apprentice, and that he had better re- 
 turn to his master." All that day was spent as fruit- 
 lessly ; and the next day, Saturday, with the like re- 
 sults. On the Sunday, Horace went to church twice; 
 and, as if in reward for his devotion, he heard in the 
 afternoon, from a sAoemaker, a friend of his landlord, 
 that printers were wanted at West's, 85, Chatham 
 Street. Next morning he was on the steps of the 
 office by half- past five. 
 
 Had Thomas McElrath, Esq. (who kept the book- 
 store under the office), passed thus early, and if he 
 had noticed Horace sitting on the steps, his red 
 bundle on his knees, his pale face supported on his 
 hands, his air and attitude one of dejection and 
 anxiety, he would have deemed it very improbable 
 that one day that sorry figure would be his partner, 
 $nd that he would be proud of the connection ! 
 
 c
 
 18 HORACE GRUELEY. 
 
 Horace thought it very long before any one came 
 to work on that morning ; at last one of the work- 
 men arrived, with whom he fell into conversation, 
 and was glad to find that he also was a Vermonter. 
 " I saw," said the workman subsequently, " that he 
 was an honest, good young man, and determined to 
 help him if 1 could." When the foreman arrived, 
 Horace's nevr .friend tried to interest himself in his 
 behalf. The work upon which a man was wanted, 
 was a polyglot Testament the most difficult and 
 tedious work upon which a compositor can be em- 
 ployed. Several men had already given the work up, 
 after a short trial. The foreman, with his experience 
 of compositors, no more believed that the figure before 
 him could set up a page of the Testament than that 
 he could fly. However, to soften the disappointment, 
 he said, " Set up a case, and let him try ! " When 
 Mr. West, the master, came into the office, he in- 
 quired with considerable irritation from the foreman, 
 if he had hired "that fool?" adding, " For God's sake, 
 pay him off to-night." Horace meanwhile worked on 
 with his usual diligence and in perfect silence. In 
 the evening he presented " the proof " of his day's 
 work to the foreman, who was perfectly astonished 
 to find that Horace had set up more of the Testa- 
 ment, and with fewer errors, than any compositor 
 ince the commencement of the work. Of course, 
 sending him away was now out of the question ; he 
 was an established man. But still the work was
 
 AN "OFFICE" EPISODE. 19 
 
 difficult. In order to earn tolerable wages, therefore, 
 he was in the office before six in the morning, and 
 did not leave before nine in the evening. The men 
 and boys in the office soon found an endless source 
 of amusement in his dress and appearance. His 
 attempt to change his appearance did not much mend 
 matters. One evening, when the winter had set in, 
 Horace, instead of returning immediately after tea, 
 was away for two hours. Between eight and nine, 
 as the men were assembled round the " imposing 
 stone/' a tall gentleman entered, dressed in a com 
 plete suit of faded black, and a shabby, over-brushed 
 hat. The whole figure was that of one who had seen 
 better days. Presently the gentleman advanced into 
 the strong light of the office, spreading out his hands 
 and looking down at his dress, said : " Well, boys, 
 and how do you like me now ?" " Why, its Greeley," 
 screamed one of the men. It was Greeley, conv^ted 
 into a decayed gentleman, by a Jew for five dollars. 
 Cheer upon cheer rose from the men, in which the 
 venerable gentleman joined heartily. The suit, as 
 such suits generally are, was a decided failure in 
 fact, it was a dead take-in. 
 
 After this, Horace worked at several offices for 
 about fourteen months, when it happened that the 
 idea of a newspaper for "one cent" got into the 
 head of a Dr. Sheppard; but, uot finding a printer 
 that would undertake it on his own account, he made 
 an overture to a friend of HoraceX Mr. Francis 
 
 c 2
 
 20 HORACE GUEELEY. 
 
 Story, foreman of the " Spirit of the Times," to fit 
 up an office specially to print it. Story offered 
 Greeley, for whom he had a warm friendship, a 
 share in the speculation. The capital of the two 
 printers was not very burdensome, being only one 
 hundred and fifty dollars. On the morning of Jan- 
 uary 1st, 1833, the " Morning Post" and a fearful 
 snow-storm came upon the town together. On the 
 third day of the third week the ' ' Morning Post " 
 had ceased to exist. The printers lost by the paper 
 about sixty or seventy dollars. By dint of industry, 
 however, they soon made up the loss, and were in a 
 good way of business as general printers. Unfor- 
 tunately, in the seventh month of the partnership, 
 Story, while out on a pleasure excursion, was upset 
 in a boat and drowned. Greeley, on this distressing 
 event, acted with the strictest integrity. He sent 
 Story's mother half the outstanding accounts as they 
 came in, and received in the vacant place a brother- 
 in-law of his deceased partner. 
 
 After a time another partner was added to the 
 firm : the three members being Horace Greeley, 
 Jonas Winchester, and E. Sibbett. Their united 
 capital amounting to three thousand dollars, and pos- 
 sessing, in addition, as they thought, considerable 
 editorial ability, a second newspaper was started, 
 under the title of the "New Yorker." On the 22nd 
 of March, 1834, the first number appeared, and sold 
 to the extent of one hundred copies! In September
 
 DIFFICULTIES OF NEWSPAPER SPECULATION. 21 
 
 it reached a circulation of 2500 ; the second volume 
 began with 4500. For seven years the paper gradu- 
 ally increased its circulation until it reached 9500, 
 and yet it did not pay ! It would have paid, and 
 paid well, had the subscribers paid. At the end 
 of the seventh year of the paper, Horace passed 
 through all the apprehended horrors of bankruptcy. 
 He subsequently wrote, of this period : " Through 
 most of that time I was really very poor, and four 
 years of it bankrupt, though always paying my notes 
 and keeping my word, but living as poorly as pos- 
 sible." One afternoon he went into the house of a 
 female friend, and, handing her a copy of the paper, 
 said: " There, Mrs. S., that is the last number of the 
 ' New Yorker/ you will ever see. I can secure my 
 friends against loss if I stop now, and I will not risk 
 their money by holding on any longer." He was, 
 however, over-persuaded to battle with his difficulties 
 one year more. In order to eke out the needed 
 expenses, he took the entire editorial charge of the 
 " Jeffersonian," a weekly paper; in addition to which 
 he supplied the " Daily Whig " with its leading 
 article ! But even this was not enough : during the 
 political excitement of 1840, he started another 
 paper, the "Log Cabin*," to appear weekly. An 
 edition of 20,000 was struck off and sold the first 
 day; eight thousand more were printed and sold 
 next morning, and altogether of the first paper 
 48,000 were sold. In a few days the number of
 
 22 HORACE GREKLE7. 
 
 subscribers reached 90,000 ! Finally, it and the 
 "New Yorker" gave way for the present "Tribune/' 
 which Horace started when he was scarcely solvent. 
 Any other man might have found more difficulties to 
 do this ; Greeley was known to be an honest man, 
 and therefore fearlessly trusted. The "Tribune," 
 started with six hundred subscribers. Five thousand 
 copies were with difficulty given away. The expenses 
 of the first week were five hundred and twenty-five 
 dollars, the receipts ninety -two ! This sorry pros- 
 pect soon brightened, looking lightsome and cheerful. 
 The paper was made interesting by printing extracts 
 from Carlyle, Cousin, and Moore. Dickens's "Bar- 
 naby Rudge " was printed entire in subsequent edi- 
 tions. Good reports of meetings and lectures were 
 secured. Greeley himself reported a trial of interest 
 at Utica, sending from four to nine columns per day 
 to the "Tribune." And then, to fill up his spare 
 time as if such a man ever had any spare time he 
 delivered generally two lectures in the week. The 
 lectures were thus quaintly announced : " Horace 
 Greeley will lecture before the New York Lyceum at 
 the Tabernacle this evening. Subject, Human Life. 
 The lecture will commence at half-past seven precisely. 
 If those who care to hear it will sit near the desk, they 
 will favour the lecturer's weak and husky voice." 
 
 On the 5th of February, 1 845, our hero experi- 
 enced the common fortune of New York newspaper 
 owners the total destruction by fire of the " Tri-
 
 A MEMBER OP CONGRESS. 23 
 
 bune" office. The property was worth 18,000 dol- 
 lars, and was only insured for 10,000. In this sad 
 emergency temporary offices were taken, type bor- 
 rowed from other newspaper proprietors (some of 
 these were political opponents ;) and, wonderful as it 
 may seem, the very day after the fire, the "Tribune" 
 duly came out ! This instance alone is a miracle of 
 energy and perseverance. 
 
 In 1848 Greeley became a member of Congress, 
 beating his opponent, Gen. Taylor, at the election by 
 3177 votes. The "Tribune "" had meanwhile attained 
 to the most healthy condition. The circulation was 
 always on the increase; the advertising matter so 
 large as to necessitate three, four, and five supple- 
 ments each week ; the price was increased to a shil- 
 ling a week, and that without loss of subscribers. 
 The annual profits are computed at 6000. 
 
 "The thing called Crystal Palace!" as Carlyle 
 named it, attracted two thousand Americans to Hyde 
 Park : amongst them was Horace Greeley. " Wo 
 mean," he said, "to attend the world's fair at 
 London, with very little interest in the show gene- 
 rally, or the people whom it will collect, but with 
 special reference to a subject which seems to us of 
 great and general importance namely, the improve- 
 ments recently made, or now being made, in the 
 modes of dressing flax and hemp, and preparing them 
 to be spun or woven by steam or water-power." He 
 was not much impressed with the procession at the 
 
 \
 
 24 HORACE GREELEY. 
 
 opening ; he thought a parade of the New York fire- 
 men would beat it. He could not see what the 
 master of the buck hounds, the groom of the stole, the 
 mistress of the robes, and "such uncouth fossils," had 
 to do with an exhibition of industry. Having been 
 appointed a member of the jury on hardware, he de- 
 voted a month, from ten to three each day, to the 
 duties. At the banquet he was nominated by Lord 
 Ashburnham to propose the health of Mr. Paxton. 
 The sights in London did not impress him very much; 
 the Epsom races he declined to attend, for three 
 reasons : he had much to do at home ; he did not 
 care a button which of thirty colts ran the fastest, 
 and he preferred that his delight and that of swindlers, 
 robbers, and gamblers, should not "exactly coincide." 
 While in London he spoke on slavery in Exeter 
 Hall; and gave important evidence to the Parlia- 
 mentary Committee on the " Taxes on Knowledge." 
 After being seven weeks in London he started for 
 Paris, then to Lyons, Turin, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, 
 Padua, Bologna, Venice, Milan and Rome, and back 
 to London. A rapid tour through the North of 
 England, Scotland, and Ireland, completed his travels 
 in the United Kingdom; after a good passage in the 
 " Baltic " steamship, he arrived at New York at six 
 o'clock in the morning, and, determining to be ahead 
 of all his contemporaries, he rushed to the "Tribune" 
 office, and set up with his own hands the chief news 
 brought by the boat. Only a short time elapsed
 
 INDUSTRY AND ENERGY TRIUMPHANT. 25 
 
 before the news-boys were shoutingj " Yival of the 
 Baltic; extra Tribune. " Then, and not till then, 
 might Horace be seen on his way home. 
 
 In this, the briefest sketch of this eminent man, 
 in which we have seen him rise from the most obscure 
 position, to literally take his place amongst princes, 
 there are furnished incentives and encouragements to 
 the most desponding. Here is a young man, whose 
 forte is simply industry : whose maxim and practice 
 have been the employment of every moment to some 
 good and useful purpose. That, surely, is a quality 
 which may be imitated. We do not find in Horace 
 any special or striking marks of genius : probably 
 most towns and villages could furnish a better speci- 
 men ; but, how few can compare with him in purpose 
 and determination ? We shall best imitate him, by 
 setting before us some task of usefulness, and, like 
 him, bending our whole strength, and concentrating 
 our whole energy, to its fulfilment.
 
 JAMES GORDON BENNETT: 
 
 FORMERLY FARMER'S BOY IN THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOT- 
 LAND, AND NOW THE "WALTER" OF AMERICA, EDITOR 
 AND PROPRIETOR OF THE "NEW YORK HERALD," THE 
 LEADING AMERICAN NEWSPAPER. 
 
 No doubt every good man and every great man has 
 done things which he has afterwards regretted ; and 
 no doubt the life of James Gordon Bennett contains 
 circumstances which his friends would desire it did 
 not contain. But then, this remark is applicable to 
 the life of every man, be his position what it may. 
 Our business is to profit by the experience of others 
 to rendw the actions of their lives subservient to oui 
 good ; and to preserve so much of their example as 
 may be valuable to posterity. The subject of our 
 present sketch is the proprietor, editor, and presiding 
 genius of the "New York Herald," the most-widely 
 circulated newspaper in America ; a paper occupying 
 the position in that continent that the " Times" does 
 in England. 
 
 James Gordon Bennett was born at New Mill, 
 Keith, in the romantic county of Banff, Scotland, in 
 the year 1800, The family consisted of his father,
 
 SCHOOL DAYS. 27 
 
 mother, and three other children : Margaret, Annie, 
 and Cosmo. The occupations of the district were 
 chiefly pastoral, besides stocking-knitting and flax- 
 dressing ; at some one of these it is understood the 
 senior members of the family found employment. 
 Bennett was early sent to school in the neighbour- 
 hood, and remained there fourteen or fifteen years, 
 when he went to Aberdeen, and resided there two or 
 three years attending a seminary, being intended, like 
 his brother Cosmo, for the ministry. As a boy he 
 possessed good natural abilities, was of a poetic turn 
 of mind, enthusiastic, fond of solitary rambles, 
 punctilious on points of honour with his school- 
 mates, and full of confidence in his own powers. 
 He early contracted good habits, pursuing his studies 
 with zeal, and had an ambition in everything to 
 excel. He is said to have been of a generous, noble 
 disposition. In reference to his student life at Aber- 
 deen, he thus writes : 
 
 " At the seminary which I attended when a youth, 
 situated on the banks of the Dee, on the bosom of a 
 range of dark heath-clad hills, our teachers mixed in 
 all our sports, took part in all our play, and would go 
 down with us to the river, undress like the boys, 
 plunge into the clear water, and swim away like ducks 
 among the whole group. In music, dancing, playing, 
 and swimming, our teachers mingled with us just like 
 brothers on a footing of perfect equality. It was 
 only during the hours of study that the difference of
 
 2b JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 pupil and preceptor was visible." " Oh, those happy, 
 happy days, when I studied Virgil in the morning, 
 played at ball in the afternoon, and swam through 
 the warm translucent pools just as the sun receded 
 from the eye beneath the high, dark mountains of 
 another land/' 
 
 Bennett began to put on the armour of manliness 
 very soon after he left the parental abode. In other 
 words, he was inclined to think for himself, and, with 
 a degree of self-reliance extraordinary in a youth, to 
 act upon his thinking. The history of the world had 
 taught him the necessity of maintaining an indepen- 
 dent spirit, and it happened that the show of inde- 
 pendence in his case was evolved by his daring to 
 entertain sentiments opposed to the peculiar religious 
 tenets of his ancestors, and in Avhich he himself had 
 been educated. He had been reared in the inculca- 
 tion and practice of certain religious externals, but 
 he could not be misled by what he conceived to be 
 the formality and the error of either one sect or 
 another. He believed he detected the prevailing 
 faults of most of them, and was disposed at all 
 hazards to break from allegiance to any particular 
 form in which he had been brought up. He has 
 said that he used to sit by the river-side, and regret 
 that the world was not blessed with one universal 
 belief in matters of religion with one sect only. 
 
 At Aberdeen he pursued the usual routine of 
 college life, besides reading every book that came in
 
 SELF RELIANCE. 29 
 
 his reach. He belonged also to a literary club, 
 which used to meet in the grammar school, in the 
 same room where Byron once conned the lessons of 
 his youth. 
 
 Bennett was a boy when he broke loose from the 
 discipline and restraints of school, and owned no 
 master but himself. The thought of being educated 
 to sacrifice his personal independence at the dictation 
 of any Church was insupportable to him. He 
 seemed to himself to be destined to grapple with the 
 world in a foot to foot and hand to hand contest, 
 and he prepared himself by every means for the 
 coming struggle. Excited by the histories which he 
 had read, the scenes of Scotland's progress had a great 
 charm for him, and on every vacation he travelled 
 to behold the identical spots consecrated by the valour 
 of the men of the past. He left Keith in 1815, never 
 to return to it except as a visitor. From that time to 
 the period of his embarkation for America, he ap- 
 pears to have divided his time between study and tra- 
 velling. The life of " Benjamin Franklin, written by 
 himself," and published in Scotland in 1817, seems 
 to have encouraged the disposition in him to seek his 
 own fortune ; and the influence of the career of 
 Napoleon probably was not slight upon his naturally 
 ambitious and aspiring spirit. 
 
 Bennett visited Glasgow for the first time in 1817, 
 and has left on record a graphic account of the im- 
 pressions made by all he saw and heard whilst there,
 
 80 JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 He says : " I did not then know much of Walter 
 Scott, for he was comparatively unknown. His 
 novels were just coming into notice. All Scotland 
 was getting mad, and even then I panted, at that 
 early age, for the like fame and distinction which 
 were forming into a halo of glory around the great 
 Unknown. Educated in the best and highest prin- 
 ciples of morality, of virtue, of literature, my past 
 life looks like a romance. Before I was twenty I 
 had wept tears of joy over every consecrated spot in 
 my own native land/' 
 
 As far as can be ascertained, the enthusiastic lad 
 even at this period had signified his intention of 
 being no longer a charge to his parents. His educa- 
 tion had been sufficient to enable him to fly to it as a 
 resource in any emergency ; and though he was too 
 much tempted to cultivate the acquaintance of the 
 muses to grapple with the safer rules of human des- 
 tiny, yet he was prepared to undergo every peril and 
 privation to become a free man, subject to no control 
 except that of his own taste and conscience. There 
 was one circumstance, however, that was favourable 
 to the future usefulness of the boy. He did not 
 spurn the valuable lessons of history, or the mental 
 and moral experience of philosophers. Besides, he 
 was zealous to acquaint himself with the wisdom of 
 the best writers of every nation, and thus he laid the 
 foundation for following up their investigations as he 
 himself grew older, in a contest with the reality of
 
 VISITS AMERICA. 31 
 
 practical life. Uncertain as to the end to which this 
 determination would lead him, he seems to have 
 entertained dreams of visiting America, as a field 
 that promised to realize something of the ardent an- 
 ticipations of youth. At the time, the emigration 
 from Scotland to the British North American pro- 
 vinces and the United States amounted to a passion 
 with the people. Sometimes two thousand persons 
 would embark in a single week. The fever had its 
 effect on young Bennett, and he was prepared to 
 change the uncertain and doubtful prospects before 
 him in Scotland for the opportunities which might 
 arise in a land more marked by enterprise and more 
 favourable to talent and industry. 
 
 "My leaving Scotland," Mr. Bennett has said, 
 " was an act of impulse little judgment. I resided 
 at Aberdeen. I had a few literary associates imbued 
 with the same tastes, and passionately attached to 
 the same pursuits. I met one of them one day in 
 the street ; he said : 
 
 " ( I am going to America, Bennett/ 
 
 " ' To America ! When ? when ? ' 
 
 " ' I am going to Halifax on the 6th of April/ 
 
 " I mused, I thought, I spoke. 
 
 " ' William, my dear fellow, Fll go with you. I 
 want to see the place where Franklin was born. 
 Have you read his life ?' 
 
 "On the 6th of April, 1819, I prepared for em- 
 barkation. The vessel was to sail in the evening.
 
 32 JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 All the morning, up to the noon of that day, I spent 
 on the banks of the Dee, where it meets with the 
 ocean." 
 
 Such was the rapidity with which the visit to 
 America was decided upon, thus soon was the youth- 
 ful adventurer at sea, with his thoughts alternately 
 turned to the east and to the west. He had no 
 money beyond a small sum, which he calculated 
 would defray his expenses for a few days till employ- 
 ment could be obtained. At length he found himself 
 at Halifax, where he commenced the labours of his 
 new life by teaching. In this occupation, to which 
 necessity rather than choice called him, he persevered 
 for a time ; but his experiences were not of the most 
 agreeable kind. Among incidents of this kiud of 
 life one may be mentioned, that will serve to illus- 
 trate the character of the young pedagogue. He had 
 been engaged three months in instructing a very dull 
 boy in the art of book-keeping. When the term 
 expired Bennett, who needed the sum of ten dollars 
 due for tuition, sent his bill to the mother of the lad 
 for payment. In due course she called on Bennett, 
 and with tears in her eyes expressed her sorrow and 
 regret that her boy had not availed himself of the 
 opportunities of learning which she, in her poverty, 
 had desired to afford him. She spoke of the payment 
 as a sad loss to her, and one which must give her no 
 little uneasiness, but did not do so until she had 
 settled the bill and taken a receipt. As she took her
 
 EAB-LY STRUGGLES AND WANT. 33 
 
 leave of the schoolmaster, he slipped the money he 
 had received into her hand again, and with a few 
 words of good cheer, bade her farewell. His ne- 
 cessities at this time would have been much alleviated 
 by retaining the money, which he had thus volun- 
 tarily relinquished; but he contrasted his strength 
 and ability to earn with that of the poor widow, and 
 did riot long feel his loss, poor and friendless as he 
 was a stranger in a strange land. 
 
 As far as is ascertainable, Bennett's entire residence 
 at Halifax was marked by a severe struggle for exist- 
 ence, and it is not to be wondered at that he should 
 have remained there but a short time. In the sum- 
 mer, or autumn, of 1819, he was in the territory of 
 Maine, and thence he embarked in a schooner for 
 Boston, his emotions on first visiting which place 
 were scarcely ever after effaced from his recollection. 
 Mr. Bennett's experience at Boston, at first, was as 
 severe as can be well imagined. He knew no one 
 there, and, being soon entirely without money or 
 employment, knew not what course to pursue. He 
 made several desperate struggles to find employment 
 suited to his capacity; but his youth, and the fact of 
 his being a stranger, operated unfavourably with him. 
 One day, he was walking on what is called the 
 Common, despairing almost of all hope, and com- 
 plaining alike of the callousness of the world and the 
 severity of Providence. He had had no food for two 
 days, and knew no means by which he could procure
 
 34 JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 any, without becoming a mendicant. In this di- 
 lemma, as he paced the ground, and debated with 
 himself on the mysterious ways of Providence, and 
 was propounding to himself the now really serious 
 question : " How shall I feed myself?" he saw upon 
 the ground something that seemed to look him 
 directly in the face. He started back, paused, and, 
 having recovered from his surprise, picked up a York 
 shilling. This gave him courage. It appeared to be 
 a special gift at the moment, at once rebuking his 
 complaints and encouraging him to persevere. He 
 treated it as a good omen; for, having obtained some- 
 thing to eat, he at once went to work in earnest for 
 employment. He soon found a Mr. Wells, a country- 
 man of his, to whom he made known his history. 
 This gentleman had been a pupil of the celebrated 
 Joseph Priestly, and he listened to the story of the 
 young adventurer with much interest, and finally 
 invited him to take a clerkship, or salesman's place, 
 in his establishment. From this post he was trans- 
 ferred to be proof-reader in the printing office of 
 Wells and Lilly, then a leading firm in the book 
 trade of the United States. Here he had facilities 
 for adding to his stock of knowledge, in addition to 
 the counsels of one of the best scholars known to the 
 book trade of the country. While Bennett was with 
 the firm he appears to have pursued his studies with 
 his usual ardour, and to have used his time with 
 more discretion than is ordinarily displayed by young
 
 HIS NEWSPAPER EXPERIENCES. 35 
 
 men of his age. There is no evidence that he had 
 any taste for the pleasures, as they are called, which 
 destroy the best hours, and too frequently the best 
 energies, of young men. He was, at least, now ready 
 to try his temper and spirits in a conflict with the 
 world, as it stood before him, and hemmed him in 
 on all sides. 
 
 About this time, Mr. Bennett composed a con- 
 siderable amount of poetry ; but he was never much 
 distinguished in this class of composition. At the 
 time referred to, the majority of the then existing 
 newspapers, in the different cities of the American 
 Union, were wretched specimens of journalism, and 
 those of Boston and New York did not form any 
 exception to the common rule. Mr. Bennett, how- 
 ever, studied these journals, such as they were, as 
 well as the conductors of them. He gathered, from 
 their conduct and representations of public opinion, 
 the true temper of the men he aspired ultimately to 
 rival and excel, as well as the condition of society. 
 His experience, so far, in the literature of the country, 
 had enabled him to forsee that there would open, 
 eventually, a field for his active, and industrious, and 
 enterprising habits. He found his way to New York 
 as early as 1822, where, having toiled a little ex- 
 perimentally upon the press, he was fortunate enough 
 to meet with a Mr. S. Wilmington, the proprietor of 
 the " Charleston (South Carolina) Courier." He ac- 
 cepted a situation on that journal, where he was 
 
 D 2
 
 36 JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 employed chiefly, in 1823, in making translations of 
 the news from the Spanish papers received by way of 
 Havannah ; in addition to this, he wrote generally 
 for the " Courier ;" and from Mr. Wilmington's en- 
 terprise in boarding vessels far off at sea, in order to 
 obtain the earliest news, took his first lesson in that 
 system of journalism which he subsequently was in- 
 strumental in raising to comparative perfection, first, 
 by suggesting possibilities to others with whom he 
 was associated, and secondly, at a late day, by exe- 
 cuting, according to his own views, and entirely 
 without regard to cost, an elaborate but completely 
 organized system of news expresses. 
 
 "When Mr. Bennett arrived in New York from 
 Charleston, he was uncertain as to the best course 
 to be pursued to obtain a livelihood. He attempted, 
 however, a renewal of his old profession of a school- 
 master, and in October issued an address to the 
 citizens of New York, in furtherance of the intention. 
 He was again unsuccessful in this undertaking ; and 
 subsequently we find him delivering lectures on 
 political economy in the old Dutch Church, Anne 
 Street, New York. 
 
 In 1825, Bennett made his first attempt to become 
 the proprietor of a public journal. At the commence- 
 ment of the year, a John Tryon published a newspaper 
 called the ' ' New York Courier." Mr. Bennett wrote 
 for it for some time, at a small salary, such as would 
 have been spurncJ as unsatisfactory wages by any
 
 "THE NEW YORK HERALD." 37 
 
 merchant's carman or porter. After a time, Tryon 
 found that the people were not ready to support his 
 new enterprise, and appeals to the advertising 
 community did not save him from loss. Bennett 
 purchased the establishment ; but ultimately it was 
 again transferred into the hands of its original 
 proprietor. Bennett was very successful as a writer 
 and reporter at this period, and was employed at 
 different times, as occasion prompted, on different 
 journals. He was chiefly employed, however, upon 
 the columns of the " National Advocate ; " he also 
 contributed to the " Mercantile Advertiser," " Wash- 
 ington Inquirer/' "New York Courier and Enquirer," 
 " New York Globe," " New York Mirror," " Phila- 
 delphia Pennsylvanian," and other newspapers, to 
 say nothing of his contributions and literary ventures 
 of another class. It is not our purpose, however, to 
 follow him through the varying success that attended 
 his literary speculations, to express any opinion upon 
 his mode of conducting them, or the particular views 
 he advocated. The great fact of his life was the 
 establishment of the " New York Herald," in May, 
 1835. Penny newspapers had then only recently 
 been attempted. The thing was quite new to the 
 public, whose appreciation of the change was at one 
 time doubtful; the old prejudice operating that 
 if a thing was cheap, it must of necessity be de- 
 ficieut in quality. Bennett, however, took the in- 
 itiative. He published the " Herald " daily at two
 
 88 JAMES GORDON BENNETT. 
 
 cents., or one penny. At first it was conducted with 
 necessary caution as regards expense, but in a style, 
 at least, to command attention. Opinions now vary 
 as to Bennett's mode of management of the "Herald," 
 according to the clashing interests or prejudices of 
 parties for or against him. One thing is certain, 
 that by indomitable energy, tact, and. perseverance, 
 he has reared a colossal establishment of material and 
 intellectual power. The " Herald" is read in every 
 portion of the globe where its correspondents reside, 
 and its circulation is larger than that of any other 
 American newspaper. Bennett is now a rich man ; 
 his life has its uses, as exhibiting to our youth what 
 may be accomplished under the most adverse and 
 trying circumstances, by perseverance, energy, and 
 self reliance.
 
 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON 
 ROBERT, THE RAILWAY KINGS. 
 
 THE COW-BOY, AFTERWARDS THE CHEAT ENGINEER. 
 
 SAM SLICK described very accurately the use of Ameri- 
 can railways. " What is it," he said, " what is it that 
 ' fetters' the heels of a young country, and hangs like 
 a ' poke' around its neck ? that retards the cultivation 
 of its soil, and the improvement of its fisheries ? the 
 high price of labour, I guess. Well, what's a railroad? 
 The substitution of mechanical for human and animal 
 labour, on a scale as grand as our great country. 
 Labour is dear in America, and cheap in Europe. A 
 railroad, therefore, is comparatively no manner of use 
 to them, to what it is to us ; it does wonders there, but 
 it works miracles here. There it makes the old man 
 younger, but here it makes a child a giant. To us it 
 is river, bridge, road, and canal, all in one. It saves 
 what we hain't got to spare, men, horses, carts, vessels, 
 barges, and, what's all in all time." 
 
 George Stephenson and his son Robert have been 
 mainly instrumental in bringing about the present 
 splendid system of railways, both in this country and 
 In America j therefore, their names and services will
 
 40 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 not be unremembered while the English language is 
 spoken, or commerce has an existence. Strange as it 
 assuredly is, the most imaginative fancy cannot con- 
 ceive a more unpromising " start in life" than that 
 experienced by George. He and his son have achieved 
 a reputation and attained a success, when taken into 
 account with their commencement, that is unequalled 
 in the most marvellous biographical annals, and stands 
 out as a star and beacon for all future wayfarers, and 
 poor but resolute workmen. The eminence George 
 attained was the result of his own individual efforts ; 
 birth, station, education, or any accidental condition 
 had nothing to do with his destiny. 
 
 The home in which George was born is situated 
 about eight miles from Newcastle-on-Tyne, in the 
 colliery village called Wylam. It was, like the other 
 cottages in the village, unplastered, had a clay floor, 
 and was open to the rafters. " Old Bob," the father 
 of George, had a deserved reputation for industry and 
 carefulness; he was much respected amongst his 
 humble neighbours. He was fond of birds, he loved 
 children, and could tell a good story. Mabel Stephen- 
 son is described as a " rale canny body" held in high 
 repute by the wives of the village. " Old Bob" worked 
 at the Wylam colliery ; for his services as fireman at 
 the pumping engine he received twelve shillings per 
 week, upon which he had to keep the eight members 
 of his family. Paying for the schooling of any of the 
 children out of that pitt;m^o \^s of Bourse out of tlm
 
 George Stephenson constructing his First Steam-Engiue.
 
 SMALL BEGINNINGS. 41 
 
 question. But the father could teach George some- 
 thing he could take him birds-nesting, and give 
 him a love for natural history, as well as make him 
 industrious. This he did, and his lessons were never 
 forgotten. 
 
 George's first employment was to carry his father's 
 dinner to the engine-house, and to amuse the children 
 keeping them out of the way of the waggons, which 
 ran on the tram-way before his father's cottage. When 
 he had attained his eighth year, he was employed by a 
 farmer to take care of the cows, and to close the gates 
 at night after the waggons had passed through. For 
 these various duties he received twopence per day. 
 The spare time which these occupations left him, was 
 devoted to modelling engines in clay, and making 
 imaginary steam-pipes from the reeds which grew 
 around him. The place is still pointed out " just 
 aboon the cut end," as the people of the hamlet de- 
 scribe it, where the future engineer made his first 
 essays in engine-making. When George grew older, 
 and more able to work, he was set to lead the horses 
 in ploughing, and to hoe turnips, at the advanced wages 
 of fourpence a day. Then he was taken on at the 
 colliery as a " picker," at sixpence a day, whence he 
 was advanced to be driver of the gin-horse at eight- 
 pence; and there are those who still remember him 
 in that capacity as a " grit bare-legged laddie," whom 
 they describe as " quick-witted, and full of fun and 
 tricks." He himself had some misgivings as to his
 
 42 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 physical dimensions, and was wont to hide himself, 
 when the owner of the colliery went round, lest he 
 should be thought too little a boy to earn his small 
 wages. He had determined to be an engineman; and 
 great therefore was his exultation, when at about 
 fourteen years of age, he was appointed fireman at the 
 wages of one shilling a day ; when he was raised to 
 twelve shillings per week, he exclaimed, in the pride 
 of his elevation " Now I'm a made man for life \" 
 At the age of seventeen, George had got ahead of his 
 father as a workman. He was appointed plugman of 
 a pumping engine, while his father worked it as fire- 
 man. In order to discharge his duties with credit, all 
 his leisure time was devoted to cleaning, taking to 
 pieces, and putting together again, the engine under 
 his charge. By this means, he gained a thorough 
 knowledge of its construction, at the same time that 
 he gave vent to his mechanical tastes. 
 
 When he was eighteen years of age, he learned 
 that all the details of the engines made by Watt and 
 Bolton were described in books. This was incentive 
 enough to learn to read ; for up to this time he was 
 ignorant of the art. He went, grown man as he was, 
 to a night-school, at threepence a week, to learn the 
 alphabet. By practising " pot-hooks " in his spare 
 moments, by the time he was nineteen he could write 
 his own name a thing that many of the barons of the 
 middle ages could not do. Then, not content with 
 the progress he had made, he went to school to Andrew
 
 MARRIAGE AND MATERIAL PROGRESS. 43 
 
 Robertson, who taught him figures, but whose know- 
 ledge could not have been very profound, as the pupil 
 eoon outstripped the master. George worked out the 
 sums in his bye-hours, improving every minute of his 
 spare time by the engine-fire, solving the arithmetical 
 problems set him upon his slate by his master, so that 
 he soon became well advanced in arithmetic. 
 
 When George had attained his twentieth year, his 
 wages were from thirty-five to forty shillings per week. 
 In order to increase these earnings, he learned to make 
 and mend the shoes of his fellow workmen. When 
 he had soled the shoes of his sweetheart, Fanny 
 Henderson, he was so delighted with the " capital job 
 he had made of them," that he carried them about 
 with him on the Sunday to exhibit them to his friends. 
 His first guinea was saved from shoemaking ; this was 
 followed by other savings, until sufficient was obtained 
 to furnish a humble house and to marry Fanny, who 
 was taken to her new home on a borrowed horse, sitting 
 behind her husband. His industry was increased, if 
 that was possible, after his marriage. Subsequent to 
 this event, an alarm of fire caused his well-intentioned 
 neighbours to flood his house with water, so that his 
 clock was spoiled. As he could not afford to take it 
 to the clockmaker to have it cleaned, he took it to 
 pieces himself, put it together again, and thus became 
 clock-curer for the neighbourhood. On the site of 
 the cottage then occupied by George, there has since 
 been erected the Stephenson Memorial Schools, The
 
 44 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 late Mr. Robert Stephenson took deep interest in the 
 erection of the building, which it was proposed to 
 dedicate to the mempry of his father, but which is 
 now dedicated to the memory of father and son. 
 After working about three years as breaksman at 
 Willington, George removed to Killingworth, about 
 seven miles north of Newcastle. It was at this place 
 that he acquired the reputation of being an inventor, 
 and where his mechanical ability had an opportunity 
 of becoming fully developed. But it was here also 
 that he lost his excellent wife his dearly-loved 
 Fanny, who left him with one child the world- 
 famed Robert. While mourning his loss, George 
 had a situation offered him to superintend an engine 
 near Montrose. This invitation he accepted, and, 
 leaving Robert in charge of a neighbour, set out 
 with his kit upon his back, and accomplished his long 
 journey on foot. During his absence, his father, old 
 Robert Stephenson, met with an accident while 
 making some repairs to an engine ; he had been se- 
 verely scorched, by which his eyesight was destroyed. 
 George's first act, on his return, was to pay out of 
 the 28 his year's savings 15, the amount of 
 his father's debts. He soon after removed his pa- 
 rents to a comfortable cottage near his own. 
 
 He was anxious at this time to send his son to 
 school. He had, in his own instance, found out the 
 value of education, and resolved that Robert should 
 have the advantages of which he had been denied.
 
 HIS CURIOUS INVENTIONS. 45 
 
 In a speech which he delivered long afterwards, he 
 tells us how this was effected. " In the earlier period 
 of my career," he said, " when Robert was a little 
 boy, I saw how deficient I was in education ; and I 
 made up my mind that he should not labour under 
 the same defect, but that I would put him to school, 
 and give him a liberal training. I was, however, a 
 a poor man ; and how do you think I managed ? I 
 betook myself to mending my neighbours' clocks and 
 watches at night, after my daily labour was done ; 
 and thus I procured the means of educating my son." 
 
 The incident which obtained George the fame of 
 being an engine -doctor, arose from an atmospheric 
 engine at the Killingworth High Pit being unable to 
 clear the water from the works. George saw the 
 defect of the engine, and undertook to send the 
 workmen to the bottom in a week. This promise he 
 fulfilled, and received as a reward for his services .10. 
 
 This led to his becoming the engineer to the Kil- 
 lingworth Colliery. One of his improvements in the 
 coal mines reduced the number of horses required, 
 from one hundred to fifteen. He kept up his fame by 
 all sorts of contrivances in the cottages of the colliers. 
 One of his inventions was a " fley craw," to protect 
 his garden-crops from the ravages of birds. To the 
 delight of the women, he managed to make the 
 smoke-jacks rock their cradles. To the clock of the 
 watchman he attached an alarum, and invented a lamp 
 which would burn under water. By dint of this
 
 46 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 industry he was enabled to put together ^6100, to 
 give his son Robert an education as he proposed. 
 
 While at Killingworth, George went to see the 
 engines which were working on the tramway at 
 Wylam. After seeing one at work, he said "he 
 could make a better one go upon legs." One of the 
 lessees of Killingworth Colliery Lord Ravensworth 
 hearing George's remark, authorized him to try 
 his hand at fashioning a locomotive. He immediately 
 set to work, and completed his engine in about ten 
 months. It was tried on the 25th of July, 1814, and 
 drew eight carriages about thirty tons at about 
 four miles an hour. Subsequently, George invented 
 the steam blast, which more than doubled the power 
 of the engine. An accident having occurred in one 
 of the pits, drew his attention to devising means 
 to prevent explosions, which resulted in the con- 
 struction of the Geordy Safety Lamp, which was prior 
 to Sir Humphrey Davey's invention. 
 
 In 1822, George obtained his first railway engineer- 
 ing appointment. It was a line made for the Hetton 
 Coal Company, about eight miles in length. It was 
 opened in the November of 1 822, on which occasion 
 five engines, constructed by George, drew separately 
 seventeen waggons, weighing sixty-four tons, at the 
 rate of four miles an hour. 
 
 When the Stockton and Darlington Railway was 
 projected, George offered his services to the director, 
 Mr. Pease, the celebrated Quaker of Darlington.
 
 PROPHECIES THE SUCCESS OP RAILWAYS. 47 
 
 He was appointed to the responsible position of en- 
 gineer to the company, at a salary of 300 per 
 annum. The work was all laid out by himself. 
 Many country people remember him in his top boots 
 and breeches, and can tell how pleasantly he chatted 
 with them as he took his chance dinners of bread 
 and milk at the farmhouses or road-side cottages. 
 One day, when the works were near completion, 
 George dined with his son Robert and his assistant, 
 John Dixon, at Stockton. After dinner he addressed 
 them thus : " Now, lads, I will tell you that I think 
 you will live to see the day, though I may not live so 
 long, when railways will come to supersede almost all 
 other methods of conveyance in this country ; when 
 mail-coaches will go by railway, and railroads will 
 become the great highway for the king and all his 
 subjects. The time is coming when it will be cheaper 
 for a working man to travel on a railway than to 
 walk on foot. I know there are great and almost 
 insurmountable obstacles that will have to be en- 
 countered. But what I have said will come to pass, 
 as sure as I live. I only wish I may live to see the 
 day, though that I can scarcely hope for, as I know 
 how slow human progress is, and with what difficulty 
 I have been able to get the locomotive adopted, not- 
 withstanding my more than ten years' successful 
 experiment at Killingworth." How this prophecy 
 has come to pass every man and woman in the 
 United Kingdom is witness.
 
 48 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBEW. 
 
 In September, 1825, the line was opened, and was 
 found to work excellently, the traffic in goods and 
 passengers being beyond expectation. The next im- 
 portant work which George undertook was the sur- 
 veying of the Manchester and Liverpool Railway. 
 This was a work of considerable difficulty, owing to 
 the opposition of the owners of the land. Lord 
 Derby's tenants, and Lord Sefton's keepers, with the 
 Duke of Bridgewater's retainers, not only opposed the 
 survey, but threatened to duck George in a pond if 
 he proceeded. Despite these obstacles, the survey 
 was made. When the bill for the railway was intro- 
 duced into the House of Commons, a committee 
 examined George, subjecting him to a severe cross- 
 examination upon his plans. The canal proprietors 
 and land owners having secured a great array of legal 
 talent to oppose the laying down of the line, George, 
 in afterwards relating his experience, said : " I had to 
 place myself in that most unpleasant of all positions 
 the witness-box of a parliamentary committee. I 
 was not long in it before I began to wish for a hole 
 to creep out at. I could not find words to satisfy 
 either the committee or myself. I was subjected to 
 the cross-examination of eight or ten barristers, pur- 
 posely, as far as possible, to bewilder me. One 
 member of the committee asked if I was a foreigner ; 
 and another hinted that I was mad. But I put up 
 with every rebuft", and went on with my plans, de- 
 termined not to be put Uown." After examining
 
 KAILWA1 DIFFICULTIES CHAT MOSS. 49 
 
 George for three days, it was deemed advisable to 
 withdraw the bill ; but the directors, with great spirit, 
 ordered a fresh survey. This time the bill passed the 
 Commons, and was only opposed in the House of 
 Lords by the Earls Derby and Wilton. No one at 
 the present day is more convenienced than the Earl 
 of Derby by the railway system : the Manchester and 
 Liverpool rail conveys his family carriage almost to 
 his own door. But, at the time when railways were 
 first broached, it was the fashion not only to oppose 
 them, but to ridicule and laugh them down. One of 
 the leading reviews of the day said : " What can be 
 more perfectly absurd and ridiculous than the prospect 
 held out of locomotives travelling twice as fast as stage- 
 coaches ? We should as soon expect the people of 
 Woolwich to suffer themselves to be fired off upon 
 one of Congreve's ricochet rockets, as trust themselves 
 to a machine going at such a rate. We will back 
 Old Father Thames against the Woolwich railway 
 for any sum." One of the counsel before the parlia- 
 mentary committee said : " Who but Mr. Stephens on 
 would have thought of carrying a railway over Chat 
 Moss ? it was ignorance inconceivable it was perfect 
 madness." Mr. Giles, an eminent engineer, said the 
 rail across the Moss would cost 270,000; Stephen- 
 son completed it for 28,000. 
 
 George received the appointment of chief engineer 
 to the works, at a salary of 1000 per annum. His 
 great difficulty was Chat Moss ; but this was ulti- 
 

 
 50 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND UIS SON EGBERT. 
 
 mately completed, to the astonishment of the most 
 eminent engineers. During the progress of the 
 work, the directors offered a prize of 500 for the 
 best locomotive : ten miles an hour was all the speed 
 desired. George and his son Robert set about the 
 construction of their famous " Rocket" engine. On 
 the day of trial four engines entered for the contest. 
 The " Rocket" was first ready, and drew after it 
 thirteen tons weight in waggons, and attained a speed 
 of twenty-nine miles an hour. The other engines 
 were failures, so that the Stephensons were awarded 
 the prize. 
 
 From this period may be dated the commencement 
 of the formation of those huge railway works which 
 thread and cross the United Kingdom, in the con- 
 struction of which George and his son have been 
 immediately connected. 
 
 In 1835 George and his son were consulted by 
 Leopold, King of the Belgians, relative to the forma- 
 tion of railways in his kingdom. For the services 
 rendered, the king bestowed upon George the honour 
 of an appointment of Knight of the Order of Leopold. 
 This honour was subsequently bestowed upon Robert. 
 When in Belgium the engineers invited George to a 
 magnificent banquet at Brussels. The day following 
 he had an interview with King Leopold. No sooner 
 had he returned from Belgium than he received a 
 request to go to Spain, to report upon the projected 
 Royal North of Spain Railway. After thus spending
 
 "PUT BY THAT STICK, MY MAN." 5 1 
 
 the prime of his life in works that will prove a bless- 
 ing to future generations, he retired to Tapton House, 
 with the intention of enjoying his love of nature, first 
 implanted in him by his father during their bird- 
 nesting excursions. But he was not idle by any 
 means. The same spirit that enabled him to rival all 
 competitors in railway plans, induced him to desire to 
 excel his neighbours in the growth of fruit and 
 flowers. His grapes took the first prize at an exhi- 
 bition open to all England. "Young men would call 
 upon him for advice or assistance in commencing a 
 professional career. When he noted their industry, 
 prudence, and good sense, he was always ready. 
 But, hating foppery above all things, he would re- 
 prove any tendency to this weakness which he 
 observed in the applicants. One day a youth, desir- 
 ous of becoming an engineer, called upon him, 
 flourishing a gold-headed cane. Mr. Stephenson 
 said : ' Put by that stick, my man, and then I will 
 speak to you/ To another extensively-decorated 
 young man, he said : ' You will, I hope, excuse me ; 
 I am a plain-spoken person, and am sorry to see a 
 nice-looking and rather clever young man like you 
 disfigured with that fine-patterned waistcoat, and all 
 these chains and fang-dangs. If I, sir, had bothered 
 my head with such things when at your age, I would 
 not have been where I am now/ " 
 
 During his retirement, George Stephenson was 
 often the guest of Sir Robert Peel, who, more than 
 
 E 2
 
 52 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON EGBERT. 
 
 once, offered him the honour of knighthood, which 
 he steadily refused. On one occasion, being applied 
 to for the ornamental initials of his name, to be 
 introduced in a work to be dedicated to him, he said : 
 "I have to state that I have no flourishes to my 
 name, either before or after ; and that I think it will 
 be as well if you merely say ' George Stephenson.' 
 It is true that I am a Belgian knight, but I do not 
 wish to have any use made of it. I have had the 
 honour of knighthood of my own country offered me 
 several times, but would not have it. I have been 
 invited to become a Fellow of the Royal Society, and 
 also of the Civil Engineers' Society, but objected to 
 the empty addition to my name. I am a member of 
 the Geological Society, and have consented to be- 
 come president of, I believe, a highly-respectable 
 mechanics' institution at Birmingham." 
 
 After attending a meeting at Birmingham, and 
 reading a paper, " On the Fallacies of the Rotary 
 Engine," a sudden effusion of blood deprived the 
 country of one of its greatest benefactors. He died 
 on the 12th of August, 1848, in the 67th year of his 
 age, leaving his son Robert to carry out many noble 
 monuments to perpetuate for all time the genius and 
 perseverance of the Stephensons, Robert's services 
 are thus recorded in the "English Cyclopaedia" of 
 Mr. Charles Knight : 
 
 " Robert Stephenson was born at Willingtou, on 
 December 16, 1803. His father, who had felt the
 
 EARLY DAYS AND STUDIES OF ROBERT. 53 
 
 want of early education, resolved that his son should 
 not suffer from the same cause, and accordingly, 
 though at that time he could ill afford it, sent him to 
 school at Long Benton, and in 1814, placed him with 
 Mr. Bruce at Newcastle. Robert soon displayed a 
 decided inclination for mechanics and science, and, 
 becoming a member of the Newcastle Literary and 
 Philosophical Institution, was enabled to take advan- 
 tage of its library ; so that, as the Saturday afternoons 
 were spent with his father, the volume which he in- 
 variably took home with him formed the subject of 
 mutual instruction to father and son. Robert's assi- 
 duity attracted the attention of 'the Rev. William 
 Turner, one of the secretaries to the institution, who 
 readily assisted him in his studies, and was also of 
 much service to his father, with whom he soon after 
 became acquainted. Under Mr. Bruce, Robert ac- 
 quired the rudiments of a sound practical education, 
 and, under his father's direction, was always ready to 
 turn his acquirements to account. There still exists, 
 in the wall over the door of the cottage at Killing- 
 worth, a sun-dial of their joint production, of which 
 the father was always proud. In 1818, Robert was 
 taken from school arid apprenticed to Mr. Nicholas 
 Wood, as a coal-viewer, acting as under viewer, and 
 making himself thoroughly acquainted with the 
 machinery and processes of coal mining. In 1820, 
 however, his father, being now somewhat richer, he 
 was sent to Edinburgh University for a single ses-
 
 54 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 sion, where he attended the lectures of Dr. Hope, on 
 chemistry ; those of Sir John Leslie, on natural phi- 
 losophy ; and those of Professor Jaraieson, on geology 
 and mineralogy. He returned home in the summer 
 of 1821, having gained a mathematical prize, and 
 acquired the most important knowledge of how best 
 to proceed in his self-education. In 1822 he was ap- 
 prenticed to his father, who had then commenced his 
 locomotive manufactory at Newcastle ; but after two 
 years' strict attention to the business, fin ding his health 
 failing, he accepted, in 1824, a commission to examine 
 the gold and silver mines of South America, whence 
 he was recalled by his father when the Liverpool and 
 Manchester Railway was in progress, and he reached 
 home in December, 1827. He took an active part in 
 the discussion as to the use of locomotives on the 
 line, and, in conjunction with Mr. Joseph Locke, 
 wrote an able pamphlet on the subject. He also 
 greatly assisted his father in the construction of the 
 successful engine, which we believe was entered in 
 his name, though he himself ascribes the merit en- 
 tirely to his father and Mr. Henry Booth, on whose 
 suggestions the multitubular boiler was adopted. 
 
 "Robert Stephenson's next employment was the 
 execution of a branch from the Liverpool and Man- 
 chester Railway, near Warrington, now forming a 
 portion of the Grand Junction Railway, between 
 Birmingham and Liverpool. Before this branch was 
 completed, he undertook the survey, and afterwards
 
 GREAT ENGINEERING WORKS. 55 
 
 the construction, of the Leicester and Swannington 
 Railway, and, on the completion of that work, he 
 commenced the survey of the line of the London and 
 Birmingham Railway, of which he was ultimately 
 appointed engineer, and removed to London. Under 
 his direction the first sod was cut at Chalk Farm, on 
 June 1, 1834, and the line was opened on September 
 15, 1838. Fully aware of the vital importance of 
 obtaining good means of rapid transit, he still con- 
 tinued to devote much of his time to improvements 
 in the locomotive engine, which were from time to 
 time carried out under his direction at the manufac- 
 tory in Newcastle, which for some years was exclu- 
 sively devoted to engines of that class, and still 
 supplies larger numbers than any other factory in the 
 kingdom, independent of many marine and stationary 
 engines. His engagements on different lines of rail- 
 way have since been very numerous ; but he is more 
 remarkable for the magnificent conceptions and the 
 vastness of some of his successfully-executed projects, 
 such as the High Level Bridge over the Tyne at 
 Newcastle, the viaduct (supposed to be the largest in 
 the world) over the Tweed Valley at Berwick, and 
 the Britannia Tubular Bridge over the Menai Strait 
 a form of bridge of which there had been previously 
 no example, and to which, considering its length and 
 the enormous weight it would have to sustain, the 
 objections and difficulties seemed almost insuperable. 
 With the assistance, however, of Professor Hodgkin-
 
 56 GEORGE STEPHENSON A.ND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 son, Mr. Edwin Clark, and Mr. Fairbairn in experi- 
 ments on the best forms of the various portions of 
 the structure, the difficulties were triumphantly over- 
 come, and in less than four years the bridge was 
 opened to the public on March 18, 1850. 
 
 " Mr. Stephenson has also been employed in the 
 construction of many foreign railways. He was con- 
 sulted, with his father, as to the Belgian lines; also 
 for a line in Norway, between Christiana and Lake 
 Miosen, for which he received the grand cross of the 
 order of St. Olaf, from the King of Sweden; and also 
 for one between Florence and Leghorn, about sixty 
 miles in length. He visited Switzerland for the pur- 
 pose of giving his opinions as to the best system of 
 railway communication. He designed, and is now 
 constructing, the Victoria Tubular Bridge over the 
 St. Lawrence, near Montreal, on the model of that 
 over the Menai Strait, in connection with the Grand 
 Trunk Railway of Canada, for uniting Canada West 
 with the western states of the United States of 
 America.* He has recently completed the railway 
 
 * The following account of this extraordinary bridge, com 
 pleted since it was written, will be read with interest : 
 
 " The present autumn wiil witness the completion of, per- 
 haps, the greatest engineering work of our time of that great 
 bridge across the river St. Lawrence, of which the Britannia 
 Bridge over the Menai Straits proves to have been but the pre- 
 cursor. The Grand Trunk Railway connects dependencies of 
 the British Crown in North America, passing through the 
 richest parts of both Upper and Lower Canada for a distance 
 of 1200 miles. To the Grand Trunk Railway a direct nnd 
 uninterrupted communication between the north and south
 
 RAILWAY ENTEKPRISE IN THE EAST. 57 
 
 between Alexandria and Cairo, a distance of 140 
 miles, and has, during its construction, several times 
 visited Egypt. On the line there are two tubular 
 bridges one over the Damietta branch of the Nile, 
 and the other over the large canal near Besket-al- 
 Saba. The peculiarity of the structure is, that the 
 trains run on the outside upon the top of the tube 
 instead of inside, as in the case of the Britannia 
 Bridge. He is now constructing an immense bridge 
 across the Nile, at Kaffre Azzayat, to replace the 
 present steam ferry, which is found to interfere too 
 much with the rapid transit of passengers. 
 
 " In addition to his railway labours, Mr. Stephen- 
 son has taken a general interest in public affairs and 
 in scientific investigations. In 1847, he was returned 
 as member of parliament, in the Conservative interest, 
 for Whitby, in Yorkshire, for which place he con- 
 shores of the St. Lawrence was of vital consequence. In- 
 asmuch as a bridge across the St. Lawrence was the key to the 
 whole province, so, in possession of that key, the Grand Trunk 
 Railway would command the whole external intercourse of 
 Canada ; whilst, without it, it must remain a mere provincial 
 line. The difficulties of crossing the St. Lawrence were far 
 from inconsiderable. Its width, even at the most available 
 point, is very formidable ; its current is very rapid ; its depth 
 not insignificant. Besides this, the navigation of the river, 
 not merely by steamboats and other vessels, but by enormous 
 timber rafts, had to be provided for ; so that unusual elevation 
 and unusual width between the piers were both required. There 
 was another obstacle, more formidable far more formidable 
 than all. In the winter season the river presents a field of 
 ice from 3 to 5 feet thick. Could any bridge be devised to 
 withstand such formidable difficulties? If possible, how was 
 such a bridge to be constructed ? The Britannia Bridge across
 
 58 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 tiuues to sit. He has also acted with great liberality 
 to the Newcastle Literary and Philosophical Society, 
 paying off a debt, in 1855, amounting to 3100, in 
 gratitude, as he expressed it, for the benefits he de- 
 rived in early life from that establishment, and to 
 enable it to be as practically useful to other young 
 men. He has most liberally placed at the disposal of 
 Mr. Piazzi Smythe his yacht and crew, to facilitate 
 the interesting investigations undertaken by that 
 gentleman at the Island of Teneriffe, and very valu- 
 able results have been obtained. He has been an 
 honorary but active member of the London Sanitary 
 and Sewerage Commissions ; he is a Fellow of the 
 Royal Society, a member of the Institution of Civil 
 Engineers since 1830, of which institution he was 
 member of council during the years 1845 to 1847, 
 vice-president during those from 1845 to 1855, and 
 
 the Menai Straits was opened in 1849, and it was not, therefore, 
 unnatural that in 1852 the directors should look to Mr. 
 Robert Stephenson as the engineer most competent to advise 
 th<ru. Mr. Stephenson determined to go out to Canada. He 
 accordingly repaired there at the end of the summer of 1853, 
 and after examining into the facts, made a public declaration 
 of his opinion, that a bridge across the St. Lawrence was 
 prcticable. On the 2nd of May following, Mr. Stephenson 
 addressed to the Grand Trunk railway directors a report, in 
 which he considered the whole question in three branches : 
 first, as to the description of bridge best calculated to prove 
 efficient and permanent; second, as to the proper site; and 
 thirdly, as to the necessity for such a structure. Upon the first 
 point he did not hesitate at once to recommend the adoption of 
 u tubular bridge, as the description of bridge best fitted for 
 a permaineut, safe, and substantial structure in siich a situation; 
 oQ the second point, he was not a little influenced by considr-
 
 COMPLETION OF THE BRITANNIA BRIDGE. 59 
 
 president during the years 1856 and 1857. He has 
 received a great gold medal of honour from the 
 French Exposition d'Industrie of 1855, and is said to 
 have declined an offer of knighthood in Great Britain. 
 He is also the author of a work ( On the Locomotive 
 Steam Engine/ and another ' On the Atmospheric 
 Railway System/ published in 4to, by Weale. 
 
 " After the last tube of the Britannia Bridge had 
 been floated to between the piers, and had been 
 raised and deposited in the place, which, we may 
 hope, it is destined to occupy for centuries to come, 
 there was, as usual, a friendly dinner party, and those 
 present congratulated Robert Stephenson on the com- 
 plete success of his magnificent conception, and ex- 
 pressed the cordiality with which they participated in 
 the triumph of so remarkable a work of science, which 
 had met almost insuperable difficulties, and had 
 
 rations affecting the flow of the river and ' those almost irre- 
 sistible forces ' consequent upon the breaking up of the ice in 
 spring. In considering the question whether a bridge could 
 be constructed to withstand the pressure of the ice, it appeared 
 to Mr. Stephenson to be of primary importance to ascertain 
 really and precisely what that pressure was. This was a qiiestion 
 of calculation; though, in the absence of any data, the diffi- 
 culty was how to calculate. The result of that calculation in 
 figures it would be unnecessary, even if it were possible, to 
 state ; but, whatever were the figures, they enabled Mr. 
 Stephenson at once to realise one all-important fact. He ar- 
 rived at the conclusion that ' the almost irresistible force ' of 
 this mass of ice would crush or sweep away any ordinary 
 bridge, and that all the suggestions previously made for en- 
 countering the difficulty were only likely to result in disaster 
 if carried into effect. Mr. Stephenson decided at last on the 
 adoption of stone piers to carry the tubes at wide interyals,
 
 60 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 created a new application of a system of constructive 
 combination never hitherto imagined. In reply, he 
 thanked his friends for their sympathy and the ex- 
 pressions of friendly regard, but he added, that even 
 the triumph of that day did not recompense him for 
 the days and nights of anxious toil and thought, the 
 cares and anxieties which had attended the work, and 
 the old friendships compromised ; and he assured 
 those present, that were another problem of the like 
 Magnitude and consequence to be proposed to him, 
 not all the splendours of success, no honour or reward 
 in expectation, would induce him to undertake it." 
 
 Since the above notice was penned, this worthy son 
 of a great father has gone to the house appointed for 
 all living. A newspaper telegram thus recorded his 
 death : " By the general public the loss is regarded 
 
 each pier having, on the side opposed to the course of the 
 stream, large cut-waters of solid stone-work, inclined against 
 the current, up which the ice would creep, and break itself to 
 pieces by its own weight and pressure. He arranged that these 
 wedge-shaped cut-waters should present angles to the ice suffi- 
 cient to separate and fracture it as it rose upon the piers, but 
 at the same time so obtuse as not to be liable themselves to 
 fracture. These piers, therefore, were devised to answer the 
 double purpose of piers and ice-breakers. They exihihit every 
 indication of massiveness and power to resist pressure, as well 
 as of stability to support the superstructure. Experience, in- 
 deed, has proved the piers suited for all the purposes for which 
 they were designed. During the four years the structure has 
 been in progress, it has fulfilled all the conditions its originator 
 anticipated; and it has withstood, in the most satisfactory man- 
 ner, the most violent pressures which have followed the break- 
 up of the ice. Whilst the piers of this bridge are thus pecu- 
 liar in their design, in order to meet the peculiar circumstances
 
 ILLNESS AND DEATH OP ROBERT. 61 
 
 as national, and by his friends, and all who had inter- 
 views with him, as a private and public bereavement. 
 When he sailed for Norway in his yacht, soon after 
 the close of the session, he was in indifferent health, 
 and during his stay there he was attacked with a 
 complaint of the liver. He returned to England, and 
 on the voyage the yacht encountered severe weather, 
 causing him to suffer from sea sickness. For the first 
 time an attack of jaundice ensued, and on landing at 
 Lowestoft it was necessary to carry him to the rail- 
 way carriage. Upon his arrival in London it was 
 found that he was in danger, dropsy having set in, and 
 he was too weak to permit its being relieved. Con- 
 gestion of the liver also took place, but the former 
 disease was the immediate cause of his death. He 
 died comparatively free from pain. During his illness 
 he was unceasingly attended by the most eminent 
 men in London. Mr. Stephenson was in his fifty- 
 
 of the country and climate of Canada, the superstructure, 
 which creates in America so much surprise, is an elongated re- 
 petition only of the design for the Britannia Bridge. The Vic- 
 toria Bridge is indeed remarkable for its extreme length, but 
 its several tubes are not so long as those of the Britannia 
 Bridge, and are only otherwise distinguishable inasmuch &s 
 that they are the longest tubes yet constructed without the 
 adaption of the cellular principle. It deserves notice, however, 
 that these tubes, in all their details, were designed, plate by 
 plate and rivet by rivet, in the office of Mr. Stephenson, and 
 were calculated for every strength and strain, and prepared 
 and arranged in all their details, under the sole superinten- 
 dence and supervision of his relative, Mr. George Kobert 
 Stephenson. Canada owes this bridge to one mind the mind of 
 Robert Stephenson. Had that eminent engineer expressed 
 the smallest doubt or apprehension, the directors of the Grand
 
 62 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 seventh year. He leaves no family, and his wife died 
 some years since. As a proof of Mr. Stepheuson's 
 benevolence, it may be mentioned that he dispensed 
 annually in charity several thousands of pounds in the 
 ynost unostentatious manner." 
 
 The editor of the " Manchester Examiner and 
 Times," in a leading article, earnest, eloquent, and 
 truthful, sums up the characters and worth of 
 these two noble men, who could add dignity to 
 honours, but to whose names no title could add any 
 eminence. 
 
 " Yesterday, the mortal remains of Robert Stephen- 
 son were consigned to their last resting place, in 
 Westminster Abbey. The scene, we are told, and 
 can well believe, was peculiarly impressive. Tlure 
 was an absence of all funereal pomp ; nothing of the 
 vulgar grandeur in which, on great occasions, we are 
 accustomed to trick out the august solemnity of death. 
 
 Trunk railway would have shrunk from involving their com- 
 pany in an expenditure of a million and a half of money to 
 carry a bridge accross the St. Lawrence. Until Mr. Stephenson 
 had satisfied the Grand Trunk company, they \\ould not enter- 
 tain the idea of constructing such a bridge ; and, unques- 
 tionably, Mr. Stephenson would never have satisfied the com- 
 pany unless he had thoroughly satisfied himself. It was the 
 reliance of the company on Mr. Stephenson's experience and 
 professional reputation that induced them to commence the 
 bridge; and having pledged that experience and reputation, 
 Mr. Stephenson, who would have been responsible for failure, 
 is entitled to the full meed of honour and of fame which must 
 hereafter attach to the successful execution of so great a ttork 
 He has indelibly inscribed his name cm the structure which 
 resists the ice of the St. Lawrttc*,"
 
 NATIONAL INTEREST IN THE STEPHENSONS. 63 
 
 Yet the silent crowds which congregated along the 
 route, the vast assemblage of distinguished men of all 
 ranks and classes, which filled the venerable building, 
 told with sufficient emphasis that a great man had 
 been called away, and paid a fitting homage to the 
 memory of one of England's most illustrious sons. 
 
 " This mournful event is one which has not failed to 
 awaken corresponding emotions throughoutthe empire. 
 All who take an intelligent interest in the welfare of 
 their country, all who look with pride upon the in- 
 dustrial achievements of the present age, all with whom 
 patriotism is a passion too noble to be absorbed in the 
 glitter of military triumphs, all who see, or trust they 
 see, in the successful subordination of nature to the 
 wants of man a powerful auxiliary to the attainment 
 of a better time for the whole human race, will mourn 
 over the departure of one who stood foremost in the 
 army of workers, and whose admirable genius had 
 raised him to the highest rank among the architects 
 of modern society. The lives of the two Stephensons, 
 father and son, constitute a national epic. Had it 
 oeen possible for them to have lived and performed 
 half their mechanical marvels at some period prior to 
 the dawn of authentic history, the wonder of their 
 contemporaries would have transformed them into 
 demi-gods. Their names would have been handed 
 down as Hercules and Mercury, as Thor and Odin. 
 Their favour would have been invoked whenever men 
 were about to attempt any arduous enterprise, and in
 
 64 GEORGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON ROBERT. 
 
 the depths of the forests, or the solitude of the rocks 
 and mountains, species of rude worship would have 
 commemorated the benefits they had bestowed upon 
 mankind. Civilization and the printing press have 
 rescued us from the possibility of such extravagancies. 
 We have chronicled every incident of their lives. We 
 know that the elder Stephenson was eighteen years 
 old before he learned to write his own name, that he 
 was a ' big raw-boned fellow/ earning eighteen shil- 
 lings a week, acting as breaksman to a ballast engine, 
 filling up his spare time by shoe-making and clock 
 mending, and in due time the husband of Fanny 
 Henderson, who, and no loose div'nity of Valhalla, 
 was the mother of the great man just departed. In 
 1815 the father took out his patent for the first loco- 
 motive steam engine ; in 1859 the son heard of the 
 approaching completion of his own great work, tht 
 Victoria Bridge across the St. Lawrence, destined to 
 connect the railway systems of North America. Fixing 
 our attention on these two points, we are prepared to 
 grasp the prodigious improvements with which their 
 names will ever be identified. Politically, the period 
 has been mainly occupied by the manufacture and the 
 breaking up of the Treaty of Vienna, with which 
 diplomatists were busy when the principle of steam 
 locomotion was patented, and which has received its 
 final coup de grace in the great battles of the present 
 year. We need not point to the coi trast between the 
 fleeting triumphs of statecraft ami the enduring
 
 IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 65 
 
 achievements of industry, or show to which of these 
 two classes of events mankind are likely to be most 
 indebted for any permanent increase of freedom and 
 happiness. That very public opinion before which the 
 most powerful monarchs are constrained to bend, and 
 weighed with which the bloodiest victories of the 
 battle-field are light as chaff; that public opinion 
 which flashes its impulses quick as lightning from 
 capital to capital, and will eventually become the 
 governing power of Europe, owes its aggrandisement, 
 and almost its existence, to the inventions of such men 
 as Stephenson. The railway, the steam vessel, and 
 the telegraph are material instruments of civilization ; 
 the body in which the world's intellectual and moral 
 impulses become incarnate ; the brain and limbs by 
 which the aggregate soul of humanity carries out its 
 mighty will, and completes its ever-growing task. 
 
 " It is fit that the remains of Stephenson should lie 
 in Westminster Abbey. The precincts of that vener- 
 able pile may be regarded as the nursery, the cradle, 
 of our national greatness. It is a sacred spot, to which 
 the thoughts of Englishmen throughout the world 
 turn with a sentiment of idolatrous reverence. It is 
 the shrine of a secular worship, surely the purest and 
 noblest of its kind that the world has yet seen. Be- 
 neath its ancient roof repose the ashes of some of 
 our greatest men moiiarchs, warriors, legislators, and 
 poets. Doubtless we are much indebted to them. 
 We accept the legacy of gratitude without cavil. We 
 
 f
 
 66 GEOEGE STEPHENSON AND HIS SON EGBERT. 
 
 will not detract from their merits by comparing them 
 with a standard unfitted to their times. They served 
 their generation according to the light that was in 
 them, and England, such as the present age found it, 
 was the offspring of their labours. Stephenson is as 
 great a hero as any of them the hero of the nine- 
 teenth century the hero of railways, tunnels, and 
 tubular bridges; of industry, manufactures, commerce, 
 as well as indirectly of politics, morals, nationality, 
 health, business, and pleasure. Thousands who have 
 visited the ' Great Eastern ' at Holyhead passed over 
 his gigantic handiwork at Menai Straits, and the hun- 
 dreds of millions of travellers by railway every year in 
 Great Britain are, in some sense, his debtors. He has 
 left enduring monuments of his genius all over the 
 world, and the lesson which moralists have sought to 
 inculcate of the greatness and the vanity of man, can 
 hardly be impressed more forcibly upon the mind 
 than when we turn from them to contemplate the 
 narrow resting-place where his mortal remains were 
 yesterday deposited/'
 
 LORD BROUGHAM: 
 
 THE BOY PHILOSOPHER AND MODERN DEMOSTHENES. 
 
 LORD BROUGHAM is one of the greatest men the world 
 has ever seen : great in mental power, in intellectual 
 achievement, in work done, and in age attained. 
 Journeying back to the time of his birth, we have to 
 pass through England's greatest social and political 
 changes ; the history of which cannot be written 
 without a record of his name, and distinguished men- 
 tion of his services. 
 
 He was born in St. Andrew Square, Edinburgh, on 
 the 19th September, 1779, and when only seven years 
 old entered the High School in a class of 164 boys. 
 
 Lord Cockburn, who was at the same school, re- 
 lates the following anedote of him : " Brougham 
 was not in the class with me. Before getting to the 
 rector's class he had been under Luke Eraser, who, in 
 his two immediately preceding courses of four years' 
 each, had the good fortune to have Francis Jeffrey 
 and Walter Scott as his pupils. Brougham made his 
 first explosion while at Eraser's class. He dared to 
 differ from Eraser, a hot but good-natured old fellow, 
 on some bit )f Latinity, The master, like other men,
 
 68 LORD BROUGHAM 
 
 in power, maintained his own infallibility, punished 
 the rebel, and flattered himself that the affair was 
 over. But Brougham re-appeared next day, loaded 
 with books, returned to the charge before the whole 
 class, and compelled honest Luke to acknowledge he 
 had been in the wrong. This made Brougham famous 
 throughout the school. I remember, as well as if it 
 had been yesterday, having had him pointed out to 
 me as 'The fellow who had beat the master.' It was 
 then that I first saw him." 
 
 He entered the university when only in his fifteenth 
 year ; and, strange to say, when little more than six- 
 teen he sent a letter to the Royal Society, in which 
 he described a series of experiments in optics, and 
 gave an exposition of the principles which govern 
 that science. Shortly after, he sent them another 
 paper on "Certain Principles in Geometry." The 
 Society printed both papers in the "Philosophical 
 Transactions" of 1796 and 1798. These early pro- 
 ductions elicited replies and refutations from Professor 
 Prevost, of Geneva, and others. This resulted in a 
 Latin correspondence with the most eminent philo- 
 sophers of that period, in which young Brougham 
 displayed great spirit and ability. "While he was at 
 the university he was pre-eminently conspicuous for 
 his attainments in all the branches of study to which 
 his attention was directed, and particularly in mathe- 
 matics and natural philosophy, as well as in law, in 
 metaphysics, and in political science,
 
 EARLY ORATORICAL EFFORTS. 69 
 
 After leaving the university he made a tour through 
 Holland and Prussia, and on his return was duly 
 called to the Scottish bar. It was at this time that he 
 gave indication of his future success in oratory 
 frequenting the Speculative Society of Edinburgh, 
 where he came in contact with many men, who sub- 
 sequently attained considerable eminence in the legal 
 and political world. These men started the " Edin- 
 burgh Review," but, owing to an impression of 
 Brougham's indiscretion, he was not invited to write 
 in the first three numbers; after that, he was taken 
 into confidence, and did more work than any other 
 contributor. When the Review had been in exist- 
 ence five years, Brougham wrote to Mr. Constable, 
 the publisher, for one thousand pounds, telling him that 
 he would quickly clear it all off by articles for the 
 serial ; and, as a proof of his earnestness, he actually 
 wrote the whole of one number, with the exception of 
 two articles. The papers were upon various subjects : 
 one of them treated on the operation of lithotomy [ 
 Amongst other papers, he contributed one on the 
 then recently published " Hours of Idleness," by Lord 
 Byron, in which he predicted anything but success for 
 the noble poet. In this he proved, however clever he 
 was as a critic, that he was no prophet ; Byron did 
 achieve a wonderful success, and, to revenge himself, 
 wrote his " English Bards and Scotch Reviewers." 
 But, writing for the " Edinburgh" was only the pre- 
 paration for more serious labour. In 1803 he pub-
 
 70 LOBD BROUGHAM. 
 
 lished his work, in two volumes, on the "Colonial 
 Policy of the European Powers," in which he mani- 
 fested new capability, and developed fresh talents. He 
 had, meanwhile, acquired a tolerable practice at the 
 Scottish bar, but not sufficient to satisfy his restless 
 spirit ; to improve his position he determined to quit 
 Scotland, and was shortly after called to the English 
 bar by the Society of Lincoln's Inn, when he soon 
 attained a good share of practice. Shortly after his 
 settlement in England he was elected a Fellow of the 
 Royal Society; and in 1810 was counsel for a number 
 of London, Liverpool, and Manchester merchants, 
 who were heard in the House of Lords against the 
 orders in council, issued in retaliation of certain 
 decrees of Napoleon, which forbade the continent 
 having any commercial intercourse with the English. 
 On this occasion Brougham made a speech, which ex- 
 tended over two days. But it was not until 1810 
 that he attained the area where he achieved some of 
 his greatest feats ; he then entered the House of 
 Commons for the Borough of Camelford, under the 
 influence of the Earl of Darlington. His speeches in 
 Parliament were chiefly made in connection with 
 Clarkson, Wilberforce, and Grenville Sharpe, di- 
 rected against the odious slave system. Mainly owing 
 to his exertions, a law was passed in 1811, making it 
 felony for any British subject to engage in the slave 
 traffic. Liverpool had derived immense wealth from 
 this source, and yet, it can scarcely now be imagined
 
 RETUli.NhD TO PARLIAMENT. 71 
 
 that the reason why Liverpool refused to return 
 Brougham at the ensuing dissolution of Parliament, 
 was traceable to this cause. Be this as it may, the 
 inhabitants of that important sea-port returned Mr. 
 Canning by a large majority. During Brougham's 
 four years absence from the House of Commons, the 
 corn laws were enacted, to repeal which, seven years 
 of the energy and spirit of the best men of the king- 
 dom were required, headed by Richard Cobden and 
 John Bright. By the influence of the Earl of Dar- 
 lington, Brougham was returned, in 1816, for the 
 borough of Winchelsea. In the ensuing session he 
 had an opportunity to display his oratorical powers in 
 defence of tens of thousands of men and women, 
 literally starving for the common necessaries of life, 
 in consequence, as he affirmed, of the starvation laws 
 which had recently passed the House. It was during 
 this mournful time that men and women, who had 
 assembled in the most lawful manner, were cut down 
 by infuriated dragoons at Manchester. It is memor- 
 able that the site of this " Peterloo Massacre" is now 
 the site of the Free Trade Hall, built to commemorate 
 the repeal of the odious and iniquitous corn laws. 
 
 At this time the various corporate charities were 
 found to be much abused, which excited Brougham's 
 attention. He proved them to be the most scandalous 
 and revolting, and obtained a commission to inquire 
 into and report upon the alleged abuses. Little 
 ultimate good was effected, save the exposure and
 
 T2 LORD BROUGHAM. 
 
 publicity given to much knavish practice. It is very 
 probable, however, that the fame which attached to 
 him during the discussion of these; abuses secured for 
 him the high position which he next occupied, as the 
 defender of Queen Caroline. This was the event of 
 his life. It secured him popularity, and an oppor- 
 tunity which no subsequent divergence from popular 
 interests could efface. His speech upon this occasion 
 is preserved as an instance of fervid brilliant oratory, 
 and produced at the time of its delivery an almost 
 electric effect through the entire kingdom. The next 
 act of Brougham was to bring in a bill for the estab- 
 lishment of schools to provide education for the poor 
 of England and Wales. This bill proposed to centre the 
 chief power of management in the hands of the minis- 
 ters of the Church of England. In addressing the 
 House of Commons on the subject, he said : " Let the 
 House look at the alacrity, the zeal, the established 
 clergy manifested for the education of the poor. The 
 clergy were the teachers of the poor not only teachers 
 of religion, but, in the eye of the law, teachers gene- 
 rally. What then, he asked, could be more natural 
 than that they should have control over those who were 
 elected to assist them." He seems to have changed 
 his sentiments in regard to the clergy very speedily. 
 The opportunity was not long wanting tr manifest 
 his altered opinion. In 1821 he defended John 
 Ambrose Williams, who had been indicted for a libel 
 on the clergy of Durham. Williams was the proprie-
 
 MADE LORD CHANCELLOR. 73 
 
 or of the " Durham Chronicle," and had published 
 an article in his paper reflecting on the clergy, who 
 would not allow the church bells to be rung on the 
 death of the " murdered" Queen, as she was called. 
 Brougham in his spech manifested the bitterest irony 
 against the men whom he had formerly extolled. 
 The verdict went against Williams, but he was never 
 afterwards called up for judgment. 
 
 From this period Brougham devoted himself almost 
 unceasingly to the defence of freedom, and the rights 
 of conscience. In 1825 he was elected Lord Rector of 
 the University of Glasgow, in opposition to Sir Walter 
 Scott the casting vote being given by Sir James 
 Mackintosh. When the death of George IV. occa- 
 sioned a general election, Brougham was returned for 
 the large and important constituency of Yorkshire. 
 It was supposed that that county would only return 
 such persons as could boast high birth or splendid 
 connections. The return of Brougham was undoubt- 
 edly a great triumph, of which he did not fail to take 
 advantage. In the new ministry, to the astonishment 
 of the whole country, he was made Lord High Chan- 
 cellor. It is known that Brougham left the House 
 of Commons to preside over the House of Lords, with 
 the utmost pain and reluctance that his own most 
 earnest desire was not to accept any office which 
 necessitated the abduction of his position as member 
 ?or Yorkshire, and that he took a position nominally 
 and titularly higher only at the most urgent entreaty
 
 74 LOKD BROUGHAM. 
 
 find virtual command of his party. Since his removal, 
 now more than thirty years, he has never but once 
 been known to enter as auditor within those walls 
 which had so often echoed with his eloquence. The 
 single exception occurred during the present year, 
 I860, when he overcame his remarkable reluctance, 
 to hear the financial statement of Mr. Gladstone; 
 being the first time that he had heard that remark- 
 able orator, who now holds the position which he 
 himself so long held unrivalled and undisputed the 
 greatest orator in the House of Commons. 
 
 In his new position Brougham took frequent oppor- 
 tunities to lecture the members of the House of Lords. 
 He often told them that the aristocracy, with all their 
 castles, manors, rights of warren, and rights of chase, 
 and their broad acres, reckoned at fifty years' pur- 
 chase, " were not for a moment to be weighed against 
 the middle classes of England." His speeches on the 
 reform bill were much praised at the time of their 
 delivery. In 1830, in carrying out various law reform 
 schemes, he introduced a measure for local courts, and 
 subsequently various amendments in the bankruptcy 
 laws. In 1831 the ministry was dissolved; in its 
 reconstruction Brougham took no part his official 
 life was at an end. 
 
 His leisure now enabled him to turn to the world of 
 letters, to which he was always strongly attached. 
 His literary labours may be thus enumerated. First, 
 hia essays in the "Edinburgh Review f in 1803, his
 
 A HARD-WORKING MAN. 75 
 
 treatise on the colonial policy of the European powers ; 
 then his eloquent speeches and writings in favour of 
 mechanics' institutions, in connection with Dr. Birk- 
 beck, during the year 1821. In addition to being the 
 principal founder of the Society for the Diffusion of 
 Useful Knowledge, he composed several of the papers 
 published by the Society, as well as contributed to its 
 serial publications. In 1834 he published his expan- 
 sion of "Paley's Theology," and subsequently his 
 " Lives of the Statesmen of the reign of George III.," 
 four volumes of ' Political Philosophy," and " Lives 
 of Men of Science." 
 
 In this bird's eye view of the career of this extra- 
 ordinary man, the reader will have arrived at the con- 
 clusion that there must besome secretinhis marvellous 
 attainments. That secret his lordship has taken every 
 means to publish to the world. "Work is the talisman j 
 work has transmuted his labours into gold ; work has 
 been the Alladin's lamp by which his youthful dreams 
 have been more than realized. Perhaps it may be 
 said that he is the most hard-working man in England 
 even now, in his eightieth year ; but when he was a 
 young man, his labours were most extraordinary. It 
 is related of him on one occasion, that having practised 
 all day as a barrister, he went to the House of Com- 
 mons, where he was engaged in active debate through 
 the night, till three o'clock in the morning; he then 
 returned home, wrote an article for the " Edinburgh 
 Review," spent the next day in court, practising law,
 
 76 LOED BROUGHAM. 
 
 and the succeeding night in the House of Commons; 
 returned to his lodgings at three o'clock in the morn- 
 ing, and " retired simply because he had nothing else 
 to do/' It is known that he was laboriously studying 
 optics in the brief intervals of the queen's trial, one of 
 the most absorbing judicial proceedings of modern 
 times, in which, as we have seen, he was a leading 
 counsel. At other times, when it suited his purpose, 
 he could manifest sympathy for the weakness of 
 humanity. There is an amusing instance related of 
 him while he was chancellor. He had been listening 
 with the greatest attention to the speeches of two 
 counsel on one side, from ten o'clock until half-past 
 two ; a third rose to address the court on the same side. 
 His lordship was quite unprepared for this additional 
 
 infliction, and exclaimed, " What ! Mr. A , are 
 
 you really going to speak on the same side ?" " Yes, 
 my lord, I mean to trespass on your lordship's atten- 
 tion for a short time." " Then," said his lordship, 
 looking the orator significantly in the face, and giving 
 
 a sudden twitch of his nose " then, Mr. A , you 
 
 had better cut your speech as short as possible, other- 
 wise you must not be surprised if you see me dozing; 
 for really this is more than human nature can endure." 
 The young barrister took the hint, and made a short. 
 speech. 
 
 Lord Brougham has now passed his eightieth year : 
 yet, only two years ago he devised a National Asso- 
 ciation for the promotion of Social Science. At the
 
 LIVING A LIFE OP LABOUR. 77 
 
 third annual meeting, held in Bradford (1859), in 
 addressing a meeting of the working classes, his lord- 
 ship said : " That he spoke as a working man himself 
 he had been all his life a working man. This was 
 the rule he always followed never to count one hour 
 or one moment his own, to use as a means of amuse- 
 ment or relaxation, even for his instruction, out of the 
 profession to which he belonged, whatever that might 
 be at the time, until the day's work was completely, 
 honestly, and accurately performed. He had been a 
 working man all his life, and what was more, he had 
 all his life lived upon wages. It happened possibly 
 it was an accident, and therefore did him no credit, 
 but it did happen that whatever little property he 
 enjoyed, or whatever sums of money had come to him 
 in any way, he had never spent one-half, and had 
 always lived by the sweat of his brow. It might be 
 said that he should at his time of life and he was a 
 great deal over thirty years of age take a little rest, 
 and that he had earned a title to a little repose. But it 
 had been said by the great Christian poet, Cowper 
 
 ' A man unoccupied is not at rest ; 
 A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.' 
 
 And he had resolved that so long as Providence allowed 
 him to retain his faculties, he would not fall under the 
 description of a man ' unoccupied/ or of a mind ' quite 
 vacant/ He would continue, as far as he was able, to 
 live a < life of labour/ to which he had so long been 
 accustomed,"
 
 78 LORD BROUGHAM. 
 
 One of the newspaper correspondents at the Brad- 
 ford meeting describes his lordship at his present ad- 
 vanced age : 
 
 " I need hardly say that Lord Brougham was one 
 of the chief objects of interest and admiration at the 
 Bradford meeting. Although a slight deafness, and a 
 little unsteadiness in his gait, testify his advancing 
 years, he is still the Lord Brougham of our early 
 recollections. He still speaks with his characteristic 
 vigour and energy, still laughs as loudly and talks 
 away as rapidly as any of his juniors ; he is full of fun 
 and anecdote, and displays all that restless and inces- 
 sant mental and physical activity for which he was 
 always remarkable. He was, I believe, up and out 
 after twelve o'clock at night, and I understand that this 
 morning he took a walk before breakfast to the grave 
 of Robin Hood, or, to write the name more correctly, 
 Robin Eude, in the Kirklees Park, the seat of Mr. 
 "Wickham, M.P. for Bradford, whose guest he has been 
 during the week." 
 
 The ' ' Times," in commenting upon the new position 
 of the Edinburgh University, refers to a fresh honour 
 which has since been paid to Lord Brougham : 
 
 fl The University of Edinburgh has recently acquired 
 a franchise which cannot be exercised without occa- 
 sioning considerable trouble and excitement. By the 
 Act for the Regulation of Scotch Universities it is 
 provided that, for the first time, the University of 
 Edinburgh is to have a chancellor. This office, which
 
 KECENT HONOURS. 79 
 
 appears, so far as we can gather from the Act, tc 
 be, like the chancellorships of Oxford and Cambridge 
 very much of an honorary character, it is to be held for 
 life, and filled by the votes of the members of the uni- 
 versity council. This council is to consist of the pro- 
 fessors, of masters of arts, of doctors of medicine who, 
 as matriculated students, have given regular attendance 
 on classes in any of the faculties of the university, and 
 of the university court, which consists of the Rector, 
 the Principal, the Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and 
 five assessors, appointed in different manners. Of 
 course, there is one man to whom opinion both in 
 Scotland and England points as the proper person to 
 receive all the honour that the University of Edinburgh 
 has to bestow. He was a student at Edinburgh, and 
 distinguished at a time when Edinburgh was, beyond 
 all seminaries in the kingdom, fruitful of great and 
 illustrious men. He has devoted almost every leisure 
 moment of a long and laborious life to the promotion 
 of knowledge in all its shapes j and, himself a scholar, 
 a mathematician, and a physical inquirer of the first 
 order, has been unwearied in his endeavours to raise 
 the standard of knowledge and education throughout 
 the country. In his own profession he has, by the 
 power of industry and talent, long ago risen to the 
 highest post, and as a politician he has filled a con- 
 spicuous place at a most momentous period, in the fore- 
 most rank of orators and statesmen. Every one will 
 anticipate us when we say there is but one man 

 
 80 LOUD BROUGHAM. 
 
 to whom this description applies, and that that one 
 man is Lord Brougham. How fortunate ought Edin- 
 burgh to esteem herself that, in the evening of his life, 
 while he yet possesses those faculties which have for 
 half a century riveted upon him the attention and the 
 admiration of his fellow-countrymen, she has it in her 
 power to offer to her most distinguished alumnus an 
 honour not unworthy even of his acceptance ! What 
 claims Lord Brougham may have to the highest place 
 as a statesmen, a jurist, an orator, an author, a philo- 
 sopher, or a scholar, men may reasonably debate ; but 
 as the tried and consistent friend of education, as one 
 entitled to every mark of distinction which the uni- 
 versity he has adorned can bestow, he stands altogether 
 without a peer, and therefore we should have supposed 
 without a competitor." 
 
 By a recent grant from Her Majesty, the title of 
 Lord Brougham will descend to his brother and his 
 heirs male. The grant of a perpetuity to this title 
 will be felt to be a mark of respect to a man who has 
 deserved the honours of the peerage as fully as any 
 one on whom they have been conferred.
 
 JOHN KITTO : 
 
 THE WORKHOUSE BOY, AND AFTERWARDS DR. JOHN 
 KITTO, F.S.A., AUTHOR OP "THE PICTORIAL BIBLE/' 
 ETC. 
 
 IN the social scale we cannot get very much lower 
 than the workhouse. When anybody gets there, it 
 is usually supposed that every resource has failed, and 
 that he is very near " the last scene of all." And 
 yet, even from that comfortless and almost hopeless 
 place, we are about to accompany one of its younger 
 inhabitants upon a journey of usefulness and honour, 
 which might well be envied by some of the greatest 
 and most respected of men. 
 
 Our hero, for he was a hero in the true sense, was 
 born at Plymouth in the December of 1804. He had 
 a rough life before him difficulties of a gigantic 
 character to overcome ; it would have been a mercy 
 if he had had a strong healthy constitution. This 
 was not to be. When born, he was so puny and 
 sickly that he was not expected to live many hours ; 
 and although great care was taken of him, it was long 
 before he was able to walk. This constitutional weak- 
 ness prevented him, as he grew up, taking part in the 
 sports and pastimes of other boys. Indisposition to 
 
 G
 
 82 JOHN K.1TTO. 
 
 take exercise grew upon him, and was no doubt the 
 source of much after misery. But that which ap- 
 peared to be so great an evil was providentially turned 
 to a blessing. When other boys were employed in 
 their games, he was to be seen poring over a book be- 
 hind a hedge or on a sunny bank. Not that any 
 facilities were afforded him to read by his parents ; 
 he was not even sent to school until he was eight 
 years of age ; his books were borrowed or begged 
 with great difficulty ; his home was by no means a 
 home of comfort, but rather a scene of misery and 
 wretchedness ; and by the time he had attained his 
 twelfth year, through much sickness and sorrow, he 
 was placed with his father, a stone mason, to act as 
 his labourer. 
 
 But this poor boy had to bear other miseries be- 
 sides his own. His father, soon after his marriage, 
 became a confirmed sot ; he was so lost to his position 
 as to regard neither character nor reputation. From 
 being a master waited on by others, he became a ser- 
 vant ; worse even than this : to gratify the appetite 
 which consumed him, he frequently violated the laws 
 and found himself in " durance vile" at one time 
 so seriously, that Kitto wrote : " What will they now 
 say of the felon's son ?" 
 
 His grandmother, to take him out of this wretched- 
 ness, transferred him to her own garret. She, poor 
 woman, had also suffered from the curse of drink. 
 Her second husband, after spending the evening with
 
 HIS OLD GRANDMOTHER. 83 
 
 a friend, was drowned in a pond as he was returning 
 home, helplessly intoxicated. The removal of Joh 
 to his grandmother's must have been a comfort to his 
 own mother, who was so miserably circumstanced as 
 frequently to work from five in the morning until ten 
 in the evening " that she might have something to 
 put in the mouths of her babes." 
 
 Kitto was with his grandmother from his fourth to 
 his eighth year, who " pinched herself to support" 
 him. Her extreme poverty no doubt prevented her 
 from sending him to school. She took kindly to the 
 poor lad, and for his amusement made many strolls 
 in the neighbourhood. They gathered flowers toge- 
 ther, and in the season went nutting; the branches 
 w r hich were out of John's reach she hooked down 
 with her staff. At other times they made excursions 
 to the sea-beach, when his aged relative would be sure 
 to have for him in her pocket a little reserve of 
 ginger-bread, plums, apples, or sugar-stick. 
 
 When he had arrived at his eighth year, arrange- 
 ment was made for his attending school. His atten- 
 dance, however, was very irregular. The poor old 
 grandmother was too poor to pay the charges, and 
 his father would not spare a few pence for the pur- 
 pose. When he did save a little from the ale-house, 
 John went to school ; when the money was spent in 
 drink, he remained away. It was a great pity some 
 charity school was not found for him ; but the father's 
 drinking absorbed all his spare time, and his mother, 
 
 n 9 
 
 O fti
 
 84 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 to find food for her little ones, had to go out early to 
 " char." The schooling that John did get, enabled 
 him to understand a little of " reading, writing, and 
 the imperfect use of figures." His grandmother 
 boasted that he was the best scholar in Ply- 
 mouth. John knew better, adding, when he heard 
 the remark, "she did it ignorantly, but affection- 
 ately." 
 
 But if the dear old grandmother could not pay for 
 his schooling, she could teach him at home. She 
 taught him to be a proficient in sewing, so that he 
 boasted of having done the best part of a " gay patch- 
 work" for her bed, besides having made " quilts and 
 kettle-holders enough for two generations." The old 
 lady had also a store of stories about ghosts, hobgob- 
 lins, fairies, and witches ; and a shoemaker, of the 
 name of Roberts, poured into his eager ear, as he sat 
 using his awl, the tales of Bluebeard, Cinderella, Jack 
 the Giant-killer, and Beauty and the Beast. Kitto 
 wrote, in 1832 : " Assuredly, never have I since felt 
 so much respect and admiration of any man's talents 
 and extent of information as those of poor Roberts." 
 He soon made the discovery that the shoemaker was 
 not the only repository for such wonders, but that for 
 a copper he could purchase similar astounding marvels 
 at the shop of Mrs. Barnicle. This, of course, was on 
 irresistible temptation. Every spare penny now went 
 to the Barnicle vortex. Plums or ginger-bread pre- 
 sented no attraction like the witchery of a picture-book
 
 LIVING UPON BOOKS. 85 
 
 or a nursery rhyme. Walks and out-door rambles gave 
 place to close reading at home. After the toy-books, 
 John sought amusement in his grandmother's family 
 Bible (which was fortunately profusely illustrated) 
 in her Prayer Book, Pilgrim's Progress, and Gul- 
 liver's Travels. "The two last I soon devoured," 
 says he ; " and so much did I admire them, that, to 
 increase their attractions, I decorated all the engrav- 
 ings with the indigo my grandmother used in wash- 
 ing, using a feather for a brush. Some one at last 
 gave me a fourpenny box of colours, and between 
 that and my books I was so much interested at home, 
 that I retained little inclination for play ; and when 
 my grandmother observed this, she did all in her 
 power to encourage those studious habits, by borrow- 
 ing for me books of her neighbours." He had soon 
 made the acquaintance of every book in every house 
 in the street. He lived upon books they were more 
 to him than his food. It was to gratify this love of 
 reading that he made his first literary effort. He 
 thus amusingly narrated the circumstance : 
 
 " My cousin came one day with a penny in his 
 hand, declaring his intention to buy a book with it. 
 I was just then sadly in want of a penny to make up 
 fourpence, with which to purchase the ' History of 
 King Pippin' (not Pepin), so I inquired whether he 
 bought a book for the pictures or the story ? ' The 
 story, to be sure.' I then said, that, in that case, I 
 would, for his penny, write him both a larger and a
 
 86 JOHN K1TTO 
 
 better story than be could get in print for the same 
 sum ; and that he might be still further a gainer, I 
 would paint him a picture at the beginning, and 
 he knew there were no painted pictures in penny 
 books. He expressed the satisfaction he should feel 
 in my doing so, and sat down quietly on the stool to 
 note my operations. "When I had done, I certainly 
 thought my cousin's penny pretty well earned ; and 
 as, at reading the paper and viewing the picture, he 
 was of the same opinion, no one else had any right to 
 complain of the bargain. I believe this was the first 
 penny I ever earned. I happened to recollect this 
 circumstance when last at Plymouth, and felt a wish 
 to peruse this paper, if still in existence ; but my poor 
 cousin, though he remembered the circumstance, had 
 quite forgotten both the paper and its contents, un- 
 less that it was ' something about what was done in 
 England at the time when wild men lived in it ;' 
 even this was further than my own recollection ex- 
 tended." 
 
 His next effort was a drama performed by children. 
 The terms of admission were, " ladies eight pins, and 
 gentlemen ten." It is plain from these first efforts 
 that Kitto thus early had contracted a love for litera- 
 ture which would never be subdued. 
 
 These imaginative episodes, however gave place to 
 more substantial ones. The old graudmother in 
 1814, attacked by paralysis, went lower down into 
 the depths of poverty ; so that, instead of being able
 
 ACCUSED OF THEFT. 87 
 
 to maintain Kitto, she herself had to go and reside 
 with her daughter. Kitto foxmd his lather's home 
 no home for him. In order that he might do some- 
 thing for a living, he was sent as an apprentice to a 
 barber, whom Kitto describes as having a face " so 
 ' sour/ that it sickened one to look at it ; and which 
 was, beside, all over red by drinking spirituous 
 liquors." This engagement soon came to an end. 
 Kitto was simple enough to leave a woman in charge 
 of his master's razors, that he carried home every 
 night, under the pretext that she wanted the barber ; 
 of course, when Kitto returned neither woman or 
 razors were to be seen. His master not only dis- 
 charged him, but was mean enough to accuse him of 
 complicity with the thief. 
 
 There was no other resource now but going with 
 his father to render him any assistance in his power; 
 this enabled him to be a sad witness of the profligate 
 acts of his parent. On the 13th of February, 1817, 
 his father was repairing the roof of a house in Ply- 
 mouth. John was carrying a load of slates to him ; 
 but just as he was stepping from the ladder to the 
 roof he lost his footing and fell a distance of thirty- 
 five feet into the court below. He remained insen- 
 sible for more than a week, and did not leave his bed 
 for four months. Afterwards, he partially recovered 
 his strength ; but the accident deprived him of all 
 sense of hearing. He became as deaf as though he 
 had never had the sense. He subsequently sub-
 
 88 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 mitted to many surgical operations ; but all was in 
 vain the precious sense was extinguished! Kitto 
 feelingly relates how he learned that he was deaf. 
 He had been in a trance for nearly a fortnight; 
 every sound was hushed ; profound silence reigned 
 over all. 
 
 " I was very slow in learning," he writes, " that 
 my hearing was entirely gone. The unusual stillness 
 of all things was grateful to me in my utter exhaus- 
 tion ; and if, in this half-awakened state, a thought 
 of the matter entered my mind, I ascribed it to the 
 unusual care and success of my friends in preserving 
 silence around me. I saw them talking, indeed, 
 to one another, and thought that, out of regard 
 to my feeble condition, they spoke in whispers, be- 
 cause I heard them not. The truth was revealed to me 
 in consequence of my solicitude about the book which 
 had so much interested me on the day of my fall. It 
 had, it seems, been reclaimed by the good old man 
 who had lent it to me, and who doubtless concluded 
 that I should have no more need of books in this life. 
 He was wrong, for there has been nothing in this life 
 which I have needed more. I asked for this book 
 with much earnestness, and was answered by signs, 
 which I could not comprehend. * Why do you not 
 speak ?' I cried; 'pray let me have the book.' This 
 seemed to create some confusion ; and at length some 
 one, more clever than the rest, hit upon the happy 
 expedient of writing upon a slate that the book had
 
 " YOU ARE DEAF ! " 89 
 
 been reclaimed by the owner, and that I could not, in 
 my weak state, be allowed to read. ( But/ I said, in 
 great astonishment, ' why do you write to me ? why 
 not speak? Speak ! speak V Those who stood around 
 the bed exchanged significant looks of concern, and 
 the writer soon displayed upon his slate the awful 
 words, ( You ARE DEAF !' " 
 
 Fearful were now the circumstances of this poor 
 boy. When he left his bed he was useless to his 
 father; his grandmother was too poor to render him 
 any assistance, and he had not a farthing to spend 
 upon a book, which had now become, through his 
 infirmity, a prime necessity of his being. His resort, 
 in this dilemma, was to what he calls a " poor stu- 
 dent's ways and means." He went to the shore, 
 where the coasters and fishing-boats discharged their 
 cargoes, wading with other boys for pieces of rope, 
 iron, or any other refuse. Some of them made three- 
 pence per day, but Kitto never succeeded better than 
 to make fourpence in one week. This source of 
 profit, poor as it was, soon was closed. One day he 
 gave himself a severe wound by treading on a 
 broken bottle, and there was an end to his hopes from 
 that quarter. 
 
 His next effort to obtain the " ways and means " 
 was in quite a different direction. He laid out his 
 remaining twopence on paper, and set about painting 
 heads, houses, flowers, birds, and trees. These he 
 exhibited in his mother's window for sale; they sold,
 
 90 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 rude as they were, to the extent of about twopence 
 halfpenny weekly . This not satisfying his ambition, 
 he determined to have a stall at the Plymouth fair, 
 from which the proceeds were larger. Then, casting 
 about for other sources of profit, he observed that the 
 labels in the windows of the houses in the outskirts 
 were badly and inaccurately written : " Logins for 
 Singel Men," " Rooms to leet, enquire within." He 
 prepared a number of neat substitutes, in disposing 
 of which he was partially successful. Of course the 
 money thus obtained was spent on books. He used 
 to visit about once a fortnight a bookstall in the 
 market. The owner kindly allowed him to read the 
 books at the stall, and sold him others very cheaply, 
 when he spent the few coppers he had so hardly 
 scraped together. Kitto, in referring to this period, 
 wrote : 
 
 " For many years I had no views towards literature 
 beyond the instruction and solace of my own mind ; 
 and, under these views, and in the absence of other 
 mental stimulants, the pursuit of it eventually be- 
 came a passion, which devoured all others. I take 
 no merit for the industry and application with which 
 I pursued this object, nor for the ingenious contriv- 
 ances by which I sought to shorten the hours of 
 needful rest, that I might have the more time for 
 making myself acquainted with the minds of other 
 men. The reward was great and immediate, and I 
 was only preferring the gratification which seemed to
 
 THE USES OF SYMPATHY. 91 
 
 me the highest. Nevertheless, now that I am, in 
 fact, another being, having but slight connection, 
 excepting in so far as ( the child is father to the 
 man/ with my former self; now that much has 
 become a business which was then simply a joy; and 
 now that I am gotten old in experiences if not in 
 years, it does somewhat move me to look back upon 
 that poor and deaf boy, in his utter loneliness, 
 devoting himself to objects in which none around 
 him could sympathise, and to pursuits which none 
 could even understand. The eagerness with which 
 he sought books, and the devoted attention with 
 which he read them, was simply an unaccountable 
 fancy in their view ; and the hours which he strove 
 to gain for writing that which was destined for no 
 other eyes than his own, was no more than an inno- 
 cent folly, good for keeping him quiet and out of 
 harm's way, but of no possible \\se on earth. This 
 want of the encouragement which sympathy and 
 appreciation give, and which cultivated friends are so 
 anxious to bestow on the studious application of their 
 young people, I now count among the sorest trials of 
 that day, and it serves me now as a measure for the 
 intensity of my devotement to such objects, that I 
 felt so much encouragement within as not to need 
 or care much for the sympathies and encouragements 
 which are, in ordinary circumstances, held of so 
 much importance. I undervalue them not ; on the 
 contrary, an indefinable craving was often felt for
 
 92 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 sympathy and appreciation in pursuits so dear to me ; 
 but to want this was one of the disqualifications of 
 my condition, quite as much so as my deafness itself; 
 and in the same degree in which I submitted to my 
 deafness as a dispensation from Providence towards 
 me, did I submit to this as a necessary consequence. 
 It was, however, one of the peculiarities of my condi- 
 tion that I was then, as I ever have been, too much 
 shut up. With the same dispositions and habits, 
 without being deaf, it would have been easy to have 
 found companions who would have understood me, 
 and sympathised with my love for books and study, 
 my progress in which might also have been much 
 advanced by such intercommunication. As it was, 
 the shyness and reserve which the deaf usually 
 exhibit, gave increased effect to the physical disquali- 
 fication, and precluded me from seeking, and kept 
 me from incidentally finding, beyond the narrow 
 sphere in which I moved, the sympathies which were 
 not found in it. As time passed, my mind became 
 filled with ideas and sentiments, and with various 
 knowledge of things new and old, all of which were 
 as the things of another world to those among whom 
 my lot was cast. The conviction of this completed 
 my isolation ; and eventually all my human interests 
 were concentrated in these points to get books, and, 
 as they were mostly borrowed, to preserve the most 
 valuable points in their contents, either by extracts 
 or by a distinct intention to impress them on the
 
 AN INMATE OF A WORKHOUSE. 93 
 
 memory. When I went forth I counted the hours 
 till I might return to the only pursuits in which I 
 could take interest, and when free to return, how 
 swiftly I fled to immure myself in that little sanc- 
 tuary which I had been permitted to appropriate, in 
 one of those rare nooks only afforded by such old 
 Elizabethan houses as that in which my relatives 
 then abode !" 
 
 But this comparative happiness was not long to 
 continue. The dear old grandmother went to reside 
 at Brixton a severe loss to Kitto. He was now 
 entirely at the mercy of his drinking father, who 
 cared so little for him, that he was soon a pitiable 
 spectacle in the streets, pinched with hunger, shiver- 
 ing in rags, and crawling about with bleeding feet. 
 To save him from this " cold and hunger and naked- 
 ness," he was admitted into the Plymouth work- 
 house a sad culmination to his literary and artistic 
 dreams ! 
 
 The governor of the workhouse treated him kindly, 
 permitting him some indulgence. His first task was 
 to learn to make list shoes : in a short time he was 
 a proficient in the business. Within a twelvemonth 
 of his entrance into the workhouse, he commenced 
 to keep a diary, which he " with reverence inscribed 
 to the memory of Cecilia Picken, my grandmother, 
 and the dearest friend I ever had." The diary enters 
 into interesting and minute details of his workhouse 
 life. One entry runs thus :
 
 94 JOHN K1TTO. 
 
 " I was to-day most wrongfully accused of cutting 
 off the top of a cat's tail. They did not know me who 
 thought me capable of such an act of wanton cruelty. 
 
 " June 2. I am making my own shoes. 
 
 "June 9. I hare finished my shoes; they are 
 tolerably strong and neat. 
 
 " August 14. I was set to close bits of leather. 
 
 " August 15. Said bits of leather that I had closed 
 were approved of, and I was sent to close a pair of 
 women's shoes, which were also approved of. 
 
 " November 14. On Monday had been a twelve- 
 month in the workhouse, during which time I have 
 made seventy-eight pairs of list shoes, besides mend- 
 ing many others, and have received, as a premium, 
 one penny per week. 
 
 " November 20. I burnt a tale, of which I had 
 written several sheets, which I called ' The Proba- 
 tionary Trial,' but which did not, as far as I wrote, 
 please me." 
 
 Many of the most touching entries in the journal 
 relate to the dear old grandmother. Here is one : 
 
 " 1819. Granny has been absent in Dock this 
 two days. Though but for so short a period, I 
 severely feel her absence. If I feel it so acutely 
 now, how shall I bear the-final separation when she 
 shall be gone to that 'undiscovered country from 
 whose bourne no traveller returns ?' She cannot be 
 expected to live many years longer, for now she is 
 more than seventy years of age. O, Almighty
 
 Dr. Kitto making Shoes in the Plymouth Workhouse.
 
 x HIS GKANNY IS DEAD. 9b 
 
 Power, spare yet a few years my granny, the protec- 
 tor of my infancy, and the I cannot express my 
 gratitude. It is useless to attempt it." 
 
 On April 18 he wrote: " She is dead/' The 
 measure of his sorrow was complete. His best 
 friend was gone ! After this great loss,, his father, 
 for a time at least, seemed desirous to befriend his 
 poor boy, and promised him the twopence that 
 granny had used to give him weekly to get his 
 library books. John was sadly afraid that when the 
 sorrow was blunted by time, that the twopence would 
 be withheld, and then what should he do? 
 
 Sometimes his thoughts would go out to the future. 
 His ambition was to have a stationer's shop and a 
 circulating library, with twelve or fourteen shillings 
 a week income. His anxious question was : " When 
 I am out, how shall I earn a livelihood ?" He 
 thought he might travel, and that some kind gentle- 
 man might take him, even though it were in the 
 humble capacity of a servant, " to tread classic Italy, 
 fantastic Gaul, proud Spain, and phlegmatic Batavia;" 
 nay, " to visit Asia, and the ground consecraied by 
 the steps of the Saviour." 
 
 There was a ray of joy let into his heart one day, 
 by the master of the workhouse proposing to him the 
 pleasurable task of writing some lectures to be read 
 to the boys, upon the subject of their duties. Kitto 
 felt the restraint of the workhouse, and yet kindness 
 had partially reconciled him to it. He was, never-
 
 95 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 theless, most anxious to quit it. " Liberty," he cried, 
 " was my idol ; liberty, not idleness. Methinks when 
 I am out of the house, I breathe almost another air. 
 Like the wolf in the fable, I would rather starve at 
 liberty than grow fat under restraint. There is no fear 
 of my starving in the midst of plenty. I know how to 
 prevent hunger. The Hottentots subsist a long time 
 on nothing but a little gum ; they also, when hungry, 
 tie a tight ligature round them. Cannot I do so, too ? 
 I will sell my books and pawn my neckerchiefs, by 
 which I shall be able to raise about twelve shillings, 
 and with that I will make the tour of England. The 
 hedges furnish blackberries, nuts, sloes, &c., and the 
 fields turnips ; a hayrick or barn will be an excellent 
 bed. I will take pen, ink, and paper with me, and 
 note down my observations as I go a kind of senti- 
 mental tour, not so much a description of places as 
 of men and manners, adventures and feelings." 
 
 This tour, it is needless to say, was not made. On 
 the 8th of November, 1821, he was handed over to 
 a much more prosy condition apprenticed to John 
 Bowden, shoemaker. He was to remain with his 
 new master until he was twenty- one, and he was now 
 seventeen. Kitto had a little reluctance to quit the 
 workhouse at first, and only consented to do so when 
 the advantages of the change were presented to his 
 mind. " The going home at night, the possession of 
 his evenings for himself, the power of reading in his 
 own garret, without molestation, the dropping of the
 
 A HARD TASKMASTER. 97 
 
 poorhouse uniform, food in plenty, and good clothes 
 these formed an irresistible temptation.''" And then, 
 when he was fairly out of the workhouse, he gave ex- 
 pression to his feelings : " I am no longer a work, 
 house boy I am an apprentice \" 
 
 John's joy, however, was soon changed. His mas- 
 ter was a mean-spirited tyrant, who had selected him. 
 on account of his deafness thinking that his in- 
 firmity would prevent him making any complaint. 
 John thus records his feelings after being two months 
 with his master : 
 
 " January 19. O misery, art thou to be my only 
 portion ! Father of heaven, forgive me if I wish I 
 had never been born. O that I were dead, if death 
 were an annihilation of being ; but as it is not, teach 
 ine to endure life : enjoy it I never can. In short, 
 mine is a severe master, rather cruel I" The journal 
 contains many heart-rending passages of the master's 
 heartless cruelty to the poor deaf boy. He often forced 
 him to work sixteen and eighteen hours out of the 
 twenty-four striking and buffetting him without 
 mercy. His condition was so dreadful, that he twice 
 seriously contemplated suicide. Happily he had the 
 power of writing ; his case was heard before the 
 magistrates, and his indentures cancelled. When he 
 returned to his home the workhouse he began to 
 turn over in his mind the possibility of doing some- 
 thing besides making shoes. " What might he not 
 do ? Might he not write or compose a work ? be it 
 
 H
 
 98 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 poetry or prose might it not immortalise his name ? 
 What should hinder the achievement ? Might not- 
 every obstacle be surmounted, and John Kitto become 
 an author known to fame ?" 
 
 He wrote, as the result of these thoughts : " I had 
 learned that knowledge is power ; and not only was 
 it power, but safety. As nearly as the matter can now 
 be traced, the progress of my ideas appears to have 
 been this firstly, that I was not altogether so helpless 
 as I had seemed ; secondly, that, notwithstanding my 
 afflicted state, I might realise much comfort in the 
 condition of life in which I had been placed ; thirdly, 
 that I might even raise myself out of that condition, 
 into one of less privation ; fourthly, that it was not 
 impossible for me to place my own among honourable 
 names, by proving that no privation formed an insu- 
 perable bar to useful labour and self-advancement. 
 To do what no one under the same circumstances ever 
 did, soon that ceased to be the limit of my ambition [" 
 Fortunately, while he was in one of the Plymouth 
 bookshops, he had been noticed by a famed mathe- 
 matician, Mr. Harvey, who, after learning his history, 
 determined to interest others on his behalf. A circu- 
 lar was drawn up, detailing the incidents of Kitto's 
 birth and life, and suggesting that a small sum of 
 money, raised by subscription, should be appropriated 
 to his use for board and lodgings, until some perma- 
 nent situation could be procured for him. This appeal 
 was successful. The guardians subscribed five pounds
 
 THE WAY BECOMING PLAIN. 9S 
 
 to the fund. In the meantime Kitto boarded with a 
 Mr. Burnard, and had the privilege of using the public 
 library, and devoting all his hours to mental improve- 
 ment. These hours he used industriously, although 
 he was subject to frequent attacks of illness. It was 
 suggested that he might become a missionary ; a posi- 
 tion to which he had never hoped to attain in his most 
 Excited moments, but when the prospect was opened 
 up to him, it thrilled him with delight, as it presented 
 opportunities of usefulness ; and to be useful, he had 
 already learned, was the only way to secure happiness. 
 
 About this time Kitto was introduced to a Mr. 
 Groves, a dentist, residing at Exeter, who offered to 
 instruct him in his profession, to board him, and give 
 him for his services, 15 for the first year, and 20 
 for the second. Kitto happily accepted the offer 
 and found in the character of Mr. Groves the example 
 of a true Christian, and a valued friend. 
 
 In the spring of 1825, a volume of Kitto' s letters 
 and essays was published, for which more than four 
 hundred subscribers were obtained. The volume 
 gave evidence of his close and multifarious reading. 
 In it reference is made to Malebranche, Hume, Reid, 
 Stewart, Berkeley, Des Cartes, Locke, and Stilling- 
 fleet, Lord Bacon, and Madame de Stael. He des- 
 cants upon the Tuscan, Doric, and Gothic orders 
 of architecture; criticises the productions of Sal- 
 vator Rosa, Gainsborough, Titian, and Raphael ; and 
 has some noticeable remarks upon the sculpture of 
 
 H 2
 
 100 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 antiquity. It was quite evident that Kitto remem- 
 bered what he had read. But he did not read for 
 amusement merely he read for the thoughts and 
 facts which the books contained. One day he wrote : 
 " Without books, I should quickly become an igno- 
 rant and senseless being, unloving and unloved, if I 
 am not so already. I apprehend that I have some- 
 times offended my acquaintance, by the importunity 
 with which I have solicited the loan of books. But 
 if I had a house full of books myself, and knew any 
 person to whom they would be so necessary as to me, 
 and who would make so good a use of them as I do, 
 I would not stay to be entreated, nor scruple to lend 
 any, or all of them, in succession, to such a person. 
 What earthly pleasure can equal that of reading a 
 good book ? O, dearest tomes ! Princely and august 
 folio ! Sublime quarto ! Elegant octavo ! Charm- 
 ing duodecimo ! Most ardently do I admire your 
 beauties. To obtain ye, and to call ye mine, I would 
 work day and night; and to possess ye, I would 
 forbid myself all sensual joys \" 
 
 At this time, when Kitto was in his twentieth year, 
 Mr. Groves had been contemplating devoting himself 
 to the missionary work, and to this end had been 
 preparing in Trinity College, Dublin. It was pro 
 posed to Kitto that he should practise as a dentist, 
 either in Plymouth or in London ; but Mr. Groves 
 learning that the printing-offices at several of the 
 missionary stations were in need of willing workmen,
 
 PREPARATION FOR MISSIONARY LABOUR. 101 
 
 and knowing Kitto's spirit and admiration for mis- 
 sionary labour, proposed that he should go out to one 
 of the stations as a printer. He accepted the pro- 
 posal at once, as the most congenial and desirable 
 work. He was accepted by the London Board, Mr 
 Groves liberally offering to pay towards his board 
 50 per annum, for two years. In the July of 1825 
 he was consigned to the care of Mr. Watts, at the 
 Missionary College at Islington, to learn the art of 
 printing. When in the office he soon learned to set 
 the types of the Greek Testament, and Persic, on 
 Henry Martyn's translation. One of the delights 
 which he found in London was an indulgence in his 
 early propensity of visiting and reading at the book- 
 stalls. His industry was not relaxed with his com- 
 paratively easy circumstances. " I cannot/' he wrote, 
 " accuse myself of having wasted or misemployed a 
 moment of my time since I left the workhouse." He 
 was so methodical in the distribution of his time, as 
 carefully to apportion a task to every part of the day, 
 only allowing himself six hours for sleep ; and con- 
 sidered that rather more than he could afford. After 
 spending considerable time in preparation, he finally 
 went out to Malta in 1827, to enter upon the duties 
 of the printing office, which was under the direction 
 of Mr. Jowett and Mr. Schliewz, and was employed in 
 printing tracts in Greek, Arabic, Maltese, and Italian. 
 He entered upon the work with ardour devoting 
 all his spare time to the study of Asiatic characters.
 
 102 JOHN KiTTO. 
 
 After a period, owing to the disposition " which 
 would not be controlled," to learn, the Missionary 
 Committee thought his studies interfered with the 
 discharge of his duties in the printing-office ; this 
 occasioned a breach, which gradually widened until 
 he resolved to return to England. The Committee 
 evidently did not understand, and certainly did not 
 sympathise, with Kitto in his desires and aspira- 
 tions. They required a mere printer; Kitto \vas 
 more he could originate thoughts worthy of being 
 printed. 
 
 On his return to London he resolved various plans 
 to enable him to gain a livelihood, one of which was 
 his original plan : to open a stationer's shop in the 
 neighbourhood of Plymouth. But this project came 
 to nothing. In the meantime his funds were ex- 
 hausted, and he was once more reduced to the dregs 
 of poverty. Fortunately, at this time a situation was 
 offered him by a gentleman, John Synge, Esq., of 
 Glanmor Castle, County Wicklow, who was printing, 
 at his own private press, " some little works in Hebretf 
 and Greek/' He was to have entered upon the 
 duties at the printing office on the 1st of June ; but 
 before that time his oJd friend Mr. Groves had made 
 him a second offer to accompany him to the East, 
 which he at once accepted. This was literally realiz- 
 ing his early dream. He went out as the tutor to 
 the two little boys of Mr. Groves. His instructions 
 to the children embraced Hebrew, scripture, theologyi
 
 VISITS THE EAST. THE PLAGUE. 103 
 
 history, geography, writing, arithmetic, and English 
 composition. 
 
 On the 12th of June, 1829, the party sailed for St. 
 Petersburg. During his stay in Russia, Kitto did not 
 form a very high opinion of its inhabitants. After 
 staying at St. Petersburg Mr. Groves went to Mos- 
 cow, which city much pleased Kitto. The next place 
 visited was Astrachan distant about a thousand miles. 
 They then traversed the entire country, meeting with 
 many adventures on the way, until they arrived at 
 Araxes, the river dividing Russia from Persia. On 
 this journey Kitto was thrown from his horse, but, 
 having adopted the turban the previous day, its thick 
 folds no doubt saved his life. The party entered 
 Bagdad on the 6th of December, 1829, six months 
 after leaving Gravesend. "While in Bagdad the plague 
 entered the city. As many as 1000 and 1500 deaths 
 occurred in one day. In two months, 50,000 were 
 supposed to have fallen victims to it. Mrs. Groves 
 was seized on the 7th of May, and died en the 14th, 
 after a week's suffering. Mr. Groves was also threat- 
 ened, but providentially escaped. This danger was 
 not over before they were exposed to another. On 
 the 27th of April, owing to the river overflowing its 
 banks, 7000 houses were thrown down, and 15,000 
 people lost their lives ! The city seemed doomed, 
 but this was not all. The horrors of a siege followed 
 the death-dealing plague and flood. The Arab Pashas 
 of Mosul and Aleppo, so soon as the waters had sub-
 
 104 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 sided, advanced against the stricken city. The siege 
 was carried on for several months, during which 
 time the inhabitants were subjected to all the heart- 
 rending scenes engendered by fiendish war rapine 
 and famine not being the least. Kitto was confined 
 in the house for five months, during the horrors en- 
 tailed by death, sword, and pestilence. After collect- 
 ing all the information possible upon the habits and 
 customs of the East, to illustrate the Bible narratives, 
 he returned to England, in company with a Mr. 
 Newman, in the September of 1832 ; they arrived at 
 their destination in June 1833 Kitto having ac- 
 quired considerable information on the journey. 
 
 After settling down once more he was introduced 
 to Mr. Charles Knight, who employed him as a regular 
 contributor to the " Penny Magazine" one of the 
 popular serials, read, it was supposed, by more than a 
 million of people, besides being reprinted in America, 
 and translated into French, German, and Dutch. Mr. 
 Knight also employed Kitto to take charge of the 
 " Penny Cyclopaedia." This necessitated his spending 
 seven hours daily in Ludgate Street. Mr. Knight 
 also projected the " Pictorial Bible," being fully as- 
 sured that Kitto could supply the notes and illustra- 
 tive matter. This work was commenced in 1835, and 
 completed in May, 1 838. During its progress Kitto 
 received 250 a-year, and an additional sum at its 
 completion. The next work upon which he was 
 employed was the " Pictorial History of Palestine and
 
 LITEBAEY LABOURS. 
 
 the Holy Land, including a complete History of the 
 Jews." The subsequent work commenced was the 
 " Christian Traveller," a periodical publication. Only 
 three parts were published, owing to Mr. Knight's 
 business becoming embarrassed. Kitto was then en- 
 gaged by the Messrs. Black of Edinburgh to write a 
 " History of Palestine, from the Patrarchial Age to 
 the Present Time;" he also wrote " Thoughts among 
 Flowers," for the Religious Tract Society. Between 
 1841 and 1843, he prepared the letter-press of the 
 " Gallery of Scripture Engravings ;" and in 1845, 
 " The Pictorial Sunday Book," with 1300 engravings, 
 and an appendix on the Geography of the Holy Land. 
 On the title page of his next work " The Biblical 
 Cyclopaedia" Kitto's name appears as John Kitto, 
 D.D., F.S.A. The pauper surely never dreamed of such 
 a height 1 He received the diploma of Doctor of 
 Divinity from the University of Giessen; and in 1845 
 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Antiqua- 
 ries. From this period his industry was incessant 
 working almost constantly from four in the morning 
 until nine in the evening, producing in succession a 
 series of standard works which will ever remain to 
 attest his labour and research. In the December of 
 1850, Lord John Russell wrote him: " The Queen 
 has directed that a grant of 100 a year should be 
 made to you from her Majesty's Civil List, on ac- 
 count of your useful and meritorious literary works." 
 This well-earned bounty he did not enjoy very long,
 
 106 JOHN KITTO. 
 
 his intense exertion bringing on a serious illness, 
 which, despite the best attention, remission of his 
 labours, and the pleasure of a journey into Germany 
 for the restoration of his health, terminated in his 
 death, in the November of 1854. He was interred in 
 the cemetery of Cannstatt, in Germany, followed to 
 his resting-place by a large concourse of the residents. 
 Thus terminated the life of this pauper boy ! more 
 glorious in the results of his life than if he had been 
 born to the heritage of a noble name and an ample 
 estate. His works would have done him infinite 
 honour had he had the advantages of the most liberal 
 education, the companionship and encouragement of 
 the learned ; but how much more do they redound to 
 his honour when his infirmity, and all the disadvan- 
 tages of his early position are considered! What 
 boy, or what man, reading the life and trials, and 
 ultimate triumphs of the workhouse boy, will not be 
 nerved with earnest resolve and fixed resolution to 
 imitate him in his eagerness in the pursuit of know- 
 ledge, and to leave the world somewhat better than 
 he found it.
 
 HUGH MILLER : 
 
 STONEMASON; AFTERWARDS GEOLOGIST, AUTHOH, 
 LECTURER, AND NEWSPAPER EDITOR. 
 
 THE newspapers of 1856 contained notices of the death 
 of one of the most eminent men of the age. One 
 writer thus wrote : " Science and letters have to de- 
 plore the painful and untimely loss of one of the most 
 remarkable men of his time and country. Yesterday 
 morning Mr. Hugh Miller was found lying lifeless 
 on the threshold of his bedroom, in his house at 
 Portobello. His health had been disordered for some 
 time past, and his sleep broken by fits of nightmare. 
 About midnight on Tuesday, it would seem, he had 
 risen in one of those paroxysms, and snatching up a 
 revolver which lay loaded by his bed-side, made for the 
 door of his chamber. There the pistol went off, and 
 the ball, piercing his breast, he dropped dead upon 
 the spot. The story of the life which has come to so 
 sad an end needs not now be told. His own graceful 
 and graphie pen has made the world acquainted with 
 the circumstances of his birth and boyhood, his self- 
 instruction in a wide circle of knowledge, and his rise 
 from a lot of toil and obscurity to a position of com-
 
 108 HUGH MILLEE. 
 
 parative ease and acknowledged eminence. He was 
 born at Cromarty, on the 10th of October, 1802, and 
 had worked for fifteen years as a stonemason, when, 
 about 1835, he was appointed manager of a bank in 
 his native town. His first work, 'Scenes and Legends 
 of the North of Scotland/ was followed rapidly by his 
 'Old Red Sandstone/ and his 'Letter to Lord 
 Brougham on the Auchterarder Case/ so that his 
 reputation, both as a successful cultivator of geology, 
 a skilful controversialist, and a brilliant and eloquent 
 writer, was already made when he took up his residence 
 in Edinburgh about sixteen years ago. His contribu- 
 tions to the ' Witness' were for some time large and 
 frequent, and at once established that journal in the 
 confidence of the ecclesiastical party to whose interests 
 it devoted itself. Latterly, as the heat of controversy 
 abated, he wrote more sparingly in its columns. His 
 health, shaken by over exertion, now began to fail, 
 and his physicians ordered him to seek repose and 
 change of scene. His eyes were turned southward, 
 and the result was his ' First Impressions of England 
 and its people/ The publication of the well-known 
 ' Vestiges of Creation' soon afterwards called forth 
 his ' Footprints of the Creator/ The last book which 
 he lived to finish was the autobiographical sketch on 
 which he bestowed the title of ' Schools and School- 
 masters/ He had for some time been labouring, only 
 too industriously, on a new work on geology. His 
 lecture, two winters ago, in Exeter Hall, on ' The
 
 WRECK OF THE " FRIENDSHIP." 109 
 
 Mosaic Periods ;' his paper, read the summer before 
 last to the British Association at Glasgow ; and his 
 lectures which were in course of delivery on ( The 
 Noachian Deluge/ were, we believe, portions of the 
 volume he was hurrying to completion when he was 
 so suddenly struck down by the hand of death." 
 
 And what were the circumstances of the birth and 
 boyhood of this remarkable man ? Briefly these : he 
 was born at Cromarty, in 1802; he came from a race 
 of bold and hardy mariners. His father was a rough 
 sailor, but a kind man. An anecdote is related of 
 him, that when he was a boy he was sent to drown a 
 litter of puppies, but he found the task impossible ; 
 so he tucked them up in his kilt and took them home, 
 saying, " I couldna drown the little doggies, mother ! 
 and I brought them to you." 
 
 After serving his country in the navy faithfully and 
 honourably, he was at the time of Hugh's birth master 
 of a sloop. One sad stormy day this sloop, the 
 " Friendship," lay insplinters on the bar of Findhorn ; 
 another vessel, however, was obtained, which in ten 
 years after put to sea during the lull of a storm ; but, 
 sharing a worse fate than its predecessor, no vestige 
 of crew or vessel was ever seen more ! 
 
 This tragic event induced Hugh's two uncles to 
 compensate in some measure for the severe loss which 
 he had sustained. Before his father's death he had 
 been sent to a " dame school," where he learned to 
 read the Catechism, the Proverbs, the New Testament, 
 and the Bible. The inducement to read was chiefly
 
 110 HUGH M1LLEE. 
 
 owing to the stories which reading was the key to. 
 The stories of the Old and New Testament were soon 
 mastered ; then followed the usual round of " Jack 
 the Giant Killer/' &c., to the " Odyssey " and, as a 
 matter of course the " Pilgrim's Progress." Then 
 followed some harder reading : " The Scots Worthies/' 
 " Naphthali/' " The Cloud of Witnesses/' &c. " Wal- 
 lace, the Hero of Scotland/' was a special attraction. 
 The dame at the dame's school having exhausted 
 her store upon Hugh, he was transferred to the 
 grammar school of Cromarty. The dominie, however, 
 took more kindly to his own ease and comfort than 
 teaching ; the consequence was, that if a boy preferred 
 play to work why, he was allowed to follow his in- 
 clination. The schoolmaster put Hugh into Latin 
 a change not much relished, as he soon desired to give 
 up "The Rudiments" and go back to his English 
 stories. Some of the Cromarty inhabitants not liking 
 the small progress their sons made under the school- 
 master, established a subscription school on their own 
 account. The teacher was clever, and competent for 
 his duties ; but, owing to intemperate habits, he had 
 soon to give up his teaching. His successor was a 
 licentiate of the Church of Scotland ; he had to leave, 
 however, in consequence of mixing up in a theological 
 controversy. The third teacher gave up in despair. 
 All this time, no doubt, Hugh and his companions 
 had fine opportunities to make rural excursions, and 
 indulge their strong propensities for out-door exercise.
 
 NATURAL "WONDERS OP CROMARTY. Ill 
 
 Miller, in his " Schools and Schoolmasters " one 
 of the most interesting pieces of autobiography ever 
 written describes the natural wonders of Cromarty. 
 " The Cromarty Sutors," he says, " have their two 
 lines of caves an ancient line, hollowed by the waves 
 many centuries ago, when the sea stood, in relation to 
 the land, from fifteen to thirty feet higher along our 
 shores than it does now ; and a modern line, which 
 the surf is still engaged in scooping out. Many of 
 the older caves are lined with stalactites, deposited by 
 springs that, filtering through the cracks in their pas- 
 sage, acquire what is known as & petrifying, though, 
 in reality, only an encrusting quality. And these 
 stalactites, under the name of ' white stones made by 
 the water/ formed of old as in that Cave of Slains 
 specially mentioned by Buchanan and the chroniclers, 
 and in those caverns of the Peak so quaintly described 
 by Cotton one of the grand marvels of the place. 
 Almost all the old gazetteers sufficiently copious in 
 their details to mention Cromarty at all, refer to its 
 ' Dropping Cave ' as a marvellous marvel-producing 
 cavern ; and this ' Dropping Cave ' is but one of 
 many that look out upon the sea from the precipices 
 of the Southern Sutor, in whose dark recesses the 
 drops ever tinkle, and the stony ceilings ever grow." 
 Sir George Mackenzie of Coul, anxious to see the sort of 
 stones of which the caves were composed, sent a com- 
 mission to the minister of the parish for specimens. 
 He, in his turn, employed a poor man, a nailor, to
 
 112 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 explore the caves. It so happened, however, that the 
 nailer's wife had been accidentally drowned, and, if 
 report spoke true, was subsequently seen at night-fall 
 in various lone places. By no means anxious to give 
 his wife an opportunity to meet him in the deep 
 recesses of the cave, the nailor had prudently confined 
 himself to the entrance, and, as the result, brought 
 home aheap of rubbish butnot a particle of stalactite, 
 In this emergency Hugh's uncles were appealed to 
 who were delighted at the opportunity of thus for- 
 warding the interests of science ; providing themselves 
 with torches and a hammer, they setout for the caves ; 
 Hugh, of course, forming one of the party. " In the 
 deepest recesses of the caves, where the floor becomes 
 covered with uneven sheets of stalagmite, and where 
 long spear-like icicles and drapery-like foldings, pure 
 as the marble of the sculptor, descend from above, 
 or hang pendant over the sides, we found in abund- 
 ance magnificent specimens for Sir George. The 
 entire expedition was one of wondrous interest ; and 
 I returned next day to school, big with description 
 and narrative, to excite, by truths more marvellous 
 than fiction, the curiosity of my class fellows." So 
 wrote Hugh, in after years. 
 
 He failed to interest his companions to the ex- 
 tent of inducing them to devote their play hours 
 to the exploration of the caves. There was a soli- 
 tary aspect about them, which did not conform 
 to their buoyant hilarity; they preferred their old
 
 A. THRILLING ADVENTURE. 113 
 
 play-ground, it being almost within hail of their 
 homes. There was one little fellow, however, who had 
 won the confidence of Hugh, who was his constant 
 companion in his rambles, whose curiosity was largely 
 excited about the caves. With this companion, and 
 armed with John Feddes's hammer, they started for 
 the Doocot Cave, one fine spring morning. Miller, 
 in his own graphic way, thus narrates the adventure : 
 " I stood on the beach opposite the eastern pro- 
 montory that, with its stern granite wall, bars access 
 for ten days out of every fourteen to the wonders of 
 the Doocot, and saw it stretching provokingly out 
 into green water. It was hard to be disappointed, 
 and the caves so near. The tide was a low neap, and 
 if we wanted a passage dry shod, it behoved us to 
 wait for at least a week ; but neither of us under- 
 stood the philosophy of neap tides at that period. I 
 was quite sure I had got round at low water with my 
 uncles not a great many days before, and we both 
 inferred that, if we but succeeded in getting round 
 now, it would be quite a pleasure to wait among the 
 caves inside until such time as the fall of the tide 
 should lay bare a passage for our return. A narrow 
 and broken shelf runs along the promontory, on 
 which, by the assistance of the naked toe and the 
 toe-nail it is just possible to creep. We succeeded 
 in scrambling up to it, and then, crawling outwards 
 on all-fours the precipice, as we proceeded, beetling 
 more and more formidable from above, and the water 
 
 Z
 
 114 HUGH MILLEE. 
 
 becoming greener and deeper below we reached the 
 outer point of the promontory ; and then, doubling 
 the cape on a still narrower margin the water, by 
 a reverse process, becoming shallower and less green 
 as we advanced inwards; we found the ledge termi- 
 nating just where, after clearing the sea, it overhung 
 the gravelly beach, at an elevation of nearly ten feet. 
 Adown we both dropped, proud of our success ; up 
 splashed the rattling gravel as we fell ; and, for at least 
 the whole coming week though we were unaware of 
 the extent of our good luck at the time the marvels 
 of the Doocot Cave might be regarded as solely and 
 exclusively our own. Por one short seven days to 
 borrow emphasis from the phraseology of Carlyle 
 they were our own, and no other man's/ ; 
 
 After exploring minutely the wonders that lay "all 
 Before them," they thought it strange that the tide, 
 while there was yet a full fathom of water beneath 
 the brow of the promontory, ceased to fall, and then, 
 after a quarter of an hour's space, began actually to 
 creep upwards on the beach. Hoping there might 
 be some mistake in the matter, which the evening 
 tide would rectify, they continued to amuse them- 
 selves. Hour after hour passed, and yet the tide still 
 rose. "We made," says Hugh, " desperate efforts to 
 scale the precipices, and on two several occasions 
 succeeded in reaching shelves midway among the 
 crags where the sparrowhawk and the raven build ; 
 but though we had climbed well enough to render
 
 IN PERIL, BUT RESCUED. 115 
 
 our return a matter of bare possibility, there was no 
 possibility whatever of getting farther up : the cliffs 
 had never been scaled before, and they were not 
 destined to be scaled now. And so, as the twilight 
 deepened, and the precarious footing became every 
 moment more doubtful and precarious still, we had 
 just to give up in despair. ' Wouldn't care for my- 
 self/ said the poor little fellow, my companion, burst- 
 ing into tears, ' if it were not for my mother ; but 
 what will my mother say ?' ' Wouldn't care neither/ 
 said I, with a heavy heart ; ' but it's just backwater, 
 we'll get out at twall.' we retreated together into 
 one of the shallower and drier caves, and, clearing a 
 little spot of its rough stones, and then groping along 
 the rocks for the dry grass that in the spring season 
 hangs from them in withered tufts, we formed for 
 ourselves a most uncomfortable bed, and lay down in 
 each other's arms." Hugh's companion had only 
 the real evils of their position to deal with, but he 
 had imaginary ones much more serious in their 
 effects. About a month previous he had seen the 
 body of a drowned seaman, which, as all drowned per- 
 sons long exposed to the water, presented a very awful 
 sight. While they were i-n the cave Hugh continu- 
 ally fancied he saw the corpse. Towards midnight 
 they crept down in the uncertain light, to ascertain 
 if the tide had not fallen sufficiently to yield them a 
 passage. The waves were where the tide-line rnsted 
 twelve hours before. A vessel was observed crossing 
 
 i 3
 
 116 HUGH MILLED. 
 
 the wake of the moon, but all their efforts to arrest 
 its progress were fruitless. There was nothing to be 
 done but once more seek their comfortless bed within 
 the cave. They had scarcely dropped to sleep ere 
 both were roused by a loud shout. There was a 
 brief pause, and then two boats, strongly manned, 
 shot round the western promontory. The whole 
 town had become alarmed by the intelligence that 
 two little boys had straggled away in the morning to 
 the rocks of the Southern Sutor, and had not found 
 their way back. All ended well, notwithstanding 
 fearful forbodings. Some enormously bad verses, 
 so Hugh said, were composed upon the adventure, 
 which found admiring auditors at the various tea- 
 tables of Cromarty, and had the further honour of 
 being recited at the town boarding-school examination 
 by a pretty young lady. 
 
 Notwithstanding the small amount of education 
 possessed by Miller, owing chiefly to the squabbles 
 and incapacity of the schoolmasters, the last of 
 whom he deemed a pedant and coxcomb, Hugh, at 
 seventeen years of age, became a stonemason's ap- 
 prentice. His uncles desired to send him to college, 
 and would have done so, but he objected, not consi- 
 dering that he had any fitness for any of the profes- 
 sions. His first day in the Cromarty stone-quarry, 
 he thus describes : 
 
 " A heap of loose fragments, which had fallen from 
 above, blocked up the face of the quarry, and my
 
 THE STONE QUARRY. 117 
 
 first employment was to clear them away. The fric- 
 tion of the shovel soon blistered my hands ; but the 
 pain was by no means very severe, and I wrought 
 hard and willingly, that I might see how the huge 
 strata below, which presented so firm and unbroken a 
 frontage, were to be torn up and removed. Picks, 
 and wedges, and levers were applied by my brother 
 workmen; and, simple and rude as I have been 
 accustomed to regard these implements, I found I 
 had much to learn in the way of using them. They 
 all proved inefficient, however, and the workmen had 
 to bore into one of the inferior strata, and employ 
 gunpowder. The process was new to me, and I 
 deemed it a highly amusing one ; it had the merit, 
 too, of being attended with some such degree of 
 danger as a boating or a rock excursion, and had thus 
 an interest independent of its novelty. We had a 
 few capital shots ; the fragments flew in every direc- 
 tion, and an immense mass of the diluvium came 
 toppling down, bearing with it two dead birds that in 
 a recent storm had crept into one of the deep fissures 
 to die in the shelter. I felt a new interest in ex- 
 amining them. The one was a pretty cock goldfinch, 
 with its hood of vermillion, and its wings inlaid with 
 the gold to which it owes its name, as unsoiled and 
 smooth as if it had been preserved for a museum. 
 The other, a somewhat rarer bird, of the woodpecker 
 tribe, was variegated with light blue and a greyish- 
 yellow. I was engaged in admiring the poo?? little
 
 118 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 things more disposed to be sentimental, perhaps, 
 than if I had been ten years older, and thinking of 
 the contrast between the warmth and jollity of their, 
 green summer haunts, and the cold and darkness of 
 their last retreat when I heard our employer bid- 
 ding the workmen lay by their tools. I looked up, 
 and saw the sun sinking behind the thick firwood 
 beside us, and the long dark shadows of the trees 
 stretching downwards towards the shore. 
 
 " This was no very formidable beginning of the 
 course of life I had so much dreaded. To be sure, my 
 hands were a little sore, and I felt nearly as much 
 fatigued as if I had been climbing among the rocks ; 
 but I had wrought and been useful, and had enjoyed 
 the day fully as much as usual. It was no small 
 matter, too, that the evening, converted, by a rare 
 transmutation, into the delicious ' blink of rest' which 
 Burns so truthfully describes, was all my own. I was 
 as light of heart next morning as any of my brother 
 workmen. There had been a smart frost during the 
 night, and the rime lay white on the grass as we passed 
 onwards through the fields ; but the sun rose in a clear 
 atmosphere, and the day mellowed as it advanced, into 
 one of those delightful days of early spring, which give 
 so pleasing an earnest of whatever is mild and genial 
 in the better half of the year. All the workmen 
 rested at mid-day, and I went to enjoy my half-hour 
 alone on a mossy knoll in the neighbouring wood, 
 which commands through the trees a wide prospect
 
 APPRECIATION OF NATURE. 119 
 
 of the bay and the opposite shore. There was not a 
 wrinkle on the wa.ter, nor a cloud in the sky, and the 
 branches were as moveless in the calm as if they had 
 been traced on canvas. From a wooded promontory 
 that stretched halfway across the frith, there ascended 
 a thin column of smoke. It rose straight as the line 
 of a plummet for more than a thousand yards, and 
 then, on reaching a thinner stratum of air, spreac out 
 equally on every side, like the foliage of a stately tree. 
 Ben Wyvis rose to the west, white with the yet un- 
 wasted snows of winter, and as sharply denned in the 
 clear atmosphere as if all its sunny slopes and blue 
 retiring hollows had been chiselled in marble. A 
 line of snow ran along the opposite hills ; all above 
 was white, and all below was purple. They reminded 
 me of the pretty French story, in which an old artist 
 is described as tasking the ingenuity of his future 
 son-in-law, by giving him as a subject for his pencil a 
 flower-piece composed of only white flowers, of which 
 the one-half were to bear their proper colour, the other 
 half a deep purple hue, and yet all be perfectly natural, 
 and how the young man resolved the riddle and gained 
 his mistress, by introducing a transparent purple vase 
 into the picture, and making the light pass through it 
 on the flowers that were drooping over the edge. I re- 
 turned to the quarry, convinced that a very exquisite 
 pleasure may be a very cheap one, and that the busiest 
 employments may afford leisure enough to enjoy it." 
 As the work progressed he was struck with the
 
 120 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 varying appearance of the solid rocks upon which the 
 workmen were employed. In addition to the novelty 
 of labour, he found ample time for thought, in the 
 fresh objects that were continually meeting his view. 
 He was at this time laying the foundation of the 
 future geologist. After working some time in the 
 Cromarty quarries, Miller began to work across the 
 Moray Frith. Here new wonders met his astonished 
 gaze. Geological deposits, rich in the deepest inter- 
 est, were everywhere around. The observations he 
 then made, prompted only by the interest of the pass- 
 ing hour, were the ground-work of much of his future 
 eminence. When the labour season was over, Hugh, 
 in the company of a cousin, made a tour in the High- 
 lands. During the three months recess he renewed 
 some old acquaintanceships and formed new ones ; 
 and when spring came again, went once more to his 
 stone-cutting. The failure of his master, however, 
 before midsummer, threw him and the rest of the 
 men out of employment. His next engagement 
 brought him into contact with the Bothy system, the 
 first night of which he passed in a hay-loft, the only 
 place of shelter he could find. The position was so 
 new and uncomfortable that he could not sleep. About 
 midnight he got up to look out of the window, which 
 opened upon a dreary moor, a ruinous chapel, and 
 solitary burial-ground. His attention was aroused 
 by observing a light amid the grave-stones, and pre- 
 sently a low wailing scream came upon his ear. ID
 
 EDINBURGH NOTABILITIES. 121 
 
 a moment after, the door of the mansion-house was 
 thrown open, and the servants ran out to claim the 
 assistance of the workmen : a poor creature mad 
 Bell had broken from her confinement. Their ser- 
 vices were not needed, as two men were already drag- 
 ging her to her cottage, who proceeded to bind her 
 to the damp earth. Miller and a comrade success- 
 fully remonstrated. The mad woman, as if a gleam 
 of reason had flitted across her mind, turned her face 
 upon the two youths, exclaiming : " Blessed are the 
 merciful, for they shall obtain mercy." 
 
 This work coming to an end, Miller determined 
 to try his fortune in Edinburgh. He found work 
 when he arrived there, in the vicinity of Niddry Mill, 
 where he first became practically acquainted with 
 combinations amongst workmen. The strike in which 
 they were then engaged he believed would not suc- 
 ceed in obtaining the object of the men. A monster 
 meeting was projected, to be held on Bruntsfield 
 Links, at which Hugh attended. But the spirit of 
 the meeting did not accord with his views he was 
 glad to get away. At this time Edinburgh was the 
 centre of a literary galaxy which has never been sur- 
 passed at any period in the history of the Scottish 
 metropolis. There were Jeffrey, and Wilson, and 
 Dugald Stewart, and Walter Scott names that will 
 be known while the English language is spoken. 
 Miller was so unfortunate as not to see any of these 
 celebrities : one notable man, however, he both saw
 
 122 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 and heard Dr. M'Crie, the biographer of Knox and 
 Melville. 
 
 After stone-cutting for about two years in and 
 about Edinburgh, Hugh found himself with symptoms 
 of disease of the lungs and chest, brought on by his 
 employment ; he determined to return to Cromarty 
 to recruit. For some months after his return he la- 
 boured under the illness which proves fatal to so 
 many stonemasons. In the meanwhile he employed 
 himself in cutting tablets and tombstones. He after- 
 wards visited Inverness for the same purpose, where he 
 obtained excellent employment. It was at this place 
 that he put forth his first literary venture a small 
 volume of poems, serviceable only in bringing him 
 into contact with some literary men. 
 
 The stone-cutting proving so prejudicial to Hugh's 
 health, it was determined that some other employ- 
 ment should be obtained for him. A branch of the 
 Commercial Bank having been opened in Cromarty, 
 he was fortunate enough to be appointed accountant. 
 Having obtained a little instruction at the Linlithgow 
 Bank, Hugh, with very little practice, became very 
 expert in the duties of his new position ; and yet he 
 found time also to send forth his " Scenes and 
 Legends of the North of Scotland." 
 
 The second year of his engagement at the bank he 
 made Lydia Mackenzie Fraser Mrs. Miller ; he wrote, 
 also, at this time, for "Wilson's Tales of the Borders," 
 and " Chamber's Journal." Subsequently, the House
 
 THE "EDINBURGH WITNESS." 123 
 
 o Lords had made their decision in the celebrated 
 Auchterarder case, which called forth a pamphlet 
 fiom Hugh Miller's pen. It was entitled, " A Letter 
 from one of the Scotch People, to the Right Honour- 
 able Lord Brougham." It met with immense success. 
 The classic Gladstone pronounced favourably on its 
 merits. A second pamphlet was equally well received. 
 
 The free-church party were at that time on the 
 look-out for an editor for their paper. They were not 
 long in making the discovery that the man that 
 wrote the pamphlets, was the man to edit the 
 " Witness." Miller accepted the offer that was 
 made to him, and closed his accountantship at the 
 Cromarty Bank. Then commenced his intense life 
 of literary labour, in which he brought into full play 
 his peculiar genius and the experience of his life. 
 Subsequently he appeared as a lecturer, the Duke of 
 Argyle occupying the chair. 
 
 When he had nearly finished " The Testimony of 
 the Rocks," his greatest work, his medical adviser 
 forbade, for a time at least, any more literarj labour. 
 Miller had become subject to dreams and wakeful 
 appearances, so that frequently he left his bed more 
 wearied than when he entered it. To relieve these 
 distressing symptoms, Mrs. Miller invited a friend to 
 pass one evening with them. The time passed geni- 
 ally and pleasantly. Mr. Miller entertained them at 
 tea by reading Cowper's " Castaway," and the sonnet 
 to Mary Unwin. After spending some time in his
 
 124 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 study he took a bath, which had been recommended. 
 Next morning his body was found lifeless on the 
 floor ! the feet upon the study rug, the chest pierced 
 with the ball of a revolver, which had fallen into the 
 bath by his side ! 
 
 This was a sad, mournful ending in the meridian of 
 Hugh Miller's mental power ! Impressively does 
 the lesson come to the student, who, careless of the 
 limited physical power with which he is endowed, 
 seeks to attain, by midnight labour and excessive 
 mental pressure, results in weeks, which would fairly 
 occupy months, or even years. Had Hugh Miller 
 devoted only half his time to literature, and the other 
 half to those exercises which brace the will as well as 
 the muscles, he might, and doubtless would, have 
 been living this day, to diffuse the riches of the 
 rarest intellect, to warn back oppression and the 
 oppressor, to open up pages of the primeval world, 
 and to inculcate a taste for science and literature, 
 wherever books arc read and the human voice heard. 
 
 "Miller broke down," says the "Spectator," "be- 
 cause he was disobeying the laws of the creation in 
 which he lived. He was concentrating the whole 
 force of his nature in one pursuit, and suffering him- 
 self to be carried away by the excitement into which 
 he had worked himself. He was necessarily arrested. 
 It is imperative that the laws of the creation be 
 obeyed, it is not imperative that they be ' understood/ 
 Man, indeed, may for his own benefit work out a
 
 A MONUMENT TO HIS MEMORY. 125 
 
 better intellectual comprehension of the laws under 
 which he lives, but he must do it consistently with 
 obedience. He cannot snatch a further revelation, 
 nor will nature permit excess, even when the object 
 of the excess is laudable or pious. Whether under- 
 stood or not in the critical sense, the law goes on 
 relentless, and all who stand across its path are mowed 
 down." 
 
 Some little time ago the " Inverness Courier" had 
 this notice : 
 
 "The foundation stone of the monument to be 
 erected at Cromarty, in memory of Hugh Miller, 
 was laid on Wednesday afternoon. Everything was 
 done by the inhabitants that could render the cere- 
 mony impressive, and to exhibit the sincere pride 
 which they feel in being able to refer to our dis- 
 tinguished countryman as a native of their town, 
 born and brought up among themselves. Probably 
 not less than five or six hundred persons were present. 
 The monument will consist of a pillar about fifty 
 feet high, surmounted by a statue of Hugh Miller, 
 to be sculptured by Mr. Handyside Ritchie. The 
 base is of old red sandstone, taken from the shore 
 quarry, the first scene of Mr. Miller's labours, and 
 of his geological researches. The rest of the work 
 will be completed in a more durable stone, and of a 
 yellowish colour, obtained from the quarry at 
 Davidston. The following inscription to be en- 
 graved upon the base :
 
 126 HUGH MILLER. 
 
 * In commemoration of the genius and the lite- 
 rary and scientific eminence of Hugh Miller, this 
 monument is erected by his countrymen. He was 
 born at Cromarty, 10th October, 1802, and died 
 24th December. 1856.' "
 
 SAMUEL DREW: 
 
 SHOEMAKER'S APPRENTICE AND SMUGGLER; AFTERWARDS 
 MASTER OF ARTS, AND THE FIRST METAPHYSICIAN OF 
 HIS TIME. AUTHOR OF "WORKS ON THE IMMORTALITY 
 OF THE SOUL AND THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY, 
 
 ETC. 
 
 THE instances are so numerous, of great men being 
 in their youthful years poor and subjected to priva- 
 tion, unfriended and uninstructed, that the reader of 
 biography almost looks upon that condition of early 
 life as necessary to future greatness. There can be 
 no doubt that overcoming difficulties is a training 
 and an education, which no amount of mere scholastic 
 teaching can supply ; and the boy who succeeds in 
 throwing from him habits and practices formed in 
 the company of dissolute companions, has laid the 
 foundation of a life of usefulness and honour. If our 
 admiration is excited at the narration of some deed 
 of daring or perilous adventure, cited as an instance 
 of the pith and prowess of Englishmen, how ought 
 we to treasure every example of perseverance under 
 difficulties, especially, as in the case of Samuel Drew, 
 those difficulties being overcome, a position of i
 
 128 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 lectual greatness was attained, not surpassed by the 
 most gifted scholars of any age ? 
 
 Samuel Drew was born near St. Austell, in Corn- 
 wall, March 3, 1765. His father was a husband- 
 man, and followed, also, the occupation of " steam- 
 ing -," but neither means of living secured his family 
 against the chilling influences of poverty. But still, 
 he contrived to send his two boys, Samuel and Jabez, 
 to a day-school at St. Austell. Jabez was evidently 
 in love with the instruction he received; but Samuel, 
 the subject of this sketch, preferred to absent him- 
 self from the school as often as opportunity per- 
 mitted. His mother partially supplied the deficiency, 
 by giving him reading lessons at home ; and his 
 brother, also, gave him some little instruction in 
 writing. His mother appears to have been an in- 
 valuable woman, whose simple teaching left an im- 
 pression that remained with him his life long. Of 
 one incident he thus speaks : " I well remember, in 
 my early days, when my mother was alive, that she 
 invariably took my brother and me by the hand, and 
 led us to the house of prayer. Her kind advice and 
 instruction were unremitting ; and even when death 
 had closed her eyes in darkness, the impression re- 
 mained long upon my mind, and I sighed for a com- 
 panion to accompany me thither. On one occasion, I 
 well recollect, we were returning from the chapel, at 
 St. Austell, on a bright and beautiful starlight night, 
 when my mother pointed out the stars as the work
 
 HIS APPRENTICESHIP. 129 
 
 of an Almighty Parent, to whom we were indebted 
 for every blessing. Struck with the representation, 
 I felt a degree of gratitude and adoration which no 
 language could express, and through nearly all the 
 night enjoyed ineffable rapture." 
 
 Rude and callous as Samuel was, the death of hia 
 mother much affected him. His best friend was 
 gone. By the time he was eight years old he was 
 placed to work as a buddle-boy, for which he received 
 three halfpence per day. The example and im- 
 morality of the boys amongst whom he worked, did 
 him serious injury. Samuel's father was a religious 
 man ; but owing to his engagements to preach 
 to strangers, he had no time to devote to his own 
 household; thus Samuel and his brother were 
 neglected. 
 
 In the year 1776, and before he had finished his 
 eleventh year, Samuel was apprenticed to a shoe- 
 maker, residing about three miles from St. Austell. 
 His condition there is best expressed in his own 
 words : " My new abode," he wrote, " at St. Blazey, 
 and new engagements, were far from being pleasing. 
 To any of the comforts and conveniences of life I was 
 an entire stranger, and by every member of the 
 family was viewed as as underling, come thither to 
 subserve their wishes, or obey their mandates. To 
 his trade of shoemaker my master added that of 
 farmer. He had a few acres of ground under his 
 care, and was a sober, industrious man; but, un- 
 it
 
 130 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 fortunately for me, nearly one half of ray time was 
 taken up in agricultural pursuits. Oil this account, 
 I made no proficiency in my business, and felt no 
 solicitude to rise above the farmers' boys with Avhom 
 I daily associated. While in this place, I suffered 
 many hardships. When, after having been in the 
 fields all day, I came home with cold feet, and damp 
 and dirty stockings, if the oven had been heated 
 during the day, I was permitted to throw my stock- 
 ings into it, that they might be dry against the 
 following morning ; but frequently have I nad to put 
 them on in precisely the same state in which I 
 had left them the preceding evening. To mend my 
 stockings, I had no one ; and frequently have I wept 
 at the holes, which I could not conceal; though, 
 wheiv fortunate enough to procure a stocking-needle 
 and some worsted, I have drawn the outlines of the 
 hole together, and made what I thought a tolerable 
 
 job. 
 
 " During my apprenticeship many bickerings and 
 unpleasant occurrences took place. Some of these 
 preyed with so much severity on my mind, that 
 several times I had determined to run away, and 
 either enlist on board of a privateer, or a man-of-war. 
 A kind and gracious Providence, however, invariably 
 defeated my purposes, and threw unexpected obstacles 
 in the way, at the moment when my schemes were 
 apparently on the eve of accomplishment. 
 
 "In some part of my servitude, a few numbers
 
 HEADING AND DISSIPATION. 131 
 
 of the ' Weekly Entertainer* were brought to my 
 master's house. This little publication, which was 
 then extensively circulated in the west of England, 
 contained many tales and anecdotes which greatly 
 interested me. Into the narratives of adventures 
 connected with the then American war, I entered, 
 with all the zeal of a partisan, on the side of the 
 Americans. The history of Paul Jones, the ' Serapis/ 
 and the f Bon Homme Richard/ by frequent reading, 
 and daily dwelling upon them in the almost solitary 
 chamber of my thoughts, grew up into a lively image 
 in my fancy, and I felt a strong desire to join myself 
 to a pirate ship ; but, as I had no money, and scarcely 
 any clothes, the idea and scheme were vain. Besides 
 these entertainers, the only book which I remember 
 to have seen in the house, was an odd number of the 
 History of England, about the time of the Common- 
 wealth. With the reading of this I was at first 
 pleased ; but when, by frequent perusal, I had nearly 
 learned it by heart, it became monotonous, and was 
 shortly afterwards thrown aside. With this, I lost 
 not only a disposition for reading, but almost ability 
 to read. The clamour of my companions and others 
 engrossed nearly the whole of my attention, and, 
 so far as my slender means would allow, carried me 
 onward towards the vortex of dissipation. 
 
 " One circumstance I must not omit to notice, 
 during this period of my life, as it strikingly marks 
 the superintending providence of God, I was sent 
 
 K2
 
 182 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 one day to a neighbouring common, bordering on the 
 sea-shore, to see that my master's sheep were safe, 
 and together. Having discharged my duty, I looked 
 towards the sea, which, I presume, could not be less 
 than two hundred feet below me. I saw the sea- 
 birds busily employed, providing for their young, fly- 
 ing about midway between the sea and the elevation 
 on which I stood, when I was seized with a strange 
 resolution to descend the cliff, and make my way to 
 the place where they had built their nests. It was a 
 desperate and dangerous attempt ; but I determined 
 to persevere. My danger increased at every step; 
 and at length, I found that a projecting rock pro- 
 hibited my further progress. I then attempted to 
 retreat, but found the task more difficult and hazard- 
 ous than that I had already encountered. I was now 
 perched on a narrow ledge of a rock, about a hundred 
 feet below the edge of the cliff, and nearly the same 
 height above the ocean. To turn myself round, I 
 found to be impossible : there was no hand to help, 
 no eye to pity, no voice to soothe. My spirits began 
 to fail. I saw nothing before me but inevitable de- 
 struction, and dreaded the moment when I should be 
 dashed in pieces upon the rocks below. At length, 
 by creeping backwards about one-eighth of an inch at 
 a step, I reached a nook where I was able to turn, 
 and happily succeeded in escaping the destruction 
 which I had dreaded." 
 
 This was not his last adventure that nearly termi-
 
 EARLY ASSOCIATES. 133 
 
 nated with the loss of life. He had a certain amount 
 of shrewdness and cunning in his composition that 
 predisposed him for speculation and adventure. This 
 was, no doubt, induced to a large extent hy the dis- 
 satisfaction he felt at the menial drudgery to which 
 he was subjected by his mistress. This naturally in- 
 duced him to seek companionship from home, there 
 being no love or attraction at home. The result was 
 that be formed the acquaintance of the idle and dis- 
 solute, and became, as a consequence, vicious and 
 morally debased. At this time Cornwall was cele- 
 brated for the number of smugglers to be found on 
 the coast. It would have been strange indeed if 
 Samuel, with his love of adventure and course of 
 reading, had not connected himself with these domes- 
 tic freebooters. Of course his absence on these occa- 
 sions was without the knowledge or consent of his 
 master. But the boy who was only deterred from 
 joining Paul Jones because he had no money or 
 clothes, would not hesitate to run a cargo of French 
 goods or foreign spirits, without much fear either of 
 master or revenue officer. Samuel's respect for his 
 master would be considerably diminished from the 
 fact that he took no means to teach him his business ; 
 this conjoined to the treatment of his mistress, who 
 seemed to view him as the most abject menial, would 
 necessarily render him callous and intractable. One 
 of his early associates remarked : " I believe Sam was 
 a difficult boy to manage ; but he was made worse by
 
 184 8AMTJEL DREW. 
 
 the treatment he received. I was once in the shop, 
 when, for a very small offence, his master struck him 
 violently with a last, and maimed him for a time. 
 Such usage only made him sturdy, and caused him to 
 dislike his master and his work." This treatment 
 determined him to leave his master ; when he did so, 
 his funds where only sixteenpence halfpenny 1 He 
 subsequently thus described his adventure : " I 
 thought of travelling to Plymouth, to seek a berth on 
 board a King's ship. Instead of taking the short 
 road, where I feared my father might fall in with me, 
 I went on towards Liskeard, through the night, and 
 feeling fatigued, went into a hayfield and slept. My 
 luggage was no incumbrance, as the whole of my 
 property, besides the clothes I wore, was contained in 
 a small handkerchief. Not knowing how long I 
 should have to depend on my slender stock of cash, 
 I found it necessary to use the most rigid economy. 
 Having to pay a halfpenny for passing either a ferry 
 or toll-bridge, feeling my present situation, and know- 
 ing nothing of my future prospects, this small call upon 
 my funds distressed me ; I wept as I went on my way ; 
 and, even to the present time, I feel a pang when I 
 recollect the circumstance. 
 
 " The exertion of walking, and the fresh morning 
 air, gave me a keener appetite than I thought it 
 prudent to indulge. I, however, bought a penny loaf 
 at the first place I passed where bread was sold, and, 
 with a halfpennyworth of milk, in a farmer's house >
 
 THE STRAITS OF ADVERSITY. 135 
 
 ate half of my loaf for breakfast. In passing through 
 Liskeard, my attention was attracted by a shoe- 
 maker's shop, at the door of which a respectable- 
 looking man, whom I supposed to be the master, was 
 standing. Without any intention of seeking employ- 
 ment in this place, I asked him if he could give me 
 work; and he, taking compassion, I suppose, on my 
 sorry appearance, promised me employ the next 
 morning. Before I could go to work tools were 
 necessary, and I was obliged to lay out a shilling on 
 these. Dinner, under such circumstances, was out 
 of the question ; for supper I bought another half- 
 pennyworth of milk, ate the remainder of my loaf, 
 and for my lodging had again recourse to the fields. 
 In the morning I purchased another penny loaf, and 
 commenced my labour. My employer soon found 
 that I was a miserable tool; yet he treated me 
 kindly, and his son took me beside him in the shop, 
 and gave me instruction. I had now but one penny 
 left, and this I wished to husband till my labour 
 brought a supply ; so for dinner I tied my apron- 
 string tighter, and went on with my work. My 
 abstinence subjected me to the jeers of my shop- 
 mates, thus rendering the pangs of hunger doubly 
 bitter. One of them, I remember, said to another, 
 ' Where does our shopmate dine ? ' and the response 
 was, ' Oh ! he always dines at the sign of the mouth/ 
 Half of the penny loaf which I took with me in the 
 morning I had allotted for my supper ; but before
 
 136 SAMUEL 
 
 night came, I had pinched it nearly all away in 
 mouthfuls through mere hunger. Very reluctantly, 
 I laid out my last penny, and with no enviable feel- 
 ings, sought my former lodging in the open air. 
 With no other breakfast than the fragments of my 
 last loaf, I again sat down to work. At dinner time 
 looking, no doubt, very much famished my 
 master kindly said, ' If you wish, I will let you have 
 a little money on account ; ' an offer which I very 
 joyfully accepted. This was, however, my last day's 
 employment here. Discovering that I was a run- 
 away apprentice, my new master dismissed me, with a 
 recommendation to return to the old one ; and while 
 he was talking, ray brother came to the door with a 
 horse to take me home." 
 
 He returned, however, on condition that he 
 should not be expected to resume work with his 
 old master, with whom arrangements were subse- 
 quently made, and Samuel's indentures cancelled. 
 After staying at home for a few months, work was 
 obtained for him with Mr. Williams, at Millbrook. 
 This place was more congenial to Samuel's tastes 
 and disposition. It was remarkable for the stir and 
 bustle which pervaded it, being a naval station of 
 some importance. He was also more comfortable in 
 his situation ; there were a number of worknen em- 
 ployed, the work being neat and various a great 
 contrast to the solitary state and rough work of his 
 former situation. Owing to his being, as he calls
 
 A SMUGGLING ADVENTURE. 137 
 
 himself, " a wretched tool at the trade/' his average 
 weekly earnings was not more than eight shillings. 
 He had great need, therefore, not only to exercise 
 diligence in his calling, but the most rigid economy. 
 He used in after years to say, that Liskeard was not 
 the only place where he had tied his apron-string 
 tighter for a dinner. 
 
 He remained in this situation about a year. His 
 shopmates regretted his leaving. One of them said 
 afterwards : " I very well remember that in our dis- 
 putes, those who could get Sam Drew on their side 
 always made sure of victory; and he had so much 
 good humour and drollery that we all liked him, and 
 were very sorry when he went away." 
 
 The reason of his removal was owing to one of 
 his smuggling adventures, which nearly terminated 
 fatally. "Notice was given throughout Crafthole, 
 one evening about the month of December, 1784, 
 that a vessel laden with contraband goods was on the 
 coast, and would be ready that night to discharge her 
 cargo. At nightfall Samuel, with others, made to- 
 wards the port. One party remained on the rocks, 
 to make signals and dispose of the goods when 
 landed ; the other, of which he was one, manned the 
 boats. The night was intensely dark, and but little 
 progress had been made in discharging the vessel's 
 cargo, when the wind rose, with a heavy sea. To 
 prevent their vessel being driven on the rocks, the 
 seamen found it necessary to stand off from the port,
 
 138 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 thus increasing the hazard of the boatmen. Un- 
 favourable as these circumstances were, all seemed 
 resolved to persevere; and several trips were made 
 between the vessel and the shore. The wind con- 
 tinuing to increase, one of the men belonging to the 
 boat in which Samuel sat had his hat blown off, and 
 in striving to recover it, upset the boat. Three of 
 the men were immediately drowned : Samuel and two 
 or three others clung to the boat for a considerable 
 time ; but, finding that it was drifting from the port, 
 they were obliged to abandon it, and sustain them- 
 selves by swimming. They were now about two miles 
 from the shore, and the darkness prevented them 
 from ascertaining its direction. Samuel had given 
 himself up as lost, when he laid hold of a mass of sea- 
 weed, which afforded him a temporary support. At 
 length he approached some rocks near the shore, upon 
 which he and two of the men, the only survivors of 
 seven, succeeded in getting ; but they were so be- 
 numbed with cold, and so much exhausted with their 
 exertion and swimming, that it was with the utmost 
 difficulty they could maintain their position against 
 the force of the sea, which sometimes broke over 
 them. Their perilous situation was not unperceived 
 by their companions ; yet their calls for help, if 
 heard, were for a long time disregarded. When the 
 vessel had delivered her cargo, and put to sea, a boat 
 was despatched to take them off; and now, finding in 
 what condition Samuel and his wrecked companions
 
 Samuel Drew's perilous Adventure with the Smugglers.
 
 A NARROW ESCAPE. 139 
 
 were, after having been three hours in the water, and 
 half of that time swimming about, the others en- 
 deavoured to compensate, by a show of kindness, for 
 their previous inhumanity. Life being nearly ex- 
 tinct, the sufferers were carried to a neighbouring 
 farm-house, and the inmates compelled by threats to 
 admit them. A fire was kindled on the hearth, and 
 fresh faggots piled on it, while the half-drowned men, 
 who were placed in a recess of the chimney, unable to 
 relieve themselves, were compelled to endure the ex- 
 cessive heat which their ignorant companions thought 
 necessary to restore animation. One of the party, 
 supposing too, that fire within would not be less 
 efficacious than fire without, and believing brandy to 
 be a universal remedy, brought a keg of it from the 
 cargo landed, and, with the characteristic recklessness 
 of a sailor and a smuggler, knocked in the head 
 with a hatchet, and presented them with a bowlful. 
 Whether," said Mr. Drew, subsequently, " we 
 drank of it or not, I do not know : certainly not to 
 the extent recommended, or I should not now be 
 alive to tell the tale. My first sensation was that of 
 extreme cold. Although half-roasted, it was a long 
 while before I felt the fire, that burnt my legs, and 
 occasioned wounds, the marks of which I shall carry 
 to my grave. ' After leaving the farm-house, I had 
 to walk about two miles through deep snow, to 
 my lodgings. When I think of the complicated 
 perils of that night, I am astonished I ever survived 
 them."
 
 140 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 When he heard of the adventure his father ex- 
 claimed : " Alas ! what will be the end of my poor 
 unhappy boy ?" In order to secure him against any 
 future like temptation, he procured him employment 
 with a saddler in St. Austell, who was commencing 
 the shoemaking business. He went to this new 
 situation in the January of 1785, being then in his 
 twentieth year. At this period he says : f< I was 
 scarcely able to read, and almost totally unable to 
 write. Literature was a term to which I could 
 annex no idea. Grammar I knew not the meaning 
 of. I was expert at follies, acute in trifles, and in- 
 genious about nonsense. My master was by trade a 
 saddler, had acquired some knowledge of bookbinding, 
 and hired me to carry on the shoemaking for him. 
 He was one of those men who will live anywhere, 
 but will get rich nowhere. His shop was frequented 
 by persons of a more respectable class than those 
 with whom I had previously associated, and various 
 topics became alternately the subjects of conversation. 
 I listened with all that attention which my labours 
 and good manners would permit, and obtained among 
 them some little knowledge. Sometimes, when dis- 
 putes ran high, I was appealed to ; this acted as a 
 stimulus. I examined dictionaries, picked up many 
 words, and, from an attachment which I felt to books, 
 which were occasionally brought to the shop to be 
 bound, I began, to have some view of the various 
 theories with which they abounded. The more I
 
 AWAKENING DESIRE FOR KNOWLEDGE. 141 
 
 read the more I felt my own ignorance the more 
 invincible became my energy to surmount it. Every 
 leisure moment was now employed in reading one 
 thing or other. Having to support myself by manual 
 labour my time for reading was but little, and to 
 overcome this disadvantage, my usual method was to 
 place a book before me while at meat, and at every 
 repast I read five or six pages. The custom has not 
 forsaken me at the present moment/' 
 
 He continues : " After having worked with this 
 master several months, a neighbouring gentleman 
 brought Locke's 'Essay on the understanding/ to 
 be bound; I had never seen or heard of this work 
 before. I took an occasion to look into it, and I 
 thought his mode of reasoning very pleasing, and his 
 arguments exceedingly strong. I watched all oppor- 
 tunities of reading for myself, and would willingly 
 have laboured a fortnight to have the books. I had 
 then no conception they could be obtained for money. 
 They were, however, soon carried away, and with 
 them all my future improvement by their means. 
 The close and decisive manner of Mr. Locke's rea- 
 soning made on my mind an impression too deep to 
 be easily effaced ; and though I did not see his essay 
 again for many years, yet the early impression was 
 not forgotten, and it is from this accidental circum- 
 stance that I received my first bias for abstruse sub- 
 jects. 
 
 " Locke's Essay set all my soul to thiuk, to fear,
 
 142 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 and to reason from all without and from all within, 
 It gave the first metaphysical turn to my mind ; and 
 I cultivated the little knowledge of writing which I 
 had acquired, in order to put down my reflections. 
 It awakened me from my stupor, and induced me to 
 form a resolution to abandon the grovelling views 
 which I had been accustomed to entertain. In my 
 new situation I found myself surrounded with books 
 of various descriptions, and felt my taste for the ac- 
 quirement of information return with renewed vigour, 
 and increase in proportion to the means of indulgence, 
 which were now placed fully within my reach. But 
 here some new difficulties occurred, with which I 
 found it painful to grapple. My knowledge of the 
 import of words was as contracted as my ideas were 
 scanty : so that I found it necessary to keep a 
 dictionary continually by my side whilst I was read- 
 ing, to which I was compelled constantly to refer. 
 This was a tedious process. But in a little time the 
 difficulty wore away, and my horizon of knowledge 
 became enlarged." 
 
 What were the books that Drew read at this time 
 little is known. No doubt, like other readers, he 
 read pretty much all that came in his way. The 
 first book, however, which he owned was the " Pil- 
 grim's Progress," by the glorious dreamer. Its 
 perusal afforded him, as it has afforded tens of thou- 
 sands, constant and increasing delight. 
 
 About this time Samuel commenced business on
 
 COMMENCES BUSINESS. 14-3 
 
 his own account. He had only fourteen shillings of 
 his own ; a friend, however, who had urged him to 
 commence, said, " I'll lend you five pounds upon the 
 security of your good character, and more if that is 
 not enough ; and I'll promise not to demand it till 
 you can conveniently pay me." Samuel, on taking 
 this important step, determined to adopt Dr. Frank- 
 lin's maxims in his " Way to Wealth." He worked 
 eighteen hours out of the twenty-four, and sometimes 
 longer; his friends found him plenty of work, but 
 until the bills could be sent to his customers he had 
 no means to employ a journeyman. At the end of 
 the year he had the satisfaction to know that he 
 stood clear, the five pounds repaid, and a tolerable 
 stock of leather on hand. Industry and economy 
 had removed the necessity of going to bed supperless 
 to avoid rising in debt ; in addition to which, he was 
 now enabled to gratify his desire for the acquisition 
 of knowledge. The assistance which he was able to 
 obtain in his business enabled him to devote to study 
 the ordinary leisure of a common workman ; this 
 was all he desired. He says : " In this situation, 
 I felt an internal vigour prompting me to exertion, but 
 was unable to determine what direction I should take. 
 The sciences lay before me. I discovered a charm 
 in each, but was unable to embrace them all, and 
 hesitated in making a selection. I had learned that, 
 
 ' One science only will one genius fit, i| 
 Bo vast is art, so narrow human wit.' 
 
 V.
 
 144 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 "At first I felt such an attachment to astronomy, 
 that I resolved to confine my views to the study of 
 that science ; but I soon found myself too defective 
 in arithmetic to make any proficiency. Modern 
 history was my next object ; but I quickly discovered 
 that more books and time were necessary than I 
 could either purchase or spare, and on this account 
 history was abandoned. In the region of metaphysics 
 I saw neither of the above impediments. It appeared 
 to be a thorny path ; but I determined, nevertheless, 
 to enter, and accordingly began to tread it." On 
 being asked, subsequently, if he had not studied 
 astronomy, he said : " I once had a very great desire 
 for it, for I thought it suitable to the genius of my 
 mind, and I think so still : but then, 
 
 ' Chill penury repressed the noble rage, 
 And froze the genial current of the soul.' 
 
 Dangers and difficulties I did not fear, while I could 
 bring the powers of my mind to bear upom them, and 
 force myself a passage. To metaphysics I then ap- 
 plied myself, and became what the world and my 
 good friend Dr. Clarke call, a METAPHYSICIAN." 
 
 Besides this study he had contracted a love for the 
 discussion of the absorbing politics of the day. The 
 American war was at that time occupying a large 
 part of public attention. Drew entered so deeply in 
 the discussion that he could not have been more
 
 POLITICS versus BUSINESS. 145 
 
 interested if his livelihood had depended upon the 
 issue. The neighbours crowded into his shop, and he 
 went into his neighbours' with no other intention 
 than to discuss the news. To make up for this loss 
 of time he had frequently to work until midnight. 
 One night, when he was so engaged, some youngster 
 shouted through the key-hole of the door, " Shoe- 
 maker ! shoemaker ! work by night, and run about 
 by day !" " Had a pistol," said Drew, " been fired 
 off at my ear, I could not have been more dismayed 
 or confounded. I dropped my work, saying to my- 
 self, ' True, true ! but you shall never have that to 
 say of me again/ I have never forgotten it; and 
 while I recollect anything, I never shall. To me it 
 was as the voice of God, and it has been a word in 
 season throughout my life. I learned from it not to 
 leave till to-morrow the work of to-day, or to idle 
 when I ought to be working. From that time I 
 turned over a new leaf. I ceased to venture on the 
 restless sea of politics, or trouble myself about mat- 
 ters which did not concern me." 
 
 " During several years," he further wrote, " all my 
 leisure hours were devoted to reading or scribbling 
 anything which happened to pass my mind ; but I do 
 not recollect that it ever interrupted my business, 
 though it frequently broke in upon my rest. On my 
 labour depended my livelihood literary pursuits 
 were only my amusement. Common prudence had 
 taught me the lesson which Marmontel has so 
 
 L
 
 146 SAMUEL DUETT. 
 
 happily expressed : ' Secure to yourself a livelihood 
 independent of literary success, and put into the 
 lottery only the overplus of time. Woe to him who 
 depends wholly on his pen ! Nothing is more casual. 
 The man who makes shoes is sure of his wages the 
 man who writes a book is never sure of anything/ ' 
 
 The books he read at this time were Milton, 
 Young, and Cowper ; Pope's Ethical Epistles he 
 frequently perused, and Goldsmith's works he highly 
 valued, having committed to memory the whole of 
 the "Deserted .Village." The knowledge he thus 
 received he would frequently turn over with his own 
 workmen, rendering that plain and palpable which 
 was difficult and abstruse. In April, 1791, he 
 married the daughter of Jacob Halls, of St. Austell, 
 on which occasion it is recorded that his wedding 
 coat was " as good as new, of a plum colour, with 
 bright buttons, very little worn, and quite a bargain." 
 He was now esteemed as a respectable tradesman, 
 and had exercised his ability as a local preacher 
 amongst the Wesleyans, amongst whom he had be- 
 come very popular. 
 
 His first literary effort was a poetical epistle to his 
 sister, which was followed by several other metrical 
 compositions. His manner of study he has himself 
 related : " During my literary pursuits I regularly 
 and constantly attended my business, and do not re- 
 collect that one customer was ever disappointed by me 
 through these means. My mode of writing and
 
 ** PURSUIT OP KNOWLEDGE UNDER DIFFICULTIES." 147 
 
 study may have in them, perhaps, something pecu- 
 liar. Immersed in the common concerns of life, I 
 endeavour to lift my thoughts to objects more sub- 
 lime than those with which I am surrounded, and, 
 while attending to my trade, I sometimes catch the 
 fibres of an argument, which I endeavour to note, 
 and keep a pen and ink by me for that purpose. In 
 this state, what I can collect through the day re- 
 mains on any paper which I have at hand, till the 
 business of the day is despatched, and my shop shut, 
 when, in the midst of my family, I endeavour to 
 analyse such thoughts as had crossed my mind during 
 the day. I have no study I have no retirement 
 I write amidst the cries and cradles of my children, and 
 frequently, when I review what I have written, en- 
 deavour to cultivate the ' art to blot/ Such are the 
 methods which I have pursued, and such the disadvan- 
 tages under which I write." He usually sat on a low 
 nursing chair by the kitchen fire, with the bellows on 
 his knees for a desk ! 
 
 Samuel was first induced to become an author in 
 consequence of a friend, a young surgeon, imbibing 
 the principles of Voltaire, Rousseau, Gibbon, and 
 Hume. With this gentleman Samuel had debates 
 from time to time, the groundwork being the newly 
 published " Age of Reason," by Paine. These dis- 
 cussions ultimately resulted in the gentleman's 
 renouncing his infidel opinions, and his acceptance 
 of the truth of revelation. Drew having committed 
 
 L2
 
 148 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 the arguments to paper, as the debate proceeded, at 
 the conclusion submitted the MS. to two competent 
 friends, who advised their immediate publication, 
 which was done. The publication of this pamphlet 
 secured him many warmly attached friends. His next 
 venture was an elegiac poem, which, owing to local 
 circumstances, became very popular. But poetry was 
 certainly not Samuel's forte. At this time the Rev. 
 Richard Polwhele, Vicar of Manaccan, Cornwall, had 
 issued a little work : " Anecdotes of Methodism/' 
 which was a very severe and unwarranted attack upon 
 that body of Christians. Samuel answered the book. 
 The result was one of the severest and justly merited 
 castigations that a religious libeller ever received. 
 Polwhele was not only silenced, but he afterwards 
 became a warm friend and admirer of Drew. When 
 Samuel published his great work, "Essay on the 
 Soul," which was the next printed after the " Reply," 
 Polwhele reviewed the work in the " Anti- jacobin Re- 
 view." This spontaneous act redounded to his credit 
 as a scholar and a Christian. Drew, by his publications, 
 had now established himself as an author of some re - 
 pute. A visit to " the metaphysical shoemaker" was 
 deemed an essential by all strangers. Drew was not 
 much puffed up by this public notice. He said : 
 " These gentlemen certainly honour me by their visits; 
 but I do not forget that many of them merely wish 
 to say, that they have seen the cobbler who wrote a 
 book."
 
 LITERARY ENGAGEMENTS. 149 
 
 Drew was next engaged upon his largest work his 
 essay on the " Identity and Resurrection of the Hu- 
 man Body." This occupied a considerable amount of 
 time, was written and rewritten, and was, before 
 publication, submitted to the criticism and examination 
 of the members of the London Philological Society. 
 Eight hundred copies were at once subscribed for, the 
 author receiving five hundred copies for the copyright. 
 When it was published only one or two reviews ap- 
 peared. This, as it was subsequently found, was not 
 owing to any slight on the part of the editors of the 
 serials of the time, but owing to the absence of per- 
 sons capable to enter into the spirit of the work. One 
 London bookseller actually wrote to Drew requesting 
 him to review his own work. To this request he 
 made answer : ' ' Such things may be among the 
 tricks of trade, but never will I soil my fingers by 
 meddling with them. My work shall honestly meet 
 its fate. If it be praised, I shall doubtless be grati- 
 fied if censured, instructed ; if it drop still born 
 from the press, I will endeavour to be contented." 
 It was soon after the publication of this work that Mr. 
 Drew was elected a member of the Manchester Philo- 
 logical Society. The next year witnessed Drew with- 
 drawing from shoemaking with the intention of de- 
 voting himself exclusively to literature. His first, 
 work was in connection with Dr. Coke, whom he as- 
 sisted in finishing his " Commentary on the Bible," 
 his "History of the West Indians," and other works,
 
 150 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 In 1806 Drew commenced to write for the " Eclectic 
 Review," on the recommendation of Dr. Clarke. In 
 1812, he competed for the Burnet prize on the 
 "Being and Attributes of the Deity." He M r as not 
 successful, however. The first prize was awarded to 
 Dr. Brown, then Principal of Marischal College ; and 
 the second prize to Dr. Sumner, afterwards Bishop of 
 Chester. Drew's Essay was afterwards published in 
 two octavo volumes, and an edition of a thousand 
 copies sold. 
 
 It will now only be needful, in this rapid sketch of 
 this wonderful self-taught man, merely to indicate his 
 subsequent labours. First, then, he was engaged to 
 write a " History of Cornwall," and a " Life of 
 Dr. Coke/' at that Divine's special request ; then he 
 assumed the entire editorship of the " Imperial 
 Magazine," published by Mr. Fisher, in Liverpool, 
 where Drew then resided. In 1821, the degree 
 of A. M. was conferred upon him by Marischal 
 College, Aberdeen. This mark of favour and appre- 
 ciation of ability, was alike honourable to the College 
 and to Drew. In 1831, the council of the London 
 University solicited him to allow himself to be nomin- 
 ated as Professor of Moral Philosophy in that insti- 
 tution. He declined, on the ground of his desire to 
 settle down in his own native county for the remainder 
 of his days. His incessant literary employment had 
 materially weakened a constitution which must at 
 one time have been as strong as iron, During the
 
 LATER LABOUES AND DEMISE. 151 
 
 summer of 1831, he visited his native place; he 
 had fixed this as the time to retire from his edi- 
 torial labours, but for the benefit of his children re- 
 solved to continue for two years more a resolve 
 which no doubt helped to hasten his final departure. 
 After endeavouring to fulfil faithfully his engagements 
 for a little while longer, illness overtook him. He 
 died, as he desired, in his native county, on the 29th 
 of March, 1833. The inhabitants of St. Austell, in 
 remembrance of their distinguished townsman, erected 
 in the parish church a tablet bearing the following 
 inscription : 
 
 "To the Memory of SAMUEL DIIEW, a native of 
 this Parish, whose talents as a Metaphysical writer, 
 unaided by education, raised him from obscurity into 
 honourable notice, and whose virtues as a Christian 
 won the esteem and affection of all who knew him. 
 He was born March 3rd, 1765. Lived in St. Austell 
 until January, 1819, and, after an absence of fourteen 
 years, during which he conducted a literary journal, 
 he returned to end his days in his native county, as 
 he had long desired, and died at Helston, March 29th, 
 1833. To record their sense of his literary merit and 
 moral worth, his fellow-townsmen and parishioners 
 have erected this tablet." 
 
 So ended the life of one of England's greatest 
 worthies ! No, not ended : his life is still stored up 
 in the books he wrote, which are as imperishable as his 
 name. He has left a torch, in the bright example of
 
 152 SAMUEL DREW. 
 
 his life, which will cheer many a desponding student 
 in the monotony of his daily tasks ; and when the 
 humble Christian is assailed by the sophistries of the 
 infidel and the sceptic, he will find his best defence 
 in the unanswered arguments of the giant shoemaker. 
 Cornwall has reason to be proud of such a son, and 
 England, that she was privileged to give birth to such 
 a man.
 
 THOMAS COOPER, 
 
 SHOEMAKER ; AFTERWARDS POET, NEWSPAPER 
 EDITOR, AND ORATOR. 
 
 " I was born," says Thomas Cooper, Cf at Leicester ; 
 but ray mother, being left in a state of widowhood in 
 my infancy, removed me to Lincolnshire, her native 
 county. She procured me bread by the labour of 
 of her own hands, and I have often known her give 
 me the last bit of food in our humble home, while she 
 herself fasted. I frequently knew, in childhood, what 
 it was to go shoeless, and to wear ragged clothing. 
 My constitution was enfeebled by early and continued 
 illness, and to this circumstance, perhaps, it was 
 owing rather than to any natural bent of the mind 
 that I became very early devoted to reading, draw- 
 ing, and music. My beloved mother inflicted hard- 
 ships on herself in order to afford me encouragement ; 
 she frequently gave me her last penny fora circulat- 
 ing library book, a sheet of paper, a black-lead pencil, 
 or a bit of water-colouring; and, as I advanced in 
 boyhood, she purchased me, with much self-denial, 
 one of the old-fashioned but sweet-toned instruments 
 called a dulcimer, on which I learned to play with
 
 154 THOMAS COOPER. 
 
 considerable skill. In this manner, surrounded with 
 poverty, but wrapt up in a happy attachment to books, 
 and drawing, and music, often varied by a ramble on 
 the hills and among the woods above Gainsbro', in 
 search of flowers, I passed the earlier portion of my 
 existence. At fifteen years of age, after many pro- 
 mises of patronage had been broken, my poor mother 
 was compelled to send me to the stall to learn the 
 humble trade and craft of a shoemaker. I plied the 
 awl and bent over the last until I was three-and-tweiity 
 years of age ; and if I can look on any period of my 
 life with unmingled pride and pleasure, it is on that 
 portion of it which I passed in this sedentary employ- 
 ment. My young enthusiasm found a vent in the 
 composition of poetry, for some time after I was thus 
 placed at an occupation which only employed the 
 hands without filling the mind; but the perusal of a 
 memoir of Samuel Lee, Professor of Hebrew in the 
 University of Cambridge, and an example of geuius 
 and perseverance triumphing over all the difficulties 
 of lowly birth, soon animated me to encounter the 
 labour of acquiring languages, together with the 
 mathematics. I formed a written resolution to ac- 
 quire, in a given time, the elements of Latin and 
 Greek, and of geometry and algebra, and to commit 
 the whole of ' Paradise Lost ' to memory, togethei 
 with the seven best plays of Shakspeare. My resolve 
 was exceeded in some respects, but failed in others. 
 I committed to memory three books of Milton and
 
 HAED STUDY. 155 
 
 the whole of ' Hamlet / and these treasures I still 
 retain. I went through a course of geometry and 
 learnt something of algebra, and, in addition to the 
 Latin and Greek, I mastered the elements of Hebrew 
 and French ; to these philological acquirements I 
 have, in succeeding periods of my life, added some 
 knowledge of the Italian, German, and other tongues, 
 but less perfectly than my earlier studies. During 
 the youthful period in which I was striving after 
 elementary knowledge, I had to contend with want and 
 deprivation, sometimes in a severe degree. I could 
 not earn more than ten shillings a week at my trade, 
 and my poor mother, who began to advance in years, 
 was often too much enfeebled to work. We were 
 thus compelled to share a scanty pittance, barely suf- 
 ficient to keep us in existence. Yet I look back to 
 that time with pride and pleasure. In the summer 
 mornings I used to rise at three or earlier, and walk 
 miles, among the woods and over the hills, reading 
 every inch of the way, and returning to my labour at 
 the hour of six, not quitting my stall till nine or ten 
 in the evening found me so far wearied with exertion 
 that I frequently swooned off my seat. In the win- 
 ter, because poverty prevented my enjoyment of a fire, 
 I used to place a stool upon a stand to rest my book, 
 and a lamp upon it, and with a bit of old rug under 
 my feet, and my mother's old red cloak over my 
 shoulders, I used to keep up a gentle kind of motion, 
 so as to keep off cold and sleep at the same time, In
 
 156 THOMAS COOPER. 
 
 this mode I used to pass the winter hours from nine 
 or ten to twelve at night, and from three or four to 
 seven in the morning, my mind being too enfeeverd 
 after learning, to permit my sleeping long, even if I 
 had remained in bed. During those laborious hours, 
 in addition to my pursuits in languages, I read over 
 the production of some of the most colossal intellects 
 my country has ever produced such as Hooker, and 
 Cucbvorth, and Stillingfleet, and Warburton. Oh ! 
 those were happy hours, I am proud of them ! 
 
 " On recovering from a severe illness, brought about 
 by severe study, a valued friend persuaded me to leave 
 the humble trade which I had followed for nearly eight 
 years, and to enter on the profession of a school- 
 master. I did so, and formed a prosperous school at 
 Gainsborough. Shortly before I was thirty years of 
 age, I left that town for Lincoln, still pursuing my 
 calling as a schoolmaster. I joined the Mechanics' 
 Institute there, a thriving establishment, under the 
 patronage of Lord Yarborough ; I taught Latin and 
 French classes, gratuitously, in the institution, and 
 was enthusiastically attached to my engagement. In 
 conjunction with two other young men, I also pro- 
 jected a choral society ; and during four years I de- 
 voted myself most unremittingly to its management 
 as secretary. My mind thus became familiar with 
 the choral majesty of Handel, the sweetness of Haydn, 
 the varied richness of Mozart, and the sublimity of 
 Beethoven.
 
 HIS CONNECTION WITH THE " FOTJUTH ESTATE." 15? 
 
 " It was at Lincoln that I first became connected 
 with a newspaper. I had been listening to some very 
 eloquent and instructive lectures on chemistry, deli- 
 vered at the Institute by a Mr. Murray, and asked 
 my stationer whether the lectures would be reported 
 in any of the public pfipers. He replied, that he 
 would send a paragraph descriptive of the lectures 
 to the ' Stamford Mercury/ if I would write one. 
 That paragraph led to my connection with that 
 paper. Mr. llichard Newcomb, a gentleman for 
 whom I shall always feel a grateful attachment, gave 
 me a situation as reporter for Lincoln, my salary 
 being successively advanced from 20 to 40, 60, 
 and 100 a year. Eventually he removed me to 
 Stamford, with the understanding that I was to 
 remain there and to assist him in the editorship of 
 his paper, at a salary of 300 per annum. 
 
 " Owing to family circumstances, I was induced to 
 leave Samford and ventured to London, depending 
 chiefly on the promises of help given me by a literary 
 baronet who then represented Lincoln, and in whose 
 interest I had sedulously laboured for some years. 
 For seven anxious weeks that baronet kept me in 
 cruel suspense, pretending that he had placed a 
 manuscript romance in the hands of his own pub- 
 lisher. I afterwards learned that this was a whole- 
 sale falsehood ; and he had only been mocking me 
 when he returned that manuscript, complimenting 
 me on its merits, but affecting to regret that his pub-
 
 ]58 THOMAS COOPKR. 
 
 lisher had too many things on hand to undertake to 
 bring it out. For eleven months I subsisted almost 
 by casuality in London. My library, which was a 
 choice one, amounting to five hundred volumes, I 
 sold, volum3 by volume, for bread. Sometimes I 
 obtained a little employ on the magazines ; but when 
 I had earned five pounds, I usually received no more 
 than one. Mr. Luinley, the bookseller, was one of 
 the kindest friends I found in town ; he employed 
 me on various occasions, especially in the pleasing 
 though laborious work of copying at the British 
 Museum library. At length when I was on the 
 point of being reduced to extreme difficulty having 
 actually pawned my cloak and several other articles 
 I received a letter, offering me the editorship of 
 the ' Greenwich Gazette, or Kentish Mercury/ I 
 remained upon that paper, at a salary of 3 per 
 week, until the prospect of retrieving it from ruin 
 was gone. It has since become extinct. One fort- 
 night after I had given notice to leave that situation 
 by one of those sudden and unlooked-for incidents 
 which I have so often experienced in life, as to impel 
 me to the belief that a high and ever watchful Power 
 presides over our ways I received an effer of a situa- 
 tion as reporter to the 'Leicestershire Mercury.' 
 There were several reasons which operated strongly 
 to induce me to accept this offer/' 
 
 Some of his reasons were political, and others 
 maternal ; it was his birthplace, and his aged mother
 
 SYMPATHIES EXCITED. 159 
 
 was still living there. In a few weeks after his settle- 
 ment at Leicester, he was requested by the pro- 
 prietor of the paper to attend and report a political 
 lecture. When he left that lecture, he first became 
 acquainted with the destitution then prevailing 
 amongst the operatives. It was about eleven o'clock 
 at night ; when, hearing the looms still going, he 
 observed to some of the working men who had been 
 at the meeting : 
 
 " Bless me, do these poor people frequently work 
 so late ?" 
 
 " Aye, and gladly, when they can get it to do," 
 was the reply. 
 
 " And what may their earnings be ?" was the next 
 question. 
 
 " On the average about seven shillings ; and three 
 goes for frame-rent and other charges, so that they 
 have about four shillings left." 
 
 " Well," was the reply, " four shillings per day is 
 a decent wage." 
 
 (e But we mean four shillings per week," was the 
 rejoinder. 
 
 On inquiry, Cooper found this to be the case. Ac- 
 tual knowledge of this distress induced him to make 
 the poor workers' cause his own. One framework- 
 knitter, on whose veracity he could repose his life, 
 had suffered the deepest privation for weeks, but suf- 
 fered silently. At length, when every article which 
 rould be so disposed of had been taken to the pawn-
 
 IPO THOMAS COOPER. 
 
 shop, himself, his young wife, and infant reached the 
 verge of starvation. Unable longer to conceal his 
 extremity, he laid a note upon Cooper's desk at 
 eleven o'clock one night, and ran out of the shop. 
 That note depicted his destitution, and informed 
 Cooper that on the previous morning, when he 
 awoke, with his young wife lying by his side, her 
 first language, accompanied with heart-breaking 
 sighs, was 
 
 " Sunday come again, and nothing to eat ;" while 
 the infant sought her breast, but there was no nutri- 
 ment for it : Nature's fountains were dried up by 
 starvation ! Another stockinger went one morning 
 into Cooper's house, and, sitting down with a despair- 
 ing look, exclaimed, with an oath 
 
 " I wish they would hang me ! I have lived on 
 cold boiled potatoes, which were given me, for the 
 last two days, and this morning I have eaten a raw 
 potato from sheer hunger ! Give me a bit of bread 
 and a cup of coffee, or I shall drop !" Such was the 
 wretchedness and suffering to which the operatives 
 had been reduced. This suffering induced Thomas 
 Cooper to commence political lecturer. Amongst 
 other places he was invited to lecture in the Pot- 
 teries. He arrived at Hanley for the purpose, on the 
 13th of August, 1842. On the next day he addressed 
 three meetings. His text in the evening was, " Thou 
 shalt do no murder." After the meeting, he was 
 invited to address the colliers next morning, who
 
 POLITICS AND IMPRISONMENT. iSl 
 
 were then on strike. The result of the meeting at 
 Hanley was disastrous. The colliers, excited to a 
 high degree on the following night, broke into the 
 house of an obnoxious clergyman, became furious by 
 drinking the wine in his cellar, set fire to his and 
 other houses, and committed various acts of violence. 
 
 Mr. Cooper was arrested on the charge of aiding 
 and abetting this riot. He proved on his trial that 
 he was on his way to Manchester at the time of the 
 outbreak. He was acquitted of this charge, but re- 
 manded on two other indictments. In his defence 
 he referred to the moral means by which he sought 
 to elevate the people. " I have," he said, " delivered 
 familiar and elementary lectures on geography, astro- 
 nomy, history, phrenology, and other popular sub- 
 jects. I have endeavoured to humanize, and civilize, 
 and refine my own class. I never saw a pike, a gun, 
 or a dagger, among the Leicester Chartists. I never 
 had an offensive weapon of the kind in my possession 
 during my whole life. I never let off a gun or a 
 pistol in my life, nor do I know how to prepare either 
 instrument for firing." 
 
 On the second trial of Cooper, he made a most able 
 and eloquent defence. The famous Judge Erskine 
 sat on the bench. The trial lasted ten days. The 
 case for the prosecution was conducted by the 
 Solicitor-General, Si." William Follett. The result 
 was the imprisonment of Cooper for two years and 
 eleven weeks ; during which time, owing to being
 
 
 
 1G2 THOMAS COOPER. 
 
 placed in a damp cell, he was afflicted with neuralgia, 
 rheumatism, and other torments. While in prison 
 he wrote his " Purgatory of Suicides." In the pre- 
 face Mr. Cooper says : " I am poor, and have been 
 plunged into more than two hundred pounds debt by 
 the persecution of my enemies j but I have a consola- 
 tion to know that my course was dictated by heart- 
 felt zeal to relieve the sufferings and oppressions of 
 my fellow men. Sir William Follett was entombed 
 with pomp, and a liost of titled great ones, of every 
 shade of party, attended the laying of his clay in the 
 grave ; and they purpose now to erect a monument 
 to his memory. Let them builj* it : the self-educated 
 shoemaker has also reared his ; and despite its imper- 
 fections, he has a calm confidence that, though the 
 product of poverty, and suffering, and misery, it will 
 outlast the posthumous stone block that may be 
 erected to perpetuate the memory of the titled 
 lawyer." 
 
 William Howitt, in the " Eclectic Review/' thus 
 speaks of the " Purgatory of Suicides :" " We have 
 here a genuine poem, springing out of the spirit of 
 the times, and, indeed, out of the heart and experi- 
 ence of one who has wrestled with and suffered for it. 
 It is that of a soul full of thought, full of a burning 
 zeal for liberty, and with a temperament that must 
 and will into action. The man is all bone and sinew. 
 He is one of those terras filii that England, more 
 than all the other nations of the earth put together,
 
 CONTEMPORANEOUS OPINIONS. 163 
 
 produces. One of the same class as Burns, Elliot, 
 Fox, the Norwich weaver-boy, to say nothing of the 
 Arkwrights, Smeatons, Brindleys, Chantreys, and the 
 like, all rising out of the labour-class of the thinkers 
 and builders-up of English greatness. What is 
 moreover singular, is, that he is another of the shoe- 
 maker craft that craft which has produced such a 
 host of men of talent, as Hans Sachs, George Fox, 
 Drew, Gifford of the ' Quarterly,' and others/-'' 
 "Till three-and-twenty," he says of himself, "hs 
 bent over the last and awl, struggling against weak 
 health and deprivation, to acquire a knowledge of 
 languages, and his experience in after life was, at 
 first, limited to the humble sphere of a schoolmaster, 
 and never enlarged beyond that of a laborious worker 
 on a newspaper." 
 
 In two months after the " Purgatory of Suicides" 
 was published, Cooper sent forth a work in two 
 volumes : " Wise Saws and Modern Instances;" this 
 was succeeded by "The Baron's Yule Feast." Sub- 
 sequently, Mr. Cooper was engaged on Douglas 
 Jerrold's newspaper, to write a series of articles on 
 " The Condition of the People of England/' making 
 a tour through the manufacturing districts to collect 
 materials. 
 
 In 1846 he delivered, in the National Hall, "Two 
 Orations against taking away Human Life under any 
 Circumstances ;" and subsequently, in the same place, 
 lectures upon almost every subject of history, science, 
 
 M2
 
 164 
 
 THOMAS COOPER. 
 
 morals, and government; and in the -various literary 
 institutions in London and the provinces, lectures 
 upon men of genius, history, and poetry, &c. He 
 has also composed two songs, estimated by competent 
 judges to display real musical taste. One of his 
 productions, which does not bear his name " The 
 Triumphs of Perseverance," published by Darton and 
 Co., London is one of the most nervous and eloquent 
 incentives to industry in the language. It is a book 
 which should be put into the hand of every youth, 
 and read by every young man, who complains of want 
 of time for self-improvement. 
 
 It is as an orator, however, that Mr. Cooper leaves 
 the most indelible impression. His public discourses 
 he styles and very properly Orations. He realises, 
 in the magnificence of his periods, the grandeur of 
 the ancient orator, rather than the modern speaker. 
 After listening to him for two hours upon the 
 " Genius of Milton," detailing at the outset every 
 important incident of his life, with ample reference 
 to the times in which he lived, and the circumstances 
 by which he was surrounded, the audience is amazed 
 by hearing him recite, with becoming dramatic action, 
 the whole of the first book of Milton's " Paradise 
 Lost," and this without a pause ! 
 
 " It will be seen that Thomas Cooper is still a hard 
 worker the especial fate of the author in London. 
 The labour he performs would be a large amount for 
 a man of strong habit and robust health, but m
 
 A CHRISTIAN CONVERT. 165 
 
 Thomas Cooper's case this labour is performed with a 
 constant struggle with ill health, debility, and neu- 
 ralgia, the fruit of jail confinement. The difficulty 
 with which he pursues his lecturing from this cause 
 would perhaps, however, never be suspected by those 
 who listen to the fervent addresses which often, for 
 two hours together, he pours out." 
 
 In his earlier years Mr. Cooper had deistical im- 
 pressions ; as he says, " for two years I rejected reve- 
 lation." This state of mind was superinduced by 
 reading the plausible infidel works which were in 
 vogue at that period ; a perusal of the " Memoirs oi 
 Henry Marty n," and an acquaintance with Paley's 
 " Evidences," which he read thrice, so that he could 
 repeat the substance of the work, served to fix in him 
 a belief of the historical evidence of Christianity. 
 That evidence he has never since doubted. Subse- 
 quently, however, he adopted the Socinian views, and 
 taught in his lectures the doctrines of Strauss' " Life 
 of Christ." He has renounced these views. At the 
 present time he is engaged lecturing throughout 
 England upon the various forms of infidelity and 
 scepticism, and on the Sabbaths, preaching twice 01 
 thrice in various dissenting chapels. 
 
 Recently hehas addressed a letterto the "Freeman," 
 in which he says : " I have little that is new to 
 communicate to you, save and except that for four 
 months I have been a teetotaler. I broke off 
 smoking more than a year and a-half ago, and vowed
 
 166 TI10MAS COOPER. 
 
 never to smoke more. But when friends urged their 
 total abstinence doctrines upon me I resisted, under 
 the persuasion that, with my life of labour, a draught 
 of bottled stout, or a 'night cap' of spirit and water 
 was necessary, absolutely necessary for me, if I meant 
 to continue to work hard and keep tolerable health. 
 Last summer, however, on revisiting some dear friends 
 in Northumberland and Durham, characterised by 
 holy lives and prayerful habits, I felt self-condemned, 
 because I saw they were grieved with me. I reflected 
 that Paul would not f eat flesh, or drink wine, or do 
 anything whereby his brother stumbled or was of- 
 fended, or was made weak;' and I said within my- 
 self ' I must not grieve the children of God/ Yet, 
 I thought, Paul would not have killed himself out- 
 right in order to avoid giving offence to his brethren, 
 So I said again, ' I will try, in right good earnest, 
 whether I can abstain, and yet be as strong as here- 
 tofore.' And I have tried, and I hereby declare that I 
 believe I am stronger and better without alcoholic 
 drinks ; and, by God's help, 1 will be a teetotaler as 
 long as I live. I lecture usually every night, and 
 most commonly preach three times on Sundays, and 
 I find I am well enough to go on; and have no need 
 to say, ' I am wearied.' I could enlarge on the 
 happy feelings resulting from the consciousness that 
 slavish habits are broken ; but I refrain, begging 
 pardon for having said so much about myself instead 
 of my work."
 
 WILLIAM JAY: 
 
 THE EMINENT BOY-PREACHEB, AND DISTJNGDSIHKD 
 DIVINE. 
 
 WE may be sure that he was a beardless boy when 
 he commenced his career : we learn this from an anec- 
 dote related by himself in his autobiography. He 
 had been preaching at Melksham on the Sunday : on 
 the following morning he called upon an old gentle- 
 man from London, a very wise man in his crwn 
 opinion. He did not receive Jay very courteously, 
 but said rudely, he had no notion of beardless boys 
 being employed as preachers. " Pray, sir," said Jay, 
 " does not Paul say to Timothy, ' Let no man despise 
 thy youth !' And, sir, you remind me of what I have 
 read of a French monarch, who had received a young 
 ambassador, and complainingly said, ' Yo-ur master 
 should not have sent me a beardless stripling !' ' Sir, 3 
 said the youthful ambassador, ' had my master sup- 
 posed you wanted a beard, he would have sent you a 
 goat/ " 
 
 On the subject of the ancestors of Jay we are not 
 much enlightened : a matter of small moment. Jay 
 has said facetiously, in the words of Bacon, that " they
 
 168 WILLIAM JAY.. 
 
 who derive their worth from their ancestors resemble 
 potatoes, the most valuable part of which is under- 
 ground." He used to relate, that when one of Lord 
 Thurlow's friends was endeavouring to make out his 
 relationship to the secretary Cromwell, whose family 
 had been settled in the county adjoining Suffolk, he 
 replied, " Sir, there were two Cromwells in that part 
 of the country, Thurlow the secretary and Thurlow 
 ihe carrier ; I am descended from the latter." This 
 ' almost as good as the anecdote related of the man, 
 who, being asked some questions about his pedigree, 
 answered that " he was not particularly sure, but had 
 been credibly informed that he had three brothers in 
 the ark." 
 
 Jay's father was a stonsmason. Neither his father 
 nor mother were persons of much education; they 
 were, however, upright, conscientious, kind, tender, 
 charitable, and were much esteemed in the neigh- 
 bourhood. The family attended the ministry of a 
 Presbyterian, who was described as a dry and dull 
 preacher, but very kind and generous. He gave Jay 
 the two first books he could call his own Watt's 
 *' History of the Old and New Testament," and Bun- 
 yan's " Pilgrim's Progress." At this time he was re- 
 ceiving the humble education afforded at the village 
 school. But he was not apt in receiving instruction. 
 One of his sisters said the family thought William 
 would never learn to read ; but when he did master 
 the art, he was very anxious to acquire additional
 
 TELLING A LIE ASKING FORGIVENESS. 169 
 
 knowledge. He was, perhaps, learning more at this 
 time than his teachers would give him credit for. The 
 impressions of the beautiful scenery around his home 
 sank into his heart and memory, during his solitary 
 walks, never after to be effaced. At this time he had 
 a reputation for being a good boy, with a desire to do 
 right : he had not, as he relates, any immoralities. 
 On one occasion, however, while he was at play, he 
 uttered a falsehood, accompanying the untruth with 
 an oath, to carry his point. This wicked act so 
 preyed upon his conscience that he shortly after re- 
 tired to his own room, to repent in solitude and to 
 ask God's forgiveness. He was apprenticed to his 
 father's business, stone-cutting, when he was about 
 fourteen years of age, and worked with his father at 
 the building of Fonthill House, the celebrated resi- 
 dence of Mr. Beckford, which cost in its erection 
 2713,000 ; the pictures, library, and furniture were 
 valued at more than a million ! On one occasion, 
 after his day's work, he went to hear a Mr. Turner 
 preach in a private dwelling; the singing and the 
 sermon upon that occasion made a deep impression 
 upon him, so that he scarcely slept for weeping and 
 for joy. Next morning there was another service at 
 seven o'clock, at which he was the first attendant. 
 Mrs. Turner, the preacher's wife, opened the door, 
 and kindly taking him by the hand, said, " Are you 
 hungering for the bread of life?" Subsequently, 
 this excellent woman met him on his way from work
 
 170 WILLIAM JAY. 
 
 on several occasions, and conversed with him as only 
 a good kind woman can. One evening, after hearing 
 a sermon by Mr. Turner on family worship, Jay re- 
 turned home and besought his father to undertake 
 it. On his refusing on account of inability, he offered 
 to perform it himself. The offer was accepted with 
 tears, and he became a kind of domestic chaplain. 
 
 Just at this time the excellent Cornelius Winter 
 came to preach at Tisbury. Jay formed one of the 
 congregation, whose countenance so impressed the 
 preacher as to be remembered twelve months after, 
 when he again officiated in the same place. This 
 second occasion was on a week evening, when there 
 sat Jay with his flannel jacket and his white leather 
 apron, just as he had returned from work. After the 
 sermon the minister sought an interview with him, 
 desiring the doorkeeper to ask "Billy Jay" to come 
 to him in the parlour after the service. When he 
 did so, the good man knelt down a.nd prayed with 
 him, and subsequently offered to admit him amongst 
 a small academy of young men that he was educating. 
 The invitation was happily accepted. He went to 
 Maryborough, where for some years he was under 
 the instructions of that "celestial creature Corne- 
 lius Winter," as Bishop Jebb called him. 
 
 It may be both interesting and instructive to insert 
 a specimen of Jay's literary ability at the time of 
 his joining the academy. There is only one specimen 
 extant, and, contrasted with the after productions of
 
 EARLY EPISTOLARY EFFORTS. 171 
 
 Jay, it is a very curious document indeed. It is in- 
 serted, of course, verbatim. 
 
 "To Mr. Winter, Marlborough. 
 
 "Tisbury, January 30th, 1785. 
 
 "DuTiruLL FUELED this comes with my kind loved 
 to you hoping It will find you in good health as it 
 Left me and all my friend at tisbury thanks be to god 
 for his mercy and Goodness in preserving us to this 
 present moment in health and strength, health is the 
 honey that Sweetens every temporal mercy to be well 
 in body is a great blessing but to be well in Soul is a 
 much greater Blessing than this what is the body when 
 compar'd with the Soul it is no more than the Candles 
 Slender Light to the great illuminary the Sun in its 
 meridian Spleiider and beauty. 
 
 " I received your Letter and was very thankfull for 
 your kindness to me in it. You Desired to hear 
 from me Mr. Serman's return and if I could write 
 you something of my Christen Experience, my ex- 
 perience is that I Desire to Love the Lord above all 
 and Desire to Live more to his Glory and honour. 
 I hope I can Say that he is the Cheiftest to my 
 Soul of ten thousand and altogether Lovely I De- 
 sire to know nothing but Jesus and Desire to be 
 found in him not having on my own Righteousness 
 which is pulluted with sin and impure but the .Righte- 
 ousness which is of god which is for all and upon all 
 that Believe in him. my father says he will find me in
 
 J72 WILLIAM JAY. 
 
 cloths as much as he is able. I can tome at any time 
 when you think proper. So I conclude with my father 
 and mother's Love to you I am your humble servant 
 
 " WILLIAM JAY." 
 
 It will be apparent that few persons could go to 
 the academy more deficient of general knowledge than 
 Jay. But he had the essential thirst for information, 
 which ensured application when the opportunity was 
 presented. At the academy he soon made progress 
 under the direction of his tutor, by whom he was ap- 
 pointed at various times, with the other pupils, to visit 
 the surrounding villages to exhort and in various ways 
 to forward the spiritual interests of the people. Jay 
 was little more than sixteen when he preached his 
 first sermon, selecting as his text, " If so be ye have 
 tasted that the Lord is gracious." After this he 
 preached very frequently, so that he delivered, as he 
 tells us, more than a thousand sermons before he had 
 attained his twenty-first year ! 
 
 Jay was not unconscious, from the fact of the many 
 applications for the " boy preacher," that he possessed 
 talents of which he had previously taken no account. 
 Tie had, however, the good sense to know if he was 
 to make any figure in the world he must remember a 
 remark in the " Life of Watts :" " The reason why 
 the ancients surpassed the moderns was their greater 
 modesty. They had a juster conception of the limi- 
 tation of human powers; and, despairing of universal
 
 William Jay, the Boy-preacher, delivering his First Discourse to 
 a rustic Congregation.
 
 MINISTERIAL LABOURS. 173 
 
 eminence, they confined their application to one 
 thing, instead of expanding it over a wider surface." 
 
 After the needful preparation at Mr. Winter's, 
 Jay was engaged by the celebrated Rowland Hill to 
 preach for a season at the Surrey Chapel, London 
 a formidable engagement for so young a man. The 
 place, though so large, was soon crowded to excess ; 
 and when he preached his last sermon, the yard before 
 the adjoining dwelling-house was filled with the lin- 
 gering multitude, who would not disperse until he 
 had bidden them farewell from the window. Before 
 he left London, he had several offers to become the 
 pastor of various chapels. With singular good sense 
 he declined the invitations, with the wise intention of 
 securing more preparation before entering upon any 
 important permanent interest. For this purpose he 
 accepted a small charge at Christian Malford, near 
 Chippenham. His salary was to be 35 a year, with 
 the additional consideration of being boarded gra- 
 tuitously by one of the tradesman of the place. His 
 design, however, in going to the village was frus- 
 trated : his books were few ; there was no public 
 library to which he could have access, and his salary 
 was too small to allow him to purchase new ones ; 
 also, as a farther impediment to his improvement, he 
 was constantly urged to preach abroad, and he 
 lacked the moral courage to say " No." 
 
 After leaving Christian Malford, which the cir- 
 cumstances of the case compelled him to do, Lady
 
 174 WILLIAH JAT. 
 
 Maxwell, who owiied the chapel at the Hotwells at 
 Bristol, invited him to occupy that pulpit. He 
 stayed there twelve months, during which time the 
 chapel was always crowded; and, what must have 
 filled him with great joy, he heard of several conver- 
 sions as the result of his preaching, three of whom 
 subsequently became preachers themselves, and were 
 ordained over congregations, and ultimately died in 
 the faith. Some difficulty arising with Lady Max- 
 well's sub-governess, who had the management of 
 affairs in her lady's absence, induced Jay to with- 
 draw from the charge. At this time he fortunately 
 received an invitation from the Independent Church 
 at Bath, then destitute, by the death of the Rev. 
 Thomas Tuppen. This invitation he accepted, and 
 soon found himself in his new position completely at 
 home. His ordination shortly followed; when he 
 might now be said to have made his permanent 
 choice. Subsequently the chapel was thrice enlarged, 
 and even then it was too small to meet the wishes of 
 the members who desired sittings. 
 
 Shortly after his establishment at Bath, he married 
 a most excellent and amiable woman, who was in his 
 after life, and under all circumstances, a true help- 
 mate. Jay speaks of her in terms the most enthusi- 
 astic, and doubtless ever loved her with the utmost 
 warmth of his ardent nature. Both Jay and his wife 
 suffered from continued illness at different periods of 
 their lives. -He speaks of his own illness as resulting
 
 INDISPOSITION AND THE REMEDY. 175 
 
 from a weak constitution and from study, which had at 
 times been much protracted. For a lengthened period 
 he had been subject to constant headaches, which ren- 
 dered both his preaching and his preparatory studies 
 painful. At times, his sight was so confused that he 
 was almost rendered unconscious of outward things. 
 The medical men to whom he applied used all the 
 means which their skill and experience suggested, 
 which only resulted, however, in bringing him almost 
 to the brink of the grave. In this emergency he was 
 recommended by the slave's friend, Mr. Wilberforce, 
 to consult Dr. Bailie, whom he spoke of as his 
 friend and physician. The result of his advice was 
 the adoption of habits which ultimately tended to 
 the restoration of his health. In the first place, he 
 contracted the custom of being seldom in bed after 
 five in the morning; this was not because he could 
 not sleep, but because he felt it a duty to practice 
 this self-denial. He felt that the practice was morally 
 right, as it redeemed time and aided duty ; and also 
 that it was physically right; as it was wholesome and 
 healthful. Then, in addition, he was exceedingly 
 temperate in his food ; he used, in his later years at 
 least, water only. He was careful, also, not to add to 
 his wants by any fictitious appetites. The wretched 
 habits of snuff-taking and smoking he carefully avoided, 
 and during any temporary headache, or disturbance 
 of his general health, exercised himself in the garden 
 or in any open air relaxation, which soon brought 
 back the desired healthy tone.
 
 176 WILLIAM JAT. 
 
 The works he published during his protracted life 
 were read with the utmost avidity by members of 
 various denominations. His first literary venture 
 was a sermon on " The mutual Duties of Husbands 
 and Wives," which went through six editions, and 
 was much commended at the time. This was suc- 
 ceeded by a volume of sermons, also favourably re- 
 ceived ; and subsequent volumes of sermons " Short 
 Discourses for the Use of Families," went through re- 
 peated editions, and procured for him the diploma of 
 D.D. This title he never used except on one occa- 
 sion, when he left a case of manuscripts at a large 
 inn. It answered the purpose of preserving the 
 papers, and from that circumstance he argued the 
 use of such honours. After the volumes of sermons he 
 published two biographical works " The Life of the 
 Rev. Cornelius Winter," and " Memoirs of the 
 Rev. John Clarke." He also published two volumes 
 of " Morning Exercises for the Closet," which soon 
 reached a tenth edition ; these were followed by two 
 more volumes of exercises for the " Evening." Many, 
 if not the whole of these works, were reprinted in 
 America; and one complete collected edition of the 
 entire was published at Baltimore. The rich, refined, 
 and elegant Mr. Beckford, during the time that Jay 
 was preaching in Bath, took an opportunity to hear 
 him, without being aware of the fact that the preacher 
 had been employed as a lad in assisting to rear his 
 princely home. Afterwards he left a noble tribute
 
 BECKFORD'S OPINION. 177 
 
 to Jay's power. He said : " This man's mind is no 
 petty reservoir, supplied him by laborious pumpings ; 
 it is a clear, transparent spring, flowing so freely as 
 to impress the idea of its being inexhaustible. In 
 many of these passages the stream of eloquence is so 
 full, so rapid, that we are fairly borne down and laid 
 prostrate at the feet of the preacher, whose arguments 
 in these moments appear as if they could not be con- 
 troverted, and we must yield to them. The voice 
 which calls us to look into ourselves, and prepare for 
 judgment, is too piercing, two powerful, to be re- 
 sisted ; and we attempt, for worldly and sensual con- 
 siderations, to shut our ears in vain." 
 
 Jay records the circumstance of preaching at tne 
 opening of Hanover Chapel, on which occasion the 
 Duke of Sussex was present. He adopted his usual 
 custom to retire before the service, for prayer and con- 
 templation ; so that when he entered the pulpit ne 
 delivered his message with his accustomed freedom. 
 The fear of man had no snare for him. He did not, 
 as a rule, write out his sermons, yet, as the oppor- 
 tunity presented, he committed his thoughts to paper. 
 It was the advice of Mrs. Hannah Moore, at her fir?t 
 interview with him, to write much. " It matters 
 not, comparatively," said that extraordinary woman, 
 " on what a young composer first writes ; by the 
 constant use of his pen he will soon form a style ; 
 and by nothing else will he attain it." Sbe also 
 recommended writing with ns much celerity as possible,
 
 178 WILLIAM JAY. 
 
 I'egardless of trifling inaccuracies. " These," she said, 
 " should not be suffered to check and cool the mind. 
 These may be safely left for correction in review, 
 while advantage is taken of the heat of composition, 
 to go on to the end ; it being better to produce the 
 whole figure at one fusion, than to cast successively 
 various parts, and then conjoin them." 
 
 On the 31st day of January, 1841, Mr. Jay com- 
 pleted his fiftieth year of ministering. On that oc- 
 casion the members of his congregation presented him 
 with a silver salver, with the following inscription: 
 
 " Presented, together with the sum of six hundred 
 and fifty pounds, to the Rev. "William Jay, by the 
 members of the church and congregation assembled 
 in Argyle Chapel, Bath, and by other friends, on the 
 completion of the fiftieth year of his happy and useful 
 pastorate, as a tribute of Christian esteem, affection, 
 and gratitude. January 30, 1841." The younger 
 members of the congregation also presented him with 
 a handsome gold medal and a silver salver. Subse- 
 quently, the servants of the families composing the 
 congregation presented him with a silver sugar-basin, 
 stating simply, " that it came from many attached 
 female servants in connection with the church and 
 Congregation." Mr. Jay wrote the contributors 
 affectionate letters, and presented each of them with 
 a volume of his sermons. 
 
 The life of this good man came to a close on the 
 27th day of December, 1853, when his spirit left it
 
 HIS DEATH. 179 
 
 earthly clay to join the good who had gone bcfoie. 
 Thus ended the lengthened life and valuable career of 
 the stonemason's apprentice honoured and esteemed 
 by the whole Christian world. How fittingly may 
 we close this sketch in the words of the poet : 
 
 44 Honour and shame from no condition rise ; 
 Act well your part there all the honour lies
 
 JOHN PHILPOT CURRAN: 
 
 THE CELEBRATED ORATOR AKD LAWYER* 
 
 IRELAND is celebrated for its famous orators. For wit, 
 and the power to move the passions, they are unrival- 
 led. The present generation, however, bears no com- 
 parison with the generation long ago carried to the 
 '-' narrow house." The wit and eloquence of the mo- 
 dern Irish orator seem tame and vapid to the springy 
 freshness of an O'Connel or a John Philpot Curran. 
 "Little Jacky/' as the subject of our sketch used 
 to be called, saw the light in the small town of New- 
 market, in the county of Cork. He is described in 
 his boyhood to have been a light-limbed, short, 
 brown boy. Loving his mother as if it were possible 
 that any true-hearted boy could do otherwise the 
 tales she told him he treasured in his memory. She 
 became his inspiration ; he afterwards boasted, when 
 surrounded with friends and in the noon-tide of his 
 fame, that to his affectionate and intelligent mother 
 all his success and merit, mast be attributed. "When 
 Curran had attained a first position at the bar, and 
 perhaps after being present in the court and hearing 
 her sou plead with his accustomed eloquence, she said,
 
 AN INCIDENT. 181 
 
 "O Jacky, 3acs.y, what a preacher vras lost in 
 you ! " 
 
 Kind and considerate as this excellent woman was, 
 owing to her large tamiiy, she couid not bestow special 
 attention upon any memoer, so that "Master Jacky" 
 was left pretty much to his own resources. He early 
 became acquainted with all the means of amusement 
 both in the town and in the country around ; he was 
 a prime favourite at all the wakes and dances, and 
 anticipated with great delight the Newmarket fair, 
 which was held four times a year. On one occasion 
 Newmarket was visited by the time-honoured exhibi- 
 tion of " Punch and Judy," which attracted much 
 attention ; but owing to the sudden illness of the pro- 
 prietor, the pleasure of the sight- seers seemed speedily 
 about to come to an end. In this emergency Cumin 
 offered his services as showman, and acquitted himself 
 to the satisfaction of the on-lookers. Indeed, it is 
 said that he would have proved quite a treasure to the 
 Punch and Judy man had he not, in the exuberance 
 of his spirits, dared to burlesque the parish priest. He 
 got so roughly handled for his profane treatment, that 
 all taste for showmanship was taken out of him. 
 
 One day, while play ing marbles, there occurred an 
 incident upon which his future eminent position 
 mainly depended. He had been very successful at 
 play, and was, as a consequence, full of hilarity and 
 fun. Mr. Boyce, the rector of the parish, was a 
 cheerful spectator of the game, and was particularly
 
 182 JOHN PH1LPOT CTJEBAN. 
 
 delighted with Curran's vivacity and sparkle. Deter- 
 mining to develope the power, of which he had dis- 
 covered the germ, he induced " Jacky," by bribes of 
 kind words and sweet cakes, to visit him at the rec- 
 tory, where he taught him to read, gave him a know- 
 ledge of grammar, and made him acquainted with the 
 rudiments of the classics. Subsequently he sent him 
 to Middleton school. 
 
 The school was under the direction of Mr. Carey, 
 an excellent classical scholar. From this school he 
 went to Trinity College, when he was not seventeen 
 years old. He was an inmate of the college, which 
 saved him from absolute want, and enabled him to 
 devote himself with assiduity to his studies. In three 
 years after entering the college he obtained a scholar- 
 ship by his steady and persevering industry. He 
 subsequently aspired to a fellowship, but from some 
 unexplained reason, relinquished the hope. His 
 classical acquirements were very considerable. He 
 could quote from the classics at all times with the 
 happiest effect. His biographer, Phillips, says that 
 he saw him in a Holyhead packet during a fearful 
 storm, while all on board were dreadfully sea-sick, 
 deliberately take out of his bag a pocket edition of 
 Virgil, by which he charmed himself into security. 
 
 While he was at Trinity College he was frequently 
 before the board, charged with some slight irregularity. 
 On one occasion the crime was laid to his charge of 
 wearing a dirty shirt : in his defence he told his ac-
 
 DEBATING CLUBS. 183 
 
 cusers the story of Barry Yelverton, afterwards Lord 
 Avonmore. " I wish, mother," said Barry, " I had 
 eleven shirts." " Eleven, Barry, why eleven ? " 
 " Because, mother, I am of opinion that a gentleman, 
 to be comfortable, should have twelve." Barry and 
 Curran had two between them. 
 
 Curran was intended for the church ; his mother 
 was sanguine enough to think that one day he would 
 become a bishop. He had himself no such thoughts ; 
 so that when he had obtained his degrees at Trinity 
 College, he started for London with a light heart and 
 quite as light a purse. When he arrived in the 
 metropolis, he contrived to enter the Middle Temple, 
 and also contrived to live how, is the unsolved 
 question. Probably he wrote for the papers and 
 magazines, and so eked out a subsistence, and pre- 
 vented himself from starving. He managed, how- 
 ever, to pass the legal terms, and come out a full- 
 fledged barrister. "While he was in London, Curran 
 did not consider that his law studies were sufficient 
 to occupy his attention : in the first place, he had 
 an impediment in his speech, which had obtained 
 for him at school the soubriquet of " Stuttering 
 Jack ;" this he set himself earnestly to amend. One 
 of his plans was to declaim daily before a looking- 
 glass, selections from Junius, Bolingbroke, and 
 Shakespeare. He was also a constant attendant at de- 
 bating clubs. One oi'the mos* celebrated, at which he 
 made his debut as a public speaker, is in existence at the
 
 184 JOHN PIIILPOT CURUAN. 
 
 present day, close to Temple Bar, in Fleet Street. Cur- 
 ran thus tells the story of his first effort : " When I 
 had gained some reputation as an advocate, a friend 
 flatteringly told me one day that he thought oratory 
 was born with me. I denied it, and said that it was 
 not born until at least twenty-three years afterwards. 
 The story of its birth, as regards me, is this : I was 
 one night at the debating society, when I was ap- 
 pointed to speak to a certain subject. I arose, in 
 the pride of conscious ability, and said, ' Mr. Chair- 
 man' I became nervous ; the sound of my own voice 
 startled me; I grew pale; my heart must have bounded 
 iuto my throat, for certainly I could not heave out 
 another word. The fact is, I fancied at the moment, 
 although there was not more than a dozen in the 
 room, that I was to address a grand assembly, and 
 that every eye was intently riveted on me, as a kind 
 of moral centre, from which they expected the purest 
 rays of intellect to beam upon them. The thought 
 unnerved me ; I was bewildered ; in short, I con- 
 cluded by sitting down. After this they called me 
 ' Orator Mum.' I attended the society notwithstand- 
 ing, and after some time I could say 'ay' or 'no/ 
 boldly enough. It happened, I think, about three 
 weeks or a month after my first essay at speech- 
 making, that I went to the debating club ; my spirits 
 were unusually high, for I had dined that day with 
 two friends on a leg of mutton. Well, as I said, I 
 went to the club, and on entering the room I found
 
 PECUNIARY DIFFICULTIES. 185 
 
 a ghostly-looking fellow, with an extremely dirty 
 bilirt, speaking at a rapid rate. I could not help 
 smiling at his ludicrous blunders. He remarked me, 
 and challenged me, as c Orator Mum,' to a discussion. 
 Excited by the taunt, I got upon my legs, and dressed 
 him better than ever he was dressed before. I was 
 loudly applauded, and the president invited me to 
 supper. Such was the birth of my oratory, and 
 ever since I never was at a loss for a reply." 
 
 During the second year of his residence in London, 
 he married his cousin, Miss Creagh, of Newmarket 
 a most unwise, and, as it subsequently proved, a 
 most unfortunate act. In 1775 he returned to Ire- 
 land, and was called to the Irish bar, penniless and 
 without patronage. Yet he took his seat amongst 
 the junior barristers with the utmost confidence of 
 ultimate success, and experienced the usual fate of 
 attending the courts without a brief. But even at 
 this time he attained a degree of celebrity. If he 
 was not called upon to exhibit his oratorical powers 
 in the law courts, he had his revenge by seeing always 
 ar mid him a willing and eager crowd of listeners in 
 the halls, whom he amused by his wit, and delighted 
 by his eloquence. After attending the Cork Assizes 
 he returned to Dublin, very little improved in his 
 circumstances. He was so poor at this time that he 
 could not pay the rent of his very humble lodgings ; 
 this was the more embarrassing, as his landlady would 
 wait for a change of fortune.
 
 186 JOHN PHILPOT CTJRRAN. 
 
 One morning Curran left home in the utmost de- 
 jection of spirits. He had uo darner for his family, 
 and he had no money for his rent. The day was 
 passed miserably, as usual, when on returning home, 
 he was surprised to find on his study-table a large 
 brief, with twenty guineas wrapped inside, and the 
 name of " old Bob Lyons" inscribed upon it. We 
 may be sure the rent was immediately paid, and " old 
 Bdb" invited to a good dinner. That brief was the 
 commencement of his fortunes. " Bob" afterwards 
 gave him business that amounted to eleven hundred 
 pounds. Then the time speedily arrived when no 
 important cause was tried in any part of Ireland in 
 which he was not engaged. 
 
 While he was struggling to make a position at the 
 bar, he was the subject of a heartless attack by Judge 
 Robinson, who is described as having a sour, cynical 
 disposition, and who attained his elevation to the 
 bench by meanness and corruption. In the coarse 
 of one of his speeches in court, Curran, in combating 
 the opinion of the opposite counsel, said, " he had 
 consulted all his law books, and could not find a 
 single case in which the principle contended for was 
 established." " I suspect, sir," said the judge, " that 
 your law library is rather limited." To this remark, 
 Curran, after eyeing him for a moment, indignantly 
 replied : " It is very true, my lord, that I am poor, 
 and this circumstance has certainly rather curtailed 
 my library ; my books are not numerous, but they
 
 ENTERS THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 187 
 
 are select, and I hope have been perused with proper 
 dispositions; I have prepared myself for this high 
 profession rather by the study of a few good books 
 than by the composition of a great many bad ones. 
 I am not ashamed of my poverty, but I should of my 
 wealth, could I stoop to acquire it by servility and 
 corruption. If I rise not to rank, I shall at least be 
 honest ; and should I ever cease to be so, many an 
 example shows me that an ill-acquired elevation, by 
 making me the more conspicuous, would only make 
 me the more universally and the more notoriously 
 contemptible \" 
 
 After being five years at the bar, Curran entered 
 the Irish House of Commons, and attained there an 
 equal celebrity to that which he had acquired in the 
 law courts. 
 
 In the height of his fame, Curran returned one day 
 from the courts, where he had been practising, and 
 found to his astonishment a venerable stranger in his 
 rooms, making himself freely at home. A glance 
 showed him that it was the good Mr. Boyce. " You 
 are right," said he, as he rushed into his arms, e( you 
 are right, sir ; the chimney-piece is yours, the pictures 
 are yours, the house is yours ; you gave me all I have 
 my friend, my father I" After dinner Mr. Bcyce 
 accompanied his protegee to the House of Commons, 
 of which he was a member, and heard him with de- 
 ligbted feelings make one of his eloquent and power- 
 ful speeches.
 
 188 JOHN PH1LPOT CURRAN. 
 
 At the death of Mr. Pitt, the political party to 
 which Curran was attached, came into office. He 
 was made Master of the Rolls, which position he filled 
 for six years, and thenretired upon a pension of 2,700 
 per annum, and finally closed his eventful life on the 
 14th of October, 1817, in the sixty-eighth year of his 
 age. 
 
 After his death the celebrated Irish barrister 
 Phillips thus wrote of him : " His place at the Irish 
 bar has not even been approached since his departure. 
 There is no man, not merely next him, but near him. I 
 have heard the best efforts of the ablest amongst them; 
 and though they were brilliant in their way, it was as 
 the brilliancy of the morning star before the sunbeam. 
 One, perhaps, is witty, sarcastic, argumentative an- 
 other, fluent, polished, plausible a third, blunt, vehe- 
 ment, and energetic but, there is not one like him, 
 at once strong, persuasive, witty, eloquent, acute, and 
 argumentative, giving to every argument the charm 
 of his imagery, and to every image the magnificent 
 simplicity of his manner not one, who, when he had 
 touched all the chords of pity, could so wrinkle up 
 the cheek with laughter, that the yet undried tear 
 was impeded in its progress not one who, when he 
 had swept away the heart of his hearer, left at the 
 same time such an impression upon his memory, that 
 the judgment, on reflection, rather applauded the tri- 
 bute which, at the moment of delivery, had been 
 extorted from the feelings !"
 
 SAMOEL OROMPrON: 
 
 1HE INGENIOUS BOY, INVENTOR OF THE SPINNING 
 MULE, AND ONE OP ENGLAND'S GREATEST BENE- 
 FACTORS. 
 
 THE results of perseverance are seen, not only in 
 individual progress and personal success, but in the 
 happiness and prosperity of towns, of districts, of 
 countries. Some ingenious mechanic, to further his 
 own ends, may devise a machine which may save him 
 from many tedious hours' labour ; the machine not 
 only answers his individual ends, but is an invention 
 for all time, to save so much manual labour to the 
 human family. No more remarkable instance is to 
 be found than in the life of Samuel Crompton, the 
 inventor of the " Spinning Mule." His discovery 
 gave an immense impetus to the industry of the 
 people of Lancashire, causing insignificant villages to 
 spring into large and important towns. 
 
 Samuel Crompton was born on the 3rd of Decem- 
 ber, 1753. His ancestors had occupied distinguished 
 positions both in the commercial and legal world. 
 His parents resided at Firwood, in the township of 
 Tonge, near Bolton ; they were farmers, but, as was 
 the custom of the time, the leisure of the family was
 
 190 SAMUi-L CKOMPTON. 
 
 devoted to carding, spinning, and weaving. George 
 Crompton, the father of Samuel, died at the early 
 age of thirty-seven. He and his wife, Elizabeth 
 (better known as Betty) Holt, of Turton, were reli- 
 gious people, regularly attending the services at the 
 Chapel-in-the-fields, now known as All Saints' Church,, 
 Little Bolton. 
 
 Fortunately for Samuel, his mother was a prudent 
 and exemplary woman, she had decision and energy 
 in her character ; some thought her self-willed and 
 imperative, but no mother could have been kinder 
 or more solicitous for her son's welfare than Betty 
 Cromptou was for her son Samuel. The school that 
 this good woman sent her boy to was kept by one 
 William Barlow, who had quite a reputation for his 
 skill in writing, arithmetic, book-keeping, geometry, 
 mensuration, and mathematics ; he was styled " a 
 witch in figures/' Ko doubt this school afforded 
 Samuel all the education that he received, and that 
 his attendance was not protracted to any lengthened 
 period, as his mother would be anxious to avail her- 
 self of his earliest capable services. During this 
 period, Samuel says, his mother practised to the very 
 letter the injunctions of Scripture, many times sub- 
 jecting him to a beating, not for any fault, but because 
 "she so loved him" an excess of kindness from 
 which she might have been excused. 
 
 When Samuel was in his sixteenth year he was 
 occupied at the loom at his mother's house, For six
 
 Samuel Crompton inventing Lis celebrated Mule.
 
 J1ECHANICAL GENIUS. 191 
 
 years previous there had been a great demand for 
 cotton goods, and especially for imitations of the 
 muslins sent from India. The efforts of the manu- 
 facturers to produce these goods at home \vere fruitless. 
 A little advance had, however, been made in the means 
 of producing the cloth ; Kay, of Bury, had invented 
 a mode of throwing the shuttle by a simple contriv- 
 ance, by which the weaver could make twice as much 
 cloth ; and Hargreaves, a weaver of Stand-hill, near 
 Blackburn, had invented the jenny. But both Kay 
 and Hargreaves were driven from their country by the 
 ignorant prejudices of their fellow workmen, who 
 conceived that their inventions would throw them out 
 of employ. While Samuel was working at home on 
 one of these machines he was also learning to think. 
 His mother exacted a certain amount of work daily. 
 His leisure, however for he had some hours of relax- 
 ation was devoted to making a violin, which he 
 soon learned to play, contracting a love for the in- 
 strument which never afterwards left him. This, and 
 the few books which were at his command, filled up 
 the spare time not given to his daily work. 
 
 When lue was in his twenty-first year he com- 
 menced the construction of his " Mule/' which took 
 him five years to perfect. He thus briefly relates the 
 experience of these years : " The next five years had 
 this addition to my labour as a weaver, occasioned by 
 the imperfect state 01 cotton spinning, viz., a con- 
 tinual endeavour to realize a more perfect principle
 
 192 SAMUEL CROMPTON. 
 
 of spinning ; and. though often baflfod, I as often re- 
 newed the attempt, and at length succeeded to rny 
 utmost desire, at the expense of every shilling I had 
 in the world/' All this experimenting was done 
 at "over hours," and many hours which should 
 have been spent in bed were devoted to the " im- 
 provements." The lights and noises at all sorts 
 of untimely hours heard and seen at the old Hall, 
 originated a report that it was haunted. This was 
 no doubt the fact, but it was with Samuel's rest- 
 less spirit, which would not be laid until his object 
 was attained. The only tools he had to work with 
 were a few sacredly preserved by his mother, once 
 the property of his father, and which were used by 
 him in the construction of a church organ. Every 
 spare shilling was devoted to adding to their number ; 
 for this purpose Samuel frequently hired himself 
 and his darling violin to the manager of the Bolton 
 Theatre for one shilling and sixpence per night, 
 so that he might purchase some needed tool for his 
 inventions. The " Mule" was chiefly constructed of 
 wood, but parts of it were of iron, as it has subse- 
 quently been ascertained that he frequently visited a 
 small way-side smithy in the township, where he " used 
 to file his bits of things." In a paper which John 
 Kennedy, Esq., read before the Manchester Literary 
 and Philosophical Society in 1830, he informs us that 
 " Crompton's machine was called the ( Hall-in-the- 
 wood wheel/ or muslin wheel, because its capabilities
 
 MARHIAGE. 193 
 
 rendered it available for yarn for making muslins; 
 and finally it got the name of the ' Mule' from its 
 partaking of the two leading features of Mr. Ark- 
 wright's machine and Hargreaves's spinning-jenny." 
 
 When Crompton was just on the eve of completing 
 his machine, in 1779, the Blackburn spinners and 
 weavers were excited to riot against machinery, which 
 they igriorantly supposed would destroy their means 
 of living. Every jenny for miles round Blackburn 
 was destroyed, excepting such only as had less than 
 twenty spindles. Samuel, during this outbreak, took 
 his machine to pieces and concealed the parts in the 
 loft or garret, not daring to put them together for 
 some weeks after. In the course of the same year, 
 however, it was all complete, and yarn spun upon it, 
 which* was used for the manufacture of muslins of a 
 very fine description. 
 
 The first profits of the u Mule" were spent upon a 
 silver watch, made expressly for Samuel by a watch- 
 maker in Bolton. This watch was his constant com- 
 panion for fifty years. Soon after, Samuel set up 
 house on his own account in a cottage attached to 
 the old Hall, taking home Mary Pimlott, who made 
 him an excellent wife and judicious adviser. She is 
 said to have been gifted with an additional sense, 
 " something like Scotch second-sight, by which she 
 could tell a rogue in an instant, and warn her family to 
 have nothing to do with him." Samuel now worked 
 upon his " Mule v with the utmost secrecy, and as- 
 
 o
 
 194 SAMUEL CROMPTON. 
 
 tonished the manufacturers by the fineness and firm- 
 ness of the yarn he produced. Everything at this time 
 had a promising and cheery look for a happy future. 
 
 Samuel was then only twenty-seven years of age, 
 and the inventor of a machine which from the first 
 hour of its completion altered the entire system of 
 cotton manufactures in the country. It was now 
 seen that the much-coveted India muslins could be 
 made at home. We may well suppose, therefore, that 
 the neighbouring manufacturers were very anxious to 
 penetrate the secret of Samuel's invention. This, of 
 course, he was very unwilling to disclose. The old 
 Hall was besieged as a consequence, by persons near 
 and from a distance ; some to purchase yarn, others 
 desirous of learning something of the wonderful new 
 wheel. All sorts of stratagems were used to obtain 
 admission to the house ; and when this was denied, 
 many climbed up to the windows outside, by the aid 
 of harrows and ladders, to look in at the machinery. 
 
 A screen was erected to defeat this espionage ; but 
 that was not always successful. One man is said to 
 have ensconced himself for some days in the cock-loft, 
 watching Samuel at work through a gimlet-hole 
 pierced through the ceiling. 
 
 Under these circumstances it seemed impossible to 
 retain the secret of his machine. In one of his papers 
 he refers to this period : " During this time I mar- 
 ried, and commenced spinner. But a few mouths 
 reduced me to the cruel necessity either of destroying 
 my machine altogether, or giving it up to the public,
 
 A ONE-SIDED BARGAIN. 195 
 
 To destroy it I could not think of; to give up that 
 for which I had laboured so long was cruel. I had 
 no patent, nor the means of purchasing one. In pre- 
 ference to destroying, I gave it to the public/' He 
 trusted to the manufacturers to remunerate him ; and 
 they made, indeed, a sort of one-sided bargain with 
 him. The agreement was thus drawn up : " We 
 whose names are hereunto subscribed, have agreed to 
 give, and do hereby promise to pay unto, Samuel 
 Crompton, at the Hall-in-the-wood, near Bolton, the 
 several sums opposite to our names, as a reward for 
 his improvement in spinning. Several of the princi- 
 pal tradesmen in Manchester, Bolton, &c., having seen 
 his new machine, approve of it, and are of opinion 
 that it would be of the greatest public utility to make 
 it generally known, to which end a contribution is 
 desired from every well-wisher of trade/' According 
 to one statement Samuel derived 50 for giving up 
 Ids " Mule;" while another authority sets the amount 
 at 106. Crompton said himself: "I received as 
 much by way of subscription as built me a new ma- 
 chine with only four spindles more than the one I had 
 given up ; the old one having forty- eight, the new 
 one fifty-two spindles." How miserable this result, 
 when the advantage rendered is taken into ac- 
 count ! 
 
 But more shameful still even those parties that 
 had promised a wretched dolement, when the " Mule" 
 had left Oompton's hands, sought by any or every 
 means to evade the payment. He wrote : " At last 
 
 o 2
 
 196 SAMUEL CROMPTON. 
 
 I consented, in hope of a generous and liberal subscrip- 
 tion. The consequence was, that from many sub- 
 scribers, who would not pay the sum they had set 
 opposite their names when I applied to them for it, I 
 got nothing but abusive language, given to me to drive 
 me from them, which was easily done, for I never till 
 then could think it possible that any man (in such 
 situations of life and circumstances) could pretend one 
 thing and act the direct opposite. I then found it 
 was possible, having had proof positive." This dis- 
 graceful conduct on the part of the manufacturers 
 tended to sour the temper of Samuel for the remain- 
 der of his days. 
 
 Some time before the year 1 785, Crompton removed 
 from the old Hall to the farm-house at Oldhams, about 
 two miles from Bolton. His new " Mule" was erected 
 in the upper story, and to prevent the crowds who 
 flocked to see the new wheels gaining admission to the 
 apartment, Samuel contrived a secret fastening for the 
 door. One of the visitors was no less a person than 
 the first Sir Robert Peel, then a member of the firm 
 of Peel, Ainsworth, and Co., Bolton. On the first 
 visit he found Crompton absent, when he chatted 
 with his wife, and presented his son George with half 
 a guinea. On Mrs. Crompton going into her dairy for 
 a bowl of milk for her guest, Mr. Peel took the oppor- 
 tunity to ask the boy where his father worked. He 
 was just pointing out the secret contrivance for fas- 
 tening the door latch, when his mother returned and 
 warned him by a look that he was doing wrong. It
 
 CUTS UP HIS SPINNING AND CARDING MACHINES. 197 
 
 is creditable to the Peel family to know that old 
 Mr. Peel's visit was made with the intention of induc- 
 ing Mr. Crompton to accept a lucrative situation in his 
 employ, and subsequently a partnership in his concern. 
 Samuel unfortunately saw fit to decline both these 
 offers. Doubtless, had he acceded to the overture, he 
 would have been saved from much after sorrow ; but 
 he had been disappointed once, and his faith in pro- 
 mises was considerably lessened. He continued, 
 therefore, in his own loft, hoping at least to secure 
 as much success as his neighbours ; but in this he 
 was doomed to be disappointed. No sooner did he 
 teach any new hands the use of his machines than 
 they were bribed to leave him by some of the manu- 
 facturers. Crompton thus bitterly records this addi- 
 tional injustice : " I pushed on, intending to have 
 a good share in the spinning line, yet I found there 
 was an evil which I had not foreseen, and of much 
 greater magnitude than giving up the machine, viz., 
 that I must always be teaching green hands, employ 
 none, or quit the country ; it being believed that if 
 I taught them they knew their business well. So 
 that for years I had no choice left but to give up 
 spinning, or quit my native land. / cut up my spin- 
 ning machine for other purposes." On another 
 occasion, feeling most acutely the injustice which 
 was done him, he seized his axe and broke his carding 
 machine in pieces, saying, " They shall not have this 
 too." The axe used in this work of almost justifiable 
 destruction is preserved as a relic at the present time.
 
 198 SAMUEL CROMPTON. 
 
 In 1800, however, some gentlemen of Manchester got 
 up a subscription for Crompton, under the impression 
 that he had been hardly used. Before it was completed 
 the country was suffering from the high price of food, 
 owing to a failure of the crops. This almost destroyed 
 the scheme. Between four and five hundred pounds 
 was all that was handed over to enable Samuel to 
 increase his little manufacturing establishment. 
 
 It must not be assumed that his inventive talents 
 were exclusively devoted to the invention of manu- 
 facturing machinery. About the year 1803 he built 
 an organ in his house in King Street, Bolton, where 
 he had removed. It was afterwards bought for 
 the use of the New Jerusalem Church. At this 
 church Crompton took the entire charge of con- 
 ducting the singing. There are several music books 
 preserved that contain tunes composed by him, and 
 "pricked" with his own hand. The choir thought 
 so highly of his services that they presented him with 
 a silver cup, upon which his portrait was engraved ; he 
 afterwards made a pentagraph, by which he added the 
 profiles of all the members of the choir. 
 
 In 1811 Samuel commenced collecting information 
 of the results of his invention. He found, after visiting 
 the manufacturing districts of England, Scotland, and 
 Ireland, that there were between four and five millions 
 of mule spindles in use; two -thirds of the steam power 
 then employed in cotton spinning was applied to turn 
 the mules. The value of the buildings and machinery
 
 PETITIONS PARLIAMENT. 199 
 
 employed in Samuel's invention was computed at be- 
 tween three and four millions sterling ; and, as a proof 
 that the invention had not thrown handsout of employ, 
 it was found that 70,000 persons were directly en^ 
 gaged upon the mules, and 150,000 more in weaving 
 the yarn thus spun. It was ascertained that the 
 aggregate number of persons depending upon Cromp- 
 ton's invention was 660,000 ! This was in 1 8 1 1 : what 
 must the number be in 1860 ? When Samuel was in 
 Scotland the Glasgow manufacturers were desirous of 
 giving him a public dinner r their intention was frus- 
 trated by his modesty. When the time came, to use 
 his own words: "rather than 'face up/ I first hid 
 myself, and then fairly bolted from the city." 
 
 The result of the statistics was embodied ia a 
 petition to Parliament ; a committee was empowered 
 to examine the allegations of the petition, which re- 
 ported favourably, after examining various witnesses 
 and documents. The report to the House concluded 
 thus : " Your committee beg leave to observe, that 
 the petitioner appears to them to be highly deserving 
 of a national reward." Samuel was in the lobby of 
 the House of Commons on the llth of May, con- 
 versing with Sir Robert Peel and Mr. Blackburne on 
 the subject, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
 Mr. Perceval, joined them. His first words were 
 " You will be glad to know that we mean to propose 
 twenty thousand pounds for Crompton ; do you think 
 that will be satisfactory ?" Samuel did not hear the 
 reply, as, from motives of delicacy, he walked away.
 
 200 SAMUEL CROMPTON. 
 
 In a moment after, before he had left the lobby, he 
 heard a rush of people, and cries that Mr. Perceval 
 had been shot. The assassin, Bellinsrham, had com- 
 pleted his deadly purpose; in an instant England 
 had lost a faithful servant, and Samuel a valuable 
 friend. On the 24th of June the House voted Kim 
 five thousand pounds a large sum unquestionably ; 
 and yet, taken into consideration with the benefits the 
 nation had derived from the invention of the mule, 
 it was a miserable pittance. Crompton had proved 
 before the committee of the House of Commons that 
 he had contributed 300,000 per annum to the 
 revenue, solely from duty on cotton wool imported 
 into the country to be spun on his machine ! Mr. 
 M'Culloch designated the -grant to Samuel as "a 
 pittance hardly adequate to defray the expenses of 
 the application." In the sessions of 1826 or 1827, 
 a second application was made to Parliament, but 
 was unsuccessful in procuring another grant. So far 
 as Samuel was individually concerned, this was not 
 of much consequence, as he died in his house in 
 King Street, Bolton, on the 26th of June, 1827, in 
 his seventy-first year. In the language of his bio- 
 grapher, " Let us hope that his memory may yet be 
 revived, and his name worthily honoured, not only in 
 his native parish, but reflected thence over the world ; 
 which his invention has done so much to civilize ; 
 and that history may yet inscribe the neglected name 
 of SAMUEL CKOMFTON on one of the brightest pages of 
 her annals."
 
 ELIHU BURRITT: 
 
 THE LEARNED BLACKSMITH. 
 
 A FEW years ago there was gathered within the walls 
 of the lecture hall of the Manchester Athenaeum, the 
 elite of the city, attracted by the fame of the gentle- 
 man announced to lecture upon the " Philosophy of 
 Labour." He was introduced by one of the Directors, 
 who passed a high eulogium upon his character and 
 genius, and who, in the warmest terms, gave him a pub- 
 lic welcome to that important city. Elihu Burritt 
 for he was the lecturer then stood forth, and de- 
 livered in terms the most chaste and classic, an ad- 
 mirable exposition and defence of labour, replete with 
 poetic simile and the wisest maxims. If ever man has 
 earned a right thus to speak it is this man, who may 
 well be described as " the apostle of labour." 
 
 Elihu Burritt's father was a shoemaker, and was 
 blest, in common with Elihu's mother, with a most 
 benevolent and kind disposition. His early home 
 was the refuge of the poor and the weary. He re- 
 members, as one of his earliest acts, arranging the 
 seats and chairs round the fire, for the poor people 
 who came from a distance to church. He also fondly
 
 202 ELIHU BURRITT. 
 
 remembers the expression of his father's face, as he 
 conducted to the best seat an old idiotic pauper, called 
 " Aunt Sarah." All persons who had met with mis- 
 fortune were admitted to a relationship with the 
 family. The lame, the halt, the blind, the dumb, if 
 they were males, became uncles; if females, aunts. 
 Elihu remembers his father, when weary from the 
 fatigue of attending the market ten miles distant, 
 turning many times two or three miles out of his 
 way, in order that he might leave in the home of 
 some poor sick sufferer, a few oysters, oranges, or 
 other small present. Elihu's mother was a fit- 
 ting helpmate to her husband ; " she was the best 
 friend her children had on this side of Jesus Christ, 
 exhibiting all the father's benevolence, with an un- 
 ruffled placidity of manner truly beautiful." In such 
 a school, and with such teachers, no wonder that Elihu 
 stands out at this day as the embodiment of benevo- 
 lence, and the high priest of brotherly kindness. 
 But this excellent father was. removed from his 
 labours while his famous son was yet in his earliest 
 years. That son has now the satisfaction of knowing 
 that after a hard day's work in the forest or in the 
 fields, he sat for half the night by his father's bedside, 
 during his last illness, ministering in all those kindly 
 acts prompted by affection. At this time he had few 
 opportunities of obtaining knowledge. There was a 
 chapel library, to be sure, to which he had access ; 
 but the books were very few, and only changed once
 
 HIS DEVOTION TO STUDY. 203 
 
 in four months. The few historical books which he 
 obtained, however, he read with avidity. 
 
 When he was sixteen years of age, he apprenticed 
 himself to a blacksmith, residing with his brother 
 Elijah, who had opened a school in his native town, 
 having left Georgia in consequence of some of his 
 anti-slavery notions. By this brother's advice, when 
 his apprenticeship expired in his twenty first-year, 
 he became a student in his school for six months. 
 In this course he had no other end in view than being 
 able to manage a surveyor's compass, and, perhaps, 
 learn to read Virgil in Latin. As a blacksmith, he 
 could earn six shillings per day ; therefore he justly 
 considered that his schooling cost him that amount 
 of money. This, of course, would incite him to the 
 utmost industry. At the end of the half year, he 
 was well satisfied with the progress he had made he 
 had gone through Virgil in Latin, had read several 
 French works, and was well versed in mathematics. 
 In order to make up for the time spent in school, he 
 determined to undertake the united labour of two men, 
 that he might receive double wages, to do which he 
 had to work fourteen hours each day. Still, absorbing 
 as this labour was, he found time to read a little of 
 Virgil, or French, in the morning or evening. He 
 found also, at this period, that lie could, withoru 
 much difficulty, read Spanish. In addition to which 
 he determined to ootain an acquaintance with the 
 Greek language. To this end he procured a Greek
 
 204 ELIHU BUBMTT. 
 
 grammar which would just lie in the crown of his 
 straw hat ; so that while he was at work he could 
 glance at the page, and thus commit part of a Greek 
 verb to memory. In this manner he worked with 
 brain and hands until autumn. The progress that 
 he made rendered him dissatisfied with his position 
 the more he learned the more he desired to learn. 
 Leaving his furnaces, therefore, he determined to ap- 
 propriate his earnings to the pursuit of knowledge. 
 He spent the winter at New Haven, where he devoted 
 himself to intense study. He thus records the course 
 he adopted : 
 
 " As soon as the man who attended to the fires had 
 made one in the sitting-room, which was at about 
 half-past four in the morning, I arose, and studied 
 German till breakfast, which was served at half-past 
 seven. When the boarders were gone to their places 
 of business, I sat down to Homer's Iliad, without a 
 note or a comment to assist me, and with a Greek 
 and Latin lexicon. A few minutes before the people 
 came into their dinners, I put away all my Greek 
 and Latin, and began reading Italian, which was less 
 calculated to attract the notice of the noisy men who 
 at that hour thronged the room. After dinner I 
 took a short walk, and then again sat down to 
 Homer's Iliad, with a determination to master it, 
 without a master. The proudest moment of my life 
 was when I first possessed mysejf of the full meaning 
 of the first fifteen lines of that noble work. I took a
 
 LITERATURE AND LABOUR. 205 
 
 triumphal walk in celebration of that exploit. In the 
 evening I read in the Spanish language until bedtime. 
 I followed this course for two or three months, at the 
 end of which time I read about the whole of the Iliad 
 in Greek, and made considerable progress in French, 
 Italian, German, and Spanish." 
 
 When the winter was over he once more put on 
 the leather apron, resolving to double his diligence to 
 " make up for lost time." The fame of his learning 
 having reached his home before him, he received an 
 offer on arriving there, which he accepted, of the 
 mastership of a grammar school in a neighbouring 
 town. He occupied this position for about a year, 
 attending most sedulously to his own studies as well 
 as to the studies of the scholars under his care. His 
 health suffering from the confinement, he was com- 
 pelled to give up the charge, and resume once more 
 the healthful exercise of the forge. After some time 
 he formed the resolution to obtain a knowledge of the 
 oriental dialects ; the chief difficulty, however, seemed 
 to be to get the books needed for the study. Elihu 
 entertained the idea of working his passage over to 
 England to obtain them, and actually walked to 
 Boston, a distance of a hundred and twenty miles, 
 for the purpose. When there he heard of an anti- 
 quarian library at Worcester, where he determined to 
 go and obtain work as a journeyman, in order that 
 he might have the opportunity of consulting the 
 books. As he was about to leave the city, a feeling
 
 206 ELIHU BUEEITT. 
 
 of unwonted depression and weariness came over him. 
 He was exhausted in body by fatigue : he was lame, 
 and so poor, that all his store was one dollar and his 
 watch. In this wretched plight he limped along the 
 streets of the city in no very enviable mood. When 
 he reached Boston bridge, on his way to Worcester, 
 he was overtaken by a boy with a waggon, that he 
 found was going to his destination. As it was still 
 forty miles away, Elihu induced the boy to allow him 
 to ride. When they arrived at the end of the journey, 
 the question arose how the boy should be compen- 
 sated. Burritt, under his then circumstances, could 
 not dispense with the dollar, as that was all his avail 
 able cash; so he determined to part with his old 
 watch. The boy was informed that it was useless as 
 a watch, but as he could afford to have it properly 
 repaired, it would be worth more than the ride ; and 
 at some future time he must give him the difference. 
 On these not very hard terms the watch was accepted. 
 Elihu soon got employment as a journeyman black- 
 smith. One day when he was at work at the anvil, 
 the waggon-boy entered the smithey and handed him 
 a few dollars, telling him with a smiling face, that 
 "the watch had been mended, and was going 
 cleverly." Subsequently Burritt again became pos- 
 sessed of the watch. He was travelling on the rail- 
 way from Worcester to New Britain, when one of 
 his fellow passengers, a handsome well dressed young 
 man, thus accosted him : " You have forgotten me,
 
 AN INCIDENT MORE WOKK. 207 
 
 Mr. Burritt, but I have not forgotten you. You re- 
 member the boy to whom you gave the watch? I 
 am he a young man now, a student of Harvard 
 College." After mutual pleasant greetings, Burritt 
 said : " And about that watch ; what has become of 
 it ? for to tell you the truth, I was much attached to 
 it, and should like to have it back again." " That 
 you shall," replied the young man, " you shall have 
 it back. I sold it; but I know where it is, and it 
 shall be yours." The watch was soon recovered, and 
 afterwards decorated Burritt' s printing office. 
 
 The Worcester antiquarian library could not be 
 used by Burritt, much to his sorrow. The library was 
 only open to the general public a certain number of 
 hours each day, and those hours he was employed at 
 the forge. Under this difficulty he continued his 
 study of Hebrew Avithout assistance. Every spare 
 moment was devoted to its study. In the winter 
 mornings he rose early ; and while the mistress of the 
 house was preparing breakfast by lamplight, he would 
 stand by the mantel-piece with his Hebrew Bible on 
 the shelf, and his lexicon in his hand; he partook of 
 all his meals in this way. This incessant study, how- 
 ever, was not indulged in with impunity. He suffered 
 much from headache the remedy for which was two 
 or three additional hours of hard work at the forge, 
 with a little relaxation from study. Burritt kept a 
 diary, from which we learn the amount of mental 
 labour incurred. One specimen of the appropria-
 
 208 ELIHU BUERITT. 
 
 Item of the spare time of a week will serve for the 
 whole : 
 
 "Monday, June 18th: Headache; forty pages 
 Cuvier's Theory of the Earth, sixty-four pages French, 
 eleven hours forging. Tuesday : Sixty-five lines of 
 Hebrew, thirty pages of French, ten pages Cuvier's 
 theory, eight lines Syriac, ten ditto Danish, ten ditto 
 .Bohemian, nine ditto Polish, fifteen names of stars, 
 ten hours forging. Wednesday : Twenty-five lines 
 Hebrew, fifty pages of astronomy, eleven hours forg- 
 ing. Thursday : fifty-five lines Hebrew, eight ditto 
 Syriac, eleven hours forging. Friday : Unwell ; 
 twelve hours forging. Saturday : Unwell ; fifty 
 pages natural history, ten hours forging. Sunday : 
 Lesson for Bible class." 
 
 Subsequently, Burritt became acquainted with the 
 Turkish, Ethiopic, and Persian languages. He trans- 
 lated many of the Icelandic Sagas for the American 
 serials, and received repeated invitations to lecture 
 in the chief American cities, as well as overtures for 
 a provision to secure him against the necessity of 
 labour. The last he resolutely refused. He did not 
 care to owe anything to patronage, and therefore con- 
 tinued at his forge. Indeed, he held that the condition 
 of an apprentice, or workman, was most favouralle 
 to the attainment cf knowledge. AY hen the day's 
 work is done there is no care or thought on the mind 
 to interfere with study. Burritt himself furnished 
 an example of what may be the result of application 
 during the workman's own time.
 
 CONTEMPORARY HONOURS. 309 
 
 It does not appear that he had any ultimate 
 design in his vast acquirement of languages ; in the 
 order of Providence, however, devoting himself to 
 the one grand idea the universal brotherhood of all 
 the nations of the earth, his labours have resulted 
 in the greatest benefits to the human family. Re- 
 turning from Europe after spending some time there 
 in the cause of peace, he was welcomed home by a 
 public meeting of the inhabitants of the state of 
 Massachusetts. On that occasion the Rev. Warren 
 Burton said : " About twelve years ago there came 
 from a little town in Connecticut, on foot, travelling 
 one hundred and twenty miles to Boston, a young 
 man about twenty-six years of age. He, while labour- 
 ing at the anvil many hours of the day, and as 
 thousands and tens of thousands and millions of other 
 mechanics can do, and I hope will do, spent the 
 leisure hours of the morning and evening in study. 
 
 " He found that he had exhausted little Con- 
 necticut, and he sought where he could find more 
 books that would open to him those lofty and hidden 
 treasures of literature which his heart and head 
 coveted ; and he sought the nearest point where he 
 supposed a vessel might be found, bound to the 
 eastern continent, that there amid those old cities, 
 and laid up amid those mighty libraries he might 
 find the books his own country could not supply. 
 On reaching Boston he found, to his disappoint- 
 ment, no ship going out. He knew nobody. He 
 
 r
 
 210 ELIHU BURRITT. 
 
 was in the largest human wilderness into which he 
 had ever wandered. There, depressed in heart, and 
 equally depressed in pocket, he knew not what to 
 do, which way to turn, or whom to ask. Passing 
 through Cornhill, and accidentally stepping into 
 .some of the antiquarian book stores I think into 
 Barnum's his eye fell on the catalogue of the anti- 
 quarian library of this city. Here, he said, is what 
 I want. And towards Worcester he turned his steps 
 on foot. He became wearied ; he became lame ; 
 he became despondent. And in this state a boy with 
 a waggon came along, and, making inquiry whither 
 he was going, found he was bound for Worcester. 
 The boy consented to let him ride, the young man 
 offering his old silver watch in pay. 
 
 " He came to Worcester. He knew nobody ; nobody 
 knew him. Everything was strange. He had not 
 the key to open that library door. All he could do 
 was to go, with his humble attire, as I have been 
 told, to a blacksmith's shop, and, putting his foot 
 upon the anvil, and his hand upon the bellows, asked 
 the foreman whether he would like to hire some one 
 very cheap. The master at first employed him for 
 very low wages. And there he laboured, and laboured 
 on for months. And there he found access to the 
 treasures his heart coveted. And now, after having 
 entered on this great enterprise of peace having 
 scattered his OLIVE LEAVES broadcast over one con- 
 tinent, and with a strong arm flung them three
 
 NOBLE SENTIMENTS. 211 
 
 thousand miles to another, so that they alighted 
 there, after having crossed the ocean, and marched 
 them to one common centre, as it were, under the 
 guidance of their distinguished men after having 
 accomplished what others did not dream of, he now 
 comes back to you, borne in the hollow of the hand 
 of Providence, and he is in our midst. What a 
 change ! What a contrast I" 
 
 Speaking of himself, Burritt remarks : "All that I 
 have accomplished, or expect or hope to accomplish, 
 has been, and will be, by that plodding, patient, and 
 persevering process of accretion which builds the ant- 
 heap particle by particle, thought by thought, fact 
 by fact. And if I ever was actuated by ambition, its 
 highest and farthest aspiration reached no further 
 than the hope to set before the young men of my 
 country an example in employing those fragments of 
 time called "odd moments." And I should esteem 
 it an honour of costlier water than the tiara encircling 
 a monarch's brow, if my future activity and attain- 
 ments should encourage American working-men to 
 be proud and jealous of the credentials which God 
 has given them, to every eminence and immunity in 
 the empire of mind. These are the views and senti- 
 ments with which I have sat down night by night for 
 years, with blistering hands and brightening hope, to 
 studies which I hoped might be serviceable to that 
 class of tho community to which I am proud to 
 belnog. This is my ambition ; this is the gaol of my 
 
 p 2
 
 212 ELIHU BURRITT. 
 
 aspirations. But not only the prize, but the whole 
 course, lies before me, perhaps beyond my reach. ' I 
 count myself not yet to have attained' to anything 
 worthy of public notice or private mention : what I 
 may do is for Providence to determine. "With regard 
 to my attention to the languages (a study of which I 
 am not so fond as of mathematics), I have tried, by a 
 practical and philosophical process, to contract such 
 a familiar acquaintance with the head of a family of 
 languages, as to introduce me to the other members 
 of the same family. Thus, studying the Hebrew very 
 critically, I became readily acquainted with its cog- 
 nate languages ; among the principal of which are 
 the Syriac, Chaldaic, Arabic, Samaritan, Ethiopic, 
 &c. The languages of Europe occupied my attention 
 immediately after I had finished my classics ; and 1 
 studied French, Spanish, Italian, and German, under 
 native teachers. Afterwards I pursued the Portuguese, 
 Flemish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Welsh, Gaelic, 
 Celtic. I then ventured on further east, into the 
 Russian empire, and the Sclavonic opened to me 
 about a dozen of the languages spoken in that vast 
 domain, between which the affinity is as marked as 
 that between the Spanish and Portuguese. Besides 
 those, I have attended to many different European 
 dialects still in vogue. I am now trying to push on 
 eastward as far as my means will permit, hoping to 
 discover still further analogies among the Oriental 
 languages, which will assist my progress."
 
 POWER 01? ACQUIUEMENT. 213 
 
 In connection with his study of the Celtic language 
 Mr. Burritt relates an interesting circumstance. One 
 day while looking over the books at the public library, 
 he lighted upon a grammar and dictionary of the 
 Celto-Breton language, which had been presented by 
 the Royal Antiquarian Society of Paris. In turning 
 over the leaves of the dictionary it struck him that it 
 would be a very fine exercise for him to try and write 
 a letter in that language to the president of the Royal 
 Antiquarian Society. When this thought first crossed 
 his mind he did not know a single word of the lan- 
 guage, but with him, to will such an undertaking was 
 to perform it. He immediately began the task, and 
 in less than three months it was accomplished. A 
 letter was written in the Celto-Breton tongue, and 
 duly forwarded to Paris, in August, 1838. About a 
 year afterwards a gentleman residing in Worcester 
 called upon Elihu, whom he found busily employed 
 at the anvil, and handed him a large parcel, ad- 
 dressed, " Mr. Elihu Burritt, Worcester, Massa- 
 chusetts, U.S." This was from the Royal Anti- 
 quarian Society of Paris, and, along with a letter from 
 the secretary, not in ancient Celto-Breton, how- 
 ever, but in good modern French acknowledging 
 the receipt of Mr. Burritt' s letter, contained a copy 
 of the yearly Transactions of the Society, in which, 
 among other interesting documents, that letter, fol- 
 lowed by a translation into French, had been inserted. 
 Burritt speaks of this incident as one of the most
 
 214) ELIIIU BURRITT. 
 
 gratifying which has occurred to him in connection 
 with his studies, and certainly it was one of the most 
 wonderful, seeing that, for want of proper books, he 
 had to hunt up his words in the dictionary, which 
 was merely the Celto-Breton and French portion, and 
 consequently not very available for his purpose. In 
 looking for a Celtic word, he had sometimes to go 
 before he could find it. But Mr. Burritt was not a 
 man to be arrested by any such obstacles. He had 
 made up his mind that " it would be a very good 
 thing to show the French savans what a real Yankee 
 could do." And no doubt he rather astonished them 
 with his Celtic epistle from New England. 
 
 In concluding this brief sketch of this wonderful 
 man, it may be mentioned that for several years past 
 he has wholly given up the study of languages, having 
 found work of a more practical nature. The great 
 business to which he has devoted himself is the spread 
 of peace amongst all the nations of the earth. To 
 this end he has formed a " League of Universal 
 Brotherhood," the basis of which may be found in 
 the " pledge" put forth at its formation by Burritt : 
 " Believing all war to be inconsistent with the spirit 
 of Christianity, and destructive of the best interests 
 of mankind, I do hereby pledge myself never to enlist 
 or enter any army or navy, or to yield any voluntary 
 support or sanction to the preparation for, or pro- 
 secution of, any war, by whomsever or for whatsoever
 
 TIIK PLEDGE OP PEACE. 215 
 
 purposes declared or waged. And I do hereby asso- 
 ciate myself with all persons, of whatever country, 
 condition, or colour, who have signed, or shall here- 
 after sipcn this pledge, in a ' LEAGUE OF UNIVERSAL 
 BROTHERHOOD/ whose object shall be to employ all 
 legitimate and moral means for the abolition of all 
 war, and all the spirit and all the manifestations of 
 war throughout the world ; for the abolition of all 
 restrictions upon international correspondence and 
 friendly intercourse, and of whatever else tends to 
 make enemies of nations, or prevents their fusion into 
 one peaceful brotherhood ; for the abolition of all 
 institutions and customs which do not recognise and 
 respect the image of God and a brother in every man, 
 of whatever clime, colour, or condition of humanity/'
 
 DOUGLAS JERROLD: 
 
 SAILOR BOY, SATIRIST, DRAMATIST, NOVELIST, AND 
 PHILOSOPHER. 
 
 " His bitterness was but to make tilings sweet, 
 
 And sprang from love of all the tried and lowly , 
 He felt so yearningly for lives that slowly 
 
 Toil through their flinty ways with hopeless IVeL 
 
 His trenchant wit the truest of our age 
 His soul-deep warrings relaxation gave ; 
 As foam is but the fringing of the wave, 
 
 The ornament that docks its noble rage ! 
 
 Like some physician, steadfast to an end, 
 
 "Which end, he trusts, may fuller life secure, 
 His tonic-thoughts, unsweetat first, endure, 
 
 And health and vigour to our nation lend. 
 
 In this life's fight the last of wrong his goal .' 
 
 With tender freshness ever in his soul." 
 
 THE kind, witty, trenchant, laughter-loving, tear- 
 evoking Douglas who has not heard of him ? 
 
 Of Samuel, the father of Douglas, less is known. 
 He, however, in his time, literally " played many 
 parts." Had the reader, in 1806, been at Wilsby, 
 in Kent, he might have made the acquaintance of the 
 elder Jerrold, who at that time owned the theatre, 
 set up in a barn, under the protecting wing and on 
 the estate of Sir Walter and Lady Jane James, the 
 great people of Angley. Samuel Jerrold, like all
 
 EARLY RECOLLECTIONS. 217 
 
 other mortals, had had his fortunes and misfortunes. 
 One of his misfortunes was to lose his wife, and one 
 of his fortunes was to marry again at Wicksworth, in 
 Derbyshire, a Miss Reid, who is described as a young 
 lady of great energy and spirit. The husband, how- 
 ever, was older than his mother-in-law. Still, the 
 match was a prudent one, because a happy one, and 
 brought prosperity to the theatrical concern. On 
 the 3rd of January, 1803, while she was in London, 
 Mrs. Samuel Jerrold gave birth to our hero, who 
 received the name of Douglas, in compliment to his 
 grandmother's maiden name. 
 
 " The sheep-bells," writes Blanchard Jerrold, " that 
 made the softly-rounded hills about Cranbrook ever 
 musical, and the rude theatre in the suburbs of the 
 little town, were little Douglas's earliest recollections. 
 In 1806, when in his third year, he was a strong, 
 rosy, white-haired boy, as Mr. Wilkinson, who had 
 just arrived at the little theatre, to tempt fortune upon 
 its humble boards, is still alive to testify. That 
 intense love of nature, that thirst which the grown 
 man felt for the freshness of the breeze, and that glow 
 of heart with which he met the sunshine in after-life, 
 appear to have first moved his soul as an infant. 
 The memory of the sheep-bell, I have said, was his 
 earliest impression ; for the sweetness of the rich 
 pasturages and leafy lanes, the swelling distances 
 of grove, and hill, and valley, were all summed up, in 
 his memory, in this pastoral music. Led by his
 
 218 DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 grandmother, with whom he chiefly lived, for careful 
 walks along the cleaner paths, he gathered the abun- 
 dant wild flowers of Kentish hedges, and trotted early 
 home to bed, that the old lady might be at her hum- 
 ble post of money-taker at the Wilsby theatre. 
 
 When Master Douglas passed into his fourth year, 
 in 1807, his father became the lessee of the Sheerness 
 theatre. At this theatre many important personages 
 visited ; amongst others the Russian admiral, whose 
 bespeak resulted in the welcome sum of 4.2 18*. 
 Lord Cochrane was also a frequent visitor, who always 
 insisted upon paying double. No doubt the manage- 
 ment was not materially inconvenienced by his lord- 
 ship's bounty. Little Douglas, however, the little 
 white-haired boy, who ran about the theatre, looked 
 with feelings of awe and veneration at the naval hero. 
 In after years Douglas did him good service with 
 his pen. 
 
 At this time, in various ways, little Jerrold was made 
 useful. In the performance of the Stranger, he ap- 
 peared as one of the children of that melancholy man; 
 he was also carried on the stage in " Rolla," by the 
 celebrated Edmund Kean. But still he had no special 
 liking for the stage, and in after-life he did not care 
 to go behind the scenes. A certain Mrs. Reid, 
 who took upon herself the duties of bringing Douglas 
 up, was careful that no spot should be seen upon his 
 collar, that no button should be wanting upon his 
 clothes.
 
 HIS EDUCATION 219 
 
 " Mr. Wilkinson, who remained a member of the 
 Sheerness company till 1809, having joined it at 
 Sheerness at Christmas, 1807 some months, proba- 
 bly, after the close of the Cranbrook campaign was 
 engaged early in 1809, when Douglas was six years of 
 age, to teach him reading and writing. He combined 
 the duties of teacher with those of actor till the close 
 of that year's season, when he left Sheerness for Scot- 
 land. At this time ' little Douglas ' shewed a re- 
 markable love for reading; and years afterwards, when 
 the good old lady was blind and bedridden, she would 
 tell stories of how she used to lock up ' the dear child 
 in his own room, with his books, before she went to 
 take money at the theatre. And the 'dear child,' 
 grown to manhood's estate hazy acreage very often ! 
 would tell his stories of the bright summer evenings 
 when he was locked up like a pet bird, and when he 
 looked down into the streets to watch his free play- 
 mates pass, chirruping, to and fro, to their games. He 
 loved his books undoubtedly; but the key was turned 
 in the lock, and his spirit chafed to know it." 
 
 Blanchard Jerrold, in his admirable life of his 
 father, says that Douglas, " from his little prison in 
 the High Street, might, however, watch the fleet at 
 anchor off the town. And in those days, when the 
 men about the thoughtful boy were all naval heroes 
 when the glories of the British tar was the unfailing 
 theme upon his father's stage, the great ships lay 
 there, to him fairy floating palaces. Already his
 
 220 DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 half-brother was a sailor, and his grandmother had 
 relatives in the service of his Majesty. The stories 
 that were told him by his garrulous grandmother 
 were of Prince William, the royal sailor ; of Nelson, 
 and Collingwood. The passionate reader of the 
 ' Death of Abel ' and of ' Roderick Random ' (his 
 first books), at an age when most boys devote their 
 free energy to the niceties of ( knuckling down/ or 
 to the mysteries of rounders ; he turned from the 
 dwarfed pictures of life, as presented on the stage, to 
 the great, real drama afar off, of which he caught the 
 faint but thrilling echoes. In his walks with his 
 grandmother, who insisted that he should wear 
 pattens in dry as in wet weather, neighbours would 
 stop to watch the little fellow read the names over 
 the shops, or the bills in the shop windows; and 
 Jogrum Brown declares that his master's boy, 
 Douglas, was a stout, well-made, white-haired, and 
 rosy-cheeked child, graver than other children, and 
 somewhat unusually ready to ' show fight/ " 
 
 When the first schoolmaster Wilkinson left Sheer- 
 ness, in the pursuit of his fortunes, his pupil Douglas 
 was handed over to the care of a Mr. Herbert, who 
 had the honour of keeping the best school in Sheer- 
 ness, and directing the ideas of about a hundred 
 scholars, and who now for he still lives bears testi- 
 mony to Master Douglas as a boy to whom he had 
 not, at any time, need to speak an angry word ; and 
 was particularly studious. But the routine of a day
 
 LONGING TO KNTER THE NAVAL SERVICE. 221 
 
 school, with its meagre teaching, was not sufficient 
 to fill the large heart of Douglas. Wistfully and long- 
 ingly did he gaze from out his temporary prison- 
 windows at the noble ships sinking below the horizon, 
 on their way to victory. At this time, great visions 
 would come over him of Nelson afloat under victorious 
 bunting, of flying Frenchmen and gallant board- 
 ing-parties, of prizes in tow, and the grateful cheers 
 from English shores glowed in his heart. That 
 ardent temper, that white-hot energy which pulsed 
 through him in after-life, and made his utterances all 
 vehement, whether right or wrong, showed in the 
 boy whose daily walks were in the midst of gallant 
 sailors scarred by war come home to be glorified by 
 their countrymen. He also would bear his part, and 
 add by his prowess to the glory of England. And 
 yet, with these valorous sentiments, the games of 
 boys, and the company of boys, were not his delight, 
 The only game he ever mastered was backgammon. 
 He was, however, engaged in the serious business of 
 directing, as their leader, the Blue Town juveniles. 
 His leadership was so earnest, that the interference 
 of heroes of a larger growth became necessary. The 
 Blue Town of those days was a very loose place. 
 " Jack-ashore " was always " Jack-a-prise." Hence 
 the mouth of the Medway was the scene frequented 
 by Jews, by landsharks, and the endless pimps, 
 whose business it was to filch Jack of his hard-earned 
 wages and prize money.
 
 222 DOUGLAS JEKROLI). 
 
 It was here that Douglas learned to hate the 
 French ; to thrash them being the aspiration of his 
 life. He had no future that was not connected with 
 the sea. And very soon, on the 22nd of December, 
 1813, he was on his way to join the guard-ship 
 " Namur," lying at the mouth of the river. He 
 joined as a first-class volunteer, and was not a little 
 proud of his uniform. 
 
 "Life on board a man-of-war in 1813," writes 
 Blanchard Jerrold, " even on board a guard-ship at 
 the Nore, was no holiday work. I have often heard 
 my father dwell upon the great emotion with which 
 he first ascended the gangway to the deck of one of 
 his Majesty's ships. The great floating mass had the 
 pomp and power of a kingdom about it a kingdom 
 in which he, a child eleven years of age, was to play 
 a part not quite obscure. The good Captain Austen 
 received him kindly, and petted him throughout the 
 year and one hundred and twenty-three days which 
 he passed under his command. Still, life at the Nore 
 was not the naval career to which Captain Austen's 
 midshipman aspired. He liked well enough to pass 
 hours in the captain's cabin, to read Buffon through 
 and through, and to get up theatricals, aided by the 
 pictorial genius of foremast-man Clarkson Stanfield, 
 afloat in the same ship. He was near home, too, and 
 this had its charm. He was permitted also to keep 
 pigeons; and he loved to see his flight of birds swoop- 
 ing round the fleet. The sounds of war afar off, how-
 
 ON ACTIVE SERVICE. 223 
 
 ever, smote incessantly upon his ear, and made him 
 eager for active service. The life on board the 
 f Namur ' was dull ; the position of a midshipman in 
 her not a very hopeful one as, in the fortunes of 
 'Jack llunnymede/ first-class volunteer Douglas 
 William Jerrold, promoted long afterwards to pen, 
 ink, and paper, ventured to set forth. To this picture 
 of a guard-ship, when Runnymede, caught by a press- 
 gang, was put on board, must be added the figure of 
 the faithful limner, as he walked the deck with his 
 dirk at his side, and clad in that remarkable com- 
 promise between a gentleman and a footboy, which 
 in those days distinguished the midshipmen in his 
 Majesty's service from their betters or inferiors." 
 
 From the comparative monotony of the guard-ship, 
 Douglas was transferred to the brig "Earnest." Active 
 service at sea was now to be the order of the day. 
 At this time the glory of the great Napoleon was 
 about to culminate. The tragic events of Waterloo 
 were about to dim the lustre of that prestige which 
 had been won on many a hard-fought field. The 
 " Earnest ; ' was to take part in the final catastrophe. 
 She was to convoy transports with troops and stores 
 to Ostend. During this trip Midshipman Jerrold 
 experienced the usual troubles of all youngsters at 
 sea. His hammock was stolen, so that for six weeks 
 he had to sleep on the floor ; in addition to which he 
 got into disgrace with the captain for being too 
 lenient with his men. But all this was nothing to
 
 224- DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 the fine boy, full of glorious enthusiasm. He was at 
 sea, taking part in the hostilities against the French. 
 With that thought in his mind, and the fine sight of 
 the transports surrounding the little brig, these 
 annoyances were not worthy of being entertained for a 
 moment. The "Earnest" entered Ostend harbour 
 only five days before the battle of Waterloo, and then 
 returned to the Nore. After a stay of only two days 
 the little brig was off to sea again. While on this 
 voyage the weather became heavy, so that the 
 " Earnest " had to anchor at Cuxhaven or at Heligo- 
 land ; where, writes Blanchard Jerrold, " I suspect 
 that the midshipman of the brig, in whom we are 
 interested, fell into sad disgrace. He had gone 
 ashore with Captain Hutchinson, and was left in 
 command of the gig. While the commander was 
 absent, two of the men in the midshipman's charge 
 requested permission to make some trifling purchase. 
 The good-natured officer assented, adding, 
 
 " ' By the way, you may as well buy me some 
 apples and a few pears/ 
 
 "'All right, Sir,' said the men; and they 
 departed." 
 
 The captain presently returned, and still the sea- 
 men were away on their errand. They were searched 
 for, but they could not be found. They had deserted. 
 Any naval reader whose eye may wander over this 
 page will readily imagine the disgrace into which 
 Jcrrold fell with his captain. Upon the young
 
 SINGULAR IECOGNITION. 225 
 
 delinquent the event made a lasting impression, and 
 years afterwards he talked about it with that curious 
 excitement which lit up his face when he spoke of 
 anything he had felt. He remembered even the 
 features of the two deserters, as he had most un- 
 expectedly an opportunity of proving. 
 
 The midshipman had long put his dirk aside, and 
 washed the salt from his brave face. He had become 
 a fighter with a keener weapon than his dirk had 
 ever proved, when one day, strolling eastward from 
 the office of his own newspaper, to the printing 
 premises of Messrs. Bradbury and Evans, in White- 
 friars, he was suddenly struck with the form and 
 face of a baker, who, with his load of bread at his 
 back, was examining some object in the window of 
 the surgical instrument-maker, who puzzles so many 
 inquisitive passers-by, near the entrance of King's 
 College. There was no mistake. Even the flour 
 dredge could not hide the fact. The ex-midshipman 
 walked nimbly to the baker's side, and, rapping him 
 sharply upon the back, said : 
 
 " I say, my friend, dont you think you've been 
 rather a long time about that fruit ?" 
 
 The deserter's jaw fell. Thirty years had not 
 calmed the unquiet suggestions of his conscience. 
 He remembered the fruit and the little middy, for he 
 said : 
 
 " Lor ! is that you, sir ?" The midshipman wont 
 on his way laughing. 
 
 On the COth of June, the "Earnest" was back at 
 
 Q
 
 DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 Texel. Here Jerrold was witness to one of those 
 dreadful floggings which have of late years excited 
 the public disgust. The after-recollection of the 
 punishment of Michael Ryan for theft always made 
 him heart-sick ; and probably incited him, in after- 
 years, to write with his distinguishing vehemence 
 against the " cat." 
 
 On the 8th of July, 1815, the " Earnest " was 
 ordered to the Downs, there to rceive on board 
 one ensign, forty-seven invalided soldiers, two women, 
 and two children, who were to be conveyed to Sheer- 
 ness. This ghastly cargo was a remnant of the 
 battle of Waterloo : the raw stumps and festering 
 wounds gave the young middy a lively sense of the 
 horror of war. Subsequent years failed to erase a 
 vivid recollection of the stench from and groans of 
 the sufferers. When this duty was performed, the 
 "Earnest" had discharged her last trust. Europe was 
 preparing for a long peace, in which a gun-brig could 
 be of no manner of use. Orders came therefore that 
 the ship's company should be paid off. Accordingly, 
 on the 21st of October, 1815, the Middy Douglas 
 Jerrold stepped on shore, and his service in the Navy 
 was at an end. His son insists, however, that he 
 remained through life at heart a sailor. " He loved 
 the sea was proud of British oak." 
 
 " Yet he spoke with horror of the hardships of a 
 sailor's life. That a boy should ' rough it ' was an 
 idea he frequently and earnestly put forth. lie 
 believed that the roughing process gave manliness to
 
 THEATRICAI M1SFOIITUNES. 23? 
 
 a boy's nature that it steeled him to fight the world. 
 Yet he saw in the life of a ' middy ' something too 
 rough to be good something that might make a very 
 brutal man. His admiration for the midshipman 
 who had fought his way to command, and had kept 
 the gold of his original nature in him who had de- 
 veloped into a bluff, daring man, with that wondrous 
 touch of feminine tenderness which belongs to sailors 
 of the better class his admiration for this triumph 
 of nature over adverse conditions, was boundless. Of 
 Nelson he would talk by the hour, and some of his 
 more passionate articles were written to scathe the 
 Government that left Horatio Nelson's legacy to his 
 country in want. It was difficult to persuade him, 
 nevertheless, that a man did wisely in sending his son 
 to sea. A friend called on him one day to introduce 
 a youth, who smitten with love for the salt, was 
 about to abandon a position he held in a silk manu- 
 facturer's establishment, for the cockpit. 'Humph!' 
 said the ex-midshipman of the ' Earnest ; ' so you're 
 going to sea. To what department of industry, may 
 I enquire, do you now give your exertions? ' ' Silk/ 
 briefly responded the youth. ' Well, go to sea, and 
 it will be worsted.' " 
 
 After his two years' sea-service, Douglas was re- 
 ceived once more in the arms of his old grandmother. 
 Fortune was not dealing kindly with his father the 
 peace was certain ruin to the SLeerness Theatre. 
 Certain alterations which Mr. Samuel Jerrold had
 
 228 DOUGLAS JEItKOI.D. 
 
 been induced to make in the theatre, which amounted 
 to the re-erection of the entire building; the unjust 
 dealings of the men to whom he committed the work, 
 with losses at Southend, compelled him to relinquish 
 management altogether. The final blow was struck 
 when the Government resolved to claim the land upon 
 which the theatre stood. Then it was that the brave 
 young wife went forth to London to pave the way for 
 the family, leaving her children and her now aged 
 husband to brood upon their misfortunes. At the 
 close of the year the family left Sheeruess never 
 to return. 
 
 " About seven o'clock in the morning, on the first 
 day of the year 1816, the Chatham boat arrived in 
 London. A sharp, damp, and foggy dawn very 
 appropriately ushered in to Mr. Samuel Jerrold the 
 three or four sad years he was destined to spend 
 within the sound of Bow Bell. His son Douglas, 
 whose coat had been stolen from the cabin, and who, 
 therefore, trudged for the first time, along London 
 streets hardly prepared for the fog or the cold, proba- 
 bly felt neither the sharpness of the wind nor the 
 suffocating tendency of the fog. The scene was new 
 to him, and all that is new is welcome to the young. 
 Holding his sister by the hand, he walked the streets 
 for some minutes on his own responsibility, while his 
 father stepped aside to comfort himself with a draught 
 of purl. The young middy might well try thus early, 
 even for a few minutes, the effect of walking alone in
 
 LITERARY ASPIRATIONS. 229 
 
 London ! A house in Broad Court, Bow Street, re- 
 ceived the family a humble lodging enough ; but 
 the general peace, and the confiscation of the land 
 upon which the theatre stood, had ruined them utterly. 
 Fortune, food, had to be sought. This Broad Court, 
 with its dingy houses ; its troops of noisy, ragged 
 boys, its brawls and cries ; was the first impression of 
 the great city. Here, too, for the first time, Douglas 
 came to hob-and-nob with the stern realities of the 
 world. As yet he had passed a youth not remarkable 
 for its vicissitudes, and he had been two years in His 
 Majesty's navy, in the position, and with the prospects 
 of a gentleman." 
 
 But what was he to do now that he was in London? 
 He had thought of a little work for himself not 
 likely, at that time at least, to result in any profit. 
 Meeting one of his father's former actors, of whose 
 abilities he seems to have had a very high estimation, 
 he said : " Oh, Mr. Wilkinson ! your are sure to 
 succeed, and I'll write a piece for you." Rather 
 presumptuous this ! 
 
 Yet the boy spoke earnestly. Pie felt that there 
 was the strength in him to produce. He was 
 measuring himself by others ; and possibly it is the 
 custom of youth was dwarfing the capacities of the 
 successful men about him as much as he over- 
 estimated his own power. In after years, he could 
 hardly suppress his disgust fur the assumptions of 
 young men or boys. " It appears to be a habit," he
 
 230 DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 would say, " among young fellows, to think they're 
 frogs before they're tadpoles." For his keen eye saw 
 the fall that was coming to every man who started in 
 life with the idea that at one spring he would carry 
 the world with him. This bitter feeling was the fruit 
 of long sorrow. For many years his passionate soul 
 suffered agony, as day by day opportunities flew by 
 as time after time, utterings were cast into print, and 
 left unnoticed. The deep religion that, to him, lay 
 in the true outpouring of every human soul, kept a 
 burning desire in his heart, making him irascible, 
 fierce ; because the expression of this religion was, 
 for the moment, denied him. Yet he had the sailor's 
 manful bearing too the sailor's hearty spirit in 
 him. If he had left the sea, and the dangers of the 
 sea, he could still find pleasure in banding together 
 the boys of his neighbourhood, and leading them to 
 a fierce conflict against a rival band in Broad Court ; 
 and he always liked to see something of the com- 
 bative spirit in boys. " I can remember," writes his 
 son, " that, when I was a child about seven years old, 
 he knelt one day upon the lawn behind his house in 
 Thistle Grove, Chelsea, and, calling me to him, gave 
 me a lesson in sparring. 1 was, of course, afraid to 
 strike out; but he repeatedly shouted to me to hit hard, 
 and aim at his head. Years afterwards he would 
 relate with obvious glee, how certain of his boys, with 
 their schoolfellows had repeatedly thrashed a whole 
 " T illage of French urchins. The pugnacious element was
 
 APPRENTICED TO A PRINTER. 231 
 
 peculiar in him decidedly. It is clear, unmistakable 
 in all his writings ; it gave a zest to his conversation. 
 It extended to physical prowess ; for he, borne down 
 by rheumatism, was heard, in a moment of anger, to 
 threaten the eviction through the window of a gentle- 
 man standing six feet. He would wander in after-life 
 through the most lonely places at any hour of the 
 night, calm as in his own study. I call to mind an 
 occasion on which, when walking home with him, a 
 gardener, a square, strong man, hustled me as he 
 passed. The father turned upon him, and bade him 
 ' take cai^e of the child/ The man replied with a 
 gross impertinence. In a minute the father's hat and 
 stick were in my trembling hands, and a hard blow 
 would have been dealt in a minute had not the burly 
 workman, cowed by the fierceness of his opponent, 
 slunk away." This spirit, irrepressible in the man, 
 must have been very fierce in the boy, when the blood 
 was hot. It must have made him eager to enter the 
 lists to be independent. The poverty of his parents 
 at this time was a new stimulus to him, and when* 
 hi? was apprenticed to Mr. Sidney, a printer in 
 Northumberland Street, Strand, he went to his work 
 with hearty good will. The naval uniform was 
 thrown away, the dirk was given to good Mrs. Reid, 
 to be treasured by her, and a dress suited to the new 
 position was put on eagerly. 
 
 "There was something congenial to the young 
 apprentice in the business of a printer. It brought
 
 232 DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 him, in some degree, into connection with books. 
 
 It would be his duty, at any rate, to set up the 
 
 thoughts, the teachings of others ; and, biding his 
 
 time, and reading hard, to put the stick aside some 
 
 day, and take up the pen. This was his burning 
 
 hope when he went every morning at daylight to 
 
 Mr. Sidney's printing offices ; and as books fell in 
 
 his way, the hope became a passion. I have often 
 
 heard him describe his work at this period of his life, 
 
 with honest pride. He would tell me how he had 
 
 risen with the first peep of day to study his Latin 
 
 grammar alone, before going to work ; how he had 
 
 fallen upon Shakespear, and had devoured every line 
 
 of the great master ; and how, with his old father, 
 
 who was a thoughtful, if a wealc man, he had sat 
 
 in the intervals of his labour, to read a novel of 
 
 Sir Walter Scott's, obtained, by pinching, from & 
 
 library. He used to relate a story, with great 
 
 delight, of a certain day on which he was useful 
 
 in several capacities to his father. The two were 
 
 alone in London : Mrs. Jerrold and her daughter 
 
 were in the country. The young apprentice brought 
 
 home, joyfully enough, his first earnings. Very 
 
 dreary was his home, with his poor weak father 
 
 sitting in the chimney corner ; but there was a 
 
 fire in the boy that would light up that home ; at 
 
 any rate, they would be cheerful for one day. The 
 
 apprintice, with the first solid fruits of industry in 
 
 his pocket, sall>d forth to buy the dinner. The
 
 EARNS A DINNER. 233 
 
 ingredients of a beefsteak-pie were quickly got to- 
 gether, and the purchaser returned to be rewarded 
 with the proud look of his father. To earn the pie 
 was one thing, but who could make it? Young 
 Douglas Avould try his hand at a crust ! Merrily 
 the manufacture went forward ; the pie was made. 
 Then the little busy fellow saw that he must carry 
 it to the bakehouse. Willingly went he forth ; for, 
 with the balance of his money, it had been agreed 
 that he should hire the last of Sir Walter's volumes, 
 and return to read it to his father while the dinner 
 was in the oven. The memory of this day always 
 remained vivid to him. There was an odd kind of 
 humour about it that tickled him. It so thoroughly 
 illustrated his notions of independence, that he 
 could not forbear dwelling again and again on it 
 among his friends. ' Yes, sir/ he would say, em- 
 phatically, * I earned the pie, I made the pie, I took 
 it to the bakehouse. I fetched it home; and rny 
 father said, Really the boy made the crust remark- 
 ably well.' " 
 
 "When Jerrold was in his fourteenth year he had 
 formed the determination to write. He had already 
 begun to compose little bits of prose and poetry. The 
 book which was his constant companion was Shake- 
 spear. He has often been heard to say, that when he 
 was a young man, nobody could quote a line from 
 the works of the immortal bard, to which he could 
 not instantly add the next line. " Young men now-
 
 234- DOUGLAS JERROLD. 
 
 a-clays," he would often repeat, " read neither their 
 Bible nor their Shakespear enough." 
 
 "In 1818 (his fifteenth year), I presume," writes 
 Wilkinson, " he wrote his first piece. It was sent in 
 to Mr. Arnold, of the English Opera House, and it 
 remained in the theatre for two years. It was pro- 
 bably never read. After some difficulty, he got it 
 back. In the year 1821, Mr. Egerton, of Covent 
 Garden Theatre, becoming manager of Sadler's Wells 
 Theatre, and I having a short time to spare between 
 the closing of the Adelphi and the opening of the 
 Lyceum, he wished me to engage with him for a few 
 weeks, which I did, but on condition of his purchas- 
 ing the farce which had been returned from the 
 English Opera House, and producing it on the first 
 night of my engagement, giving me the character 
 intended for me. The original title of this piece was 
 ' The Duellists "* a weak title, I thought, for Sadler's 
 Wells ; so I re-christened it, calling it ' More 
 Frightened than Hurt/ It was performed, for the 
 first time, on Monday, the 30th of April, 1821, in its 
 author's eighteenth year. 1 ' It was received, accord- 
 ing to the play-bills', with rapturous applause. " It 
 was/' continues Mr. Wilkinson, " highly successful, 
 and however meanly the author may have thought 
 of it in after days, it had merit enough to be trans- 
 kited and acted on the French stage; and, oddly 
 enough, some years after it had been produced in 
 France, Mr. Kenney being in Paris, saw it played
 
 HIS EARLIER WRITINGS. 235 
 
 there, and, not knowing its history, thought it worth 
 while to re-translate it ; and he actually brought it 
 out at Madame Vestris's Olympic Theatre, under the 
 name of ' Fighting by Proxy,' Mr. Listen sustaining 
 the character originally performed by me/' 
 
 " It has been said wisely, that Douglas Jerrold's 
 first printed works appeared in the 'Sunday Moni- 
 tor/ then edited and printed by his employer, of 
 Lombard Street ; but this is not the fact. The author 
 of 'More Frightened than Hurt/ following the almost 
 invariable tendency of young men with something to 
 say, first tempted the judgment of the public by bits 
 of fugitive verse ; and this in c Arliss's Magazine/ a 
 periodical long since forgotten. From the moment 
 when he came in contact with journals, he began to 
 cast off sonnets, epigrams, and short quaint papers. 
 It is true that the young compositoi', having an order 
 to see ' Der Freischutz/ went to the theatre, and be- 
 came so possessed with the harmony of the work, 
 that he wrote a critical paper on it, and dropped the 
 composition into Mr. Bigg's letter-box. He passed 
 an anxious night, we may be certain, when this 
 adventurous step had been taken. And that was a 
 bright morrow when the editor handed him his own 
 article to compose, together with an address to the 
 anonymous correspondent, asking for further contri- 
 butions. His way from the case to the writer's desk 
 was bridged, though years might pass before he should 
 be able finally to pass from the mechanical drudgery
 
 236 DOUGLAS JKRUOLD. 
 
 to the intellectual pursuit. It was true that Jerrold's 
 first article in the ' Monitor * was a criticism on ' Dcr 
 Freischutz/ but it is not true that this article was his 
 first appearance in print." 
 
 Subsequently, his sisters remember the boisterous 
 delight with which he would occasionally bound into 
 the house with a little publication in his hand, shout- 
 ing, " It's in, it's in I" 
 
 Our limits will not permit us to do more than thu 3 
 accompany Douglas to the confines of his literary 
 pilgrimage. Otherwise, it would be a pleasant task to 
 follow him through his life of work ; to enjoy the rich 
 flavour of his comedies ever " pointing a moral and 
 adorning a tale ;" again to laugh at his exquisite word- 
 painting in " Punch ;" and admire once more the 
 manly and patriotic spirit which ever fired his breast 
 in the defence of the wronged and the injured, despite 
 the threats or cajolings of friend or foe. 
 
 On the 8th of June, 1857, without a struggle, peace- 
 fully as a child falls asleep in its nurse's arms, this 
 brave, strong, self-reliant man worker for all men, 
 and for all time, fell into his long rest, with a smile 
 upon his face. 
 
 ' Yet mourn not idly o'er his grave the words ho left 
 
 behind 
 Were something more than empty sounds that die upon the 
 
 wind; 
 Their echoes through men's hearts shall ring, as onward 
 
 years shall roll, 
 And men will own the master-hand, and say, ' God rest !iia 
 
 eoul.'"
 
 DAVID LIVINGSTONE: 
 
 THE POOR FACTORY LAD; NOW DR. LIVINGSTONE, TH R 
 FAMOUS AFRICAN EXPLORER. 
 
 IT is a very old saying, but a very true one, " that 
 truth is stranger than fiction/' Who can imagine 
 changes, in fairy land even, greater than those effected 
 by the marvels of science? Fairies, genii, gnomes, 
 dwarfs with golden hair, wonderful lamps, enchanted 
 wands and rings, have all been rivalled long ago by 
 electricity and by steam. Why, that daring " Puck" 
 never conceived a time so short to put a girdle round 
 the earth, as we can now encircle it with a stream of 
 electricity ! But what was the girdle worth when 
 " put round ?" and what is our stream of electricity 
 worth ? The one is the toy of a child, the other a 
 powerful instrument in the hands of a giant. Many 
 years agone, so it is said, visits could be paid to 
 strange old men and women, who had, amongst other 
 curiosities stuffed alligators and dried bats being the 
 chief a marvellous magic mirror, which, after certain 
 cabalistic words had been pronounced, would reflect 
 the image of some dear friend or loved relation for a 
 single instant, and would then vanish. Now, by the
 
 238 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 aid of photography, our fathers and mothers and 
 loved relatives can peep at a glass four inches square, 
 prepared not with any enchantment, but with a little 
 collodion, soid by most chemists, and their loved 
 images will be reflected and retained for many coming 
 years. And then again, all the stories of converting 
 cinder-girls into princesses, porters and market-men 
 into grand viziers and chief magistrates, by the touch 
 of a wand or the exercise of a wish why, that is not 
 so marvellous as the reality. Look at this fact in 
 illustration: David Livingstone was a poor factory 
 lad; he is now one of the most successful travellers, 
 and for his scientific attainments the learned societies 
 of all countries have vied to do him honour. He is 
 a gold medallist and corresponding member of the 
 Royal Geographical Societies of London and Paris, 
 and Doctor of Civil Laws of the University of Oxford. 
 David's great-grandfather fell at the memorable 
 battle of Culloden : that is something to be proud of; 
 his grandfather, like many men of a past race, was 
 intimately acquainted with all the legends and stories 
 which formed the foundation of Sir Walter Scott's 
 " Tales of a Grandfather/' and other thrilling narra- 
 tives. David was a willing and a delighted listener 
 to the recital of these legends. His grandmother, 
 also, had stores of Gaelic songs, which she sang for 
 the amusement of our hero, and which she believed 
 had been composed by captive islanders, languishing 
 hopelessly among the Turks. Dvid's grandfather
 
 EAELY HISTORY. 239 
 
 could trace the family tree for six generations ; he 
 could state incidents, and give interesting particulars 
 of the various members for so long time back. David 
 remembers with pleasure one fact in connection with 
 his family. A poor islander, one of his ancestors, 
 who was renowned in the district for great wisdom 
 and prudence, when he was on his deathbed, called 
 all his children round him and said : " Now, in my 
 lifetime I have searched most carefully through all 
 the traditions I could find of our family, and I never 
 could discover that there was a dishonest man among 
 our forefathers. If, therefore, any of you, or any of 
 your children should take to dishonest ways, it will 
 not be because it runs in our blood ; it does not 
 belong to you. I leave this precept with you : Be 
 honest." 
 
 David's grandfather, in order to support his family, 
 removed to the neighbourhood of the Clyde, near 
 Glasgow, where his sons were received as clerks in 
 the cotton manufactory of Monteith and Co. He 
 acquired a reputation for unflinching honesty, and 
 was employed by the proprietors of the works to 
 convey large sums of money to and from Glasgow ; 
 and when he had grown old in their service he was 
 pensioned off, so that his declining years were passed 
 in comfort. 
 
 David's uncle, during the French war, entered the 
 army and navy; his father, however, remained at 
 home engaged in the not very important duties of a
 
 240 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 small tea dealer. His kindliness of manner and 
 excellence of disposition caused him to be loved and 
 respected by his children. His example to his 
 offspring was such as that which is so beautifully and 
 truthfully depicted in Scotland's great poem " The 
 Cottar's Saturday Night." He died when Livingstone 
 was on his travels, expecting some day to return and 
 have the pleasure of sitting by the cottage fire to 
 relate his adventures. 
 
 David was born at the village of Blantyre, 
 Scotland, in or about the year 1817, and when he 
 was ten years of age, he says : "I was put into the 
 factory as a 'piercer/ to aid by my earnings in 
 lessening my mother's anxiety. With a part of my 
 first week's wages I purchased Ruddimau's ' Rudi- 
 ments of Latin/ and pursued the study of the 
 language for many years afterwards, with unabated 
 ardour, at an evening school which met between the 
 hours of eight and ten. The dictionary part of my 
 labours was followed up till twelve o'clock or later, if 
 my mother did not interfere by jumping up and 
 snatching the book out of my hands. I had to be 
 back in the factory by six in the morning, and con- 
 tinue my work, with intervals for breakfast and dinner, 
 until eight o'clock in the evening. I read in this 
 way many of the classical authors, and knew Virgil 
 and Horace better at sixteen than I do now. Our 
 schoolmaster, happily still alive, was supported in 
 part by the company ; he was attentive and kind, and
 
 HIS STUDIES. 241 
 
 so moderate in his charges, that all who wished for 
 education might have obtained it. Many availed 
 themselves of the privilege; and some of my school- 
 fellows now rank in position far above what they 
 ever appeared likely to come to when in the village 
 school." 
 
 Everything in the shape of good books that is, 
 books of travel and treatises upon scientific subjects, 
 he read with avidity ; and, from his subsequent life, 
 there can be no doubt that what he read he remem- 
 bered no mere time-killing, but earnest, anxious, 
 thoughtful reading, in order that he might know and 
 learn. While he was at his work, even, he managed 
 to turn to good account the stray moments which his 
 employment afforded him. 
 
 " In recognising the plants pointed out in my first 
 medical book," he writes, " that extraordinary old 
 work on astrological medicine, ' Culpeppers's Herbal/ 
 I had the guidance of a book on the plants of Lanark- 
 shire, by Patrick. Limited as my time was, I found 
 opportunities to scour the whole country side, ' col- 
 lecting simples.' Deep and anxious were my studies 
 on the still deeper and more perplexing profundities 
 of astrology, and I believe I got as far into that abyss 
 of fantasies as my author said he dared to lead me. 
 It seemed perilous ground to tread on farther, for the 
 dark hint seemed to my youthful mind to loom towards 
 'selling soul and body to the devil,' as the price 
 of the unfathomable knowledge of the stars. These 
 
 1
 
 242 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 excursions; often in company with brothers, one now 
 in Canada, the other a clergyman in the United 
 States, gratified my intense love of nature ; and 
 though we generally returned so unmercifully hungry 
 and fatigued that the embryo parson shed tears, yet 
 we discovered so many, to us, new and interesting 
 things, that he was always as eager to join us next 
 time as he was the last. 
 
 " On one of these exploring tours we entered a 
 limestone quarry long before geology was so- popu- 
 lar as it is now. It is impossibe to describe the 
 delight and wonder with which I began to collect the 
 shells found in the carboniferous limestone which 
 crops out in High Blautyre and Cambuslang. A 
 quarryman seeing a little boy so engaged, looked 
 with that pitying eye which the benevolent assume 
 when viewing the insane. Addressing him with, 
 * How ever did these shells come into these rocks ?' 
 e When God made the rocks, he made the shells in 
 them/ was the damping reply. What would Hugh 
 Miller have thought of this Scotchman ? 
 
 "My reading while at work," he further says, 
 " was carried on by placing the book on a portion of 
 the spinning -jenny, so that I could catch sentence 
 after sentence as I passed at my work ; 1 thus kept 
 up a pretty constant study, undisturbed by the roar 
 of the machinery. To this part of my education I 
 owe my present power of so completely abstracting 
 the mind from surrounding noises, as to read and
 
 Dr. Livingstone studying wliile working in the Cotton Factory.
 
 JOINS THE LONDON MISSIONARY SOCIETY. 243 
 
 write with perfect comfort amidst the play of children 
 or the dancing and songs of savages. The toil of 
 cotton-spinning, to which I was promoted in my 
 nineteenth year, was excessively severe on a slim, 
 loose-jointed lad, but it was well paid for; and it 
 enabled me to support myself while attending medical 
 and Greek classes in winter, also the divinity lectures 
 of Dr. Wardlaw, by working with my hands in sum- 
 mer. I never received a farthing of aid from any 
 one, and should have accomplished my project of 
 going to China as a medical missionary, in the course 
 of time, by my own efforts, had not some of my friends 
 advised my joining the London Missionary Society ; 
 but it was not without a pang that I offered myself, 
 for it was not quite agreeable to one accustomed to 
 work his own way to become in a measure dependent 
 on others ; and I would not have been much put 
 about though my offer had been rejected." 
 
 Livingstone does not regret that his first years 
 were devoted to intense labour; on the contrary, he 
 rejoices that they were so spent. He says : " Look- 
 ing back now on that life of toil I cannot but feel 
 thankful that it formed such a material part of my 
 early education ; and, were it possible, I should like 
 to begin life over again in the same lowly style, and 
 to pass through the same hardy training." 
 
 These sentiments are alike creditable to his head 
 and heart. What eminence is there in the world 
 which can equal that which has been won from 
 
 1! 
 K iw
 
 244 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 iiidiger.ee and obscurity ? To be boru to riches and 
 rank is certainly no disgrace ; but riches and rank do 
 uot of themselves entitle to honour and esteem. AVe 
 respect men for their personal merits, for their efforts 
 to acquire knowledge, and to diffuse to others the 
 results of their attainments. These things constitute 
 the true nobleman. If, therefore, we had no other 
 reason to esteem Livingstone, this confession of his, 
 of not only coming from the ranks of the factory 
 workers, but glorying in the fact, secures the admi- 
 ration of good men, and presents an example for all 
 coming time to every youth and earnest man. 
 
 An observation may be made here, in opposition to 
 the opinion generally entertained, that greatnc&s or 
 eminence is the result of some accident, or peculiarity 
 of situation, or class of mind born or inherited. It 
 was the opinion of Sir Joshua Reynolds that "' the 
 superiority attainable in any pursuit whatever does 
 uot originate in an innate propensity of the mind 
 for that pursuit in particular, but depends on the 
 general strength of the intellect, and on the intense 
 and constant application of that strength to a specific 
 purpose." And in confirmation reference need only 
 be made to the habits of any really great man, who 
 will tell you that the secret of his success has been 
 application, constant and ever enduring work. David 
 Livingstone, as we have seen, is no exception to this 
 rule. By dint of hard work he finished his medical 
 course of study, and was admitted a Licentiate of tne
 
 JOUUNEY TO AFRICA 245 
 
 I acuity of Physicians and Surgeons. His delight on 
 this consummation arose from the fact that he was 
 now better fitted for works of practical benevolence. 
 
 Owing to the China war, it was not deemed 
 advisable that he should proceed to that country. 
 Hearing the celebrated Robert Moffatt preach, upon 
 his return from Africa, he determined, and, acting 
 upon his determination, offered himself to the London 
 Missionary Society to go out to that country. He 
 was, to his great satisfaction, accepted, and returned 
 with Mofl'att to the Kuruman station. While there, 
 he learned many things which were afterwards of 
 great service to him ; made himself acquainted with 
 the language, and learned to ride upon oxen. After 
 leaving Kuruman he proceeded to Kolobeng, about 
 two hundred miles to the north, where he built 
 mission premises chapel, school-house, dwelling- 
 house, &c. Desirous of ascertaining the truth of 
 the statement made by the people at the station that 
 about a month's journey there was a large river and 
 inland sea, he set out on an exploring expedition. 
 Great difficulties were encountered in crossing the 
 Sahara desert, but finally the noble river Zouga was 
 reached. Here, impatient for further discoveries, 
 Livingstone got a rude canoe constructed, and com- 
 mitted himself to the mercy of the waters of the 
 newly discovered river. His object was, if possible, 
 to arrive at the lake Ngami. On the 4th of July, 
 1849, David reached the broad part of the lake,
 
 246 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 "when, for the first time, this fine-looking sheet of 
 water was beheld by Europeans." Having ascer- 
 tained beyond all doubt the existence of this great 
 river and lake, Livingstone planned a further 
 journey across the Zouga, with the intention of 
 seeing what country lay beyond. In this second 
 journey he ascertained that the lake was seventy 
 miles in length, about twenty-five miles in breadth, 
 and that it was nearly 3000 feet above the level of 
 the sea. In the December of 1851 he commenced 
 his third journey. This time he packed u all his 
 property, and with his wife and three children 
 started for the interior of Africa. His intention 
 was, if possible, to reach Linyante' a town said to 
 be in existence, and where a friendly chief was said to 
 reside named Sebitome. After crossing the Zouga 
 and travelling 200 miles north, he arrived at a dried- 
 up salt lake, or inland sea, about 100 miles in length 
 and fifty in breath ; it was encrusted with pure white 
 salt. Diverging in a north-westerly direction he 
 made the discovery of the splendid river Chobe, which 
 is larger, and surrounded with finer scenery than 
 the Zouga. After crossing the Chobe, he soon 
 reacked Linyante, where he was most hospitably 
 received. He remained here some considerable time, 
 occupied in taking observations and noting the 
 manners and customs of the natives. Finding, how- 
 ever, that the place was unfavourable for a missionary 
 station, on account of its inundations, he returned to
 
 STUDIES ASTRONOMY. 247 
 
 Kurumau, and wrote to the Directors of the London 
 Missionary Society that he had only half done his 
 work ; but, having had his arm broken by a lion 
 though that was nothing and his throat being 
 diseased, he should be compelled to go to the Cape to 
 recruit. Whilst at Cape Down, where he embarked 
 his wife and family for England, he placed himself 
 under the instruction of Mr. Maclear, the astronomer 
 royal, so that in his journeys he might be able to take 
 solar and lunar observations. He was subsequently 
 enabled to take 146 latitudes and longitudes, and 
 about 190 observations; so that now, any person, by 
 using the map made by Livingstone, may go straight 
 to any part of Africa he traversed. 
 
 Livingstone left Kuruman on his fourth journey in 
 June, 1852. He crossed the river Zouga, and the 
 dried salt lake, going in his former westerly direc- 
 tion. On this journey the weather was so bad that 
 his oxen and waggon stuck in the mud, so that he 
 had to go forward almost alone. Making use of a 
 small boat he had brought with him, he cut his way 
 for three days and nights down the river for twenty 
 miles, by which means he arrived at Linyante a 
 second time. The young chief, when he saw Living- 
 stone, lifted up his hands with astonishment, and 
 said, " Well, we did not think any one could reach 
 Linyante in the rainy season, and we intrenched 
 ourselves here that wemight never be invaded. You 
 Englishmen must have dropped from the skies on
 
 248 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 the back of a hippopotamus." After resting awhile, 
 he again started to reach the western coast, being ac- 
 companied by forty-seven of the natives. The chief 
 lent him his canoe, which was twenty inches wide 
 and thirty-four feet long. He and his party reached 
 St. Paul de Loando, on the western coast, having 
 endured on the journey a variety of perils. "When 
 the natives saw the sea, their astonishment exceeded 
 all bounds. They said, "Our fathers told us the 
 world had no end ; they deceived us ; we have come 
 to the place where the world does end, and the 
 world says, ' I'm done, and there is no more of 
 me, but all the rest is water/ ' Now that the 
 natives have seen the sea, they attribute all the 
 wonders they cannot understand to it. When they 
 are asked where the cotton goods come from, they 
 always reply, " From the sea." Hence they have a 
 belief that Englishmen live in the sea. All the 
 natives of North Africa have no other idea. Living- 
 stone, when he passed through the villages, was shown 
 as the man living in the sea. As confirmation, the 
 natives pointed to his hair, and said that it was all 
 scaled out with water; and when he was accom- 
 panied by his friends from Linyante, the inhabitants 
 as they passed through the settlements tried to per- 
 suade them not to go, " For," said they, " You will be 
 taken down into the sea and eaten." When the party 
 arrived at the coast, Livingstone invited the poor 
 people to go "on board some of the ships; but they
 
 AFRICAN DISCOVERIES. 249 
 
 were still afraid there was some truth in the state- 
 ment. However, when they were told they could go 
 or not as they liked, they consented. After this 
 visit Livingstone was treated with great respect. The 
 marvels of the ships had made an immense impres- 
 sion upon them. 
 
 In 1854, Livingstone commenced his last trip, 
 | rior to visiting his father-land. It was Ixis inten- 
 tion to reach the other side of the continent of 
 Africa. On this journey, which was full of difficulty 
 and peril, he discovered that the language into which 
 the Scriptures had been translated by Moffat and 
 Hamilton, was the language spoken throughout 
 Africa. He soon found, also, that which had been 
 the anxious object of his search for six years a high 
 table land, in every respect well suited for a mission 
 station. On this spot Livingstone founded a mission 
 establishment; and then only did he return for a 
 brief period to old England. He was anxious to 
 bring over one of the natives, who had served him as 
 a faithful servant, but such an effect was produced 
 upon him by the steam-engines and the other novel- 
 tics of the vessel, that he jumped over-board in a fit 
 of delirium and was drowned. 
 
 Livingstone during his sojourn in Africa had many 
 narrow escapes from death. One of his hair-breadth 
 adventures he thus narrates : 
 
 " Returning towards Kuruman, I selected the 
 beautiful valley of Mabotsa as the site of a mission-
 
 250 DAVID LIVINGSTONE, 
 
 arv station; and thither I removed in 1843. Here 
 an occurrence took place, concerning which I have 
 frequently been questioned in England, and which, 
 but for the importunities of friends, I meant to have 
 kept in store to tell my children when in my dotage. 
 The Bakatla of the village Mabotsa were much 
 aoubled by lions, which leaped into the cattle-pens 
 by night and destroyed their cows. They even at- 
 tacked the herds in open day. This was so unusual 
 an occurrence, that the people believed that they 
 were bewitched ' given/ as they said, f into the 
 power of the lions by a neighbouring tribe.' They 
 went once to attack the animals, but, being rather 
 a cowardly people compared to Bechuanas in general 
 on such occasions, they returned without killing any 
 " It is well known that if one in a troop of lions is 
 killed, the others take the hint and leave that part of 
 the country. So the next time the herds were 
 attacked, I went with the people, in order to en- 
 courage them to rid themselves of the annoyance by 
 destroying one of the marauders. We found the 
 lions on a small hill, about a quarter of a mile in 
 length, and covered with trees. A circle of men was 
 formed round it, and they gradually closed up, as- 
 cending pretty near to each other. Being down 
 below on the plain with a native schoolmaster, named 
 Mebalwe, a most excellent man, I saw one of the 
 lions sitting on a piece of rock within the now closed 
 circle of men. Mebalwe fired at him before I coulr',
 
 ADVENTURE WITH A LION. 251 
 
 and the ball struck the rock on which the animal was 
 sitting. He bit at the spot struck, as a dog does at 
 a stick or stone thrown at him ; then leaping away, 
 broke through the opening circle and escaped unhurt, 
 The men were afraid to attack him, perhaps on 
 account of their belief in witchcraft. When the 
 circle was re-formed, we saw two other lions in it ; 
 but we were afraid to fire, lest we should strike the 
 men, and they allowed the beasts to burst through 
 also. If the Bakatla had acted according to the 
 custom of the country, they would have speared the 
 lions in their attempt to get out. Seeing we could 
 not get them to kill one of the lions, we bent our 
 footsteps towards the village ; in going round the 
 end of the hiH, however, I saw one of the beasts sitting 
 on a piece of rock as before, but this time he had a 
 little bush in front. Being about thirty yards off, I 
 took a good aim at his body through the bush, and 
 fired both barrels into it. The men then called out, 
 ' He is shot, he is shot \ } Others cried, ' He has 
 been shot by another man, too ; let us go to him P 
 I did not see any one else shoot at him, but I saw 
 the lions tail erected in anger behind the bush, and, 
 turning to the people, said, ' Stop a little till I load 
 again ! When in the act of ramming clown the bul- 
 lets I heard a shout. 
 
 " Starting and looking half round I saw the lion 
 just in the act of springing upon me. I was upon a 
 little height ; he caught my shoulder as he sprang,
 
 252 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 and we both came to the ground below together. 
 Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as a 
 terrier dog does a rat. This shock produced a stupor 
 similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse 
 after the first shake of the cat. It caused a sort of 
 dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain, nor 
 feeling of terror, though quite conscious of all that 
 was happening. It was like what patients partially 
 under the influence of chloroform describe, who see 
 all the operation, but feel not the knife. This sin- 
 gular condition was not the result of any mental 
 process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no 
 sense of horror in looking round at the beast. This 
 peculiar state is probably produced in all animals 
 killed by the carnivora ; and, if so, is a merciful pro- 
 vision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the 
 pain of death. Turning round to relieve myself of 
 the weight, as he had one paw on the back of my 
 head, I sa\v his eyes directed towards Mebalwe, who 
 was trying to shoot him at a distance of ten or 
 fifteen yards. His gun, a flint one, missed fire in 
 both barrels; the lion immediately left me, and 
 attacking Mebalwe, bit his thigh. Another man, 
 whose life I had saved before, after he had been 
 tossed by a buffalo, attempted to spear the lion while 
 he was biting Mebalwe. He left Mebalwe and caught 
 this man by the shoulders, but at this moment the bul- 
 lets he had received took effect, and he fell down dead. 
 The whole was the work of a few minutes, and must
 
 THE DANGERS CF TRAVEL. 2.ZO 
 
 have been his paroxysm of dying rage. In order to 
 take out the charm from him, the Bakatla on the 
 following day made a huge bonfire over the carcase, 
 which was declared to be that of the largest lion they 
 had ever seen. Besides crunching the bone into 
 splinters, he left eleven teeth wounds on the upper 
 part of my arm. A wound from this animal's tooth 
 resembles a gun-shot wound ; it is generally followed 
 by a great deal of sloughing and discharge, and pains 
 are felt periodically ever afterwards. I had on u 
 tartan jacket on the occasion, and I believe that it 
 wiped off all the virus from the teeth that pierced the 
 flesh, for my two companions in this affray have both 
 suffered from the peculiar pains, while I have escaped 
 with only the inconvenience of a false joint in the 
 limb. The man whose shoulder was wounded showed 
 me his wound actually burst forth afresh on the 
 same month of the following year. This curious point 
 deserves the attention of inquirers." 
 
 On several other occasions Livingstone was in 
 imminent danger, at times by hunger and thirst, and 
 then his life was in peril by the hands of savages, and 
 the repeated attacks of fever, while exposure to 
 drought and rains, to heat and cold, make it almost 
 a miracle that he should have been preserved. After 
 braving these dangers he returned to his dearly loved 
 country but for a brief season scarcely sufficient to 
 render to his countrymen an account of his wander- 
 ings, and then returned to the scene of his usefulness j
 
 251 DAVID UVLNGSTONE. 
 
 this time, as an explorer, bearing a government com- 
 mission, and accompanied by companions suited for 
 observing the various features of a newly opened up 
 country. 
 
 So recently as June last Sir George Grey received 
 a letter from the distinguished traveller, containing a 
 sketch of some important geographical discoveries. 
 
 " River Shire, June 1, 1859. 
 
 " MY DEAR SIR GEORGE, We have lately dis- 
 covered a very fine lake by going up this river in the 
 steam launch above 100 miles, and then marching 
 some fifty more on foot. It is called Shirwa, and 
 Lake N'gami is a mere pond in comparison. It is, 
 however, particularly interesting from the fact re- 
 ported by the natives on its shores, that it is separated 
 by a strip of land of only five or six miles in width 
 from Nyanja, or Lake N'yinyesi the stars which 
 Burton has gone to explore. We could hear nothing 
 of his party at Shirwa, and having got r.o European 
 news since you kindly sent some copies of the ' Times' 
 last year, we are quite in the dark as to whether lie 
 has succeeded or not. Lake Shirwa has no outlet, 
 and its waters are bitter, but 'Irinkable. It abounds 
 in fishes, leeches, alligators, and hippopotami. We 
 discovered also by examining, partly a branch of the 
 Shire, called Ruo, that one portion of the Shirwa is not 
 more than thirty miles distant from a point that may 
 easily be reached by this launch, which by newspaper
 
 FURTHER DISCOVERIES. 255 
 
 measurement draws thirteen inches, and actually 
 thirty-one. The Lake Shirwa is very grand. It is 
 surrounded on all sides by lofty green mountains. 
 Dzomba, or, as people nearest it say, Zornba, is over 
 6,000 feet high, of same shape as Table Mountain, but 
 inhabited on the top ; others are equally high, but 
 inaccessible. It is a high land region the lake itself 
 being about 2,000 feet above the sea. It is twenty or 
 thirty miles wide, and fifty or sixty long. On goinj 
 some way up a hill, we saw in the far distance two 
 mountain tops, rising like little islands on a watery 
 horizon. An inhabited mountain island stands near 
 where we first came to it. From the size of the waves 
 it is supposed to be deep. Mr. Maclear will show 
 you the map. Dr. Kirk and I, with fifteen Makololo, 
 formed the land party. The country is well peopled, 
 and very much like Londa in the middle of the 
 country, many streams rising out of bogs the vege- 
 tation nearly identical also. Never saw so much 
 cotton grown as among the Manganga of the Shire 
 and Shirwa Valleys all spin and weave it. These 
 are the latitudes which I have always pointed out as 
 the cotton and sugar lands ; they are pre-eminently 
 so, but such is the disinterestedness of some people, 
 that labour is exported to Bourbon, instead of being 
 employed here. The only trade the people have is 
 that of slaves ; and the only symptoms of impudence 
 we met were from a party of Bajana slave traders; 
 but they changed cheir deportment instantly on hear-
 
 256 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 ing that we were English, and not Portuguese. There 
 are no Maravi at or near Shirwa ; they are all west of 
 the Shire, so this lake can scarcely be called Lake 
 Maravi ; the Portuguese know nothing of it ; but the 
 minister who claimed (blue book for 1857) the honour 
 of first traversing the African continent for two black 
 men with Portuguese names, must explain why they 
 did not cross Shirwa. It lies some forty or fifty miles 
 on each side of the latitude of Mozambique. They 
 came to Tete only, and lacked at least 4-00 miles of 
 Mozambique. We go back to Shirwa in July, and 
 may make a push for N'yinyesi. 
 
 (Signed) DAVID LIVINGSTONE." 
 
 No doubt the wonders of Africa are only just en- 
 tered upon ; and that, if the life of Livingstone is 
 spared, his labours will not only result in incalculable 
 blessings to the natives, but be the source of material 
 advantages to his own countrymen. This imperfect 
 sketch of Dr. Livingstone may be fittingly closed by 
 the estimate of his character, given at a great meeting 
 held at the Senate House at Cambridge, by the 
 eloquent and learned Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
 Mr. Gladstone. Upon that occasion he said : 
 
 " Dr. Livingstone is such a man as raises our idea 
 of the age in which we live. That simplicity in- 
 separable from true grandeur, that breadth and force, 
 that superiority to all wordly calls and enjoyments, 
 that rapid and keen intelligence, that power of
 
 MR. GLADSTONE'S EULOGY. 257 
 
 governing men, and that delight in governing them 
 for their own good he has every sign upon him of a 
 great man, and his qualities are precisely those which 
 commend themselves with resistless power to the 
 young by whom we see this building crowded. For 
 when I stand in this noble structure, I cannot stay 
 for a moment to admire its magnificent proportions. 
 It is not the gold, but the temple that sanctifieth the 
 gold ; it is not the Senate House of Cambridge, 
 beautiful as it is, but it is the minds and hearts of 
 those by whom it is filled that alone can draw atten- 
 tion for a moment. Let us render to Dr. Living- 
 stone the full tribute of what we feel. Dr. Livingstone 
 is a Christian, a missionary, a great traveller; he 
 corresponds in every particular to that great name 
 which the admiration of all ages has consecrated he 
 is a hero. Your own great poet the great poet of 
 this age Alfred Tennyson in his ' Idylls of the 
 King/ a work which has taken its place in the death- 
 less literature of the world, has carried us back to a 
 period of heroic manners, heroic deeds, and heroic 
 characters ; but if the power which he possesses could 
 have gone beyond what it has effected, could have 
 gone beyond the almost living men whom it has 
 portrayed, and could actually have evoked them from 
 the tomb, not one among them, though the ideal of 
 human nature, would have failed to recognise Dr. 
 Livingstone as a brother, and to acknowledge him as 
 his most worthy companion." 
 
 b
 
 258 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 Since these words were spoken, the following very 
 interesting communication has been received by Mr. 
 William Logan, of Glasgow, from Dr. Livingstone's 
 brother, Mr. Charles Livingstone : 
 
 "Kongone, mouth of the Zambesi, Dec. 1, 1859. 
 
 " My Dear Friend, We have explored the river 
 Shire to its source in the great lake Nyassa. This 
 river is about 200 miles long, and has a deep channel 
 for 112 miles from its mouth. A series of rapids 
 then commence, extending about 30 miles, after 
 which there is no other impediment to navigation to 
 Lake Nyassa; and how far that extends to the 
 north, we are as yet unable to say ; natives informed 
 us that it took three months to reach the head of 
 the lake. 
 
 " The Shire flows through an exceedingly fertile 
 valley, which is bounded by two ranges of lofty hills, 
 and is from 10 to 12 miles wide at the lake, and 
 from 20 to 30 below the cataracts. East of the 
 cataracts are the highlands a magnificent country, 
 well watered, and wooded, with a rich soil, and 
 pretty numerous population. From the large num- 
 ber of old grey-headed people we met, it would ap- 
 pear to be a fine healthy country, well adapted for 
 European constitutions. The men are all armed 
 with bows and arrows, or spears, yet they do not 
 seem to be blood-thirsty., As a general thing, they 
 treated us with civility. As was natural, they were
 
 SUSPICIONS OP THE NATIVES. 259 
 
 at first somewhat suspicious, but as soon as we told 
 them what our object was, their suspicions vanished. 
 One chief, however, said that parties had come to 
 them before with as fine a story as we had, and after 
 a few days, jumped up, seized a number of his people, 
 and carried them off as slaves. We suspected 
 that he himself engaged in this business. The 
 country is well adapted for cattle and sheep, yet 
 the inhabitants possess only a few goats, and still 
 fewer sheep. Besides various kinds of provisions, 
 &c., they grow cotton largely. In the highlands 
 and lowlands, through two and a half degrees of 
 latitude, we met with cotton everywhere, and it 
 may be as fine a cotton country for several degrees 
 farther to the north than we were. We went no 
 farther than the foot of Lake Nyassa. Some cotton 
 patches covered three acres, though for the most 
 part they did not exceed half an acre. Each family 
 seems to have its own cotton plantation, which is 
 carefully cultivated. They could raise almost any 
 amount if they had a market for it. The cotton 
 is of two kinds the foreign and the native. The 
 former is of good staple and quality ; the latter is 
 short in the staple, and feels more like wool than 
 cotton. The foreign is perennial, and requires 
 planting only once in three years. It is burned 
 down before the rains, and soon springs up of its 
 own accord. The native has to be planted every 
 year in the highlands. The people prefer it, because, 
 
 s 2
 
 280 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 
 
 they say, it makes the stronger cloth. In well nigh 
 every village, we saw men spinning cotton, while 
 others were weaving it into strong cloth, in looms 
 of very simple construction. Both spinning and 
 weaving are a very tedious process. 
 
 "They are all anxious to trade. The women 
 were often up all night grinding their corn to sell 
 to us. One village we passed without halting. The 
 inhabitants followed us, calling upon our guide to 
 return with them to trade. As a last argument, 
 they shouted 'Are we to have it said that white 
 people came to our country and we did not see 
 them ? ' 
 
 " They are by no means teetotalers. Large 
 quantities of beer are manufactured by them, and 
 they are as fond of it as our countrymen are of 
 whisky. The chief of a village almost always pre- 
 sented us with a large pot of beer. We passed a 
 village one day, and saw a large party of men sitting 
 smoking in the public square, who did not seem at 
 all communicative. After resting a little under a 
 tree, a short distance from them, they sent us a 
 calabash of beer, to see if we were friends, which 
 was to be manifested by our partaking of it. We 
 saw many partially intoxicated people, tipsy chiefs, 
 and even members of the learned professions get ' a 
 little elevated at times/ A native doctor, with his 
 cupping-horn hanging round his neck, who had 
 evidently been making some deep potations, came
 
 A STRANGE DOCTOR. 261 
 
 out and scolded us severely : ' Is this the way to 
 enter a man's village, without sending him word 
 that you were coming ? ' Entering a hut, he came 
 out staggering under a large pot of beer, which he 
 presented to us. Perhaps his patients only pay him 
 with beer. I wish we had a few hundred good, in- 
 dustrious Scotch families on these fertile highlands. 
 Instead of, as at home, toiling for a bare subsistence, 
 here they could cultivate largely sugar and cotton, 
 &c., benefit the natives by their example, and 
 furnish materials for our manufacturers at home. 
 We have a healthy country, and, with the exception 
 of thirty miles, over which a road can be construc- 
 ted, water communication all the way to England. 
 The natives are industrious, and somewhat ingenious. 
 They have better houses and implements than any 
 on the Zambesi. They would not, I think, molest 
 emigrants. With good missionaries, the most happy 
 results might be anticipated. Yours, with much 
 esteem. 
 
 " CHARLES LIVINGSTONE."
 
 JAMES MORRISON: 
 
 STABLE BOY, MERCHANT, MEMBER OF PAELIAMENT, AND 
 MILLIONAIRE. 
 
 WHEN the Right Hon. B. Disraeli, M.P., addressed 
 the associated members of the mechanics' institutes 
 of Lancashire and Cheshire, in the Manchester Free 
 Trade Hall, he gave birth to a number of truisms 
 which it would be well should find a resting-place in 
 the mind of every youth and young man that has his 
 way to make in the world. On that occasion he 
 said : " I do not think there is any greater fallacy 
 than that which holds up England as a country in 
 which it is difficult to advance, for those who have in- 
 telligence and integrity. Take this as an incontro- 
 vertible principle, accept this as a moral dogma of 
 your life, ' every man has his opportunity/ It may 
 be a long time coming, but, depend upon it, it is sure 
 to arrive ; and what you have got to do in the inter- 
 val is, to prepare yourselves for that opportunity. 
 Life is not a lottery. Life is a science, and certain 
 qualities and certain talents, properly handled and 
 properly managed, must lead to certain results/' 
 In confirmation of this opinion, no better illustra-
 
 EARLY STRUGGLES AND DIFFICULTIES. 263 
 
 tion could be adduced than that furnished in the 
 life of James Morrison, who rose from the utmost 
 obscurity to the possession of immense wealth. His 
 parents, like the parents of many great men, were in 
 indigent circumstances and unknown, save to the 
 poor neighbours by whom their humble dwelling was 
 surrounded. James first saw the light in 1780, 
 the county of Hants being his oirthplace. His first 
 years were passed in the midst of the difficulties 
 which labourers in the agricultural counties have 
 specially to contend with. But so soon as he be- 
 came conscious of his position aware of the actual 
 circumstances by which he was surrounded he de- 
 termined, with much strength of mind and will, to 
 make an effort to advance himself in life. His de- 
 sire was to obtain a situation in some large thriving 
 town, where, as he thought, opportunities would 
 constantly occur by which a boy could " get on/* 
 His poverty, however, prevented this consummation 
 of his wishes ; he did therefore the next best thing : 
 he engaged himself as a stable-boy on Wallop Com- 
 mon, near Salisbury Plain, where the mail coach for 
 the West of England to the metropolis changed 
 horses. 
 
 The novelty and interest of this new and quick 
 mode of travelling was not calculated to still the 
 longing desire which had taken possession of young 
 Morrison, to see something of the great world beyond 
 the confines of his limited sphere. After long brood-
 
 264 JAMES MORRISON. 
 
 ing and considering the matter, he formed a resolu- 
 tion not to allow the mail to make many journeys to 
 London without being one of the passengers. Con- 
 sulting a friend on the desirability of the venture, 
 he was strongly urged to take the journey, and an 
 offer was made of a loan of two guineas, to enable him 
 to live in London for a little time, without absolute 
 want, until a situation was obtained. After this 
 needful provision was made, James was not long 
 before he found himself on the outside of the mail 
 on his way to the great world of London. No doubt, 
 like many other adventurers, his anticipations and 
 the first realization were not exactly one and the same 
 thing. Whatever was ultimately realized, James 
 found London streets not paved with gold. For a 
 length of time he wandered about in great despon- 
 dency, quite unsuccessful in obtaining work of any 
 description, and finally was so much reduced as to 
 be compelled again to appeal to his friend, who had 
 assisted him on starting, for a further advance of 
 thirty shillings. When this needed assistance came to 
 to hand, James took fresh courage, nerving himself 
 for another battle with the difficulties of his position. 
 We can scarcely conceive of a state more lonely and 
 disheartening. Here he was in the city of all others 
 where sympathy and friendly aid were least to be ex- 
 pected. He had no introductions, he was a perfect 
 stranger, his previous situation was not likely to be 
 a passport to one in London, and, withal, he was
 
 Morrison resolves to proceed to London to push his Fortuncr.
 
 THE RESULT OF SMALL BEGINNINGS. 265 
 
 ignorant of the simplest elements of common educa- 
 tion. Notwithstanding these serious sources of dis- 
 couragement, he persevered with almost unexampled 
 diligence, which at length resulted in his obtaining 
 a situation as a porter in a small drapery establish- 
 ment on Fish Street Hill. Here he was not fated 
 long to remain. His inward craving for progress 
 prevented his being satisfied with his laborious and 
 comparatively ill-paid situation. He was fortunate, 
 however, to meet with employment and advanced 
 wages in the firm of Messrs. Todd, East Cheap. Here 
 he had ample opportunity to bring into activity his 
 commercial spirit, his wonderful perseverance, and 
 exemplary attention to business. As his tact and 
 ability were recognized by the head of the firm, he 
 was advanced to a position of considerable trust and 
 responsibility, until ultimately he became chief sales- 
 man in the wholesale department. His new position 
 emboldened him to sue for the hand of Miss Todd ; 
 whom he subsequently led to the altar, amid the 
 congratulations of friends, and with the prospect of 
 much domestic happiness. The relation in which he 
 now stood to the head of the firm, made it desirable 
 that he should have a closer connection with the 
 business, and he was at once taken into partnership. 
 Ultimately, at the death of Todd, the entire concern 
 fell into his hands. Then it was, when he could 
 command the needful capital, that his clear-sighted 
 commercial spirit manifested itself. He was iiot
 
 266 JAMES MORRISON. 
 
 satisfied with the progress made by his own concern, 
 but with the keenness of a speculator he bought up, 
 from time to time, tea, sugar, silk, &c. His capital 
 enabling him to hold these goods over until the price 
 advanced, he was by this means enabled to derive 
 considerable profits, and ultimately amass immense 
 wealth. He did not consider it neeful to sell in the 
 dearest markets, if he bought in the cheapest. He 
 was, in this respect, a trade reformer selling at a 
 less rate of profit than any other firm. 
 
 But commercial success by no means satisfied him. 
 He had gone through the entire routine of business- 
 life he had experienced its anxieties, and had reaped 
 its golden rewards. But there was yet another step 
 to which his ambition pointed he desired the honour 
 of being a member of the British Parliament ; ulti- 
 mately he attained his wish by being returned for 
 the borough of St. Ives ; and when the new parlia- 
 ment was convened, after the passing of the Reform 
 Bill, he was elected member for Ipswich. Subse- 
 quently he represented in the House of Commons 
 the district of Inverness Burghs, for which he sat 
 until his health failed. 
 
 His political principles were those known as " ad- 
 vanced liberal." In the early days of his political 
 life he had avowed himself in favour of a fixed duty 
 on corn, but afterwards joined the great Anti-corn- 
 law League, and most magnificently contributed to- 
 wards its funds. When the landed interest inter-
 
 THE SAD ENDING OF HIS CAREER. 267 
 
 posed by every means the attainment of the object of 
 the " League/' Morrison proposed that a mammoth 
 subscription should be raised that should at once set 
 the question of funds at rest. He proposed to head the 
 subscription with a donation of one hundred thousand 
 pounds I The concession on the part of Sir Robert 
 Peel, and the subsequent repeal of the truly obnox- 
 ious impost, rendered this princely donation un- 
 necessary. 
 
 We have thus traced the progress of Morrison 
 from indigence to affluence. His closing career 
 furnishes another and very striking illustration of the 
 mutation of all sublunary things, and of the great 
 evil of setting our affections too completely upon 
 objects of time and sense. The possession of wealth, 
 as shown in the case of Morrison, was, in one re- 
 spect, a good thing, because it enabled him to do 
 good and to communicate, and to give practical 
 effect to the promptings of his benevolent disposition; 
 but it ultimately, in a moral sense, proved to his dis- 
 advantage. He had made business and the process 
 of accumulation an object of too absorbing interest, 
 regardless of the oft-felt experience, that the mind 
 centred upon one object merely, is apt to become 
 unsettled by the perpetual and unnatural strain upon 
 it. It proved so in the instance of Morrison. The 
 great law of compensation, which enjoins that mortals 
 shall reap that which they sow, was no more abro- 
 gated in his case than in any other. He had abused
 
 268 JAMES MORRISON. 
 
 his mental constitution by too great an absorption in 
 the prosecution of one idea, and the evil recoiled upon 
 him by inducing a certain mental hallucination, 
 under which he was affected by a constant and most 
 harassing fear of impending poverty. Of course, 
 with a man who could count his resources by hun- 
 dreds of thousands of pounds one rich beyond the 
 dreams of avarice such fear was not only unneces- 
 sary, but peurile ; so complete a hold, however, had 
 it obtained upon his mind, that he could only be ap- 
 peased by a nominal payment to him of twenty 
 shillings per week, in the shape of wages, and his 
 morbid condition was such, that in his declining days 
 his chief satisfaction consisted in poring over and 
 counting this paltry pittance. Hereon a homily 
 might be written upon the vanity of all earthly pos- 
 sessions ; certain it is, that our desire to compass the 
 good things of this life should be controlled by 
 reason, to receive the blessing of Providence, or the 
 approval of conscience.
 
 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY: 
 
 FARMER'S BOY, AFTERWARDS LORD MAYOR OF LONDON. 
 
 " FROM little causes great effects arise." Thus runs 
 the " old saw/' and certainly numberless " modern 
 instances" go to prove the verity of the asseveration. 
 The late Alderman Kelly was at one time a very poor 
 boy on a very poor farm, engaged in the merest 
 drudgery of the roughest agricultural labour ; whose 
 educational opportunities were of the most meagre 
 description, who entered the (to him) wilderness of 
 the great metropolis, penniless and friendless, at the 
 age of fourteen years, and after having by his own 
 unassisted efforts passed through a protracted and 
 not very agreeable period of servitude, succeeded in 
 amassing a large fortune, and was ultimately raised 
 by the spontaneous suffrages of his fellow citizens 
 to the highest honours it was in their power to 
 bestow, 
 
 Thomas Kelly was the oldest son of John and Ann 
 Kelly. He was born at Chevening, in the county of 
 Kent, about the 7th of January, 1772. His father 
 was only an ordinary shepherd at the period of his
 
 2TO ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 marriage ; with which, however, he occasionally com- 
 bined the occupation of cattle dealing, and by dint of 
 great industry and carefulness he contrived to save as 
 much as two hundred pounds. The abandonment of 
 his original calling, and the taking of an inn in his 
 native village, entailed the loss of the whole of his 
 savings, and ultimately led to his resumption of 
 agricultural occupation. Kelly, the elder's, farm was 
 a very poor one, consisting of about thirty acres of 
 cold, wet land ; it has been said that its utmost worth 
 at the present day would not have been more than 
 five shillings an acre, as an annual rental. While the 
 husband was employed in the out-door occupations of 
 such a farm, his wife appears, by the concurrent 
 testimony of all who knew her, to have been a per- 
 fect model of industry and frugality, and was not les? 
 active and assiduous in the various employments that 
 fell to her lot. To his latest day the subject of this 
 notice was apt to speak in terms the most affectionate 
 and respectful of the many obligations he owed to his 
 parents ; ascribing much of the prosperity which 
 had attended his subsequent years, to the salutary 
 impression produced upon his mind by the example 
 of their integrity and uprightness. 
 
 At the age of six years Kelly was sent to school to 
 a female named Humphrey. Here he remained two 
 or three years, receiving his first scanty instruction. 
 He was afterwards sent to the school of a neighbour- 
 ing hamlet, kept by one Phillips. At school Kelly
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF A LONG JOUKNEY. 271 
 
 was a quiet, docile, tractable boy ; the hours which 
 were allowed for play were spent, not in association 
 with his noisy companions, but in the voluntary 
 seclusion of the deserted schoolroom ; where, gladly 
 taking advantage of the quiet that reigned, he 
 endeavoured to perfect himself in his various studies. 
 When he was but twelve years old, he was taken 
 from school, and was obliged to assist his father in 
 the labour and hard work of the farm. " Handling the 
 plough " he never could achieve, however, and he 
 had a special distaste for the care and cleaning of 
 horses. 
 
 He retained to the end of life a vivid recollection 
 of having accompanied his father on foot to Weyhill 
 Fair a distance, there and back, of at least 150 
 miles and of having assisted him to bring home 
 some thousands of lambs, which the latter had been 
 commissioned to purchase for the neighbouring 
 farmers and gentry. The terrible fatigue of the first 
 day's walk to Farnham not less than forty miles 
 their passage across Salisbury Plain, while in Wilts, 
 and on their way home, the apparently indefinite 
 length of the row of lambs, when confined within 
 some of the narrow lanes through which they had to 
 pass, were among the features of the journey which 
 appear to have made a most striking impression on 
 the mind of the younger Kelly. On these occasions 
 .he followed in the rear of the flock with his sagacious 
 (log, while his father, who went first as pioneer, was
 
 272 ALDKRMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 frequently, owing to the number of lambs between 
 them, completely out of his sight, and so far in advance 
 of himself as to impress him, when passing through 
 some of the more secluded spots, not only with a 
 sense of loneliness, but at times, with something allied 
 even to a fear for his personal safety. His growing 
 dislike of this pastoral mode of life began at length 
 to express itself, not in murmurings or complaints, 
 but in the desire for some other employment more 
 in accordance with his taste. This indeed may 
 be inferred from the vague and indeterminate reflec- 
 tion, " Surely I must be born for something better 
 than this," which he remembered frequently to have 
 crossed his mind when pondering on his condition. 
 In this state of feeling, a circumstance occurred which 
 gave a more decided impulse to his aspirations. A 
 son of his old schoolmaster, Phillips, who was esta- 
 blished, as it was supposed, prosperously as a wine- 
 merchant in Idol Lane, Tower Street, London, paid a 
 visit to Kelly's parents. Here, the youth thought, 
 was an opportunity which ought not to be lest sight 
 of, and he accordingly pressed his mother to use her 
 influence with young Phillips, to obtain for him, if 
 possible, some situation in the metropolis. "Whether 
 a promise was given by Phillips, or if given, whether 
 it was remembered, it were useless to inquire. No- 
 thing more was heard of it, and poor Kelly again 
 sank into despondency. 
 
 These repeated disappointments, however, began to
 
 BENEVOLENCE OP HEART. 278 
 
 tell seriously upon his health, and so disturbed was 
 he in mind, that he began to be addicted to sonnam- 
 bulism, or sleep walking. At length Kelly's parents 
 became alive to the necessity of procuring him a 
 situation away from home ; inquiries were set on foot 
 in the neighbourhood, which resulted in his engage- 
 ment to be apprenticed to a tallow-chandler at Oxtead. 
 A day was fixed for young Kelly's entering on his 
 new duties ; and it was arranged that his father should 
 accompany him to the place of his destination a 
 village about five miles off. They had scarcely pro- 
 ceeded half a mile when the boy was overcome by 
 his feelings and burst into tears. His father seeing 
 this, and rightly interpreting the cause, said, in a tone 
 of affectionate remonstrance, " Why, Tom, you're 
 crying ; I see you don't want to go, and you shan't 
 go." The engagement was abandoned ; they returned 
 home, to the infinite surprise of the mother. It is 
 worthy of being put on record, that on this occasion, 
 on taking leave of the family of a poor neighbour, on 
 the eve of his departure, he presented each of the little 
 children with a penny. Sixty-four years rolled away, 
 and the donor and one of the recipients again met. 
 The associations of childhood were reverted to ; and 
 the less fortunate candidate for this world's favours, 
 acknowledging the gift of the parting token, became 
 affain, in his declining years, the object of his play- 
 fellow's bounty. How different the destiny of these 
 two men ! Brought up in close proximity to each 
 
 T
 
 274 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 other, and under circumstances not materially dis- 
 similar, to one was assigned a life of unmitigated toil 
 and labour, with an old age of penury and want ; 
 while, in the ordinary course of things, little else 
 could have been expected of the other, though in the 
 end he rose to honour and wealth, and the highest 
 civic dignity. 
 
 At length, through the medium of a friend, a situa- 
 tion in London was found for Kelly, and was at once 
 accepted by him. It was as assistant in the office of 
 a brewery at Lambeth. Preparations were accord- 
 ingly made by his mother for his removal to London. 
 In anticipation of his leaving home, she had found 
 time to make for him half-a-dozen shirts, and as 
 many pairs of stockings. She had also purchased for 
 him some other necessary articles of wearing apparel. 
 Putting together these, which constituted his whole 
 wardrobe, and were no more than he was able easily 
 to carry himself, and at the same time giving him a 
 few shillings, she bade him farewell. ^Vhen alluding 
 afterwards to the incidents of this parting, he described 
 them as unspeakably touching. To add to the 
 sorrowful feelings produced by a separation from his 
 parents, the day was a gloomy one. A thick fog 
 prevailed, from the effects of which he was soon nearly 
 wet through. It was under these circumstances, and 
 with many melancholy forebodings, that he set out, 
 on foot, in the year 1786, and when only fourteen 
 years old, for that great City, over which, in the
 
 ARRIVAL IN LONDON. 275 
 
 revolution of exactly half a century, he was destined 
 to preside as its chief magistrate. 
 
 On arriving in London he entered upon the duties 
 of his situation at Lambeth, which, however, after the 
 lapse of two or three years, was brought to an abrupt 
 termination by the bankruptcy of the concern ; but 
 his employer interesting himself in his behalf, suc- 
 ceeded in obtaining for him the situation of shopman 
 in a bookseller's establishment in Paternoster Row. 
 These were the circumstances which introduced him 
 to the ward, of which, in due time, he 'became the 
 alderman. The terms on which he accepted the en- 
 gagement were those of the ordinary domestic servant. 
 He was to board and lodge on the premises, and 
 to have ten pounds a-year. Though he had accepted 
 the situation in Paternoster Row, a day's trial was to 
 be allowed, that he might have the opportunity of 
 seeing how far he should like the situation, or be 
 qualified for its duties. In no respect discouraged by 
 the issue of the day's experiment, at the close of it he 
 announced to the housekeeper of his master his in- 
 tention of returning to Lambeth to sleep, and of 
 being back on the following morning in time for 
 commencing business ; his object in going being to 
 take leave of his friends, and bring back with him 
 the few clothes he possessed. 
 
 His master, on being made acquainted with the 
 fact of Kelly's absence, at once concluded that it was 
 a mere excuse for leaving altogether, and exclaimed
 
 276 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 in a tone of irony : " Depend on it you'll see no 
 more of him ; he's had enough of it already." The 
 sequel proved that he was mistaken in the character 
 of the youth he had to deal with. 
 
 True to his promise, Kelly repaired to the City, 
 with his bundle under his arm, long before the time 
 appointed. Finding the shutters of his master's 
 shop still closed, he spent a solitary hour in pacing 
 up and down the Row ; until at length, observing the 
 impediments to his admission withdrawn, he placed 
 his foot within the threshold of those premises, 
 "where/' adverting to the event sixty years after- 
 wards, he remarked, " I have been ever since." 
 
 The establishment in question was kept by Alex- 
 ander Hogg, and was confined to No. 16, Paternoster 
 Bow. The business was even then considerable. 
 Kelly's duty, as the shopman, was to make up par- 
 cels for the retail booksellers ; to write out invoices ; 
 to assist in keeping the books; and, generally, to 
 meet the calls of casual customers. When these 
 duties of the day were over, he applied himself with 
 diligence to his own studies, endeavouring especially 
 to improve himself in grammar, in which he had 
 previously had no instruction, and also in history, 
 geography, &e. Conceiving that a knowledge of 
 French would be serviceable to him he contrived, 
 without any instruction from a master, so far to per- 
 fect himself in the rudiments of the language, as to 
 be able to read some of the most popular French
 
 SELF IMP11OVEMENT. 277 
 
 works with ease and fluency. The pronunciation, 
 in which he was unusually accurate, he made himself 
 master of by attending the Sunday evening service 
 in the French Protestant Church, then in Thread- 
 iiecdlc Street, where he took and paid for a sitting 
 expressly for the purpose. 
 
 We may not exclude from this summary of Kelly's 
 duties and occupations while in the service of Mr. 
 Hogg all reference to the spot where he was con- 
 demned to pass his nights. It was thought necessary 
 for the security of the premises that some one should 
 sleep in the shop, and this duty fell upon Kelly ; the 
 very counter on which he transacted business during 
 the day, formed his canopy and resting place at night. 
 A state of things more calculated to have a depress- 
 ing influence on mind and body, it is scarcely possible 
 to conceive ; but that inflexible perseverance, which 
 appeal's never to have forsaken him, carried him 
 hopefully through all his difficulties. When after 
 the lapse of years he could place in favourable juxta- 
 position with these early struggles, the accumulated 
 blessings of a long life, he endeavoured to extract 
 from the contrast subjects for meditation and thank, 
 fulness. In his master's aged housekeeper, Mrs. 
 Best, he found, from the first, a kind and faithful 
 friend. It was with this humble woman, who appears 
 to have been the only society the place afforded him, 
 that he took his daily meals, and spent most of his 
 leisure hours. As an instance of consideration it
 
 278 ALDEBMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 should be observed, that she never once exercised the 
 power she possessed of compelling him to do any- 
 thing menial. But Kelly's steady and consistent 
 behaviour vras already beginning to excite the 
 jealousy of an out-door servant, who for some reason 
 evidently wished for, and tried to procure, his removal 
 from the establishment. The following conversation 
 between this man and his master, overheard by Mrs. 
 Best, and by her repeated to Kelly, demonstrates 
 clearly the weight which the youth's docile conduct 
 was giving him in the estimation of his master. 
 " Well," inquired Mr. Hogg, " how is the new lad 
 getting on ? " " Oh ! " replied the other, " I don't 
 think he'll do for us at all ; he's so slow." " I like 
 him," remarked Mr. Hogg, emphatically; "he's a 
 biddable boy." 
 
 The sequel to the story, as respects this man, may 
 be briefly disposed of here. 
 
 Some little time after the above occurrence, Kelly 
 discovered him stealing his master's property, and 
 he at length divulged the secret. The man was 
 accordingly watched. Soon repeating the offence, he 
 was detected in the act of taking from the premises 
 a number of books concealed under his clothes. The 
 unoffending object of his dislike had been made the 
 instrument of his detection. He was dismissed from 
 the establishment. 
 
 One day, on passing a cheesemonger's on business 
 Kelly saw in the window some loose printed sheets,
 
 FIEST APPEARANCE IN A COURT OF JUSTICE. 279 
 
 which he instantly recognised as forming part of his 
 master's works. On entering the shop for the purpose 
 of making inquiry, he was astonished to find the shelves 
 at the further end piled with an enormous quantity 
 of similarly printed paper. This, it seems, had been 
 purchased of a woman, on representing it as a portion 
 of the misprints and damaged paper of a printer 
 who was clearing his shop, and had authorized her to 
 dispose of it. The fact, however, was, that it con- 
 sisted of sheets of some of Mr. Hogg's new periodi- 
 cals, which had been sent direct from the printer's 
 to a certain house, for the purpose of being folded 
 and stitched, and been clandestinely conveyed from 
 thence. Kelly immediately acquainted his master 
 with the discovery, and the result was, that the 
 woman was tried at the Old Bailey, convicted, and 
 sentenced to an imprisonment of seven months. Re- 
 verting to this occurrence, in a letter written at an 
 advanced period of his life, he thus comments upon 
 it : " This being my first appearance as a witness in 
 a court of justice, I felt (more than words can ex- 
 press) an extreme fear lest I should state a single 
 word incorrectly, being fully impressed with the 
 sacred obligation of an oath, ever remembering the 
 Third Commandment of God's Law, and always de- 
 sirous to possess a conscience void of offence towards 
 God and towards all men. Little did I then think, 
 when humbly trembling in the witness-box, that, at a 
 future day, I was destined to be raised to the dignity
 
 280 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 of Her Majesty's First Commissioner of the Central 
 Criminal Court of England ; and with the sword of 
 Justice suspended over my head, and the mace of 
 authority placed at my feet, should myself occupy the 
 very judgment seat at which I then glanced with 
 euch awful emotion ! Oh ! how often, during my 
 experience as a magistrate, has the verification of the 
 sacred aphorism, ' the humble shall be exalted/ and 
 the contrary, ' the proud shall be abased/ occurred 
 to my mind : sorry to have seen many men of high 
 station in the world fallen ; subjecting themselves to 
 be placed at the bar of the Old Bailey, tried and con- 
 demned for having madly violated the laws of God 
 aud mau, and become the victims of their own folly 
 and inordinate desires. True it is, honesty is the 
 best policy." 
 
 In Mr. Hogg's situation, Thomas Kelly continued 
 for twenty years; during the first fifteen of which 
 he never had a day's holiday. 
 
 Two things are clearly memorable during that long 
 period of servitude. When the youth's wages were 
 only ten pounds a year, he gave nearly half to help 
 his parents. As his salary slowly increased, he in- 
 creased his aid in proportion. He wanted to help 
 his father to stock his farm better, and to improve 
 his crops and he especially wanted to lighten his 
 poor mother's toils. There were some griefs he could 
 not ward off: sickness came often to his parents 
 dwelling; five of his younger brothers and sisters
 
 CLOSE OP nrs CAREER. 281 
 
 died, the expense of their funerals, and partly of 
 their illness, being defrayed by Thomas. 
 
 When Thomas Kelly was thirty-nine years of age, 
 he began business for himself. He had only a very 
 small capital, and no connections who could help him. 
 
 For two years he contented himself with dealing 
 in miscellaneous books and publications ; at the end 
 of that time he ventured to launch into a new and 
 important branch of business, that of undertaking 
 the printing and publishing of some important stand- 
 ard books, and circulating them in numbers, employ- 
 ing agents and travellers to sell them. 
 
 From this period, the usual casualties incident to 
 commercial life excepted, his course was one of almost 
 uninterrupted and brilliant success ; his trade trans- 
 actions were estimated by hundreds of thousands of 
 pounds, and his advance towards the goal of fortune 
 was certain and rapid. 
 
 His career as a citizen of London is easily traced. 
 Early in his residence, he became a freemen of the 
 Plasterers' Company, and was elected Common Coun- 
 cillor of the Ward of Farringdon-within, in 1823; 
 served the office of Sheriff in 1825 ; was removed to 
 the Court of Alderman in 1830; and was chosen 
 Lord Mayor in November, 1836. 
 
 Full of days and honours, all his prospects brighten- 
 ing to the last, he closed his valuable life at Margate, 
 :n August, 1 855, at the advanced age of eighty-four. 
 
 Oae affecting incident will close our record of this
 
 282 
 
 ALDERMAN THOMAS KELLY. 
 
 truly good man. He made an annual visit to the 
 grave of his parents, generally accompanied by his 
 beloved and only sister. This visit led to his friend- 
 ship with the clergyman of the parish, who became 
 his biographer, and whose first admiration for the 
 character of Alderman Kelly was called forth by the 
 filial piety that annual memorial-visit displayed.
 
 JOSEPH STURGE: 
 
 WHO WENT ABOUT DOING GOOD. 
 
 "Or many public characters/' writes a journalist, 
 " we hear men speak as ' the great/ ' the illustrious/ 
 ' the learned/ ' the gallant / but with Joseph Sturge's 
 name will ever stand connected the appellative by 
 which his friends loved best to designate him, and 
 which was at once the most expressive of his charac- 
 ter and most honourable to his name. GOOD JOSEPH 
 STUIIGE was his familiar title, and the only one which 
 distinctively marked him as a public man." A second 
 journalist writes : 
 
 " In every land that love could penetrate, and 
 sympathy find an object to succour or befriend, 
 Joseph Sturge had a constituency who knew his 
 name, and will deplore his loss. Down the sable 
 cheeks of many an aged negro, once furrowed by 
 slavery, will flow the tears of loving and reverential 
 sorrow. In many a home of toiling industry there 
 will be the choking utterance and the stifled sob, as 
 the bereaved poor talk together of the friend who is 
 lost to them. In the palace where imperial splendour 
 reigns, and in the distant ^inlander's cheerless hut,
 
 284 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 his name will be remembered and his memory 
 blest." 
 
 The editor of the " Birmingham Gazette," in his 
 notice of the death of his eminent townsman, said : 
 
 " Although Mr. Sturge held strongly pronounced 
 opinions, at variance with those of the majority of his 
 countrymen, it would be difficult to say whether he 
 was more respected by his opponents or his friends. 
 The perfect simplicity of his character, his high 
 honour, his sterling honesty in every relation of pub- 
 lic and private life, and his readiness to concede to 
 others the same freedom of action and the same 
 purity of motive that he claimed for himself, all con- 
 tributed to ensure him the respect and regard of every 
 person who knew him. The sentiment of regard his 
 generous beneficence deepened into attachment. His 
 ear was never deaf nor his hand closed against any 
 tale of distress ; but not a tithe of his benefactions is 
 known to the world, for, like all good men, he was 
 much given in his charities to observe the Scriptural 
 precept, ' Let not thy left hand know what thy right 
 hand doeth.' " 
 
 Joseph Sturge was born at Elberton, in Gloucester- 
 shire, on the 2nd of August, 1793. He was the 
 second son of a repectable farmer, who bore the 
 same name as himself, and who could trace his de- 
 scent through a line of " Friends," going back al- 
 most to the origin of the society. Not having much 
 liking for his father's occupation, as soon as he was
 
 HIS EFFORTS TO ABOLISH SLAVERY. 285 
 
 of age he commenced business as a corn merchant at 
 Bcwdley, where he was joined by his brother Charles, 
 and where they laid the foundation of that fine com- 
 mercial fabric, which by their united industry, energy, 
 and high integrity, grew to be one of the foremost in 
 the kingdom both in extent and in honourable estima- 
 tion. In 1822 he removed to Birmingham, as afford- 
 ing ampler scope for mercantile enterprise. In 1834 
 he married the only daughter of that excellent man 
 and eminent philanthropist, James Cropper, Esq., of 
 Liverpool, but, after the brief happiness of little 
 more than a year, was doomed to follow her and her 
 infant to an early grave. In 1846 he married 
 Hannah, the daughter of Barnard Dickenson, Esq., 
 of Coalbrookdale, in whom he found a " true yoke- 
 fellow," sympathising with and aiding him in all his 
 projects of benevolence and public usefulness. 
 
 Mr. Sturge became early and deeply interested in 
 the Anti-Slavery cause. He had for some years 
 borne a conspicuous part in that long and arduous 
 agitation, which preceded and produced the Act for 
 the abolition of slavery in our West India Colonies, 
 by the government of Earl Grey, in 1833. He was 
 always strongly opposed to the interval of compul- 
 sory apprenticeship, which was one of the serious 
 blemishes in that great measure of tardy justice. 
 Determined to examine for himself into the operation 
 of this scheme, he visited the West Indies at his own 
 expense, in 1836, and spent many months in travers-
 
 286 JOSEPH STUEGES. 
 
 ing the various islands, and collecting evidence as to 
 the state of the negroes under the system of appren- 
 ticeship. He was accompanied on this journey by 
 Mr. Thomas Harvey, of Leeds, a gentleman singu- 
 larly qualified to be his associate in such an enterprise, 
 and by his able and accomplished pen to present the 
 results of their united labours in an impressive form 
 to the public. The use which Mr. Sturge made 
 on his return to England of the information he 
 gathered during his West India tour, was to go 
 through the country denouncing the iniquities he 
 had witnessed. For several days he stood a rigid 
 examination before a Committee of the House of 
 Commons, where his evidence could not be impugned. 
 He convened a conference of the friends of the slave 
 in London, and, in fine, awakened an agitation, 
 which, in spite of a powerful opposing interest, the 
 dead- weight of a reluctant Government, and the luke- 
 warm ness, if not the positive hostility, of a portion of 
 the old Anti-Slavery party itself, swept the appren- 
 ticeship system clean away before it, caused the 
 negro's heart to leap for joy at the tidings of un- 
 conditional freedom, and cleared the character of 
 England for ever of all complicity in the master 
 abomination of slavery. In 1841, he visited the 
 United States, mainly under the same impulse of 
 sympathy for the oppressed, though he combined with 
 that a variety of other philanthropic objects, espe- 
 cially the question of international peace, and the
 
 ATTEMPTS TO GET INTO PARLIAMENT. 287 
 
 treatment of prisoners. On his return from America 
 he threw himself, with all the ardour of his brave 
 and generous nature, into the movement in favour of 
 free-trade, which was then beginning to stir the 
 country, and after a brief interval, took up, with a 
 view to direct it into the right channel, the agitation 
 in favour of extending the suffrage, which at that 
 period was a topic of such absorbing interest with the 
 working classes. 
 
 On these passages in his career we are not called 
 upon here to dwell. But we have the strongest con- 
 viction that, though his connection, especially with 
 the latter movement, exposed him to great obloquy, 
 and to no little coolness and suspicion from some of 
 his own friends, there is no portion of his history 
 that, when the facts are properly known and appre- 
 ciated, will more redound to the honour of his charac- 
 ter. The bold part which, at the time in question, 
 he took in the political discussions of the day, turned 
 the attention of many constituencies to him, as a fit- 
 ting man for a place in Parliament. He stood three 
 unsuccessful contests for a seat in the House of Com- 
 mons the first at Nottingham, the second at Bir- 
 mingham, and the last at Leeds. He was wont in 
 the latter years of his life to express his deep satisfac- 
 tion that he had not succeeded ; and it may, indeed, 
 be greatly doubted whether that assembly, which is 
 the scene of so much party conflict and personal 
 intrigue, would ever have proved a congenial atmo-
 
 288 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 sphere for one of such transparent simplicity of 
 motive and purpose as he was. His manifold labours 
 and benefactions in the cause of education, of tem- 
 perance, of the health and recreation of the working 
 classes, of reformatory schools, of prison discipline, 
 and other forms of philanthropy which his active 
 mind and large heart comprehended, who can fully 
 describe ? His innumerable private charities were 
 performed in a manner so quiet and unostentatious, 
 that their course could be traced, like that of some 
 tranquil and noiseless stream, only by the verdure 
 and beauty which they spread around. 
 
 He had imbibed early and earnestly the principles 
 of the society in which he was born on the subject of 
 war. This is strikingly proved by an incident which 
 happened to him when quite a young man, before he 
 had attained his majority. He was engaged in his 
 experimental probation as a farmer, to which it is 
 understood his father wished him to devote himself, 
 when he was balloted for the militia. As he could 
 not serve himself, he did not choose to evade the 
 responsibility by procuring a substitute to do that 
 which his conscience forbade him to do in person. 
 He therefore took joyfully the spoiling of his goods, 
 and saw several of his sheep and lambs seized to pay 
 the penalty he had incurred by his refusal. By this 
 act of youthful decision and sacrifice, he committed 
 himself to the line of conduct from which he never 
 afterwards swerved by a hair's-breadth. He asso-
 
 THE PEACE SOCIETY. 289 
 
 elated himself with the labours of the Peace Society 
 soon after its formation in 1816. During the last 
 tour he took in the service of this cause, only two 
 months before his death, he was pleasantly reminded 
 by his old friend, Mr. Thomas Pumphrey, of Ack- 
 worth school, how they had been united, some forty- 
 one years ago, in forming an Auxiliary Peace Society 
 at Worcester, Mr. Sturge being the chairman, and 
 Mr. Pumphrey the secretary, at the first meeting. 
 Referring to that meeting, Mr. Pumphrey says : " I 
 only recollect that- he was the chief agent in originat- 
 ing it, and in carrying it on for the first three or 
 four years; that he used to come from Bewdley, 
 fourteen miles, to attend the committees ; and that, 
 as a youth of only sixteen, I was deeply impressed 
 with his earnestness and devotion." In 1827 he took 
 part in the formation of an Auxiliary Peace Society 
 at Birmingham. But the first time that he came 
 conspicuously before the public in connection with 
 this question, was on the outbreak of the war with 
 China in 1839. The occasion and the object of that 
 unrighteous conflict to protect the interests of opium 
 smugglers deeply moved his indignation ; and in 
 April, 1840, he addressed a letter " To the Christian 
 Public of Great Britain/' earnestly calling upon them 
 to protest, in the name of religion and patriotism, 
 against proceedings which were so deeply dishonour- 
 able to bor,h. At his instigation, principally. ?n im 
 portant public meeting was hfsjri at th Fnxenfi9*ovy 
 
 u
 
 290 JOSEPH STUEGE. 
 
 Tavern, in London, presided over by Earl Stanhope, 
 at which resolutions were passed, " deeply lamenting 
 that the moral and religious feeling of this countrj 
 should he outraged, the character of Christianity dis- 
 graced ill the eyes of the world, and this kingdom 
 involved in war with upwards of 350.00 ,000 of 
 people, in consequence of British subjects introducing 
 opium into China, in direct and known violation of 
 the laws of that empire." In 1841 he renewed his 
 appeal to the Christian public on this subject, in a 
 second letter, in which he adjured them to send 
 petitions and memorials to the new Government 
 which had then come into power, " strongly sug- 
 gesting a reference of the existing differences with 
 China to commissioners mutually appointed, who 
 shall be authorised to adjust them, and also to deter- 
 mine on the best means of suppressing the guilty 
 traffic in opium . v 
 
 The first general Peace Convention was held in 
 London at the suggestion of Mr. Sturge. In the 
 preface of the volume he published on his return 
 from the United States, he says that, in visiting that 
 country, " the objects which proffered the chief claim 
 to his attention were the universal abolition of Slavery 
 find t>'te promotion of permanent international peace." 
 In pursuance, accordingly, of the second of these 
 onjects, a special meeting of the American Friends of 
 Peace was held at Boston on the 29th of July, 1841. 
 In the minute of proceedings drawn up by the gen-
 
 PEACE CONVENTION. 
 
 tlemen who officiated as secretary on that occasion, it 
 is stated that "the meeting was called for the pur- 
 pose of meeting Mr. Joseph Sturge, from England, 
 and there were present most of the active members of 
 the American Peace Society. Amasa Walker, Esq., 
 was chosen chairman, and Mr. J. P. Blanchard secre- 
 tary. Mr. Sturge addressed the meeting, and sugges- 
 ted the expediency of calling, at some future time, a 
 convention of the friends of peace, of different nations, 
 to deliberate upon the best method of adjusting in- 
 ternational disputes." Ultimately the meeting unani- 
 mously adopted a resolution approving the propo- 
 sal, and suggested that the Convention should be held 
 in London at the earliest practicable opportunity. 
 On his return to England, he submitted this and other 
 r. solutions passed by the same meeting, to the com- 
 mittee of the London Peace Society, by whom they 
 v ere warmly taken up, and the Convention was 
 accordingly held at Freemasons' Hall, on the 22nd, 
 23rd, and 2-lth of June, 1843. Mr. Sturge was one 
 of the vice-presidents of this meeting, and contributed 
 largely, by his zeal and energy, to the success of the 
 demonstration. 
 
 When the project, which originated with Elihu 
 Burritt, was first conceived of holding something like 
 a congress of nations on the Continent, to discuss the 
 subject of international peace, Mr. Sturge was one of 
 the earliest to give it his warm support ; and in con- 
 nection with the whole of that remarkable movement, 
 
 u 2
 
 292 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 which issued in the Peace Conferences that were held 
 at Brussels, Paris, Frankfort, London, Manchester, 
 and Edinburgh, and which led, moreover, to the 
 motions brought forward in Parliament by Mr. Cob- 
 den, in favour of international arbitration and mutual 
 disarmament, it is little to say he was one of 
 its most ardent promoters. He was, in fact, the soul 
 of the entire movement, encouraging the timid into 
 decision, kindling the lukewarm into zeal, provoking 
 others to love and good works by the fervour of his 
 own spirit, and the contagion of his noble and gene- 
 rous example. In consequence of the eloquent 
 appeal made by Dr. Boderistedt, of Berlin, at Frank- 
 fort, Mr. Sturge, in conjunction with Mr. Burritt and 
 Mr. Frederick Wheeler, undertook the task of 
 mediating between the two hostile States of Denmark 
 and the Duchies of Schleswig Holstein. Chevalier 
 Bunsen, who was then Prussian Ambassador to this 
 country, expressed his belief that there was a stronger 
 hope of a satisfactory adjustment of the matter in 
 dispute from that pacific embassy, than from all that 
 had been done before by the professional diplomatists 
 of Europe. 
 
 In the winter of 1854, in conjunction with Mr. 
 Henry Pease and Mr. Kobert Cbarlton, Mr. Sturge 
 undertook a journey to St. Petersburg, to make one 
 last effort to stay the outbreak of hostilities. Nothing 
 is more certain than that the Emperor of Russia was 
 stirred with deep and genuine emotion by the simple
 
 THK RUSSIAN WAR. 293 
 
 but fervid appeal which fell in accents all tremulous 
 with Christian tenderness and zeal, from the lips of 
 Joseph Sturge. How profoundly he was affected with 
 wonder, indignation, and distress, at the deplorable 
 manner in which the professedly Christian people of 
 this country abandoned themselves to the evil spirit 
 of war, during these two melancholy years ; how 
 earnestly he laboured to allay that spirit by all efforts 
 within his power, and how eagerly he watched every 
 opportunity to promote the restoration of peace, those 
 can best testify who were in close and constant com- 
 munication with him during that painful episode in 
 our national history. But whoever faltered in op- 
 position to the war. whoever yielded to the torrent of 
 popular excitement and unreason and, alas! their 
 name was legion he stood firm as a rock, ready to 
 brave any amount of obloquy rather than violate the 
 integrity of his Christian conscience by a cowardly 
 deference to the demands of a spurious patriotism. 
 He lived long enough to reap the reward of his 
 resolute constancy to principle, by seeing the general 
 conviction spreading through the minds of his 
 countrymen, that the opponents of the war were, 
 after all, in the right that that bloody and desolating 
 strife, while prolific of many and lasting evils, had 
 proved utterly barren of all appreciable good. When 
 the war was over, Mr. Sturge joined very heartily in 
 the effort made by the peace party in this country to 
 obtain from the representatives of the Great Powers
 
 294 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 sitting in conference at Paris, a recognition of the 
 principle of arbitration as a substitute for war. For 
 this purpose he accompanied Mr. Charles Hindloy 
 and Mr. Richard as a deputation to Paris, to la; the 
 matter before the Plenipotentiaries, and hud the satis- 
 i fiction of finding, when the Protocols of the Congress 
 were published, that the question had been earnestly 
 discussed, and that a resolution had been adopted, 
 which though unhappily not containing the clause 
 binding the parties to abide by the decision of the 
 arbitrators, to which the deputation attached most 
 importance, yet " giving for the first time," as Mr. 
 Gladstone afterwards said, " at least a qualified dis- 
 approval to a resort to war, and asserting the supre- 
 macy of reason, of justice, of humanity, and religion." 
 In the course of the year 1856, distressing accounts 
 reached this country of the sufferings that were being 
 endured by the people of Finland, occasioned in a 
 main degree by the ravages committed on their coasts 
 by the English fleet during the war. The heart of 
 Mr. Sturge was deeply touched by these reports, and 
 he determined to repair in person to the scene, and 
 investigate the case for himself. Accompanied by 
 Mr. Thomas Harvey, his old associate in the West 
 Indies, he accordingly visited the southern parts of 
 Finland. They found not only a good deal of 
 iis tress, which became greatly aggravated shortly 
 ufterwa ds by the failure of the harvest in the 
 IK;, them districts of the same country, b it " that the
 
 THE INDIAN MUTINY. 295 
 
 good feeling previously existing among the population 
 towards England was changed into one of bitter 
 animosity." After they had formed a committee of 
 relief on the spot, Mr. Sturge authorised the gentle- 
 men so acting to draw at once to a large amount, for 
 immediate use, upon the firm of which he was a 
 member. On their return to England an appeal for 
 help was issued, and a fund amounting to about 
 .9000 was raised, principally among the Society of 
 Friends, of which Mr. Sturge and his brother Charles 
 a true brother in all noble and generous deeds 
 contributed no less a sum than 1000. 
 
 When the mutiny or, to speak more accurately, 
 the rebellion broke forth in India in 1857, Mr. 
 Sturge, convinced that there were deeper causes for 
 that terrible disaster than those so confidently 
 assigned in this country, became exceedingly anxious 
 to ascertain, if possible, from the natives themselves, 
 the story of their grievances. He was prepared to 
 expend a large sum to send out an agent for that 
 purpose, if a suitable person could be found. But 
 as none such appeared, Mr. Sturge, with that wonder- 
 ful self-devotion which was so characteristic of him 
 when the interests of humanity were concerned, had 
 at one time made up his mind to go to India himself. 
 On consultation, however, with gentlemen intim;itely 
 conversant with India, it was felt that the disturbed 
 state of the country, and especially the extreme t> rror 
 and suspicion which had taken hold ot the native
 
 296 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 mind, would have rendered it impossible at that time 
 to conduct such an inquiry as Mr. Sturge contem- 
 plated with any satisfactory results. 
 
 We can only touch on some of the salient points in 
 his long course of service to the cause of Peace, leaving 
 untouched his constant, habitual efforts, year by year, 
 month by month, we might almost add day by day, 
 by journeys, conferences, correspondence, circulation 
 of tracts, organization of public meetings, and un- 
 bounded liberality in the use of his means. In all 
 these exertions he was admirably seconded and sus- 
 tained by the generous co-operation of his brothers, 
 and by the earnest sympathy, executive skill, and 
 vigorous eloquence of his fellow-townsman the Rev. 
 Arthur O'Neil. At the anniversary of the Peace 
 Society for 1858, he was elected President of that in- 
 stitution/ Never was there an appointment the fit- 
 ness of which was more instantly and unanimously 
 recognised. It was obvious to those in close inter- 
 course with him, that, strenuous as had been his 
 abours in that cause for many years, he felt that this 
 new position in which he was placed entailed upon him 
 additional obligations, which lie was prepared to take 
 ap with the thoroughness which was characteristic of 
 his nature. His mind had for some time been much 
 occupied with the wish to press the claims of peace 
 upon the young, especially among the members of his 
 own Society. In pursuance of this object he had 
 been engaged during the year in attending a series of
 
 LABOURS OP HIS DECLINING DAYS. 297 
 
 meetings in the north, in conjunction with Mr. Smith 
 of Sheffield, and Mr. Richard. IS' one who heard him 
 on those occasions can ever forget the earnestness, 
 the humility, the pleading and pathetic tenderness 
 which marked his addresses. They were listened to 
 by many then with throbbing hearts and tearful eyes ; 
 but, oh ! if we had known that he was standing so 
 near the threshold of heaven when he spoke to us, 
 how we should have caught and treasured every word 
 that fell from his lips ! None but those who have 
 some practical acquaintance with the large amount of 
 anxiety and toil involved in the conduct of such a 
 cause can adequately appreciate the value of a co- 
 worker like Joseph Sturge, whose faith never faltered, 
 whose energy was unwearied, whose generosity was as 
 inexhaustible as it was unostentatious. His character 
 was to them as a host. His presence was a solace 
 and an mspiratiqn in the darkest moments. The 
 very consciousness of his existence was a tower of 
 strength. 
 
 The foundation of Mr. Sturge's character must be 
 sought in his deep and devout religious earnestness. 
 He was not a ma i to make any display of his re- 
 ligious emotions. But those who were admitted into 
 his intimacy were at no loss to discover the secret 
 source whence he derived his strength for his long 
 and strenuous labours in the service of mankind. It 
 was because he held habitual communication with the 
 eternal Fountain of life and power, that his own soul
 
 298 JOSEPH STURGB. 
 
 was replenished with a divine mlgnt which enabled 
 him to stand unmoved amid the flowing and ebbing 
 tide of circumstance and opinion. The structure of 
 his intellect, also, simple and practical as it was, did 
 not interfere to prevent his enjoying the full ad- 
 vantage of this blessed privilege. Having taken firm 
 hold upon a few vital Christian truths, he reposed 
 upon them with absolute and unquestioning trust, 
 and never could have had occasion to use the 
 language which one of our poets has put in the lips 
 of a man of subtle and speculative intellect : 
 
 " Spirit of speculation, rest, oh rest ! 
 And push not from her place the spirit of prayer." 
 
 His faith was strong, and simple as a child's. 
 
 He possessed naturally what we should call a sin- 
 gularly healthy mind. There was nothing in the 
 slightest degree moody, morbid, or capricious about 
 him. There are men, and very good men too, with 
 whom it is difficult and painful to co-operate, from 
 deficiencies of temper. You have to study their moods, 
 to humour their eccentricities of thought or feeling, 
 to beware how you touch their too vigilant self- 
 esteem, to watch your opportunity before you can 
 get them to act, for while sometimes ardent and en- 
 thusiastic, they are at othertimesgloomy and irresolute. 
 But not so with Joseph Sturge. He was blest with 
 a most fresh, free, vigorous nature. You were sure 
 of always finding him the same, always cheerful as 
 the day, always firm of purpose, always generous and
 
 HIS PRACTICAL CHARACTER. 299 
 
 ready. Never was there a man more thoroughly re- 
 liable. You could count upon liim as you could upon 
 the ordinances of nature that are fixed by a divine 
 law. He had, moreover, wonderful force of will. 
 This indeed was the secret of what we may call his 
 intellectual strength. He did not affect the possession 
 of any faculty that was either brilliant or profound. 
 His understanding was plain and practical, and he 
 had little or no imagination. But he was a man of 
 most resolute determination. He wanted only to be 
 clear on the question of principle, to have his con- 
 science satisfied in regard to any course, and then no 
 labour could daunt him, no obstacle suffice to turn 
 him from his path. His firmness was, however, 
 tempered by a most gentle and generous disposition. 
 It was quite a study to watch how these two qualities 
 acted and re- acted upon each other, and were some- 
 times brought into conflict. But when, as was gene- 
 rally the case with him, his benevolent feelings ran 
 in the same line with his resolute will, the junction 
 of the two imparted to him that force and fervour of 
 character by which he was so distinguished. He had 
 a remarkable power not only of working himself, but 
 of getting others to work. As one of his dearest 
 friends said, "It was impossible to refuse Joseph 
 Sturge anything." And hence it was that, in all the 
 public enterprises in which he was engaged, he drew 
 around him, with the utmost ease, those who could 
 supply what may have been lacking in his own quali-
 
 300 JOSEPH STUllGE. 
 
 fications. Every oue who came near him feit it a 
 pride and a privilege to serve him. 
 
 As Mr. Charlton remarked at the peace meeting, 
 his conduct was marked by an utter absence of self- 
 seeking. Ceaseless as were his charities, abundant 
 as were his labours in so many departments of 
 Christian philanthropy, important as were the results 
 he had achieved in more than one direction, and 
 honourably conspicuous as his name had become for 
 many years, no man was ever so little self-conscious 
 of his own goodness or greatness. There was no 
 assumption of authority, no jealousy for his own 
 reputation. He was willing to the last to render the 
 humblest service to any cause he loved, content to 
 bear the heat and burden of the day, let whosoever 
 list take the praise. 
 
 It pleased Providence to place him in circumstances 
 eminently favourable to the development of a cha- 
 racter so beautiful. His home was the very abode 
 of peace and love. He was surrounded from the 
 early part of his career, and so it continued to the 
 close, with members of his own family, who, loving 
 him with a devoted affection, animated by a kindred 
 spirit with his own, and sympathising with him cor- 
 dially in his benevolent aspirations, did everything to 
 help and nothing to hinder him in following the im- 
 pulses of his own generous nature. To know such a 
 man was to think better of the whole human race. 
 When wearied with unsuccessful labour, when cast
 
 INFLUENCE OF HIS EXAMPLE. 301 
 
 down by disappointment or hope deferred, when in 
 danger of being soured by the selfishness of some, and 
 the lukewarmness of others with whom we may be 
 brought into contact, the memory of him, his strong 
 faith, his Christian gentleness, his high courage, his 
 unselfish dedication to the service of God and man, 
 may well come to us with healing on its wings, soothe 
 our irritation, and, by his example, nerve our hearts 
 to a patient continuance in well-doing, irrespective or 
 the world's smiles or frowns. 
 
 Can we more fittingly close these sketches, then, 
 in reference to the character, the industry, the perse- 
 verence, and the high aims of Joseph Sturge, say to 
 the reader : " Go thou and do likewise ?"
 
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