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[Illustration: MOORE AND SCOTT IN THE RHYMER’S GLEN.]




                       FOOTPRINTS OF FAMOUS MEN.

                              DESIGNED AS
                 INCITEMENTS TO INTELLECTUAL INDUSTRY.


                           By JOHN G. EDGAR,
                 AUTHOR OF “THE BOYHOOD OF GREAT MEN.”


               The heights by great men reached and kept,
                 Were not attained by sudden flight,
               But they, while their companions slept,
                 Were toiling upward in the night.

                                                  LONGFELLOW.


                          With Illustrations.


                               NEW YORK:
                    HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.
                                 1854.




“Magna etiam illa laus, et admirabilis videri solet, tulisse casus
sapienter adversos, non fractum esse fortuna, retinuisse in rebus
asperis dignitatem.”

                                             CICERO _de Orat_.


                             PHILADELPHIA:
                       PRINTED BY KING & BAIRD,
                            SANSOM STREET.




CONTENTS.


                                 PAGE
 I.――MEN OF ACTION.

        WASHINGTON                  9
        BURKE                      44
        NECKER                     68
        PITT                       82
        LORD ERSKINE              103
        LORD COLLINGWOOD          123
        LORD TEIGNMOUTH           143


 II.――MEN OF LETTERS.

        DEAN MILNER               159
        DAVID HUME                180
        ROBERT SOUTHEY            200
        THOMAS MOORE              226


 III.――ARTISTS.

        SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS       243
        SIR FRANCIS CHANTREY      272
        SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN      289


 IV.――MEN OF SCIENCE.

        DR. WILLIAM HUNTER        305
        BLACK                     324
        BRINDLEY                  332
        WATT                      340
        ADAM SMITH                348




LIST OF PLATES.


 MOORE AND SCOTT IN THE RHYMER’S GLEN            _Frontis._

 YOUNG WASHINGTON’S MILITARY ASPIRATIONS       _Page_   11

 BURKE READING TO HIS MOTHER                            46

 ERSKINE’S FIRST SUCCESSES                             116

 COLLINGWOOD’S JUVENILE GENEROSITY                     130

 MILNER RESCUED FROM THE LOOM                          166

 SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS AT BLENHEIM                       267

 CHANTREY’S EARLY STUDIES                              277




FOOTPRINTS OF FAMOUS MEN.




WASHINGTON.


The name, which this truly great and good man rendered for ever
illustrious and venerable, is of thoroughly English origin, and
was assumed, from a manor in the county of Durham, by one of the
proprietors, during the dynasty of the Plantagenets. The family
continued, for successive centuries, to produce men distinguished
in their day and generation as knights, divines, lawyers, and
agriculturists; and during the Protectorate two of its cadets, more
adventurous than their predecessors, fared forth from a hereditary
grange in Northamptonshire, took shipping for Virginia, sailed into
the bay of Chesapeake, and settled, in the midst of silk grass and
wild fruit, under the shade of the tall, bulky trees on the banks of
the Potomac.

The grandson of one of these emigrants, a colonist of industry,
enterprise, and repute, flourished in the earlier part of the
eighteenth century. He seems to have been fully alive to the
inconvenience, and steeled against the temptations of celibacy; for
he was twice married, and blessed with several children, of whom
George Washington――the eldest son by the second wife――was born on the
22d of February, 1732. Shortly after this joyous event, the worthy
and prosperous planter removed to an estate he possessed in Stafford
county; and there, on the east side of the Rappahannoc river, the
childhood of the future general and statesman was passed. He soon gave
indications of a natural disposition to lead and govern; and showed an
innate inclination for military pursuits and athletic exercises. When
at play, he took infinite delight in forming his youthful comrades
into companies, which he drilled, marched, and paraded with due order
and formality. Sometimes they were divided into two armies, and fought
mimic battles――he acting as captain-general of one party. Then, as in
maturer years, he was much given to such feats as running, leaping,
wrestling, throwing bars, and others of a similar character. Moreover,
he was held in great respect by his more volatile companions, who
looked up to him as an extraordinary lad; and thus he was often
privileged to arbitrate on and settle their casual disputes, always, it
is stated, to the satisfaction of the parties concerned.

[Illustration: YOUNG WASHINGTON’S MILITARY ASPIRATIONS.]

It has been remarked that, in general, persons attain with credit, and
fill with dignity, the positions which might have been anticipated from
their juvenile indications. Some, indeed, afterward display talents
of which, in their first stages, they gave no sign, and others put
forth a blossom not destined to bring forth the promised fruits: but
most frequently the man is such as might have been predicted from the
characteristics exhibited in early years. Washington can hardly be
regarded as an exception to the general rule; though it is unnecessary
to add, that he more than realized any hopes that could reasonably
have been entertained from his puerile performances. The seminary at
which he received his very scanty education was by no means of the
highest class. The pupils were not even initiated into the rudiments
of classical learning. Enough was taught the urchins to fit them for
conducting the practical business of a planter――at that time the
pursuit of nearly all gentlemen whose progenitors had left the comfort
and security of merry England to encounter the toils and hardship of a
colonial life. The teachers seem to have acted rigidly on the precept
of a Spartan king, that the boy should be instructed in the arts likely
to be useful to the man. If, on leaving school, the hopeful youths
could read with decent correctness, write a tolerable hand, and keep
accounts intelligibly, what more was wanting to capacitate them for
growing tobacco and shipping it, to be disposed of by the commercial
magnates who, arrayed in scarlet cloaks and flowing periwigs, paced,
with haughty step and unvailed pride, the arched Exchange of Glasgow?
Young men destined for learned professions were, it is true, generally
sent to be educated in England; for others a private tutor was
sometimes engaged; but in most cases the juvenile Virginians shouldered
their satchels, and, picking up the wild grapes in their path, marched
to the nearest hamlet to make the best of such tuition as it boasted
of. Such, at all events, was the fortune of Washington. Under these
disadvantageous circumstances, he pursued his simple studies with
unusual vigor and exemplary diligence. At the age of thirteen, he
strangely occupied much of his attention with the dry forms used in
mercantile transactions. He practiced his skill in the writing of
bonds, indentures, bills of exchange, and other deeds, compiled for
his own use and guidance a code of rules for behavior in company and
conversation, and transcribed such pieces of poetry as touched and
charmed his fancy. From a boy, he was peculiarly careful to polish
his manners, to cherish the heart’s best affections, to do to others
as he would be done to, and to exercise such a habitual control over
himself, that he might restrain his constitutional ardor and hold his
natural susceptibility in check. His early compositions were not, from
the imperfect nature of his education, distinguished by grammatical
correctness; but, by reading and perseverance, he gradually overcame
these defects, and learned to express himself with force, clearness,
and propriety. He had a decided turn for mathematical studies; and
the last years of his school career were devoted to the mysteries of
geometry, trigonometry, and surveying. For the last he felt a singular
partiality; and he gratified the taste by measuring the neighboring
fields and plantations, entering all the details and particulars in
his note-books. This was done with systematic precision; he used his
pen with the most scrupulous care, and acquired habits which were of
inestimable value when he ascended to posts of peril and responsibility.

Meantime, his father had been cut off in the prime of life; but this
early deprivation was, in Washington’s case, almost counteracted by
the character of his surviving parent, who, being a woman of sense,
tenderness, vigilance, a strong mind, and prudent management, reared
her family with the utmost discretion and success. She had the
satisfaction of living to witness the splendid position to which the
abilities, conduct, and energy of her son ultimately elevated him.

Washington went no longer to school after his sixteenth year. His
relations had previously entertained the intention of entering him
as a midshipman in the navy; and with this view had successfully
exerted their influence to procure him a warrant. It appears that the
future hero of a continent joyfully acquiesced in this scheme for his
advancement in life; and had it been persisted in, he would no doubt
have borne himself with credit and distinction. This was unquestionably
a critical juncture in his career, and in the history of America; but
it was terminated, imprudently in the opinion of his friends, by the
interference of his widowed mother, who little relished the thought
of her darling being sent “to rough it out at sea.” She therefore
authoritatively forbade his departure. Perhaps the incipient hero was
not altogether disconsolate at the maternal veto being thus exercised;
for about this date he proved himself not insensible to the magic power
of female grace, and became vehemently enamored of some rural beauty.
He celebrated her perfections in love-ditties, and confessed his pangs
in letters to a confident; but, with a modesty surely rare under such
circumstances, he ventured not to reveal the state of his agitated
heart to the fair being whose image was stamped on its tablets.

At this period, Washington was fortunate enough to go on a visit to
his eldest brother, Lawrence. That gentleman was intelligent and
accomplished. He had served with honor in the expedition made, in
1740, against Carthagena; and secured the esteem and intimacy of the
high-spirited Admiral Vernon. On returning home he had, in compliment
to that gallant officer, named his property Mount Vernon; and they
still continued in friendly communication. He had, moreover, become a
member of the Colonial legislature, and connected himself by marriage
with Lord Fairfax, who, having in earlier days proved his capacity
by writing papers in the “Spectator,” had just crossed the Atlantic
to explore and examine the immense tract of land that belonged to
him in the New World. Thus the company in which the elder Washington
moved was by no means deficient in literary culture or patrician
refinement; and his sagacious brother, in mixing with it, had opened
up to his view aspects of society with which he might otherwise have
remained unacquainted. He was too wise not to avail himself of the
advantage in this way presented to his opening mind. Slow to speak,
ready to hear, and anxious to understand, he used it to counterpoise
the partial training his mental faculties had undergone, and thus laid
the foundation of the mild dignity and scrupulous politeness which, in
other days, made Sir Robert Liston declare, that he had never conversed
with a better-bred sovereign in any court of Europe.

Lord Fairfax, on reaching his wild and uncultivated possessions, found
that settlers were quietly making their way up the rivers, selecting
the most valuable spots, and occupying them without leave or license.
It was, therefore, deemed necessary that his seignorial rights should
be asserted; and with that object he determined on having the lands
properly lotted and measured, preparatory to claiming rents and
giving titles. The destined victor in the War of Independence had
already been presented to this clever, but eccentric, representative
of the renowned Parliamentary general; a favorable opinion had, in
consequence, been formed of the youth’s merits and ability; and
Washington being intrusted with the responsible duty, and attended by a
kinsman of his lordship, sallied forth on his first surveying excursion
in the beginning of 1748. The task was arduous and fatiguing; he
was frequently obliged to pass whole nights under the cold sky, or
in tents which afforded little shelter against the wintery wind and
rain: but the expedition was not without beneficial results. He became
conversant with localities then little known, but afterward the field
of his military operations; he saw something of Indian life, witnessed
an Indian war-dance, and acquired some acquaintance with the habits of
the race upon which the spirit of civilization was bearing so hard.
Besides, he executed his task with so much success, as not only to
give complete satisfaction to his noble employer, but to establish
his character as an excellent surveyor; a matter of considerable
consequence, as there were then few in the district, and the emoluments
were temptingly high. He therefore procured a commission, which gave
authority to his operations, and entitled him to have their results
entered in the provincial registers. By activity and diligence his
occupation was rendered very lucrative; and on attaining the age of
nineteen he had achieved so enviable a place in public esteem, that
a most honorable military appointment was bestowed upon him by the
Government on the approach of danger.

His taste for martial affairs had, indeed, been adhered to with
resolution, and cultivated with assiduity. Since acting as a surveyor,
he had resided chiefly with his brother, whose house was more
conveniently situated for his exertions than was the home of his
infancy; and he had, from this cause, been brought more into contact,
than he would otherwise have been, with men versed in military matters.
Under their instruction he had industriously practiced himself in sword
exercise, and become not inexpert. Besides, he had eagerly studied
books treating of the art of war. The early aspirations of great men
are generally met with ridicule. “_Obsta principiis_” is too often the
motto of jealous dunces. When the author of “Marmion” proposed in youth
to compose his “War-Song of the Edinburgh Light Dragoons,” the idea of
his attempting such a thing raised coarse laughter, and was regarded
as a piece of absurdity; and, in like manner, it is not difficult
to imagine the brisk tittering excited by the efforts of the young
colonial surveyor to initiate himself into handling the weapons and
understanding the theory of war.

But however that may have been, it came to pass that, in 1751, when
there appeared a prospect of encroachment on the part of the French,
and it was deemed prudent to embody the militia to defend and protect
the frontiers, Washington received a commission as Adjutant-General of
one of the districts into which Virginia was divided. This entitled
him to rank as major; and his duty was to assemble and exercise the
local troops, inspect their arms, and maintain fitting discipline;
no unworthy training for that military genius which subsequently
accomplished so much for the land of his nativity. Then, as afterward,
candor, sincerity, and straightforwardness were the characteristics
of his noble mind. He had been eminently endowed by Nature with the
qualities which form a ruler of men; and perhaps the training which
he now underwent was, in reality, more favorable than any of a more
regular and systematic kind would have been to the working out of his
peculiar destiny.

About this period, Washington was withdrawn for a brief season from
the sphere of his new duties. The health of his brother became so
precarious, that medical advisers recommended an excursion to a
different climate; and the company of some kind friend being required
to cheer and sustain the invalid on his voyage, the fraternal affection
of the boy-major prompted him to undertake the office. The atmosphere
of a West India island being considered most likely to act as a
restorative, Barbadoes was fixed upon. During the voyage thither,
Washington busily occupied himself with making observations and
increasing his knowledge; and on an October day they arrived at their
destination.

Hardly could any prospect be more pleasing than that which arrested
the eyes of the travelers, as, after being confined for five tedious
weeks to the narrow limits of a trader, they anchored in the bay,
the stillness of whose waters was only broken by the sailing of the
dreaded shark, or by the tropical breeze which played lightly around,
and gratefully modified the warmth of the sun, as it descended with
merciless glow upon their strawy head-pieces. Before them lay the
chief town, circling around the silver strand, and shrouded in palm
trees that fringed the blue waters of the ocean. In the background,
fields of the sugar-cane, planters’ airy mansions, the tall windmills,
and the negro-huts bosomed in the evergreen and luxuriant foliage of
the tropics――having the appearance of scattered villages――presented
a scene, picturesque, attractive, and promising delightful journeys
to the curious stranger. Nor was Washington disappointed in that
respect. Every thing came under his notice, and enlisted his sagacious
reflection. The soil, methods of culture, and the agricultural
productions, engaged his attention no less than the manners of the
inhabitants, their military force, their form of government, and their
municipal institutions. While thus profitably employed he was laid
prostrate by a sharp attack of small-pox, which confined him to the
house for weeks; but with skillful medical treatment he was released
from this doubly-dull durance, and enabled to resume his habits of
gaining experience and collecting information.

Meantime the health of his brother had, at first, improved rapidly.
Change of air and novelty of scene had produced a salutary impression;
they invigorated his frame and revived his spirits: but the symptoms of
decay speedily re-appearing he proceeded to Bermuda. Washington then
embarked for Virginia, to execute the kindly duty of conducting his
sister-in-law to her expiring husband; but ere arrangements could be
made for that purpose, the latter was on the sea, and he soon after
breathed his last under his own roof. The melancholy task of attending
to the affairs of a departed relative, so near and dear, now devolved
upon Washington, and for months he applied to the estate the sound
sense and accurate investigation which ever characterized the great
self-taught soldier and statesman in dealing with weightier affairs.

In the interval the sphere of his public duties had been enlarged and
extended. The colony had, for purposes of defense, been divided into
four grand districts; Washington’s commission was then renewed, and
the northern portion was confided to his steady care and untiring
vigilance. This included several counties, each of which he had to
visit periodically. The duties were quite in harmony with his taste and
temper, and he discharged them with an energy and an enthusiasm which
were not lost on those over whom he was appointed to exercise control,
and among whom he had to insure discipline. Still he had not arrived
even at that time of life when the generality of mortals are charitably
supposed to have reached “years of discretion.”

Events were now speeding to a crisis. Intelligence arrived that the
French had crossed the lakes from Canada, and were preparing to
establish posts and fortifications on the Ohio river. On receiving
these alarming reports, the Virginian governor, having resolved
to send an officer commissioned to inquire by what right they thus
intruded on the English dominions, selected Washington, as peculiarly
fitted to execute the duty with faith, discretion, and delicacy.
Accordingly, about the close of 1753, he departed with suitable
credentials and the requisite powers from Williamsburg, the seat of
government; and with a retinue of eight persons, two of whom were to
act as interpreters, he, after much toil and trouble, arrived at the
French head-quarters. There he was courteously received and entertained
by the commandant, a Knight of the Order of St. Louis. Immediate
attention was promised to the subject of his mission, and in due time
an answer, indicative of firmness and hostility, was granted to the
remonstrance of his excellency the governor. Washington then retraced
his steps, through trackless forests, over rugged mountains, and by
swollen floods; making several hair-breadth escapes by land and water.
During the expedition he had found frequent opportunities of extending
his knowledge of Indian manners and customs; and he had been escorted
to the French camp by an influential personage, bearing the title of
“Half King.” While returning, his journey was agreeably diversified
by a visit to Queen Alliquippa, an Indian princess; no doubt, like
the charming but hapless Yarico, appareled in beautiful shells, and
possessed of wild graces. She maintained her state at the junction of
two rivers, and had expressed her displeasure at the representative
of the British king having failed to show her any proper mark of
respect on his way out; but a polite apology and a substantial present
soothed her wounded pride and ruffled dignity, and secured the young
envoy a gracious dismissal. Twelve months later the dusky sovereign
lady was under the necessity of placing herself and her son under his
protection, when driven from her royal residence by the French troops.

After an absence of three months, Washington presented himself to the
governor, and reported the result of his mission. In order to fire the
patriotic enthusiasm of the colonists, the journal of his adventures
was forthwith published. It appeared in all the provincial papers, and
was reprinted in England by order of the government.

War was now imminent, and preparations were imperative upon the
authorities. The governor was a wary Caledonian, and surrounded by a
knot of his countrymen, who took care that in his appointments he did
full justice to their claims; but, at the same time, he exhibited much
zeal for the honor of the vice-regal office, and becoming ardor for the
dignity of the British Crown. His schemes were, however, subject to
be provokingly thwarted by the members of the local legislature, who
manifested a republican spirit by no means agreeable to his loyal and
patriotic sentiments. Hence he found considerable difficulty in making
such arrangements for defense as he deemed necessary for the safety of
English interests. Nevertheless, he succeeded in embodying a force to
repel the invaders; and Washington having already, by his high courage
and admirable conduct, proved his rare capacity for military business,
was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, and nominated second
in command. He immediately marched, with his new authority, to the
Alleghany Mountains, and being joined by parties of those Indians who
were favorable to the English, he commenced skirmishing with the enemy.
In one sharp fray the leader of the hostile party was killed, and his
men forced to yield. But in another encounter, at a place known as
the Great Meadows, where he had thrown up an intrenchment, and called
it Fort Necessity, Washington was, after a conflict of nine hours,
obliged to capitulate. Then marching out, with flying colors and drums
beating, he retreated to Williamsburg. His praiseworthy conduct during
the campaign elicited high applause from the governor, and was rewarded
with public thanks, conveyed through the House of Assembly. Next year
he found himself in a somewhat awkward predicament. The forces being
organized on a new system, he had to choose between being reduced to
the rank of captain, and placed under officers whom he had previously
commanded, or leaving the army. Without hesitation he resigned his
commission, and spent the winter in retirement.

Early in the spring, however, he emerged from his retreat, and
consented, while retaining his former rank, to accompany General
Braddock as a volunteer. He was received with flattering respect,
and prepared to take part in the expedition against Fort Duquesne;
when, unfortunately, he was prostrated by a fever, which rendered his
consignment to the baggage-wagon and the physician’s care a matter
of necessity: but he was sufficiently recovered in a fortnight to
bear arms in the bloody battle of the Monongahela. Beautiful and
impressive was the array of British troops on that memorable morning
as the little army marched in order, with high hopes and ardent
anticipations, the sun gleaming on their burnished arms. On one side
was a flowing river, and on the other a shadowy forest. Suddenly, at
noon, ere the rear had well crossed at a ford, they were attacked
with fatal dexterity――the foe firing at a distance from behind trees,
and practicing all the stratagems of Indian warfare. The general,
disdaining to imitate such tactics, was mortally wounded; his two
aides-de-camp were disabled; sixty-three out of eighty-six officers
were killed and wounded; seven hundred private soldiers met with
similar fates: but Washington seemed to have a charmed life. He rode
about in all directions, and exerted himself with the utmost courage.
He was a conspicuous mark for the enemy’s sharp-shooters, and four
bullets went through his coat; yet, though his companions fell in heaps
around, he escaped unhurt. The nut-brown riflemen, old and young,
singled him out; but with as little effect as, at Torquilstone, the
arrows of the English archers had on the Milan steel of the bold leader
of free lances. The idea of preternatural protection occurred to their
superstitious imaginations; and as the Scottish Covenanters believed
that General Dalziel possessed a diabolical charm against steel, and
that Claverhouse was guaranteed against lead by the enemy of mankind,
so the Indian warriors concluded that Washington was under the especial
guardianship of the Great Spirit, and they ceased their efforts to slay
him. Thus, although the day was most disastrous, he gained much praise
by the valor, energy, and resolution he had exhibited throughout. He
was instanced, even in pulpits, as preserved by a wise Providence
to confer some signal benefit on his country; his public reputation
rose high; the Legislature voted him a sum of money for his services;
and when the local regiment was increased to sixteen companies, he
was nominated their commander-in-chief. Being now intrusted with
responsible functions, he devoted himself to the fulfillment of them
with much care and foresight; and he procured the passing of a law to
insure proper regularity and discipline. While thus gravely occupied,
he had a dispute concerning precedence with an officer holding King
George’s commission; and in order to solve the difficulty, which was
at once vexatious and perplexing, he had to undertake a journey to
Boston, to obtain the opinion of General Shirley, commander of His
Majesty’s forces in America, who unhesitatingly decided the point
in Washington’s favor, and held serious and important conversation
with him as to the plan of operations for the next campaign. Much
curiosity was evinced, in the places through which he passed, to see
the individual who had, at the early age of twenty-three, won so much
renown for his bravery, and who was regarded as remarkable for the
escape he had recently made. And there he was――a gallant and dignified
cavalier, rather more than six feet in height, with long limbs, and
a slender but erect and well-proportioned form――making an equestrian
excursion of five hundred miles in the depth of winter, with two trusty
comrades. He remained for some time at New York; and while there he had
to encounter in a family circle――the most perilous of all arenas――a
blooming damsel, whose charms, more effectual than the bullets of
Indians, penetrated to his heart, and made so deep an impression that,
after going to Boston, he returned and lingered till called away by the
stern voice of duty. Doubtless reciprocal emotions fluttered in the
gentle breast of the attractive nymph; but, as usual, the course of his
love did not run quite smoothly: his hopes blossomed but to die. In a
few months he was informed that a formidable rival was in the field,
and the citadel in the utmost danger. Besides, it was intimated that,
if he wished to save the coveted prize, he must make his appearance
forthwith. Washington, absorbed with “the harsh duties of severe
renown,” or despairing of success, failed to comply with this friendly
suggestion; the fair lady――a “cynosure of neighboring eyes”――did not,
perhaps, excessively relish his apparent coolness; and his lucky
competitor, being thus in undisputed possession of the ground, marched
onward, with flying colors, to a connubial triumph.

Our hero, however, was not idle. If, like the rival of young Lochinvar,
he had been “a laggard in love,” he was no “dastard in war.” The army
had, on his return, received a considerable augmentation; and though
the nature of his operations was unfavorable to the acquisition of
much martial glory, he excited respect and admiration by the signal
ability and ingenious resource he constantly displayed. Yet in modern,
no less than in ancient times, abuse and calumny are essential parts of
triumph; and they were now busy with the character and career of the
successful young soldier. Some vituperative rumors were, it is stated,
finally traced to the intrigues of the wily Scots, who clustered in
ambitious expectancy, and in a “dark impenetrable ring,” around their
consanguineous governor. The excellent qualities of Washington’s heart,
his sensible modesty and honest frankness, were the best antidotes to
the poison; but the labors attaching to his office were so arduous,
that his health gave way; his physician insisted on a temporary
retirement; and betaking himself to his estate, he underwent a feverish
illness, which preyed upon him for months.

On recovering his strength, Washington resumed his military career.
The accession of Mr. Pitt, afterward the great Earl of Chatham, to the
English ministry, had inspired life and vigor into the struggle; a new
expedition against Fort Duquesne was planned; and the place falling
into the hands of the British troops, was named Fort Pitt, in honor of
the mighty War Minister. When this happened, Washington resigned his
command and returned to Virginia, as he had previously resolved to do
in case of the enterprise being crowned with victory.

His affections, twice baffled in their objects, were now to find
the peace and repose not seldom, even in the case of men of strong
minds, essential to the achievement of great and memorable actions.
Mrs. Custis, a widow lady, at this time resided in the vicinity of
the provincial capital. She was still in the bloom of youth, gayety,
and beauty, distinguished by wealth, affability, and attractions, and
dignified with the maternity of two children. Besides, she possessed
in rare perfection the domestic graces and accomplishments which,
in the opinion of persons whom experience has divested of glowing
romance, constitute the true fascination of woman. This flower of the
female sex was, indeed, a being too captivating not to have wooers;
and amidst social life and festive enjoyments few, perhaps, could have
perused her various charms without admiration. Washington’s noble
bearing and sage conversation could hardly fail to make an impression
on the gentle heart which her fair form enshrined. He came, saw, and
conquered; and, in the beginning of 1759, they were happily united.
Being now in possession of quiet leisure, Washington, with his matronly
bride, settled at Mount Vernon, to which he had succeeded since the
decease of his brother. The tranquil mansion-house was a most agreeable
residence. In front was a spacious lawn, bounded by blossoming orchards
and pleasant gardens, which reposed in the shade of thriving trees, and
were watered by the broad and deep Potomac. The domestic habits of the
owner of the domain were uniform, and characterized by a regularity
from which he seldom deviated. He rose with the sun, and retired early
to rest. His attention was chiefly given to agriculture, in which,
in accordance with a strong natural inclination, he had always taken
a lively interest. His land was devoted, for the most part, to the
growth of tobacco, which he exported to be sold in the English markets.
The life of an ordinary Virginia planter was, at that date, somewhat
monotonous. He lived during the whole year on his own land, which, in
most cases, lay so near some of the large rivers that ships sailed
almost to his door, and received the produce of his farm to swell the
imports into distant emporiums. In practicing hospitality, he was
generally so profuse that inns were utterly useless. Weary wayfarers,
even without introduction, had only to call at the nearest proprietor’s
house, with the certainty of being heartily welcomed and cheerfully
entertained. He might not indeed be, and seldom was, rolling in wealth;
but that point the guest would soon hear explained with emphasis.
Every colonist availed himself of his privilege as a British subject
to complain loudly that British merchants, by some process or other,
contrived to appropriate the better part of his just profits; and even
Washington, however different from his neighbors in other respects,
scrutinized accounts with a sharpness which shows that he was not
altogether without his suspicions.

The hospitality of the great colonial soldier was displayed on a scale
of magnificence which must have tended to relieve the dullness; and
when at home, he seldom allowed a day to pass without having visitors
of intelligence and distinction. Moreover, he had a keen relish for
field-sports. He hunted, at the proper season, twice or thrice a-week;
was fond of the excitement and recreation which a fox-chase afforded;
was familiar with the use of his fowling-piece; signalized his
expertness against the game which abounded in his preserved grounds,
and fought as courageously in an affray with poachers as he had ever
done in a battle with the French. He was always eager to be useful,
and took a particular interest in the affairs of his parish. He was
recognized by the people in his neighborhood as a man of extraordinary
candor and judgment; insomuch that when they became involved in
quarrels, which there appeared no prospect of otherwise settling
amicably, they were in the habit of resorting to him as a last appeal,
and submitting the case to his reason, justice, and decision, just as
his school-fellows had done in other days:

    “His doom contending neighbors sought――
     Content with equity unbought.”

Indeed, his wish to act without fear, favor, or affection, when thus
consulted, and to promote peace and concord, was so evident, that few
uttered an audible murmur against his arbitration.

On relinquishing his military employment, he had been returned as a
member of the House of Burgesses, and for a period of fifteen years
was successful at each election. It was a rule with him through life
to execute with unflinching diligence any duty he undertook; and as
a representative his attendance was punctual and exemplary in the
extreme. He seldom spoke; he had no longing for oratorical conflict,
and altogether refrained from entering into stormy discussions; but his
acute perception, earnest judgment, and sage prescience, gave him an
influence in the assembly which his wordy, brawling, and disputatious
compeers struggled and strove for in vain. He was in the habit of
studying attentively, and forming opinions with scrupulous impartiality
on the chief subjects under deliberation. In this respect, _Nunquam
non paratus_ might have been his motto. Thus, when the Stamp Act was
imposed on the colonies by Mr. Grenville, he at once assumed a position
of antagonism to the infliction, and concurred with firmness and
determination in the measures of opposition adopted by America. From
this, and his high reputation, he was chosen to command the independent
companies of militia which the colonists had hitherto been privileged
and encouraged to raise; he was sent as a delegate to the Virginia
Convention, and afterward elected as a member of the general Congress,
in whose proceedings he acted a prominent and influential part.

When the second Congress assembled, in 1775, it presented an array
of “fierce faces threatening war.” Blood had already been shed; at
Lexington had commenced that contest which, with few intermissions,
lasted for eight years. The English crown was, at a perilous crisis,
found without competent advisers; Wisdom cried aloud in public
places, without being regarded; and American senators openly and
boisterously invoked the God of battles. Civil strife, fierce and
bloody, was inevitable; and in this emergency Washington was chosen
Commander-in-chief of the forces raised to carry on the momentous
struggle. Yet it can not be supposed that this great man contemplated a
separation from the mother-country without a pang. Even Jefferson, at
this date, declared that in the whole empire there was no individual
who more cordially loved the union with Great Britain than himself;
and hardly any one competent to form an opinion on such a subject can
conceive that Washington, who had given such tokens of patriotism, was
less loyal in his sentiments. His forefathers had fought on famous
fields, and in walled cities, for the crown of England; he himself had
won his laurels under her lion-flag against her hereditary enemies; and
he was, moreover, a man of faith, breeding, and refinement. With such
a person, considerations of such a nature are not readily banished or
suppressed, and there can be little doubt that his patriot soul was
often tossed with contending emotions; like the Saxon nobles whom the
Conqueror, with fire and sword, drove into the Scottish territory, who
felt no respect for the Norman line of kings, but whose hearts lingered
about the scenes where their progenitors had held sway and created
civilization. The tastes and associations of Washington might well
have led him, had an option been granted, to side with the imperial
cause. But the course pursued by Lord North, who, as a statesman, ever
displayed more wit than wisdom, and whom neither the sagacious warnings
of Burke nor the vehement declamation of Chatham could awaken from
a sleepy stupidity, left him no choice. He believed that his native
plains must either be drenched in blood or inhabited by slaves; he
regarded it as a sad alternative: but he did not falter or hesitate in
his course. With engaging diffidence in his own powers he accepted the
responsible position offered; and repairing to Cambridge, where the
insurgent army lay, he proceeded to remodel and improve it to the best
of his ability. In the interval Bunker’s Hill had been fought. The
victory remained with the Loyalists; but the engagement had convinced
them that the foe was not to be despised. Subsequent events fully
confirmed this opinion; and General Howe being under the necessity of
abandoning Boston, Washington was received by the inhabitants with
significant enthusiasm.

Soon after, the Declaration of Independence was published; but events
inauspicious to the cause of the colonists now came onward in rapid
succession. The defeat at Long Island filled their ranks with such
dismay and consternation as put their general’s invincible resolution
to a severe test. New York was straightway relinquished by them, with
considerable loss; a defeat was sustained at Chatterton’s Hill; Fort
Washington was lost; and General Lee was taken prisoner. This was a
period to try the souls of those who had taken up arms against taxation
without representation. Their operations had proved unexpectedly
disastrous; their army had melted away till it seemed but a shadow
of its former self; pardon had been proclaimed in the King’s name to
all who would return to their allegiance. Many persons of wealth,
consideration, and respectability, especially yeomen of strength
and substance, had accepted it on the offered terms; but Washington
remained firm and decided. His fortitude might not inaptly be compared
to that house against which the waves beat, and the rain came, and the
winds blew, but which fell not, for it was founded on a rock. He calmly
represented to Congress the plight to which he was reduced; and the
crisis being such as to silence all querulous opposition, neither the
whisper of envy nor the voice of discontent was heard. Even timidity
was overcome by fear. Indeed the members appear to have been animated
by views similar to those which the elder consul, “an ancient man and
wise,” is made to express when the thirty armies are described as on
their way to Rome:

    “In seasons of great peril
       ’Tis good that one bear sway;
     Then choose we a Dictator,
       Whom all men shall obey.”

And, accordingly, Washington was wisely invested with supreme authority
and dictatorial powers. The army was completely reorganized; and
its dauntless, but firm and prudent leader, resolved to cross the
Delaware, and attack the foes on their own ground. On a December night
he assailed and defeated them at Trenton; and pursuing his advantage,
he gained an important victory at Princeton. Next year, however, the
fortune of war again changed, and Washington fought unsuccessfully at
the fords of the Brandywine and at the village of Germantown. In the
former of these actions Lafayette, inspired with burning zeal for the
American cause, displayed his courage as a volunteer, and was wounded
in the leg while dismounting to rally the retreating troops by his
voice and example.

Ere long the French king recognized the independence of the United
States by a formal treaty; a battle was fought at Monmouth with partial
success; and a French squadron arrived to aid the new allies of the
Bourbons. Nevertheless, an assault made by the combined forces on Rhode
Island proved a failure; and a projected expedition against Canada came
to naught. An intended attack on New York had a similar termination,
and a mutiny among the troops filled the public mind with alarm and
consternation. Still the clear spirit of Washington rose superior to
adversity, and his deep determination was not to be shaken by disaster.

Affairs, indeed, seemed now to be hastening to a crisis; but as the
year 1781 advanced, they began to wear a more favorable aspect. The
cheering news was brought by a French frigate that powerful assistance
might be calculated on; and a combined attack was planned against New
York, but relinquished owing to intelligence in regard to the sailing
of the promised auxiliaries from St. Domingo. When they at length
arrived, York Town, in Virginia, was besieged by the allied forces, and
Lord Cornwallis obliged to surrender.

It now became evident that the unhappy war was approaching its
termination; and the American army, with a prospect of being disbanded,
began to complain of grievances. Besides, many of the officers looked
with so little favor on republican institutions, that, wishing for some
more vigorous form of government, they deputed one of their number to
convey to Washington the suggestion, that they were not averse to his
thoughtful brow being begirt with a diadem. He rebuked the idea with
stern indignation, and requested that it might never again be alluded
to.

In the spring of 1783, intelligence arrived that a treaty of peace had
been signed at Paris, and that the independence of the United States
had been acknowledged by the British Government. Shortly afterward, a
cessation of hostilities was announced, and arrangements were made for
the evacuation of New York. On a November morning, the English troops
finally embarked; a long procession, with Washington at its head, made
formal entry and took possession of the city. At his side――followed by
the provincial functionaries, officers, senators, and citizens――rode
the governor, who closed the proceedings of the memorable day with
a costly banquet. Yet, however flattering to their pride as a new
nation, the ceremony was not altogether unsuggestive of melancholy
considerations. The chief, the greatest, the most conspicuous actor
in it, must have been conscious of mixed feelings; and it was natural
that, a few days later, when parting with his warlike associates,
his emotion should have been visible. He had conducted a great civil
war; he had triumphed where the most sanguine might, without reproach
have despaired; and he had throughout, without an interval, exhibited
high mental dignity. He had earned the position of a prince, and the
proud title of “Father of his country;” won for himself glorious
renown, and achieved national independence for millions. But it was
impossible to look for a moment to the future, enveloped as it then was
in uncertainty, without recollecting――perhaps not without a sigh――that
America was no longer a portion of that mighty empire on which the sun
never sets; reared by Saxon sagacity, and sustained by Norman valor;
constituted by the toil of the wise, and consecrated by the blood of
the brave; and to whose immemorial institutions he had lately been as
much attached as the inhabitants of Kent or Northumberland.

When Washington resigned the command of that army with which he had
outmanœuvred the tactics of successive generals, and brought a war
with the most powerful nation in the world to a triumphant issue,
he was still in his fifty-first year; but he had a right to believe
that his long and continuous services entitled him to repose. He had
affluence and station; he did not covet power; and he looked forward
to the enjoyment of calm, contemplative retirement, till, in God’s
appointed time, he should sleep with his fathers. He therefore went to
Mount Vernon, devised schemes of internal navigation for developing
the resources and extending the commerce of the country, and seems
even to have indulged in prophetic visions of that vast trade which
has since crowded the docks of Liverpool and stocked the warehouses of
Manchester. It was then that he had the satisfaction of welcoming the
visit of Lafayette, whose friendship he highly esteemed, and whose
former services he duly appreciated. They parted with mutual regret;
never to meet again.

While planting his grounds, pruning his fruit-trees, improving
his property, receiving complimentary visits, answering courteous
congratulations, and preparing peacefully to descend the pathway of
life, under the shadow of his own vine and fig-tree――envious of none,
and determined to be pleased with all――Washington became painfully
aware that the system of government then existing did not meet the
wishes and requirements of the American public. Indeed, some were so
apprehensive of fatal consequences, that they were gradually inspired
with the desire of receiving, from among the royal families of Europe,
a prince who should wear a crown, exercise sovereign sway, and control
the conflicting elements then making themselves felt for evil. To pour
oil on the troubled waters, a Convention was appointed to devise a
form of government calculated to give general satisfaction. Washington
was chosen chairman; and, as such, affixed his name to the new
constitution, which, though not coming up to the perfection of ideal
theories, was ratified by the States and adopted by the people.

This scheme――in regard to which Franklin said, “I consent to it,
because I expect no better, and because I am not sure it is not the
best; the opinions I have of its errors I sacrifice to the public
good”――provided for the election of a President. On this being known,
all eyes were turned toward Washington, as the personage in every
respect best qualified, by rank, station, and dignity, to occupy the
eminence. His mind was, indeed, so tinged with the old leaven of
aristocracy, that, in respect to military officers, he had requested
that none but gentlemen should be considered qualified; but experience
had taught him confidence in the aspirations of a free people. Every
thing conspired to fit him to appear as the representative of various
parties, to check the prevalence of extreme opinions, and to “stay the
plague both ways.” When the day appointed for the important business
arrived, he was unanimously elected; and yielding with unfeigned
reluctance to the public voice, he became the first President of the
United States. In this trying situation, his singleness of purpose and
stainless integrity shone forth with unparalleled lustre. He ruled in
truth and sincerity――not to aggrandize himself, but to benefit his
country. Though ungifted with the brilliant qualities which dazzle
an ambitious people, and disdaining the demagogic arts too often
employed to mislead them――his sound judgment, steady mind, and powerful
understanding, enabled him to deal with the difficulties he had to
encounter, and avoid or remove the obstacles that came in his way. He
piloted the vessel he had launched through troublous times. With a firm
hand and a bold heart he maintained the balance between the contending
factions, exhibited a resolution not to be overcome or overawed, and
in 1796 retired from the position to which he had imparted dignity
with the respect, sympathy, and veneration of all parties and all
nations.

This great, intrepid, and admirable man, went down to his grave in
peace and honor in the year 1799, leaving to his country and mankind
a glorious heritage, in a name unsullied by crime or rapacity, and
an example to be held in everlasting remembrance by all future
generations.




BURKE.


The knowledge of Burke was of the most profound, various, and extensive
kind; and his excellence in almost every species of prose composition
conducted him to an eminent rank among writers. Moreover, his fame
as an orator and statesman is not inferior to that of any man who
ever appeared upon the theatre of political affairs; and he is justly
entitled to the credit of having formed and sustained his vast
reputation by genius, energy, and resolution. His own fearless pen
has recorded, for the edification of posterity, that he possessed not
one of the qualities, nor cultivated one of the arts, that recommend
aspiring intellect to the favor of the powerful; he was not made for a
minion or a tool; and he did not follow the trade of winning the hearts
by imposing on the understandings of the people. At every step in his
life he was traversed and opposed; and at every turnpike he was obliged
to show his passport, and prove a title to the honor of serving his
country. The memory of such a person surely merits a larger share of
popular attention than it has hitherto received.

[Illustration: BURKE READING TO HIS MOTHER.]

According to biographers, the family of Burke, which was ennobled
in several of its branches, could boast of ancient lineage and a
respectable position. His grandfather is stated to have been proprietor
of a considerable estate, which was inherited and disposed of by the
illustrious individual who made the name familiar to England and
Europe. This fine old Irish gentleman resided near Limerick; but his
son, having been educated to the profession of the law, carried on a
very large business as an attorney in the city of Dublin. There, on
the 1st of January, 1730, Edmund Burke entered upon his checkered and
extraordinary existence; yet hardly any event could have appeared more
improbable than that the child then born on Arran Quay should, as years
rolled on, become “the philosopher of one era, and the prophet of the
next.”

From the circumstances of his birth Burke was not subjected to the
disadvantage of a deficient education, nor to that of being destined
for pursuits uncongenial to the bent of his mind. His academic course
was, indeed, such as qualified him for the career he was appointed to
run. Being of a delicate frame he was not sent to school at the usual
early age, but taught to read by his mother, a woman of cultivated
intellect. Ere long, country air being thought necessary for his
health, he was removed from the Irish capital to the house of some
relations at Castletown Roche; and there he was placed, for initiation
into Latin, at the village seminary. In this situation he pursued his
studies with juvenile enthusiasm for several years, and then went
home for a brief period, during which he was under pedagogic rule.
Perhaps, however, a residence under the paternal roof was not found
excessively favorable to the mental development, and he was entered at
a classical academy in the county of Kildare, kept by a worthy member
of the Society of Friends, for whom, in the midst of all his subsequent
triumphs, he retained a sincere and grateful respect. On one occasion,
during a parliamentary debate, Burke, with becoming feeling, alluded to
this old teacher as “an honor to his sect;” and, assuredly, it is no
slight compliment to be spoken of in such terms by the greatest man of
an age.

Meantime the youthful pupil applied himself to his books with much
ardor and exemplary industry. He cared not to display his powers, but
stored his mind with that multifarious learning which, in many an
hour of oratorical conflict, furnished him with fine thoughts, lofty
sentiments, and noble imagery. His superiority among the boys at the
establishment appears to have been duly recognized, and was pleasingly
exhibited in cases of emergency. Once, when the assizes were held at
Carlow, he proved his natural versatility in a very amusing way. The
master had, with laudable good-humor, allowed his scholars to have a
holiday, on condition that the more advanced among them should write,
in Latin verse, a description of the procession, and the impressions
which the scene left on their minds. Burke executed the prescribed
task with ability and fullness, and was, no doubt, congratulating
himself on having acquitted himself with credit, when he was earnestly
entreated to prepare a second account of the pageant for a less
gifted class-fellow. Trusting to be supplied by his petitioner with
some slight hints for guidance in this delicate and charitable effort
at versification, the future fashioner of statesmen questioned his
comrade in regard to what part of the ceremony had struck him as most
remarkable.

“Sure,” replied the Hibernian urchin, scratching his head, “I noticed
nothing particular, but a fat piper in a brown coat.”

Dexterously availing himself of the idea thus stupidly suggested,
Burke, in a short time, produced a humorous doggerel rhyme, commencing
with

    “Piper erat fattus, qui brownum tegmen habebat.”

Though his rare faculties were proudly appreciated by the learned
Quaker, who foretold they would ultimately conduct their possessor
to fame and fortune, it is worthy of remark that Burke’s gay, witty,
and vivacious brother, Richard, was generally regarded as the more
brilliantly endowed of the active attorney’s sons. The keen and
anxious eye of their father, however, perceived the superior wisdom
and energy that, even at that date, animated the glowing breast of the
youth who was to stand forward as the terror of Indian oppressors, the
champion of injured ladies, and the marvel of Christendom. Indeed,
sparks of the peculiar sympathy for the poor and desolate, which
breathes through his political discourses, already began to flash
forth with promising brightness and warmth. A humble cottager having
been compelled to pull down his little tenement at the mandate of an
imperious road-surveyor, the young spirit of Burke, who indignantly
witnessed the operation, broke out with vehement scorn, and he
emphatically declared that, if ever he had authority in the realm, no
man should, with impunity, so treat the obscure and defenseless. The
boy is father to the man, and in after years, when his renown was at
its height, he said that his object was not more to save the high from
the blights and spoliations of envy and rapacity, than the lowly from
the iron hand of oppression and the insolent spurn of contempt.

In the spring of 1744 Burke was entered as a pensioner at Trinity
College, Dublin. Two years later he was elected a scholar of the house.
To obtain the latter distinction a candidate had to go through a
successful examination in the classics, before the provost and senior
fellows, after which he was entitled to a small annuity, a vote for
the representatives of the University, and free chambers and commons
for a certain period. But it does not appear that Burke generally
sought opportunities of proving the might of that genius which he must
have felt to be in him. On the contrary, he silently hoarded up that
universal information, which, in other days and in very different
circumstances, he exhibited in forms so grand and magnificent. Thus,
when the proper time arrived, he was able to speak or converse with
eloquence and correctness on almost any subject that presented itself.
He gave much attention to rhetoric, and improved his mind by perpetual
and sagacious reflection. While at college his habits were quiet, his
character unpretending, and his conduct marked by regularity.

Burke had, long before leaving the University, been enrolled as a
student of law at the Middle Temple, but he was in no particular
haste to keep his terms. It is even related that, while studying with
zeal and earnestness at home to improve his capacity and extend his
learning, he was induced to apply for the Logic chair at Glasgow, but
too late to gain his object. At length, seeing no fair field for the
exercise of his talents in the land of his birth, he resolved to betake
himself to London, trusting to achieve for himself, by ability and
industry, a position of honor and independence. He had already devoted
much time to accomplish himself in composition, and written several
essays to counteract the doctrines of a democratic Irish apothecary,
whose daring lucubrations had won their author considerable local
fame. Thus were exercised the rare strength and invincible courage in
political controversy which afterward enabled him to trample many a
potent and well-appointed adversary in the dust. It might have been
that his success in this contest inspired him with the desire of
signalizing his singular prowess in a wider field. At all events he
repaired to the English metropolis.

His journey thither was not undertaken without feelings of sadness;
and his eyes often filled with tears, as, after crossing the Channel,
he was rolled through a country ornamented with pleasant mansions,
neat cottages, and villages, whose cheerful and industrious appearance
he could not help contrasting with the poverty of his native isle.
Agriculture, he says, was his favorite science, and would have been his
chosen pursuit if Providence had blessed his youth with acres. He was,
therefore, highly interested in, and pleased with, its progress in the
country he was now adopting.

At the time of his arrival in London, Burke was by no means unfitted,
by knowledge or experience, to struggle with advantage. His classical
and philosophical acquirements were enormous, and he had no slight
conception of life and society. He was an eager observer of mankind,
and had seen enough of the gay and fashionable while hanging on in
Dublin to acquit himself with propriety in any company to which his
marvelous conversational powers might procure him access. His stories
and anecdotes were characterized by interest and variety. They did
not lose any thing in effect by the look and manner with which they
were set off, nor by the slight Irish accent, which to the last was
perceptible, especially in his colloquial displays. Thus accomplished,
he commenced his career of intellectual triumph by contributing
to periodicals; thereby sharpening his wits and increasing his
intelligence. The character of Englishmen immediately commanded his
respect, and, celebrated as his birth-place ever has been for its
display of female beauty, the graces of Englishwomen excited his
enthusiastic admiration. He complained, indeed, that there was less
regard paid to men of letters than he had been led to imagine, and
that genius was in small danger of being enervated by the patronage
of power. But he probably felt that his must in the end bear him
upward, in spite of every obstacle: so he strove against discontent,
and adhered steadfastly to habits of temperance, keeping his glorious
intellect unobscured by the cloud which is certain to follow
dissipation. The buildings in the wonderful city of which he was now an
inhabitant, struck him as being very fine; and in good time, attracted,
probably, by the descriptions of Addison, he visited the edifices of
Westminster. He was deeply impressed with awe and veneration for the
sacredness and solemnity of the place, and thought that sound and
useful lessons might be learned from the monuments. Indeed, it is not
difficult to conceive what fine thoughts and high imaginings must
have crossed the mind and irradiated the brain of Burke, as, for the
first time, he wandered through the venerable Abbey, and perambulated
that historic Hall, which, in later days, was the scene of the most
surpassing effort of his genius.

While earning a livelihood by literary labor, the income of the
brilliant aspirant was no doubt small; but his industry was unceasing.
He produced essays on various literary and political subjects for
weekly and daily publications, and he studied with singular diligence.
He usually read with a pen in his hand to make notes, extracts, and
reflections. His apprehension was peculiarly quick, and his memory
retentive; and he could thus travel with rapidity over a wide field.
But it is impossible to work incessantly without impairing the health.
A somewhat severe illness caused him to resort, for medical advice,
to Dr. Nugent, a physician of skill and talent, who, considering that
proper care and attention were more likely to prove beneficial than any
medicine administered in the dust and solitude of the Temple, kindly
invited the invalid to take up his quarters for a time under his roof.
Burke wisely accepted the hospitality thus offered.

During the restoration of his patient to health and vigor, the Doctor
found in his daughter an efficacious assistant; Burke found in her an
amiable and agreeable companion, who soon made an impression on his
heart. In such circumstances, even “the greatest philosopher in action
the world ever saw” acted like other mortals; he told his enamored
tale, and they were forthwith united. This step was most fortunate;
the lady proved herself eminently worthy of his affection; and when
years had brought trouble and anxiety in their train, her husband often
declared, that all his racking cares departed whenever he crossed the
threshold of his own house.

Burke had now a double motive to exertion. Animated by that love of
fame――

    “Which the clear spirit doth raise
     To scorn delights, and live laborious days.”

and at the same time by that sense of duty which is not the least
laudable incitement to mental energy, he applied himself to the
production of some work that might establish his name; and accordingly
his “Vindication of Natural Society,” in which the writer covertly,
and with admirable effect, imitated the style and principles of
Bolingbroke, made its appearance. The treatise exhibited much
historical knowledge, versatility of genius, and sagacity of mind; but
it failed to meet with the success or notice which its ingenious irony
might have been expected to secure. It was published in the year 1756,
and soon followed by his “Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful,” which so
much pleased and delighted the author’s father, that a remittance of a
hundred pounds was the consequence.

From this auspicious period Burke’s celebrity and importance may be
dated; and his reputation speedily secured him a worthy position among
men of letters and eminence. Sir Joshua Reynolds sought his society;
and at the hospitable mansion of the immortal painter he formed the
acquaintance of Dr. Johnson, who declared his new friend to be the
greatest man living. “Take up whatever topic you will,” he was in the
habit of saying, “Burke is ready to meet you. If he were to go into a
stable and talk to the ostlers for a short time, they would venerate
him as the wisest of human beings. No person of sense ever met him
under a gateway to avoid a shower who did not go away convinced that he
was the first man in England.”

In the year 1764 Reynolds proposed the formation of a club, which
met at the Turk’s Head, and soon comprehended several of the most
distinguished literary and political characters of whom Great Britain
boasted. It long flourished without a name, but was at length
recognized as the Literary Club. One of the nine original members was
Oliver Goldsmith, who had been a college contemporary of Burke, and
afterward gone to study medicine in Edinburgh. He had since traveled
over much of the Continent, holding learned disputations at the
different Universities that came in his way, where success entitled
him to a dinner, a night’s lodging, and a small sum of money. He had
now thrown himself into the republic of letters, and much amused the
brilliant circle at the Turk’s Head by his strange eccentricities and
ludicrous blunders.

At their meetings Burke was found fully a match for Johnson; and it was
observed, that he was almost the only man living from whom the huge
sage would bear contradiction. The subject of Bengal was sometimes
under discussion; and Burke, even at that period, showed an extent and
accuracy of information in regard to it rarely to be met with.

Burke had already projected and brought into operation the “Annual
Register,” which was for years carried on under his sagacious
inspection; though political matters soon occupied so much of his
attention that he had little leisure for literary pursuits not strictly
connected with affairs of state: but his introduction to public life
was gradual. In the year 1759 he became acquainted with _Singlespeech_
Hamilton, son of a Scottish advocate who had come to England at the
Union. This mysterious individual had, a short while previously, made
the solitary but successful oratorical effort from which his nickname
was derived, in a debate long remembered as one of the greatest in
which the parliamentary personages of that generation had partaken.
In 1761 he went to Ireland as Secretary to the Lord-lieutenant, and
Burke accompanied him as a friend and adviser. For his services on this
occasion the latter was granted a pension of £300 a year, which he
sacrificed, after enjoying it for eighteen months, on his rupture with
Hamilton.

Soon after making this sacrifice, which did not prevent him tendering
his aid and drawing his purse to forward the interests of his whimsical
countryman, Barry the painter, Burke had the gratification of playing a
part in the political world. On the dismissal of George Grenville from
the head of affairs, Lord Rockingham, chief of the Whig magnates, was
intrusted with the duty of forming an administration. That nobleman,
having been filled with admiration of Burke’s occasional papers in the
“Public Advertiser,” was led to desire the acquaintance of the writer,
who speedily became his private secretary, and member of parliament for
Wendover. He was, not, however, “swaddled, rocked, and dandled into a
legislator.” He set himself studiously to comprehend official forms and
parliamentary proceedings, used every means to accomplish himself in
voice and action――with that view even frequenting the theatre to derive
hints and instruction from the tones, looks, and gestures of Garrick.
Both by solitary study and debating at a society, he prepared himself
to take an active part in the business of the House of Commons. He made
his first speech on the bill for repealing the American Stamp Act, with
an eloquence which excited the admiration of all present, and evoked
the valuable praise of the great Earl of Chatham. Sir John Hawkins
expressed his amazement at the extraordinary eminence to which Burke
had suddenly ascended; upon which Dr. Johnson said,

“Sir, there is nothing marvelous in it; we who know Burke feel sure
that he will be one of the first men in the country.”

On the fall of the Rockingham ministry, to which his genius had
imparted some degree of dignity, Burke wrote and circulated a plain and
simple defense of its measures. He soon after made an ironical reply
to his own pamphlet in the form of a letter, signed “Whittington,” and
professing to be the production of a tallow-chandler, who aspired to
the office of lord-mayor. In this epistle a severe attack was made on
the cabinet which Lord Chatham had just put together.

By this time Burke, from his intimacy with patrician senators, was
known and appreciated in the world of fashion, where his talents
and acquirements qualified him to shine, in spite of those social
demarcations whose lines are not always justly drawn. He was an
especial favorite, and won golden opinions in the “blue-stocking”
circles; and he was wisely careful not to mortify the vanity nor incur
the wrath of learned ladies, by pointing out their errors or exposing
their fallacies. His position in Parliament was soon ascertained and
ere long recognized. On the very day when he broke ground in the House
of Commons, the first Pitt addressed it for the last time, and men were
in doubt which of them was the more splendid speaker. Ere two years had
elapsed, Burke had established his oratorical supremacy.

About this period a tract of Grenville’s exhibited so much ill-nature
that the Rockingham party felt the necessity of retaliating.
Accordingly, Burke published his “Observations on the Present State of
the Nation.” The popular error that a man of genius can not deal with
practical matters as successfully as those who are less richly endowed
by nature, was the consolation of mediocrity very much earlier than the
days of Burke, and from him it now met with a signal refutation. He
executed his task with complete triumph on every point of consequence,
and proved his mastery over the dry, minute, financial, and statistical
details, which were supposed to form the stronghold and peculiar
province of his sharp but narrow-minded adversary.

Burke had, ere this, purchased a pleasant villa near Beaconsfield, in
Buckinghamshire, where he could enjoy rural privacy and rest his eye on
lawns, woods, meadows, and corn-fields. Attached to his residence was
land worth about six hundred a-year, of which he retained the greater
part in his own occupation, that he might indulge in the satisfaction
of farming. Without adopting any expensive system, he proved himself
one of the most successful agriculturists in the county. When living
in town he had various articles of produce carted up with his own
stout nags, which were employed one day to draw his carriage, and on
the next to plow the soil. As a country gentleman he exerted himself
to the utmost to ameliorate the condition of the peasantry among whom
he lived; he was daily earning their blessings by the schemes he
devised for their benefit. He planned various institutions for enabling
mechanics and laborers to save something from their wages against the
season of sickness, and his hand was ever open as day to the poor or
distressed. Thus he won and enjoyed the respect and admiration of the
neighborhood. To his numerous guests his hospitality was overflowing.
He neither affected style nor studied display, but regaled them with
substantial fare, and delighted them with cheerful and entertaining
conversation. Among his visitors he counted Dr. Johnson, for whose
talents and virtues he always expressed a sincere esteem, and by whose
death-bed his voice faltered with grief and emotion.

As one of the freeholders of Bucks, Burke drew up a petition concerning
the Middlesex election, which was approved of by a county meeting, and
presented by him to Parliament. He likewise set forth his views and
opinions of the political affairs of the day, in a treatise entitled
“Thoughts on the Present Discontents,” wherein he advocated the
claims of the great Whig connection to the government of the empire.
In the House of Commons he maintained their interests with unrivaled
eloquence; he led their ranks, in opposition to Lord North, during the
American War; and he was justly regarded as by far the most formidable
assailant whom that minister had to encounter in the arena of debate.
His magnificent speech on American taxation was considered one of the
most extraordinary on record; but his fanciful flights and profound
reasoning were often too little adapted to the taste of his audience
to be relished or followed; and his contemporaries became careless of
attending to orations which, nevertheless, will last as long as the
English language. His own friends, who crept stealthily away to avoid
listening to his rich effusions, were, on their publication, surprised
at the delight experienced in perusing them. Such was their treatment
of an orator who spoke for posterity.

A dissolution occurring in 1774, Burke was, without his knowledge, put
in nomination as a candidate for the representation of Bristol. He
had just been elected for Malton, in Yorkshire, when the intelligence
of this unsought distinction arrived; and straightway he proceeded
to the ancient city. There his eloquence was exerted with such force
that it penetrated even the heads of the wealthy traders in rum and
sugar, who, after a protracted contest, placed him at the top of the
poll. An amusing anecdote is related of his colleague in the canvass――a
colonial merchant. After one of the mighty orator’s most glowing
addresses to the inhabitants, the worthy individual feeling himself
quite overpowered by the torrent, instead of attempting to explain his
views to the audience as expected, exclaimed with grave but excited
earnestness, “I say _ditto_ to Mr. Burke! I say _ditto_ to Mr. Burke!”
It happened, however, that when the next general election took place,
Burke had rendered himself so unpopular to the constituency by his
support of the Catholic claims and of the Irish Trade Acts, that he
judged it prudent to decline a contest; and he again took shelter in
the borough of Malton, which he represented during the remainder of his
parliamentary career.

The party, which Burke had all but created by his intellect and
determination, had, meantime, been reinforced by an ally of rare
prowess and extraordinary capacity. Charles James Fox, a younger son
of that Lord Holland who had sprung into political life under the
auspices of Sir Robert Walpole, and been ennobled for services rendered
to Lord Bute, had entered the House before he was of legal age. For
a while Fox held a subordinate appointment in the Government of Lord
North, but was dismissed from it on account of some refractory votes.
He then, in spite of his unfortunate gaming propensities, made himself
one of the most accomplished debaters ever heard, by speaking every
night but one during five sessions. He became the pupil of Burke, from
whom he frankly avowed having learned more than from all other men and
authors. Gradually he superseded his master in the leadership, and
their united efforts forced Lord North from power.

The Marquis of Rockingham now returned to his former position, and
Burke received the appointment of Paymaster-general, then one of the
most lucrative in the state, and was admitted into the privy council.
But, in defiance of all fairness and gratitude, he was excluded
from the cabinet. The death of Lord Rockingham, in 1782, terminated
his party’s tenure of office; and Lord Shelburne being called on to
undertake the duties of government, intrusted the lead of the Lower
House to Pitt, then little more than twenty-three years of age. Upon
this was formed the celebrated Fox and North coalition which speedily
drove Lord Shelburne into retirement, though his youthful colleague
had struggled with signal skill, dauntless courage, and commanding
eloquence to baffle the efforts of the terrible foes ranged in fierce
opposition. The Duke of Portland then became nominal premier; Fox and
his ancient enemy, Lord North, were the principal secretaries of state;
and Burke calmly went back to the Pay-office. But Pitt succeeded in
defeating their East India Bill, and returned to power in the capacity
of prime minister.

Burke on this set out on his crusade against the abuses and tyranny,
which had long occupied his thoughts. Fourteen years previously the
affairs of India had become a subject of Parliamentary deliberation and
national interest; and Burke had proceeded to investigate the matter
with restless energy. The East India Directors had proposed to send him
out at the head of a commission for the reformation of abuses, with
discretionary powers. He declined the offer, but applied himself with
persevering industry to acquire a thorough knowledge of the question.
The time had now arrived when it was to be turned to account; and
forthwith commenced the long and fierce contest, in the course of which
he shook the old oak roof of Westminster Hall with his denunciations of
the great Eastern culprit.

Warren Hastings, originally sent out to India as a poor orphan, whom
his guardian was glad to be rid of, landed in 1785 on the free soil of
Britain, after having maintained and extended the English empire in the
East, administered its affairs with singular capacity, and gathered
a large fortune for himself. Burke believed him to be sullied with
various crimes, and within a week of his triumphant arrival gave notice
of a motion seriously affecting his character as a ruler. With fiery
zeal, relentless animosity, and unflagging industry, he commenced and
carried on the assault, till, in February 1788, the memorable trial
began in Westminster Hall, which was gorgeously fitted up for the
occasion. On the third day Burke addressed the court, and his opening
speech occupied four sittings. The passion and energy of the orator
were worked up to a pitch which overbore, for a time, the conviction
of those who entertained friendly feelings for the accused. With all
the ardor of his great soul, with all the powers of his splendid
imagination, and with all the might of his marvelous intellect, he
denounced in the loftiest language the misconduct with which Hastings
stood charged. Ladies shrieked and fainted; men muttered and execrated
the dark deeds his rich mind and brilliant fancy portrayed with all the
eloquence of the highest genius; and even the feelings of the criminal
were so carried away by the resistless flood, that he almost believed
himself guilty. The effect, however, was evanescent; the ceremony
proceeded languidly; and years after it was brought to a termination by
the acquittal of the Governor-general. Meantime, on the breaking out
of the French Revolution, Burke, indignant at the removal of ancient
landmarks, took a most gloomy view of its tendency, and was thus
separated in opinion from his former associates, who did not hesitate
to express their satisfaction at the event, and their admiration of the
principles that had produced it. A party rupture was the consequence;
and in 1791, during a Canadian debate, Burke, who had previously
declared that he and Sheridan had parted forever, solemnly renounced
all political and private friendship with Fox. “My separation,” he
stated, “is a principle, and not a passion. I hold it my sacred duty
to confirm what I have said and written by this sacrifice. And to
what purpose would be the reunion of a moment? Henceforth I can have
no delight with him, nor he with me.” Even when on his death-bed, he
adhered sternly and steadfastly to this resolution, and declined an
interview with his old friend and pupil. He had already published his
“Reflections on the French Revolution,” which soon overshadowed and
agitated Europe. Dublin University conferred on him the degree of
LL.D. for the wondrous power with which he had pleaded for established
governments; and Oxford communicated to him an address of thanks.
Though long exposed to multitudinous annoyances, and irritated by
inferior men, his intellect had not suffered in the slightest degree.
Doubtless, his counsels in regard to Continental affairs were somewhat
fierce, arbitrary, and impracticable, as was not unnatural at a time
when blood was flowing like water. But his genius and knowledge were
still gloriously conspicuous; and this crowning effort of his powers as
a writer was more than equal in strength, ability, and imagination to
the splendid achievements of his earlier and more vigorous years.

In 1795 a pension was bestowed upon him for his long and faithful
services to the State. This, although the slightest reward which a
grateful monarch could have bestowed on his most gifted subject for
labors on which Englishmen, to the latest generations, will look back
with pride, as they profit by his burning sentences and words of
wisdom, brought upon him most rancorous attacks. He was still mourning
the loss of his only son, a youth of great promise; but, nevertheless,
produced an answer characterized by his tried ability and scornful
sarcasm. But no defense was necessary; and he who had sacrificed his
repose, pleasures, and satisfactions to what he considered his duty
to the country, and who had ever, without fear, favor, or affection,
obeyed the dictates of conscience and the promptings of patriotism,
need have cared little for the puny assailants who now crawled forth
with their ragged mops to bespatter the wide and broad mirror that
reflected his unrivaled greatness to an admiring world.

At length, in 1797, his bodily health began, rapidly to decline, though
his mental faculties continued unimpaired to the last. On the 8th of
July in that year he expired, after a brief struggle, and was buried in
Beaconsfield church, where a plain mural tablet has been erected to his
immortal memory.




NECKER.


Ardent admirers of such mental and imaginative power as was displayed
by the marvelous man whose career has just been sketched, will be
unable to discover any striking signs of that sublime quality in
Necker. Yet history hardly presents a more impressive and agreeable
instance of moderate talents honestly exercised, and resolute industry
unflinchingly practiced, conducting an obscure individual――in spite of
countless obstacles――to boundless wealth and supreme distinction, in an
exclusive country of which he could not even boast of being a native.
His example is, therefore, of peculiar value to youth, and eminently
worthy of attentive consideration, as showing what may be achieved by
integrity and perseverance against all disadvantages.

The forefathers of this celebrated person whose name justly occupies
so conspicuous a place in the political annals of continental Europe,
are stated to have been Irish Protestants, at a time when there was
particularly little personal safety to those holding the doctrines of
the reformed faith. At a troublous period they fled from persecution,
and sought refuge in Prussia, whence another generation found their way
into Switzerland. Thus it happened that Necker was born in Geneva,
on the 3d of September, 1732, where his parents were in respectable
circumstances, and where his father held the Professorship of Public
Law. The boy was doubtless educated with care in his native city, whose
beautiful situation on the Rhône and at the end of Lake Leman, with its
fine walks and pleasant prospects, furnished a fitting scene wherein to
indulge his youthful and ambitious aspirations after fame and fortune.
But at the same time the manners and customs of the place conveyed to
him impressions still more salutary, and predisposed him in favor of
those habits of rigid virtue on which he subsequently built his high
power and enviable reputation, as also those sound religious principles
which, in after life, distinguished him and his house from those among
whom his lot was cast.

The opinion that the true genius is a mind of large general powers,
determined by accident to some particular direction, is rather
confirmed than otherwise by the instance of Necker. His natural bent
was toward political and philosophical studies, and had they been
encouraged and pursued, he might have become a fanciful and brilliant
thinker; but his parents did not regard his prepossessions with
satisfaction. On the contrary, they deemed it better that his time
should be devoted to the lucrative labor which fortune supplies to a
votary of activity, energy, and intellect. While commerce fills the
purse it clogs the brain; and, though highly favored in his efforts,
Necker was not luckier than others in this respect. In earlier years he
is said to have written two comedies; but the extraordinary struggle
which must have been required to metamorphose a friendless clerk into
one of the richest men of his time would naturally tend to crush and
destroy any of the more precious particles of talent and enthusiasm
with which he had been endowed by nature. His uncompromising virtue,
rare amiability, common sense, amazing industry, and well-proved
philanthropy, are the claims which his name possesses to the respect
and gratitude of posterity.

Regarding the wishes of his parents as law, Necker sacrificed his own
inclinations, and was sent at the age of fifteen to acquire a knowledge
of mercantile affairs in the establishment of Vernet, a banker in
Paris. Notwithstanding his aspiring vein, it would, indeed, have been
difficult at that critical period of his existence for any one to
imagine the possibility of the young Genevan adventurer rising to be
first minister of royal France――figuring as the centre of literary
society in the most polished of European capitals, and exercising a
mighty influence on the destinies of the world.

Nevertheless his ability and industry were soon proved, and brought him
into notice; his employers duly considering, of course, that it was
their interest to do so, afforded him such assistance as was likely
to redound to their own profit and advantage. His perseverance was
encouraged; he rapidly ascended to a place of trust and confidence
in the banking-house, and thus laid the foundation of that character
for care and aptitude in business which, as years passed on, made
him Chairman of the French East India Company――the highest of his
commercial distinctions.

The reputation, however, on which he rose to political eminence had to
be created by unflinching assiduity, and the exhibition of intellect.
Female inspiration was essential to its proper formation in the capital
on the Seine; and presently an influence of no unworthy kind was
present to nerve the hand, elevate the mind, and fire the soul of the
young banker’s clerk, struggling, though unaided, to make a name and
form a reputation.

As has been well observed, “Women are the priestesses of predestination.
It is the spirit of man that says, I will be great; but it is the
sympathy of women that usually makes him so.” That influence, in a very
pure and elevating degree, it was ere long Necker’s good fortune to
find. While in the employment of Thelusson, a rich banker, he was in
the habit of visiting at the house of Madame de Vermenoux, who had just
engaged a remarkably learned and accomplished Swiss governess, of
captivating appearance, to teach Latin to her son. This foreign
instructress, though young, had run no ordinary career. She had
encountered and borne up against troubles and disappointments with
heroic courage and dauntless energy. In the gay days of girlhood she
had been wooed, won, and sighed for by no less eminent a person than
the embryo historian of the Roman empire. In obedience to the mandate
of his family, who relished not the idea of so strange a match, Gibbon
philosophically abandoned, though he could not altogether forget,
the learned and beautiful object of his attachment. The death of her
father, the venerable pastor of a mountain village, left her quite
unprovided for; but, far from sinking under the circumstances, she
conveyed her surviving parent to Geneva, where the liberal education
she had received enabled her to maintain both by teaching young
females. On the death of her mother she had been induced to remove to
Paris, and thus met the man whose aspirations she was to guide and
whose ambition she was to direct. Necker was immediately impressed by
the charms and accomplishments of the erudite damsel, and, on becoming
better acquainted, her grave style of beauty and noble character of
mind threw over him a potent spell, and produced upon his heart an
effect of no ordinary kind. Then, however, he could offer nothing but
a devoted heart, with such worldly prospects as the enthusiasm of
youth, especially in such circumstances, can readily conjure up. Thus,
in consequence of their mutual poverty, they were under the harsh
necessity of submitting to the delay of years. Soon, however, did the
hero of this somewhat romantic engagement emerge from that chill
obscurity which aspiring spirits like his can ill brook. He became a
partner of the flourishing banking-house in which he was employed, and
hailed the sun of fortune’s better day all the more eagerly that it
gave him the power of completing their union without any violation of
prudential considerations. Madame Necker’s ardent desire for honorable
fame speedily exercised an effect on her husband. It quickened his
efforts after distinction, and prompted him to apply his intellect to
huge adventures and important speculations. By his transactions in corn
he realized an immense fortune, which was employed and increased by
large financial operations with the Government.

Meantime he was steadily advancing in social favor, to which his
amiability and uprightness highly recommended him, and he was chosen
envoy for the republic of Geneva at the court of Versailles. When
that State was, in some crisis, contemplating the appointment of an
embassador to Paris, the Minister of the Crown assured Necker that such
an envoy was altogether unnecessary. “I will have nothing to do with
any one in this affair but yourself, Monsieur Necker,” he said. This
office opened up a passage for him to aristocratic circles, where his
known wealth and accurate information secured him a tolerable degree
of respect. As he rose to affluence and social importance, his natural
inclination began to assert its dormant claim; he withdrew from active
business, and devoted much attention to the pursuits toward which his
heart had originally been turned. He had studied finance with singular
determination; and his extensive knowledge of that subject, as shown in
several pamphlets written at this period, excited much interest, and
won him considerable praise.

In 1773 he carried off the prize at the Academy, with his _Eloge de
Colbert_; and soon after won even greater distinction by his able
essay, entitled _La Législation et le Commerce des Grains_. His
information was extensive, and his views of questions as intelligent
and comprehensive as his training and education admitted of their
being. His regular and precise habits were, doubtless, rare as the
conjugal devotion which raised the wonder of sneering skeptics and gay
courtiers. His conversation, though a little pedantic, was lively,
refined, and instructive, and his manner characterized by the courage
of honesty.

Indeed the time had now arrived when the upright character, financial
skill, and approved ability of the Swiss adventurer, rendered him a
personage whom the Government could not overlook. His disposition
was so amiable that it inspired love and esteem in those who were
best acquainted with him; while his generosity and munificence had
fascinated the masses, and won him popular applause. Besides, his
intellect had impressed itself on public feeling, and on the national
mind. He enunciated the doctrine, not under all circumstances
agreeable, that no new tax was lawful till all the resources of
economy had been tried; and he held opinions in favor of retrenchment
before the idea was in fashion with the multitude. Such a man was
unquestionably of no small value in the administration of affairs. The
finances were in all but hopeless disorder, and war was apparently
approaching. Therefore, though he was, as a foreigner, distasteful to
the nobles, and as a Protestant an object of aversion――not unmingled,
perhaps, with dread――to the clergy, urgent necessity overbore
considerations which might not have yielded to a less imperious
monitor, and he was nominated Director-general of the Finances. To
allay the foolish murmurs of the privileged classes, he was not
admitted to a seat in the cabinet; and to the complaints of the clergy,
who naturally remonstrated against a Protestant being intrusted with an
office of such importance, the prime minister of the day used this very
significant and conclusive argument: “I will give him up to you, if you
will pay the debts of the State.”

Having thus placed his foot on the ladder of power, Necker speedily
made his influence beneficially felt. Various reforms, great and small,
in the administration of the national finances, testified that a strong
hand and a clear head were enlisted in the service of a country that
much required them. He commenced his official career by prudently
declining to receive the emoluments pertaining to the post he occupied,
and forthwith signalized his accession to office by suppressing some
six hundred places about the Court and Treasury. His early education
had strongly impressed him in favor of free institutions; and his
system of government was essentially popular. His plan was, to render
as public as possible the national accounts and expenditure, and to
form provincial assemblies, in which local affairs and taxation might
be discussed and debated. His schemes, however, were not in any respect
agreeable to the courtiers, and he was assailed by a continuous shower
of pamphlets from the members of the Parliament of Paris. Under these
untoward circumstances he deemed a place in the Council requisite, that
he might be in a proper position to defend his measures when they were
under the deliberation of that body.

“What! you in the Council, and you do not go to mass!” exclaimed the
First Minister of the Crown, with every feature of his countenance
marked with surprise.

“Sully did not go to mass, and yet he was admitted to the Council,”
replied the Swiss financier, with becoming dignity; but in vain. The
minister offered to comply with his request, if he would become a Roman
Catholic; but, as in duty bound, Necker resolutely refused to sacrifice
his religious convictions to political advancement, and sent in his
resignation to the king. His majesty, painfully aware of the value of
the services he was thus about to lose, accepted it mournfully; and
those who had coalesced to overthrow the obnoxious statesman rejoiced
for a brief season over the triumph they had, for their misfortune,
achieved.

Meantime Necker had made a noble and philanthropic use of the influence
he possessed, and of the immense wealth which he had amassed by his
talents and industry. His private character was so unexceptionable, and
his morality so unimpeachable, as to contrast remarkably with those
among whom he acted so prominent a part; and, with the assistance of
his precious wife, he had done much to relieve and alleviate the wants
and distresses of the poor and indigent. Madame Necker had expressed a
wish to devote her talents to literature, but her husband hinted his
objection to such a course being pursued; and she betook herself to
those acts of charity and beneficence, to which he proudly appealed
in a day of darkness and gloom. Thus, at a great cost of time, labor,
and money, they had founded the hospital in Paris which still bears
their name; and there, in contemplating the good effected by their
exertions, they found consolation in times of trouble. On the day
preceding his resignation, they went thither; and the Sisters of Mercy
who attended the patients sang portions of the Psalms――the only poetry
with which they were acquainted――and loudly extolled the Neckers as the
helpers and benefactors of the poor and needy. The fallen minister was,
perhaps, much more moved with such demonstrations of affection than by
all his trials, and felt a pang at losing a position which gave him
the power of conferring blessings on his less-favored fellow-creatures.

Necker now retired to St. Omer, a short distance from Paris, where he
soon had conclusive proofs of his wide popularity. He received hundreds
of communications from people of the highest rank and importance,
regretting his removal from office: the road between his residence and
the city was crowded with the carriages of persons who went to pay
their respects to him in his retreat; and ere long he had it in his
power to decline the proposals of three foreign sovereigns, who each
hastened to offer him the management of their exchequers.

In 1787 he published his celebrated attack on Calonne, then presiding
over the financial department; and so bitter did the controversy
become, that the king judged it necessary to banish the ex-minister
twenty leagues from Paris. Next year, however, the feeling against his
successor became so strong, the monetary embarrassments so perplexing,
and the public excitement so great, that there appeared no other
politic course than to recall Necker from his retirement. Accordingly
he was privately applied to by the queen, through the Austrian
embassador, to resume his former functions; but he declined doing so
without possessing complete control. He was, therefore, recalled, as
a kind of financial dictator. His return was a triumph of the most
brilliant description. He was welcomed along the road from Bale with
expressions of joy, gratitude, and admiration, by the inhabitants of
the district. The day of his entry into Paris was kept as a festive
holiday, and the popular enthusiasm manifested itself in shouts of
applause: but he came too late to be permanently of service to the
disordered and agitated state. Few men have ever met with so hearty
a reception from their fellow-subjects; and Necker had sufficient
ambition and vanity not to be altogether insensible to the glowing
triumphs of such an hour. Yet, when congratulated on his recall, under
circumstances so flattering, he regretfully remarked――“Ah, would that I
could recall the last fifteen months!”

Nevertheless, his influence was, as anticipated, speedily and
beneficially felt in the restoration of public credit, and the relief
of the capital from the famine which had threatened and terrified its
inhabitants. Events had, indeed, arrived at a crisis which baffled the
strength of his guiding-hand and the resources of his busy brain; and
he soon found questions arising which the public excitement prevented
him from dealing with, or settling, to advantage. The wearisome and
invidious duty of being responsible for proceedings over which he had
no control, was his for a brief period; and he, unfortunately, lacked
the qualities which enable a public man to stand and save himself and
others in an age of revolution. His popularity vanished as the storm
approached; and, at length, on the 4th of September, 1790, sick
at heart, and tired of contending with difficulties which no human
power could have subdued, he finally resigned the high office which,
in ordinary times, he was capable of filling with so much honor to
himself, and so much advantage to the country, disappeared from the
stage, and was quickly forgotten amid the excitement and bloodshed of
a revolutionary tempest. He betook himself to Coppet, and felt his
banishment from the moving world less than most men who have been
compelled to relinquish power. He had that admiration of his learned,
virtuous, and amiable wife, which swallowed up such considerations.
Her influence over his heart was as unlimited as was her devotion to
his wishes. Though she was somewhat cold, formal, and precise, in his
eyes she seemed perfect, and he had ever regarded her with a feeling
approaching to idolatry; and in days of adversity she shone forth, and
exhibited domestic love, noble truth, and high-souled purity. On her
death, in 1794, Necker was solaced by the affection and friendship
of their accomplished daughter, Madame de Staël, since generally
recognized as one of the most distinguished women who ever lived. In
1800 he was visited by Bonaparte, when marching to Marengo. Necker
expired in the year 1803, and was buried in the grounds at Coppet, by
the side of his departed spouse.

This famous man was not endowed with that splendid genius which has
elevated many from obscure situations to positions of power and
dignity; but his industry was untiring, and his integrity beyond
question. He rose with credit, by habits of steady and incessant
exertion and independence, which were transferred from one sphere to
another, adhered to with resolution, and might have proved successful
in raising the land of his adoption to a condition of enviable wealth
and prosperity, but for the mighty event which tortured the foresight
of the most sagacious, and defied the valor of the bravest.




PITT.


The name and memory of a great statesman, who has led and ruled senates
by the might of eloquence, carried measures beneficial to millions, or
impressed immortal principles on public conviction, are generally, in
spite of political disputes and disagreements, regarded by a free and
favored people with feelings of respect, admiration, and gratitude.
They are associated in the mind of a community with periods of peril or
prosperity, and recalled by each succeeding generation with national
pride. “Great men,” said Burke, “are the guide-posts and land-marks
of the state;” and, assuredly, history presents few more spotless or
splendid reputations than that of the son of Chatham, who came forth
and signalized his prowess as a ripe politician, accomplished debater,
and skillful tactician, prepared for the work and warfare of the senate
by his comprehensive views in what have been termed the proper sciences
of a statesman――those of government, politics, commerce, economics,
history, and human nature――at an age when many are making their first
and last crude efforts at public speaking, or expending their faculties
in frivolous dissipation and enervating luxury.

Doubtless the name which Chatham had made immortal was a tower of
strength; and his brilliant example could hardly fail to inspire with
a love of kindred fame the son on whom his fondest hopes rested.
Indeed, there were both interest and curiosity experienced as to
whether the power of the Pitt family would be increased or diminished.
And, moreover, there was not wanting that encouragement to noble and
patriotic exertion which is usually given by a generous public to the
sons of great and popular ministers of state. It may, therefore, be
truly said, that

    “With prospects bright upon the world he came,
     Pure love of virtue, strong desire of fame;
     Men marked the lofty path his mind would take,
     And all foretold the progress he should make.”

The family to which this illustrious man belonged was rich and
respectable, though not patrician in origin or descent. The Pitts were
for ages settled in Dorsetshire, but at length one of them became
Governor of Madras, and brought home from the East that celebrated
diamond, the largest then known to be in existence, which was sold to
the Regent Orleans for more than three millions of livres, and took its
place as the most precious of the crown jewels of France. The son of
this fortunate functionary was a gentleman of Cornwall, and hereditary
patron of some boroughs; for one of which, Old Sarum, his second son,
a cornet in the Blues, was returned to Parliament. The talents of the
latter were speedily exerted in such a way as to give offense to Sir
Robert Walpole, who manifested the annoyance he felt by dismissing
him from the army: but nothing could restrain the course of that
terrible eloquence, which, in reality, was hardly under its possessor’s
control. Instead of depending, as others had done, on oligarchies and
“pocket-lists,” he relied for support on the middle classes, then
struggling into importance, and, with their aid, ere long became the
greatest war-minister who ever presided over the destinies of England.
He married a daughter of the political house of Grenville, whose
members played so conspicuous a part in the affairs of the eighteenth
century, and had several children, of whom William Pitt, the second
son, was born at Hayes, in the county of Kent, on the 28th of May, 1759.

The boy destined to exhibit so wonderful an instance of precocious
statesmanship received the rudiments of his education under the
paternal roof; and, although so delicate in health that he could only
devote half the wonted time to study, his progress was remarkably
rapid, and his talents evident to all who knew him. When eight years
old, he was seen by the mother of Fox, who instinctively prognosticated
the rivalry between her distinguished son and the young prodigy.
The contention which had long existed between their sires no doubt
suggested this idea to the anxious parent; and when she marked the
singular cleverness of the little boy, and observed the wonderful
propriety of his behavior, the maternal solicitude sharpening her
penetration, enabled her to augur the fierce and bitter strife which
was to shake senates and shatter parties. Lord Chatham was justly
proud of his son, and predicted that he would add honor to the name;
nay, more, he expressed a belief that he would some day be one of the
first men in Parliament; and, if a minister of state, that he would
arrive at the highest dignity. He therefore gave his utmost assistance
in forming the future premier’s mind, and incited him to lofty and
laudable aspirations. These labors were not in vain; and the Great Earl
lived long enough to feel assured that a useful and brilliant career
lay before the object of his tender care.

One evening a member of Parliament proposed to take the veteran
statesman’s two boys to hear a debate in the House of Commons; but he
refused to allow the younger to go. “If William,” he is reported to
have said, “heard any arguments of which he did not approve he would
rise to controvert them; and, young as he is, he has not even in that
assembly many equals in knowledge, reasoning, and eloquence.” He must
indeed have been a “marvelous boy,” to be spoken of even by a fond
father, at such an age and in such circumstances. At this date he is
stated to have had a turn for poetry, and to have composed, along with
his brothers and sisters, a play in rhyme, which was acted by them
before some friends of the family. He subsequently, while at college,
produced a tragedy, which, when at the head of public affairs he
calmly committed to the flames in presence of a friend, by whom this
emanation of his poetic faculty had just been eagerly perused and
spoken of in terms of high admiration; though perhaps the merits of the
piece might not altogether have justified the praise.

Pitt’s earlier education was conducted by a tutor, but, as has been
stated, under the vigilant superintendence of his father, who noted
his progress, and rejoiced at the constant indications he gave of
superior endowments. Haughty, vehement, and despotic in his nature
as that extraordinary minister――the pride of England and the terror
of her enemies――was to foes and friends in public life, no such
characteristics were allowed to interfere with the quiet and happiness
of his domestic circle.

In his fourteenth year, young Pitt was sent to the University of
Cambridge, and entered at Pembroke Hall, where Dr. Prettyman, afterward
Bishop of Lincoln, was his tutor. In age and appearance, indeed, he
was a mere boy; but he was by no means boyish in mind or intellect.
His acquirements were wonderful, and he could converse on various
subjects with all the seriousness of manhood. He was much liked by his
youthful compeers for his lively and amiable disposition; and at the
same time esteemed by the tutors on account of his decorum in conduct
and diligence in study. His manners in private life were then, as ever,
frank, easy, agreeable, and utterly devoid of the cold arrogance and
unbending demeanor he exhibited in his senatorial capacity.

Lord Chatham had desired and intended that Pitt should become a
candidate for academical honors, but the gifted youth was prevented
by weak health from keeping the requisite terms. Nevertheless, he
obtained the degree of A.M. in compliment to his illustrious parentage,
without any public examination. His juvenile contemporaries on the
occasion testified their approval of his being thus distinguished by
interrupting the public orator with loud and vehement acclamations. One
of his warmly-attached college friends was Wilberforce, who entered
upon public life about the same date as himself.

When Pitt left Cambridge, he was accomplished in no ordinary degree.
In Latin authors he rarely encountered a difficulty; and he had, even
at his entrance, been capable of translating pages of Thucydides with
scarcely an error. He was intimately acquainted with the beauties and
defects of the works he had perused. Indeed those who observed the
ease with which at first sight he read obscure books, state, that his
facility would have appeared beyond the compass of human intellect, if
they had not actually witnessed it. During his residence at college
his diligence in learning was exemplary, and his success remarkable.
His education was conducted with a view to the struggles of the bar as
well as the conflicts of the senate; his attention to study was of the
strictest kind; and he displayed eminent qualifications for entering
on either path of life. He made himself intimately acquainted with the
legal history of the country, studied the policy of modern nations as
well as their constitutions and forms of government, and acquired much
knowledge of the origin, prosperity, and decline of states that had
existed and been influential in remote times. His peculiar quickness
of conception rendered his progress in these branches of information
comparatively easy; and when he left college, after an unusually long
residence, his mind was as perfectly formed as mere theory could make
it. He long retained his love for ancient learning; and even amid the
bustle of politics and the devising of budgets and subsidies, was
seldom without some work from which to refresh his mind with classical
lore.

Lord Chatham’s letters written to his son about this period overflow
with parental affection and judicious advice. After the too eager
and ambitious youth had recovered from a severe illness, he was thus
touchingly addressed by his justly gratified father:

“How happy the task, my noble, amiable boy, to caution you only against
pursuing too much all those liberal and praiseworthy things to which
less happy natures have perpetually to be spurred and driven. I will
not tease you with too long a lecture in favor of inaction and a
competent stupidity――your two best tutors and companions at present.
You have time to spare; consider, there is but the Encyclopedia. And
when you have mastered all that, what will remain? You will want, like
Alexander, another world to conquer.”

After removing from the University the younger Pitt repaired to the
Continent, and spent some time at Rheims, still resolutely pursuing his
studies and adding to his stores of knowledge.

In 1778 his famous father died, under circumstances which rendered
him dearer than ever to the country, of whose honor and interest he
was ever so vigilant a guardian, and whose name he made so great, and
dreaded among the nations of the earth. Pitt, who had been present
when Lord Chatham fell down in the House of Lords while raising his
enfeebled voice to cheer the drooping spirits of Englishmen, appeared
at the public funeral as chief mourner, and ere long proved the
inheritor of his father’s popularity. Between them had existed the
strongest affection and the most complete confidence.

Having duly kept his terms at Lincoln’s Inn, Pitt was called to the bar
in 1780, and went the western circuit with sufficient encouragement to
justify expectations of success in his legal pursuits. Lord Mansfield,
indeed, declared, that if he persevered in the profession he would
be regarded as one of its chief ornaments. But it was perfectly
natural that he should rather aspire to parliamentary distinction;
and accordingly he engaged in an unsuccessful contest for the
representation of Cambridge University. It was, however, for Appleby,
a borough under the influence of the Lowthers, that he was first,
through the friendship of the Duke of Rutland, returned to that house,
which was so often stilled into silence as he rose to speak, delighted
as his grand voice swelled in every ear, and filled with thunders of
applause as he, with a coolness and self-possession unfelt by all
listeners, resumed his place with a look of lofty contempt for his foes.

Pitt was not in any way bound by the political tenets of the patron
of the constituency which he represented. He was free to act on his
own convictions. He took his seat in January 1781, and next month made
his first speech to the House, in support of Burke’s motion for an
economical reform in the Civil List. He was eminently successful, and
displayed an ease, fluency, and accuracy of language which riveted
attention and sustained public hope. It is related, that when he
had accomplished this his first parliamentary success, Fox hurried
up to express his warm congratulations. As they were conversing, an
honorable, gallant, and experienced member passed them, and remarked,
“You may well praise his speech, for, excepting yourself, no man in
the House could have made such another; and, old as I am, I expect
to see you both battling it within these walls, as I’ve seen your
fathers before you.” Fox looked rather sheepish and disconcerted at
this somewhat blunt and embarrassing compliment; but Pitt answered with
happy promptitude, “I’ve no doubt, General, you would like to live to
the age of Methuselah.”

At the close of the session some one having remarked to Fox that Pitt
promised to be one of the first orators ever heard in the House, that
great man unhesitatingly answered, “He is so already.”

Pitt still continued to practice his industry and exercise his
intellect at the bar, and was highly complimented for his ability by
more than one legal sage; while in Parliament he was receiving the
highest marks of admiration for his speeches against the ministers of
the day, and their conduct in regard to the American War. At length
Lord North was compelled to retreat from power, and Lord Rockingham
empowered to form an administration. Pitt would have been a valuable
auxiliary; but, from not belonging to what Lord Chatham had called
“the Great Revolution families,” he was disqualified, like Burke, from
sitting in the cabinet, and prudently declined taking office. He soon
after submitted his motion for an inquiry into the representative
system, with the view of lessening the influence of the dominant
aristocracy. His efforts in this respect were unsuccessful, and he
afterward endeavored circuitously to accomplish his object by creating
a host of plebeian peers. Whatever opinions he may have subsequently
entertained in regard to the necessity of Parliamentary Reform, were
rendered vain and impracticable by the startling events which speedily
changed the face of Europe. Meantime his family rapidly increased;
he was described as a greater orator even than his father, and as
possessing the full vigor of youth, with the wisdom and experience
of the maturest age. Gaming――the vice of the period――he resolutely
refrained from.

On the death of Lord Rockingham his administration fell to pieces;
and Lord Shelburne became First Minister of the Crown. The latter
nobleman was eminent for his intelligence, knowledge, and variety
of information; a great linguist, fond of science and letters, and
actuated by popular principles. He appointed Pitt Chancellor of
the Exchequer, and intrusted him with the management of the House
of Commons, within eighteen months of the young statesman’s having
obtained a seat in Parliament. In this most responsible position he
displayed consummate powers in debate, and proved himself entirely
worthy of the confidence reposed in his ability and discretion. The
opposition leaders conceived that they had been injured by Lord
Shelburne, and showed no mercy to his chief colleague, either on
account of his youth or hereditary claims to public respect; but Pitt
faced their embattled host with haughty defiance. It certainly required
no ordinary courage to do so.

Burke’s great soul was at that time heavy; he was not insensible of the
humiliation he had recently experienced; and, like the Northumbrian
Hotspur before breakfast, he was ready to vent his hoarded wrath on
any one who appeared as an antagonist. Besides, he little relished
the spectacle of the assembly, whose brightest ornament he was, being
ruled by a lad who had not donned manly garments, when he was achieving
conversational triumphs over Dr. Johnson, and contesting the palm of
eloquence with “the great Commoner.” Sheridan even went the length of
comparing the ministerial leader to one of Ben Jonson’s characters,
“the angry boy in the ‘Alchymist;’” and Fox relentlessly poured
forth against him the terrible torrent of his stirring and impetuous
eloquence.

There is something touching in the idea of a struggle against such
men having been maintained by a youth of twenty-three. It must,
indeed, have been a marvelous sight to mark that young minister, with
his plumes thus scattering on the Parliamentary gale, rise from the
Treasury bench to do battle against his puissant foes. His form was
tall, thin, and stately; his eyes blue, but bright with pride and
intelligence; and on his wide brow, and in his disdainful air, were
legibly written that proud and lofty scorn which had deeply struck
its root in his imperial mind. Facing the Opposition with a glance
of stern indignation, he gravely rebuked the untimely levity of the
sage champion of oppressed India, and declared that he could not
approve of the indiscretion which so unseasonably ran away with good
sense and sober judgment. Then he chilled the spirit of the defiant
author of the “School for Scandal,” by a contemptuous allusion to his
theatrical pursuits, than which, perhaps, no thrust would have been
more likely to tell with the gifted, but graceless and eccentric,
senator’s patrician coadjutors. And ere his enemies had recovered from
their surprise at a stroke, which the extreme and peculiar difficulty
of his situation alone could justify, he turned indignantly upon the
eminent rival of his life, branded him with sarcastic reprobation,
and defended his noble colleague in another place from the strictures
passed upon him. Then rising, for a time, above party strife and
personal considerations, he denounced the coalition which was being
formed as an event stretching to a point of political apostasy,
that not only astonished so young a man as he was, but amazed and
confounded the most veteran observers of the human heart; and he
exclaimed with glowing eloquence and fervent patriotism, “If this
baneful alliance is not already formed, if this ill-omened marriage
is not already solemnized, I know a just and lawful impediment; and,
in the name of the public safety, I here forbid the bans.” His high
spirit sustained him in all attacks; and he delivered one of his most
splendid orations at this period. But all his efforts were in vain;
the Shelburne ministry had been weak from its formation; and it fell,
after a brief but not inglorious tenure of power, during which Pitt
had been gratified with the opportunity of proving his capacity for
administration, and the power to defend what he did. Indeed, so clearly
had his talent for government been shown, that the king was desirous
that he should himself undertake the duties of prime-minister;
but feeling that the strength of the party to which he belonged
was as yet unequal to sustain him in the fierce struggle which, in
such a case, would inevitably have ensued, he wisely refrained from
grasping prematurely at a prize so flattering and fascinating to
young ambition. However, it came into his hands much sooner than he
could have contemplated. Having declined to lend his support to the
administration of Lord North and Mr. Fox, and suffered a second defeat
at Cambridge, he spent several months in France, and returned with the
intention of resuming his legal pursuits. But events soon occurred
which led him to abandon this resolution. His rivals had incurred much
unpopularity; and their India bill was regarded with such dislike and
apprehension, that the Peers thought fit to reject it, and by their
vote terminate the official existence of its authors. On this taking
place, Pitt was again requested to assume the reins of power; and
he bravely consented. The position was arduous and difficult in the
extreme; and he had scarcely completed his twenty-fifth year. He had
to encounter, almost single-handed, an opposition conducted by men
whose powers, genius, and eloquence might well have daunted the heart
of the boldest, and appalled the imagination of the most experienced
ministers; and they were supported by a party infinitely superior in
numbers to that which followed him. Though they had formerly sought his
services with eagerness, yet when a motion was made for the issue of
a writ on his acceptance of the premiership, they met it with a loud
and general shout of derisive laughter and provoking ridicule; many,
who might otherwise have hastened to proffer their support, hesitated
to enlist under a leader so young and inexperienced in affairs of
state; and they confidently predicted his immediate fall from the
dangerous eminence to which he had ascended at so early an age. Under
such circumstances, Pitt was not upheld by the family or political
connection which other ministers had used; but he had much confidence
in his own resources, and in the support of the crown and people, who,
whenever an opportunity was presented, proved that he had not erred
in his calculations. His opponents it must be admitted, had no slight
reason to predict his speedy retirement and his inability to conduct
the public business; for in a House of Commons decidedly hostile to
his pretensions, he had not a single ally capable of making himself
formidable, with the exception of his chosen friend Dundas, better
known as Lord Melville. With such aid as that skillful and sagacious
debater could render, the tall, slender, stern, and dauntless minister,
struggled with credit through a session against an enraged majority and
a host of terrible foes, panting for a swift revenge. Their desire,
however, was not destined to be gratified. Several resolutions,
declaratory of the incompetence of ministers to conduct the business of
the realm, were, indeed, carried; their speedy resignation frequently
seemed inevitable; but the king encouraged them to persevere against
the difficulties with which they were encompassed; the country, on
being appealed to, ejected a hundred and sixty of Pitt’s opponents from
their seats; and he received the thanks and the freedom of the city
of London for the uprightness and disinterestedness he had exhibited.
Pitt was, as he might well be, proud of, and emboldened by, his immense
popularity; and when the new Parliament assembled in the month of May,
1784, he had to encounter an opposition so numerically feeble, that
his arduous duties were entered upon with some degree of satisfaction.
He was now in a position to maintain his ground; and that he could do
so against the fierce and unsparing attacks of such potent adversaries
as Burke, Fox, and Sheridan, amply proves the care, attention, and
industry with which, by hard and continuous study, he had fitted and
prepared himself to enact so great and heroic a part.

Pitt, as has been stated, was the pupil of Lord Shelburne, first
Marquis of Lansdowne; and at that distinguished nobleman’s house he
became acquainted with Dr. Price, a clever Dissenting Minister, who
furnished him, among other suggestions, with his original scheme of
redeeming the National Debt by means of a Sinking Fund, which, in 1786,
he developed and submitted to the House, in a speech of six hours’
duration; and it was accepted without a division.

But the aspiring and ambitious statesman, however austere and absorbed
he might be, had other arrangements to make, besides re-organizing a
party, and, as the head of it, devising vast financial operations. It
was necessary to find fair and bewitching ladies of rank to smile upon
his efforts, and render his side attractive; and there can be no doubt
that in this important respect Fox was much more propitiously situated.
He had also to countervail the advantage which his great antagonist
derived from troops of aristocratic friends, by arraying under his
banner the adventurous genius and rising intellect of the country. His
bearing in public was peculiar, and certainly not such as to attract
the affectionate sympathies of his contemporaries; he displayed little
of “the soft green of the soul,” and his manner was utterly unbending.
Yet so enormous was his influence out of doors at this early period
that he was solicited to represent numerous constituencies; but he
preferred being returned, by a large majority, for the University of
Cambridge, which had twice previously shut the door in his face, and of
which he was afterward chosen High Steward.

On entering the House, he was in the habit of stalking along to the
Treasury bench with a severe aspect and a scornful air, scarcely
acknowledging the presence of even his most intimate friends and
devoted adherents. When he rose to speak every tongue was hushed; his
tones were lofty and arrogant; his sentences rolled forth fluently, and
swelled with delightful harmony; and every word was heard with amazing
distinctness. His speech delivered in 1791, on the slave-trade, is
stated to have been the finest effort of his oratorical faculties; and
his unreported war-speech, in 1803, was so surprisingly excellent that
Fox, in replying, said that the orators of antiquity would have heard
it with admiration, probably with envy. He had the power of speaking
with the utmost clearness, though when the process of mystification
was necessary no one could perform it with more skill or effect. That
eloquence of which Lord Chatham had been too often the slave seems to
have been completely under the control of his favorite son.

In private life Pitt was, as has been already stated, amiable in
disposition, buoyant in spirits, and warm in friendship. He was not
insensible to the charms of female grace, but office was “the pride
of his heart and the pleasure of his life.” When a match between him
and Mademoiselle Necker was proposed by her father, he is said to have
answered, half jestingly, that he was already wedded to his country.

The schemes of Pitt for raising Great Britain to a state of high
material prosperity were frustrated by the outbreak of the French
Revolution, whose causes appear to have baffled the comprehension of
the most sagacious, and whose consequences defied the foresight of the
most prophetic. His entrance upon official life had been signalized by
a treaty of peace, and his policy was founded on its maintenance; but
he was urged by his new allies, who followed Burke and Windham, to
support the war against France, and thus gratify the propensity of “an
old and haughty nation, proud in arms.” The philosophy of Burke threw a
halo around ancient institutions, and Pitt formed the great league for
their defense. The spirit of Englishmen was roused; they clamored for
war; and forthwith that long, terrible, and momentous contest, which
was brought to a glorious close on the field of Waterloo, was entered
upon.

Pitt continued to administer the affairs of the empire till 1801.
He had been successful in accomplishing the Union with Ireland, and
was anxious to carry a measure for the relief of the Roman Catholics
of that country. However, he was foiled in this intention by the
determination of the king and the feelings of the public. He then,
suddenly and unexpectedly, retired from the helm of the state, and gave
a guarded support to the ministry of his successor, who had formerly
filled the Speaker’s chair, and who was subsequently raised to the
peerage as Lord Sidmouth. That personage and his colleagues concluded,
in 1802, the Peace of Amiens, which was of short duration; and they,
being found inadequate to the functions they had, at a dark, awful,
and perilous period, undertaken, were forced to retire in 1804. Then
Pitt returned to power, and “bade the conqueror go forth,” nor in vain;
but his situation was perplexing in the extreme. With shattered health
and depressed spirits he was exposed to attack from every species of
assailant, though unaided, except by the ardent genius of Canning――his
most gifted, eloquent, and distinguished disciple. He was not destined
much longer to endure the struggle. The news of the defeat of the
allied armies at Austerlitz came with a most crushing effect upon his
great and proud soul, and he sunk with rapidity. He was cheered in his
last hours by the intelligence of the glorious victory at Trafalgar,
but all hopes of recovery had passed away. His old tutor, who had now
been promoted to the bishopric of Lincoln, attended his dying couch,
and solicited him to join in devotional prayer. Then answered the
expiring statesman, with that voice that had often thrilled listening
audiences, and taught them that they were in presence of a ruler of
mankind――“I fear that I have, like many others, neglected my religious
duties too much to have any ground to hope that they can be efficacious
on my death-bed. But,” he added, with fervor, “I throw myself entirely
on the mercy of God.” He then joined in religious exercises with piety,
calmness, and humility. On the morning of the 23d of January, 1806, he
breathed his last, at his residence on Putney Heath.

A public funeral to his mortal remains, a national monument to his
memory, and a sum of money to discharge the debts contracted by him
while toiling in the service of the state, were voted; and he was
interred in that corner of Westminster Abbey where the ashes of
so many famous statesmen, who have shaken senates with the fierce
conflict of oratory, repose in peace together. He was, indeed, well
worthy of every token of respect which a great and enlightened nation
could thus bestow; for though men may and do differ as to his genius
for legislation, his success in administration, and the propriety
and effects of his achievements, there are few who can contemplate
without admiration his high talents, his majestic eloquence, and the
zeal he ever manifested to serve the country which he loved so well,
without reference to pecuniary gain or the gratification of mere vulgar
ambition.




LORD ERSKINE.


Among the great men and accomplished orators who, during Pitt’s long
and arduous tenure of office, strove energetically to curb his will,
humble his pride, and exalt his celebrated rival, none was more
conspicuous for ability and eloquence than the immortal Erskine, though
it was not in a senatorial capacity that he displayed, to their full
extent, those vast powers, or achieved the oratorical triumphs which
added lustre to an ancestral name, and formed a reputation so splendid.

Thomas Erskine, unquestionably one of the most brilliant, courageous,
and irresistible advocates who ever appeared at the English, or indeed
at any, bar, was born on the 10th of January, 1750, in the ancient
and historic city of Edinburgh. He was the third son of the Earl of
Buchan, a Scottish nobleman of long and illustrious descent, but in
circumstances so reduced and different from those enjoyed by the
race for many centuries, that his yearly income was less than is now
obtained, with ease, by not a few banker’s clerks. Some small portion
of the family estate still remained, and on it an old castellated
residence, probably in as ruinous a condition as the famous Wolf’s
Crag, and, therefore, uninhabited by its proprietor. Had the Caledonian
thane been a single man, and unblessed by connubial ties, he might have
run a career similar to that of the great novelist’s proud, haughty,
and restless hero, “the last Lord of Ravenswood.” But he had prudently
married the daughter of a Lothian baronet, who speedily brought him
several children: so he passed his life in chill poverty, and died in
the odor of sanctity while at Bath, seeking consolation in the eloquent
preaching of Whitefield, which was said to make sinners tremble as if a
lion were roaring among them.

Although it is likely that this exemplary earl was a justice of the
peace, and rather more than probable that there were lawsuits in
the family, it does not appear that, previous to the chancellor’s
birth, the repose of the noble countess was disturbed or agitated by
such dreams as heralded the Spectator’s introduction into existence.
However, that patrician matron was held in esteem as a woman of pious
character and aspirations. She took pains to bring up her sons in the
way they should go, and instruct them in the rudiments of education.
She grounded them thoroughly in the Presbyterian catechism, and so
imbued their young minds with the spirit of religion that Erskine, in
after life, was in the habit of devoutly ascribing each piece of good
fortune to a special interposition of an over-ruling Providence.

At an early age he was placed at the High School of the Scottish
metropolis, then the most approved seminary north of the Tweed; and
there he remained for several years. His natural talents shone forth;
he distinguished himself sufficiently to be generally at the top of
his class; and no doubt, also, he proved his courage and prowess in
the boyish exploits undertaken in the neighborhood, and the juvenile
warfare daily earned on in the play-ground. It was well for him to be
exposed to such an ordeal, for the path that lay before him was not
gaily strewed with roses, but thickly “beset with thorns and briers:”
so also, though in a less degree, was that of his witty, cheerful, and
able brother, Harry, afterward Lord Advocate for Scotland and Dean of
Faculty.

When Erskine had reached the age of twelve, his high-born parents
removed to St. Andrew’s, with the view of adopting a style of living
more in accordance with their narrow finances than could be pursued
by people of “note and quality” even in the Scottish capital. At St.
Andrew’s he attended the grammar-school for a while, and subsequently
took advantage of some classes in the college of the old town; though
it appears that his opportunities of profiting by that ancient
institution were extremely limited. Nevertheless, his talent appeared;
he manifested a strong love of books, and he derived from those
within his reach a considerable amount of miscellaneous information,
which opened up his mind and fired his ambition. Bright dreams of
future eminence began to illumine his young heart, and, feeling the
urgent and paramount necessity of doing something for his support and
advancement in life, he expressed a decided preference for the learned
professions, and a desire to have his time and energies employed in the
pursuit of one of them.

The requisite means, however, were wanting to gratify his inclination
in this respect; and his parents were compelled to state, that the best
thing they could do to promote his interest was to have him placed
in some man-of-war as a midshipman. The prospect of donning a blue
jacket and cocked hat, and of the consequent adventures――generally so
pleasing to the juvenile imagination――was by no means so fascinating
to the clever, studious, and intellectual young “honorable” as might
have been expected; but, after some ineffectual efforts to make matters
more to his liking, he felt himself bound to endure what he regarded as
a hard fate, and was accordingly embarked about the completion of his
fourteenth year. Doubtless the usual parting-scene was enacted with all
due formality. Gil Blas is made to state that, when he left home, his
parents made him a present of their blessing, which was all that he had
ventured to expect, for the very competent reason that they had nothing
else to bestow; and, no doubt, Erskine was similarly favored. Perhaps,
also, the noble earl would gravely admonish the young sailor not to
trifle or hurt himself with his sword; his mother would give him a last
embrace; and his sisters would, with tears, give evidence of their
grief.

The next few years of Erskine’s life were passed on board ship,
where, however uncongenial the service, he gave all due attention
to discipline, and besides found time for improving his mind and
increasing his stores of knowledge. When ashore, he made a point of
seeing something of life in the various places where he happened to be;
and those who recollect his fine and beautiful passage about the Indian
chief, in his speech for Stockdale, will hardly question the use he
at this period made of his rare faculties. Having probably drawn his
ideas of naval life from the interesting descriptions in the pages of
“Roderick Random,” it is not wonderful that he found his situation more
tolerable than he had been led to anticipate. He particularly enjoyed
himself while stationed at Jamaica, relished its picturesque scenery,
and experienced the delightful novelty of dancing at dignity balls with
quadroon damsels, who chattered in broken English, exhibited grinning
rows of ivory teeth, and whose white dresses contrasted strangely with
their colored skins and their dark rolling eyes, which gave evidence
rather of their African than their European descent.

Though unfortunately, as it then seemed, engaged in pursuits for which
he had no real vocation, the aspiring Scot struggled manfully onward
in his profession. Nor did he fail in after life to make judges and
juries aware that he had profited largely by his naval experience,
when engaged in cases connected with marine affairs, as he frequently
was from his knowledge of technical phrases and other matters. Meantime
he, at length, had the comfort of being appointed acting-lieutenant in
the “Tartar,” and of making a voyage homeward in that capacity; but on
arrival in England, finding that the ship was to be paid off, and that
he would, from this circumstance, be reduced to his original rank, he
desperately resolved to tempt the seas no more.

About this period his father’s earthly existence terminated; and
Erskine, who appeared as one of the mourners, was much impressed with
the solemnity of the funeral obsequies. Having abandoned all thoughts
of a naval career, he turned his thoughts to a military life, and
had sufficient influence to obtain an ensign’s commission in the 1st
Regiment of Foot, with which he straightway went to Minorca. His
commission had cost all the money he possessed, and an application for
a small allowance had been refused by his eldest brother, the eccentric
Earl of Buchan, who afterward, on this ground, boasted that the future
chancellor owed every thing to him. Yet, under these inauspicious
circumstances, he contracted a romantic marriage with a young lady of
respectable parentage, which luckily proved more propitious than is
usual with unions formed under circumstances so forbidding.

While stationed in Minorca, though there appeared little prospect
indeed of his acquirements ever being turned to account, he devoted
himself with remarkable assiduity to the cultivation of his mind, by a
profound and earnest attention to the English classics. In this way,
by long and deep study, he became most familiar with the works of
Shakspeare and Milton; so that, with a very slight knowledge of Latin
authors, and almost none of Greek, he――a native of the north――rendered
himself a consummate master of the English tongue. His tastes were
thoroughly intellectual, and he even indulged them by officiating as
temporary chaplain to the regiment; to which he not only read prayers,
but preached two sermons from the drumhead, with no small measure of
success.

On returning to England, Erskine obtained six months’ leave of absence,
part of which he spent in London. While there he had the advantage
of meeting, conversing with, and encountering in discussion, no less
eminent a person than Dr. Johnson, attended by his faithful dog and
biographer. This was at the house of Sir Alexander Macdonald; and the
“young officer in the regimentals of the Scots Royals,” attracted much
attention by the fluency, precision, and vivacity of his discourse. At
the same date Erskine appeared to advantage as the author of a pamphlet
on the abuses of the British army, which had an extensive circulation,
and procured him some fame. Soon after this he was promoted to a
lieutenancy, and for some time longer endured the disagreeable process
of marching with the regiment from one place to another. His family
and his dissatisfaction gradually increasing, a gloomy cloud seemed
to hang over his existence; and there was ever before him the dismal
prospect of his life proving a long series of imaginings never to be
realized, and of aspirations never to be gratified.

Under such circumstances, while he was quartered in a provincial town,
a great thought was born within him. One day, to drive away care,
dispel annoyance, and perhaps to gratify a rational curiosity, he
strolled into the assize court, where the great Lord Mansfield was
presiding, with his wonted serene and impenetrable dignity. Perhaps
birds of Erskine’s feather were rarely seen in such haunts. At all
events, his regimentals quickly attracted the eye of the veteran judge,
who, struck, no doubt, by the peculiarly elegant and aristocratic
appearance of the singularly intelligent-looking officer, even
condescended to inquire who he was. On being informed that he was a
younger son of the late Earl of Buchan, and very much in the same
position in which the noble, learned, and influential Chief Justice
might have found himself, but for the good fortune which had early led
him to fatten and flourish in the pastures of the South, the latter
kindly accommodated the lieutenant of foot with a place beside him on
the bench, and courteously explained the case that was being tried.
Thus seated by a man who had raised himself, by his genius, from the
oatmeal porridge and aristocratic poverty of Scone Palace to wealth
and an illustrious position, it struck the aspiring and discontented
subaltern that here was a sphere in which his intellect might be
exercised with advantage and renown. He therefore availed himself of
his distinguished countryman’s politeness, which took the shape of an
invitation to dinner, to state the hardship of his lot, and explain his
views. So truly great a man as Lord Mansfield would hardly, at such a
moment, forget his own early trials and struggles. In any case, his
young acquaintance was rewarded with some slight encouragement, and the
sage advice to consult his friends. Erskine’s surviving parent readily
approved of the plan; and, between jest and earnest, she said he must
be Lord Chancellor. Accordingly, having formed his plans, he was
admitted as a student of law at Lincoln’s Inn, and, at the same time,
entered himself as a fellow-commoner of Trinity College, Cambridge,
where in spite of narrow means, his wit and talent soon brought him
into notice. The sale of his military commission produced him a
serviceable sum of money; and, divesting himself of scarlet uniform,
he proceeded to accomplish himself in the composition of English. An
amusing specimen of his skill in versifying is a parody of Gray’s
“Bard,” which gained him some applause. It was produced on the occasion
of his being detained from dinner at the College hall by the tardiness
of his hair-dresser, and begins with this not very complimentary
stanza:

    “Ruin seize thee, scoundrel Coe!
       Confusion on thy frizzing wait!
     Hadst thou the only comb below,
       Thou never more should’st touch my pate.
     Club, nor queue, nor twisted tail,
     Nor e’en thy chatt’ring, barber, shall avail,
     To save thy horse-whipped back from daily fears,
     From Cantab’s curse, from Cantab’s tears!”

Having taken the honorary degree of A.M. in 1778, the future
defender of Lord George Gordon was called to the bar in the same
year. When settled in London, he practiced his oratorical powers at
debating-clubs, and pursued his legal studies in the chambers of a
special pleader; yet it does not appear that his knowledge of the
law was ever very profound, notwithstanding his possessing, in some
measure, a legal intellect. His domestic arrangements were on the most
economical principle; there is even a tradition to the effect that his
honorable spouse was under the necessity of acting as washerwoman for
their family. His fare was of the humblest description; his dress was
remarkable only for its shabbiness; he frequently found it no easy
matter to provide the necessaries of life for the passing day; and he
was heard thanking God that, out of his own family, he did not know a
lord. It appears that his acquaintance with attorneys was still more
limited in extent. Being complimented on his health and spirits, he
answered sportively that he ought to look well, having nothing else to
do, as had been remarked of somebody’s trees.

But a man with the blood of a long line of earls in his veins, and with
the consciousness of already having given proof of superior endowments,
was not likely, while enduring galling poverty, to be wanting in
aspirations after fame, or to lose an opportunity of winning a name and
bettering his circumstances. Erskine felt within him both the stirrings
of ambition and the capacity to do and dare with success, if an
occasion were presented. His affairs were probably at the worst, when
accident threw Captain Baillie in his way.

That brave and gallant officer had, as Lieutenant-governor of Greenwich
Hospital, written and published a statement of abuses existing in the
establishment, reflecting with particular acerbity on Lord Sandwich,
first lord of the Admiralty. For this pamphlet Baillie was forthwith
suspended by the Board, and a prosecution commenced against him by some
of the less important individuals, whom he had assailed in pursuance
of what he regarded as the performance of his duty. While the case was
in prospect of being tried, Erskine happened to meet the redoubted
captain at a dinner-party, and, without being aware of his presence,
expatiated on the subject of the prosecution with so much warmth and
animation, that though they were not introduced on that occasion, the
ex-lieutenant-governor declared that the briefless barrister should
be one of his counsel; but as there were to be four seniors, the
latter naturally despaired of receiving any attention. However, at a
consultation, when the others were inclined to consent to a favorable
compromise, Erskine respectfully dissented, and advised them to stand
the hazard of a trial; whereupon the captain swore a round oath, and
cried, as he caught the future occupier of “the marble chair” in his
strong arms, “You are the man for me!” When the case came on, the
seniors were heard at great length on behalf of Captain Baillie;
and the last of them, Mr. Hargrave, being in some way indisposed,
was obliged to retire several times during his lengthened argument,
and thus so protracted the proceedings, that on his concluding Lord
Mansfield said that the remaining counsel should be heard next morning.
This was precisely what Erskine desired, and indeed appeared almost
providential, as it afforded him time to arrange during the night
the heads of what he was to say. Besides, he had the advantage of
addressing the court with refreshed energies and revived faculties.
When the judges took their places next morning, he rose from the back
row, and delivered a speech of such marvelous ability, that it has
since been regarded by sagacious critics as the most brilliant forensic
display ever witnessed under similar circumstances. As he left the
hall attorneys flocked around to congratulate him on his extraordinary
triumph, and from that memorable day business flowed in upon him.
Being asked how he could so boldly face a venerable judge like Lord
Mansfield――the very type and figure of justice――his feeling reply was,
that he fancied his children were tugging at his gown, and saying, “Now
is the time to get us bread!”

Erskine was next selected, on account of his naval intelligence, to
draw up the defense to be spoken by Admiral Keppel, on his trial.
This he did with much success; and the admiral, on being acquitted,
presented him with bank-notes to the amount of a thousand pounds,
which he flourished in triumph before his friends, exclaiming, with
the almost boyish and mirthful fancy, ever freely indulged in private,
“_Voilà_ the nonsuit of cow-beef!”

The skill, dexterity, and eloquence, together with the complete
devotion to the interests of his client, which he displayed in the
conduct of cases, led to an extensive and lucrative practice; and in
1781 he was retained as counsel for the silly but then enthusiastically
Protestant Lord George Gordon, whom he defended with brilliant power
and signal success. In 1783, though having then been only five years at
the bar, and delivered for a still briefer space from the horrors of
“cow-beef” and threadbare garments, it was thought advisable to confer
on him a patent of precedency. This gave him the privilege of donning a
silk gown and sitting within the bar. It was likewise deemed prudent to
have him brought into Parliament, and he was returned to the House of
Commons as member for Portsmouth, to try his skill as a debater among
the giants who then ruled the Legislature. The result was by no means
gratifying to his numerous friends and admirers, who really seem to
have entertained the unreasonable expectation that he was to trample
Pitt in the dust as easily and proudly as he had done the nameless
creatures of Lord Sandwich. In fact, his acquaintance with political
matters was limited, from the keen and earnest attention which he had
given to his professional pursuits; and his new position was so utterly
different from that to which he had been accustomed, as to render him
somewhat like a fish out of the water. In Westminster Hall, his ardor,
his enthusiasm, the sparkle of his piercing glance, the grace and
nobleness of his figure, the freedom and celerity of his movements,
the clearness and flexibility of his voice, the surpassing beauty
of his diction, the correct taste with which he conceived and the
singular felicity with which he executed most difficult flights, and
his figures of speech characterized by a boldness which unexceptional
success alone could redeem from the charge of temerity, had fascinated
juries, startled dignified sages of the law out of their propriety, and
commanded the admiration of experienced advocates. But in the House of
Commons his ardent spirit was chilled, his enthusiastic temperament
damped, and his eloquent tongue made to falter by the scornful stare,
the contemptuous indifference, and the cold sarcasm of the dread son of
Chatham.

[Illustration: ERSKINE’S FIRST SUCCESSES.]

Meantime his fame at the bar ascended rapidly. His powerful memory,
wakeful vigilance, and knowledge of those with whom he had to deal,
enabled him to conduct cases with wonderful skill. He defended the Dean
of Asaph in a speech of much merit and high courage; and in 1786 was
appointed Attorney-general to the Prince of Wales, an office of which
he was deprived for appearing, with dauntless determination, on behalf
of the notorious Thomas Paine, author of “the Rights of Man,” in spite
of the threatening frowns of royal power and the suggestive warnings of
northern craft.

Though bold and conscientious above all others in the performance of
his duty, Erskine had good reason to say to his admirers, “Gentlemen,
I am but a man.” He had, indeed, a considerable amount of vanity in
his nature, and even in his best days liked well, after the case had
been called, to keep a crowded and impatient audience waiting in court
for a few minutes till he should make his appearance with something
like stage effect. When he entered, to conduct some most important
case on which, perhaps, he believed “the last and best gift of God to
his creatures” depended, it was a little too apparent to intelligent
spectators that his new yellow gloves and carefully-dressed wig were
recognized by him as essential parts of the solemn proceedings. But if
he did too assiduously cultivate popular favor he can not be justly
accused of having shrunk from fear of court proscription, even when his
fortunes hung trembling in the balance.

The period of the state trials was that of Erskine’s greatest triumph
and highest popularity. His grave, sturdy, and sensible-looking
antagonist, on that occasion, was Sir John Scott, afterward Lord Eldon,
who had worthily risen to distinction by “living like a hermit and
working like a horse.” He was then attorney-general, and his duty, as
public prosecutor, could hardly have been very agreeable. Indeed, he
seemed at times to have been in no small danger from the excitement of
the mob, who daily bestowed upon Erskine frenzied applause. After the
acquittal of Hardy, the ringleaders insisted upon taking the horses out
of the brilliant counsel’s carriage, that they might draw him to his
house in triumph. Years after, when he was relating this circumstance
in presence of Lord Eldon, that distinguished personage managed to turn
the laugh against his old opponent by adding, with quiet humor, “Yes,
and I believe you never saw more of them.”

In 1802 Erskine visited Paris, and was presented to the Emperor
Napoleon, then First Consul, who, however, only honored him with the
single question, “_Êtes vous légiste?_” On returning home, he was
restored to his office of Attorney-general to the Prince of Wales, who
revived in his favor the dormant functions of Chancellor to the Duchy
of Cornwall.

On the death of Pitt, Lord Grenville, who had previously left the
party of his illustrious relative and former colleague, formed, in
conjunction with Fox and Addington, the ministry of “All the Talents.”
Erskine was nominated to the woolsack, and being advanced to the
peerage became Lord Chancellor; thus fulfilling his mother’s jocular
prediction. He resigned, with his political friends, in 1807, and
shortly after made his celebrated speech in the House of Lords against
the Jesuit’s Bark Bill; but henceforth he ceased to play a prominent or
influential part in public affairs. In 1815 the Prince Regent bestowed
on him the Order of the Thistle. He is reported to have regretted that,
from having been Lord Chancellor, he was prevented from pleading at
the bar, where had been won his crown of fame; and to have remarked
frequently to his friends, that the only reason he had for accepting
the great seal and a peerage at the time, was to place the maternal
prophecy beyond all hazard of breaking down. However, he consoled
himself for the loss of his position in the forum by reciprocating
compliments with his friend Dr. Parr. When the great scholar once
promised to write the ex-chancellor’s epitaph, Erskine replied, “Such
an intention on your part is almost enough to make one commit suicide.”

Dr. Johnson said that every man has a lurking wish to appear
considerable in his native place, and no doubt Erskine was actuated
by this natural feeling; yet it was somewhat late in life before he
turned his steps toward the land of his fathers. There, however,
his reception was so flattering that he conceived a strong desire to
revisit it in 1823. He insisted upon going by sea, as being an old and
experienced sailor, and was so unfavorably affected by the voyage that
he never recovered the shock.

He expired at Almondale, near Edinburgh, on the 17th of November, 1823,
and was buried, in accordance with the fashions and customs of the
country, in the family vault at Uphall, in West Lothian.




LORD COLLINGWOOD.


The ancestors of this noble-hearted and patriotic Englishman were
“dreaded in battle and loved in hall.” Their courage has been recorded
in history, and their courtesy celebrated in song. Yet it is less
than probable that any mailed warriors of the knightly race possessed
these attributes in greater perfection than did this gallant and
heroic admiral, who, in the nineteenth century, on that boundless
empire which his countrymen claim as their heritage, made the ancient
name he bore so widely and gloriously known in Europe and the world.
The Collingwoods were for several centuries planted in the proud and
extensive county of Northumberland. There they owned large territorial
estates, held a high social position, and formed distinguished
matrimonial alliances. Their prowess and valor were displayed in the
perpetual conflicts which, previous to the auspicious period when King
James united the crowns of the two realms upon his learned forehead,
laid waste and impoverished the wild and unruly borders. When the Civil
Wars occurred, being staunch and fearless cavaliers, they adhered to
the cause of the first Charles, and lost much land in the gloomy and
disastrous struggle for the prerogatives of that ill-fated Prince. In
later days the chief of the name――being a friend and companion of the
popular, munificent, and deeply-lamented Lord Derwentwater――engaged
in the hapless insurrection of 1715, had his estates forfeited to the
crown, and was called upon to lay his head on the block for that royal
house, against whose subjects the Collingwoods of another age had
ever been ready to fight to the death. From these and other causes a
representative of the family, in the middle of last century, appears
to have found himself in a position the reverse of convenient, and
in circumstances by no means affluent. In any case he settled at
Newcastle, married a lady of Westmoreland and was blessed with several
children.

Cuthbert Collingwood, who inherited little beside the Christian and
surnames, described by the old ballad-maker as being “so worthy to put
in verse,” and the stainless courage of “that courteous knight,” taken
prisoner at Redswire, was the eldest of his parents’ three sons, and
born on the 26th of Sept. 1750. No doubt he sported, during childhood,
on the banks of the Tyne, regarded the shipping in the port with a
curious eye, and was carried on fine afternoons, like other juvenile
inhabitants of Newcastle, to buy shortcake in the neighboring village
of Chester-le-Street.

In due time he was sent to the Grammar School, and there trained to
fear God, serve his country, and honor the king. The master of the
institution at that time was the Rev. Hugh Moises, a most worthy and
successful teacher of the old stamp, who never spared the rod when the
application of it was likely to promote the improvement and welfare
of his pupils; nor refrained from bestowing the meed of praise which
they had fairly earned by meritorious conduct. By such means, in all
probability, Collingwood――a pretty, gentle, and generous boy――was
taught those wholesome lessons of obedience and self-respect which
he afterward knew so well how to practice himself and to inculcate
on others, at once with the benevolence of a philanthropist and the
firmness of a despot. At this educational establishment religious
exercises were regularly attended to; and, perhaps, in the sentiments
there instilled into his mind may be traced the origin of those habits
of practical, unpretending piety, which characterized his illustrious
career. Among the youths who were there being instructed by Mr. Moises,
who marched to church under his auspices on Sundays, feared his
chastening birch on week-days, and who in after years acknowledged the
benefit they had derived from his tuition, were the two Scotts, sons
of a wealthy coalfitter in the place, and destined to arrive at the
highest rewards and honors of the branches of the legal profession to
which their time and talents were devoted. The younger of them, who ere
long occupied so high a position, and exercised so much influence as
Lord Eldon, was Collingwood’s class-fellow, and used to state, somewhat
unnecessarily, that both of them were placed at the time-honored
seminary because their fathers could not conveniently afford to
have them educated elsewhere. The fame which they worthily attained
in different spheres proves that they lay under no considerable
disadvantages on that account. When Collingwood’s dispatch narrating
the battle of Trafalgar arrived, the king expressed his extreme
surprise that a naval officer, who had spent so much of his life at
sea, should write in so admirable a style. But on being informed that
his brave and patriotic subject had been a scholar of Moises, his
majesty considered that fact sufficient to explain the excellence shown.

In subsequent life, when experience had sharpened his powerful
faculties, it was Collingwood’s opinion that a boy intended for the
sea should be early placed at a mathematical school, and carefully
initiated into the science of navigation; as otherwise there is little
likelihood of his achieving much progress on board a man-of-war. We are
told of Lord St. Vincent, that the only instruction he ever received
was from a considerate old sailing-master, whom he encountered while
stationed at Jamaica; but it does not appear where Collingwood acquired
his theoretic knowledge on this subject. It is probable, however,
that he enjoyed the advantage of being grounded by the celebrated
Hutton, who, just as Collingwood attained his tenth year, commenced a
mathematical class in the town, and was, in some capacity, connected
with instructing the mischievous imps under the sternly just sway
of Moises. At the age of eleven Collingwood was dedicated to the
profession of which he became so useful a member, and so bright an
ornament.

The circumstances which have led to our great naval heroes first going
to sea are sometimes peculiarly interesting, and even romantic. Take,
for instance, the case of the Hoods――sons of a vicar in Somersetshire.
A gallant captain was spending his time ashore in traveling about
the country, and in passing through the quiet village of Butleigh,
his carriage happened to break down. He looked around for an inn in
which to stay while it underwent the necessary repairs, but there
was no public place of accommodation to be had. The stranger, with
some reason, seemed a little disconcerted; but matters were presently
cleared up by the appearance of the worthy parson, who invited him to
his house with hearty good will, and entertained him hospitably. Next
morning the guest, before leaving, said, “Sir, you have two sons, would
either of them like to go with me to sea?” They availed themselves
of the frank offer,――both entered the service, and one became Lord
Hood, the other Viscount Bridport. Jervis, the son of a barrister,
was intended to follow his father’s steps; but the groom persuaded
him that all lawyers were rogues, and the little fellow, running away
from school, insisted on being a sailor. After entering the navy he
experienced hardship and poverty, but he struggled upward, with manly
spirit, to wealth, fame, distinctions, and an earldom. Nelson’s father
was a clergyman in Norfolk, but his maternal uncle, a captain in the
navy, promised to provide for one of the boys. Horatio was so slender
in frame, that he was thought incapable of roughing it out at sea; yet
he earnestly requested to be sent. Accordingly he was packed off alone
in the coach to join the ship, but had the mortification of pacing the
deck in wretchedness for a whole day before being taken notice of,
while swelled in his young breast all the germs of the genius that
recognized no fear, and the eccentricity――more valuable than the wisdom
of others――which ultimately rendered him the dread of foes and the
admiration of friends.

A relationship, similar to that which influenced the fortunes of his
mighty compeer, seems to have guided Collingwood in his selection
of a career. Captain Braithwaite, who afterward rose to the rank of
admiral, had married the boy’s aunt. That officer then commanded the
“Shannon,” and it was resolved to place the young aspirant under his
care and protection. A touching and interesting glimpse of his earliest
experience on board is afforded as he sat on the deck, sad at heart,
and with tears in his eyes, which flowed more rapidly as he gazed
through them at the shore. The first lieutenant observing the comely
little sailor in so downcast a mood, and perhaps remembering his own
feelings on a like occasion, was touched with compassion, and addressed
him in language of sympathy and encouragement. Whereupon Collingwood
felt so grateful that he led the kind-hearted officer to his box,
and offered him a large piece of plum-cake, which his anxious and
affectionate mother had given him at parting.

[Illustration: COLLINGWOOD’S JUVENILE GENEROSITY.]

Collingwood experienced much kind treatment from the kinsman under
whose protection he embarked on his career of duty and renown. He
afterward confessed the obligations he owed to Admiral Braithwaite in
the acquirement of professional knowledge. But the sage, meditative,
and energetic seaman, was far from trusting to the aid or inspiration
of others in his triumphant struggle. He thought earnestly, and labored
diligently, for himself. He steadily practiced that self-culture which
he ever strongly and perseveringly recommended to others. Besides
perusing treatises on naval affairs, he read extensively, and with no
small profit, in historical works; he obtained books relating to the
places to which he happened to sail, and exercised his intellectual
faculties by comparing these descriptions with his own impressions of
the localities and scenery. Moreover, he embraced and acted on the
opinion that a man should, before arriving at his twenty-fifth year,
establish for himself a character and reputation of such a kind as he
would have no cause to be ashamed of throughout life.

In the ordinary course of events Collingwood parted from his gallant
relative, and sailed for some time with another officer. Between these
two services thirteen years were consumed, and during that period he
made the acquaintance of Nelson. At its termination he went to Boston
with Admiral Graves, and was thus present at the battle of Bunker’s
Hill, in command of a party of seamen to assist and supply the troops,
who, under General Gage, encountered the insurgent colonists. After
that event he was advanced to the rank of lieutenant; and in 1775
joining the “Hornet” sloop, in that capacity he sailed to the West
Indies. The ship in which Nelson was lieutenant came to the same
station; and with the immortal hero Collingwood renewed the feelings of
friendship, which, cemented in the interval by many high aspirations
and bright dreams, were strikingly and glowingly displayed on another
and more glorious day.

Meantime Collingwood had the good fortune to succeed his friend as
commander of the “Badger,” and, subsequently, as a post-captain in the
“Hinchenbroke” frigate, with which he was ordered to proceed to the
Spanish Main, and employed on the expedition sent up the river San
Juan. The climate to which he was now exposed was in the highest degree
pestilential; the majority of his crew fell victims to its excessive
insalubrity; and in this perilous situation he was sustained and saved
from sharing their fate by a remarkably strong constitution. Right
glad, however, with all his powers of endurance, must he have been
when relieved in the autumn from this scene of woe and suffering. He
was then appointed to the command of the “Pelican.” With that frigate,
of twenty-four guns, he captured a French vessel, recovered from the
enemy a richly-laden Glasgow merchantman, and was soon after wrecked
among the rocks of the Morant Keys. He next obtained the command of the
“Sampson,” a ship of sixty-four guns, which was paid off at the peace
of 1783. Then he was dispatched, in the “Mediator,” to the West Indies,
where he and his younger brother, a naval officer of great promise,
who filled an untimely grave, actively aided Nelson in enforcing the
provisions of the Navigation Act against the encroachments of the
Americans.

In 1786 this brave and manly sailor arrived in England, and joyfully
turned his face homeward. He spent the next four years among his
Northumbrian relatives, of whom he had hitherto seen much less than
he could have wished. At the termination of that period an armament
was preparing against Spain, and he was immediately nominated to a
command; but the differences which had led to this step being speedily
accommodated without going to war, and there appearing no prospect
of active service, he again repaired to the frontier county; all the
more readily, perhaps, that he had already surrendered to a lady
in that northern province the exquisitely tender heart, which no
prolonged service nor scenes of bloodshed could ever harden, or render
indifferent to the welfare or sufferings of others. He was forthwith
married, and there appearing no probability of his professional
abilities being in requisition, he looked forward to a long season
of that domestic peace and happiness which he was eminently fitted by
nature to create and enjoy. However, his expectations in this respect
proved vain; the French war broke out, he was under the necessity
of sacrificing his cherished wishes to his country’s good, and he
returned, with characteristic courage and resolution, to arduous
and indefatigable exertion on that element which, almost without
interruption, was his sphere for the remainder of his earthly existence.

    “Calm thoughts that dwelt like hermits in his soul,
     Fair shapes that slept in fascinating bowers,
     Hopes and delights――he parted with them all.”

Collingwood was, without delay, appointed to the “Prince,” Admiral
Bowyer’s flag-ship, and served with that officer in the action of the
1st of June, 1794, in which Lord Howe accomplished a signal victory.
He displayed his wonted vigilance and energy, in watching for the
enemy and preparing for strife and wounds. But even then his thoughts
strayed often to a gentler scene――to the home of his family, to green
woodlands, and “mountains blue.” Even on the eve of battle his fancy
heard the ringing of the village bells, and his imagination conjured
up the form of his fair spouse as she walked to church, not unmindful
of her absent hero. The conflict was sharp, and soon over; and in it
Collingwood behaved with much gallantry. Nevertheless, his services
were unacknowledged by Lord Howe; and in the distribution of medals
he was passed over, much to the surprise of the fleet, and of some
officers with whom he had fought side by side, and by whom his bravery
had been duly appreciated. “If Collingwood has not deserved a medal,”
remarked Captain Packenham, of the “Invincible,” “neither have I; for
we were together the whole day.”

Collingwood was a man of too much pride and propriety to waste words
on such a subject; but he was, at the same time, actuated by that
sentiment of self-respect which forbade him to overlook such an
injustice. Ere long an occasion of vindicating his independence and
reputation was presented: this happened when the great victory off St.
Vincent was happily achieved in 1797. The hero of that day, Sir John
Jervis, when writing to the Admiralty, expressed the highest praise and
admiration of Collingwood’s conduct, which, in the “Excellent,” had
been conspicuously meritorious; and he announced that the Northumbrian
captain was to be rewarded with one of the medals distributed in
commemoration of the glorious event. Collingwood could now speak out
without loss of dignity; and he stated, with feeling and firmness, that
he must decline receiving this mark of distinction while the former one
was withheld.

“I feel,” he said, as his slender, well-formed person, seemed to swell
with emotion, and as his full dark eye flashed with chivalrous pride,
and the consciousness of a heart that feared no foe: “I _feel_ that I
was then improperly passed over; and to receive such a distinction in
this case would be to acknowledge the propriety of that injustice.”

“That,” replied Lord St. Vincent, with evident admiration, “is
precisely the answer I expected from you, Captain Collingwood.”

Shortly after this conversation took place, Collingwood experienced
the gratification of having the two medals transmitted to him from the
Admiralty, with a civil apology for the earlier one having been so long
kept back. He was now instructed to assist in what he considered as the
humiliating office of blockading the enemy’s ports; and, after a brief
interval of repose in the society of his friends and relatives, he was
promoted to the rank of Rear-admiral of the White; when, hoisting his
flag in the “Triumph,” he proceeded to the Channel fleet, which was
under the command of Lord Bridport. He was soon after detached with a
reinforcement of twelve sail of the line, and sent to join Lord Keith
in the Mediterranean, where the Brest fleet, with the principal naval
force of France and Spain, then lay. He subsequently shifted his flag
to the “Barfleur;” and in the beginning of 1801 became Rear-admiral of
the Red.

The events of 1802 afforded Collingwood the satisfaction of returning
for a while to his home at Morpeth, in the north of England. He arrived
in the merry month of May, and greatly relished his quiet and repose.
He was fond of company, and among his friends showed much lively humor
and no inconsiderable knowledge of books. His tastes were plain
and simple, and his inclination averse to display. He gratified his
paternal feelings by superintending the education of his daughters. He
pursued his own studies with more than youthful enthusiasm, improved
his style of composition by making extracts from the various works he
perused, and indulged his natural fondness for drawing. His garden was
situated on the banks of the beautiful Wansback――a river alluded to in
“Marmion”――which flows through a succession of fertile valleys; and
there he passed many agreeable hours. Indeed he seems, like Lord Bacon,
to have looked upon gardening as “the purest of all pleasures, and the
greatest refreshment to the spirits of man.” One day, a naval officer
coming to visit Collingwood in his happy and tranquil retirement,
sought him in vain about the grounds, and was inclined to give up the
search, when he suddenly discovered the admiral, along with his old and
trusty gardener, busily occupied in digging with vigor at the bottom
of a deep trench. The affairs of his domain ever formed an interesting
subject of inquiry; nor did distance diminish the respect which he
entertained for his faithful horticultural henchman.

In the beginning of 1803, when a renewal of hostilities between England
and France occurred, Collingwood was summoned from weeding the oaks
in his cheerful northern retreat, which he was never blessed with an
opportunity of revisiting; though he often sadly and fondly luxuriated
in the anticipation of resuming a place by his own fireside, never more
to leave it.

Meantime he was sent, in the “Venerable,” to the squadron off Brest,
Admiral Cornwallis joyfully exclaiming on his arrival, “Here comes
Collingwood――the last to leave and the first to rejoin me!” In the
April of 1803 he was advanced to the rank of Vice-admiral of the Blue,
and next year engaged in the blockade of Cadiz, until compelled to
retire by the appearance of the combined fleets of France and Spain. He
soon resumed his station, where he remained till the following autumn;
when thither came that terrible English sea-captain who had already
driven the French fleet before him, “from hemisphere to hemisphere,”
and performed the vow, long before made, that he would teach Bonaparte
to respect the British navy. On the 21st of October, 1805, Trafalgar
was fought and won; though the brilliancy was at first, in some
degree, clouded and overcast by the fall of the conquering hero, in
whose breast patriotism had so long glowed with fierce ardor. On that
glorious and ever-memorable day, Collingwood nobly did his duty. In the
morning, he arrayed himself for the coming strife with extraordinary
care and precision. Meeting with Lieutenant Clavell, whom he had long
regarded as “his right hand,” the brave admiral, with his accustomed
mental equanimity, said, “You had better put off your boots, and put on
silk stockings; as, if one should get a shot in the leg, they would
be so much more manageable for the surgeon.” Then, going on deck, he
encouraged the men in performing their duty, and asked the officers
to do something which the world might talk of in time to come. Nor,
when the hour of encounter arrived――when the successes of his great
comrade-in-arms were to be crowned with an imperishable triumph――did
he fail to sustain his old reputation for prowess and courage. He led
the British squadrons into action, and with his single ship, the “Royal
Sovereign,” advanced gallantly into the midst of the enemy’s forces.
It was then, as he was keenly pressing onward, that Nelson, standing
on board the “Victory,” decorated with all his stars and honors, and
prepared for death and glory, exclaimed, as the remnant of his right
arm moved with excitement, “See how that noble fellow, Collingwood,
takes his ship into action!” At the same time Collingwood, knowing what
thoughts would be passing through his heroic friend’s mind, remarked
to Clavell, with a smile, “What would Nelson give to be here!” It is
singular that his spirit of economy should have manifested itself under
such circumstances; as when he saw the gallant-studding-sail hanging
over the gangway, he requested his lieutenant to assist him in taking
it in, and observed that they should live to want it again some other
day. Having poured a broadside and a half into the stern of the “Santa
Anna,” the two vessels were soon so close that their lower yards were
locked together. Another was placed on the lee-quarter of Collingwood’s
ship, while three bore on her bow; but England expected every man to do
his duty that day, and it was nobly done. As for the “Santa Anna,” she
was soon compelled to strike; and the Spanish captain coming on board
to surrender his sword, was told that the name of the ship was the
“Royal Sovereign.”

“I think she should be called the ‘Royal Devil,’” he exclaimed in
broken English, as he patted one of the guns with his hand.

When his illustrious friend fell mortally wounded, the chief command
devolved on Collingwood, who, for his brave exploits and signal
services on this and former occasions, was created a peer, honored with
the thanks of Parliament, and rewarded with a pension and the freedom
of several cities. On the day following the victory he issued an order
for a general thanksgiving to Almighty God, for having mercifully
crowned the exertions of the fleet with success. His position now
became peculiarly arduous and difficult. He had the responsible task
of managing the political relations of England with the countries
bordering on the Mediterranean, in addition to discharging the duties
appertaining to his naval command. He encountered them with an
unremitting industry, which speedily brought on a disease fatal to his
health. Yet believing that it was his duty to do so, and that he might
live once more to meet the French, he remained at his post, shattering
his frame with toil, fatigue, and exposure, and racking his mind with
perpetual care and thought. At length his body began to swell and his
legs to shrink; so that his removal to England was represented as
indispensable. He accordingly surrendered his command, and embarked;
but he was not destined to set foot on the soil whose freedom and
sacredness he had spent his strength in guarding. On the 7th of March,
1810, he expired at sea, in his sixtieth year.

His end was calm, peaceful, and resigned; as his life had been just,
exemplary, and benevolent. Throughout he had been sincerely religious,
and most regular in his attendance at divine worship. Even on Sundays,
when the weather was such that the crew could not assemble on deck, he
was in the habit of retiring to his cabin, and reading the service for
the day. His piety was utterly without pretense; his acts of charity
were frequent; and his ear was never shut against a representation of
real distress. He was strictly scrupulous in his respect for inferiors,
and particularly anxious for the interests of those over whom he had
authority. His disposition was most repugnant to the exercise of
severity; and though no man was better qualified by nature to enforce
proper discipline, his humanity and refined sentiment rendered him
averse to doing so by extreme means. He looked up to his Creator with
devotion and gratitude, and he regarded the lowly with kindness and
generosity.

On their arrival in England, the bones of this brave and worthy admiral
were consigned to the dust in St. Paul’s Cathedral, hard by the spot
where the ashes of Nelson repose. A monument has since been erected to
his memory by a grateful public; and his services well deserved such
a recognition from a free people. He lived, in deed and in truth, not
for himself, but for his country; and he knew no fear but the fear of
God. He had, indeed, nobly done his duty to the last, sacrificing all
personal considerations, with patriotic disinterestedness. Domestic
enjoyment, quiet, health, life itself, were in his eyes nothing
compared with the preservation of our shores and liberties from the
great, skillful, and mighty foe, who planned earnestly and labored
anxiously for their conquest and destruction.




LORD TEIGNMOUTH.


This estimable and religious man was not endowed with any of the
splendid intellect of Pitt, nor with any portion of the brilliant
genius of Burke; yet his abilities were such, and so sufficiently
recognized, that the former, when in the pride of place and power,
thought prudent to nominate him for a trust hardly less important
than his own, though without family influence or connections; and the
latter, when denouncing the administration of affairs in the East,
to protest against the appointment with feelings of which contempt
assuredly formed not one of the ingredients. Indeed, his career, so
remarkably successful and extraordinary, presents a pleasing and
inciting example of a person ungifted with any marvelous capacity
raising himself to become the peaceful and spotless ruler of millions
of human beings.

The family from which he derived descent was of considerable antiquity
in the county of Derby; and in former days several of its members
had been returned to the House of Commons. Being connected, as times
changed, with India by a matrimonial alliance, one of the race became a
captain in the Company’s marine; and his son, while in the enjoyment of
a lucrative situation as supercargo, married, for the second time, the
daughter of an officer belonging to the same service, and had two sons;
of whom John Shore, destined to fill one of the most splendid places
on the face of the earth, was born in London, on the 5th of October,
1751. He was subsequently removed into Essex, where his parents usually
resided; and there the infancy of the future Governor-general of India,
was passed, much like that of other boys of his age and condition.

These were the good old-fashioned days, when parents were not
nervously apprehensive of any fatal effects from dressing their sons
in garments befitting their sex, and allowing them that degree of
liberty consistent with a proper attention to order. Accordingly, at
a very early age, Shore availed himself of the license afforded him,
and contrived, by hook or by crook, to find his way to the roof of a
very high barn, the most elevated part of which he bestrode with an
utter and lucky unconsciousness of the extreme danger to which he was
exposed. Fortunately he was rescued from this perilous resting-place
without any mishap; and, probably with a view of keeping him out of
such mischief in future, he was mounted every morning on one of the
coach-horses, before his father’s serving-man, and in this fashion
rode to a school in the vicinity; to be initiated into learning
at this rustic establishment, and into the ways of the world as
understood by the juveniles who attended it. He was in good time
removed to a seminary at Tottenham; and about the same date he lost his
much-respected father: but the surviving parent was a woman of highly
estimable character, polished manners, and with such an annual income
as enabled her to give her two sons a liberal education.

Shortly after the melancholy event alluded to, John Shore was
destined to the service of the East India Company, while he was yet
a little boy, with a spare frame, but sinewy, and such as fitted
him to take part in, and enjoy puerile sports and pastimes. This
arrangement was brought about by an old friend of the family, who
was perhaps glad to secure for the Company the prospective services
of so thorough-bred an aspirant as the son of a supercargo and the
grandson of a captain in their marine, unquestionably, might claim
to be. The offer of a writership was thus made, and, as a matter of
course, promptly accepted. This affair being satisfactorily settled,
Shore was removed to a school at Hertford, where he delighted in being
admitted to an excellent library to improve his mind and extend his
information. He, moreover, gratified a natural taste for poetical
compositions by rising early in the morning to feast his spirit on
Pope’s “Homer;” and he perused books of travel till his imagination
had been taken captive with the idea of such adventure, that he
longed, with as much enthusiasm as he was capable of, to go on some
expedition of discovery. Such a desire would, in all probability, be
rather heightened than otherwise by the prospect of ere long sunning
himself beneath an Eastern sky; and apparently his general interest
in such matters did not soon expire, from the anxiety he afterward
manifested to possess some account of Sir Joseph Banks’s voyage round
the world, which otherwise would have been of little moment to a
youth exercising judicial functions in India at the age of twenty,
or thereabouts. While at Hertford, Shore had what he considered a
miraculous escape from drowning, and which he ever afterward ascribed
to a special interposition of Providence in his behalf. Along with a
young companion, he had gone to bathe in a river in the neighborhood
of the school; and, in their haste and carelessness, they had mistaken
a deep pool for the place where they usually immersed themselves. They
were just on the point of plunging in when a voice called on them to
wait, and, at the moment, an equestrian appeared at their side, quite
as suddenly and opportunely as the two strange horsemen did at Lake
Regillus. He demanded if they could swim, and on being answered in the
negative, threatened them with a sharp castigation unless they walked
off immediately. Thus menaced, and considering that they were at the
moment liable to be lashed with peculiar facility and effect, the
gentle youths clutched up their raiment, and, in fear and trembling,
fled from the spot.

While encouraging and cultivating his turn for general literature,
Shore had not lagged behind his fellows in the proper studies of
the school; and in the course of time he was sent to Harrow, then
flourishing under the auspices of Dr. Sumner. There he was placed
on the fifth form, between Sheridan and Halhead; Dr. Parr being
tutor of the three. Shore applied himself to his classic studies,
and showed so keen a sense of their beauties that he became a great
favorite with the learned and fastidious head-master; though it was
augured, that of the three leading boys, Halhead was the one destined
to immortal distinction. And while events were proving the fallacy
of this prognostication, Harrovian prophets were preparing another
proof of the vanity of human anticipations by assigning to Sir George
Sinclair the prospective triumphal crown in preference to Lord Byron
and Sir Robert Peel. Shore left when on the point of succeeding to the
captaincy of the school. When Warren Hastings, at once the ablest and
most unscrupulous governor whom India ever saw, obtained a writership
and was shipped off to Bengal, his withdrawal from studies which
seemed likely to make so clever a youth one of the first scholars of
the age not only elicited an indignant remonstrance from the master
of Westminster, but even prompted that worthy individual to make the
generous and disinterested offer of sending so promising a pupil to
Oxford at his own expense; but it does not appear that the fate of the
future friend, associate, and successor of Hastings, excited equal
interest or pity in the breast of Dr. Sumner. However, their intimacy
had become such that a correspondence was commenced between them,
which did not cease till death put a period to it.

When Shore left Harrow, it was found that, however accomplished his
education had rendered him generally, he was by no means possessed
of a kind of knowledge which the Company required their servants to
be perfect in,――namely, the keeping of accounts with correctness. In
order, therefore, to qualify himself for the post to which he had
been nominated, Shore was placed for a few months at an academy at
Hoxton, where he was initiated into the mysteries of arithmetic and
book-keeping, and fitted to enter upon and pursue his duties, and
return with a fortune, if he escaped Asiatic tigers and the yellow
fever. The seminary, strangely enough, contained a young nobleman,
destined, like Shore, to enact the part of Governor-general of India,
namely, the Marquis of Hastings, whom, half a century later, he had an
opportunity of reminding of their early acquaintance, when the stately
peer was on the point of embarking on the administration of the affairs
of that empire which had been preserved and rendered durable by the
vigor and courage of his great namesake.

Toward the close of 1768 Shore sailed from England, in company with
about a dozen of writers and cadets, who proved a most disorderly set;
and about the middle of the next year he set foot in Calcutta, which
then consisted of tenements, whose appearance promised any thing rather
than comfort to the weary and storm-tossed voyager. Nothing aspiring
even to the dignity of a brick house was to be seen, however inelegant
such a structure may be thought; and the town was rendered unhealthy by
exposure to open drains, which emitted smells little resembling those
of rose-water or meadow hay. This was no agreeable place of residence
for a lad whose health was so impaired that the companions of his
voyage almost gave him up as lost. Nevertheless, he bore up against all
disadvantages, though scarcely having a single letter of introduction;
and was, soon after his arrival, consigned for twelve months to a desk
in the secret political department, where he labored with exemplary
industry at the records. Though his income was fearfully small, he
practiced the most stern economy rather than rely on his mother for
assistance; while so rare and rigid was his integrity, in an age when
Indian officials did not scruple to help themselves, and thus make up
for their limited salaries, that he won the meritorious appellation
of “honest John;” which in subsequent life, and in the midst of
multitudinous temptations, he never was guilty of forfeiting.

In 1770 Shore was nominated assistant to the Provincial Council at
Moorshedabad, where, deprived of all real power, the Nabob of Bengal
still resided, with princely magnificence, and played at government.
While holding this office, the young writer had the unexpected good
fortune to be elevated to the responsible position of a judge, at
the immature age of nineteen. The fact of his being invested with
large and important juridical functions, furnishes a pretty strong
illustration of the remark of Hastings, as to “the boys of the service”
being “the sovereigns of the country.” But this charge, so far from
overwhelming Shore, called forth the innate steadiness and perseverance
of his character; and he discharged the duties with so much success,
that, though he decided no fewer than six hundred cases in a single
year, there were not more than two appeals against the justice of his
adjudication. Meanwhile his leisure hours were diligently devoted to
the improvement of his mind, and to preparation for climbing the steep
ascent that yet lay, enveloped in shadow, between him and the height
he was destined to reach with honor and security. Perceiving what
profit might arise from an acquaintance with the Oriental languages,
his industry was immediately aroused to the undertaking; and he strove
for proficiency in the Arabic, Persian, and Hindostanee tongues. He
did not neglect his former learning, but kept a journal in Latin, that
the language might remain fresh in his memory, and read from several
Greek authors with a similar object. Still he imagined that the road to
fortune and affluence was daily narrowing, and complained that hope,
patience, and perseverance, were all he had left; though most people
would be inclined to consider such qualities very sufficient capital
for an intelligent youth who had hardly arrived at legal age. He was
still regretting that he had left England, when, after employing
his knowledge of Oriental languages before the Provincial Council at
Moorshedabad, he was appointed a member of the Board of Revenue, and
thus plunged into that long quarrel which was, as years rolled on,
transferred from the council-chamber of Calcutta to Westminster Hall.
He owed this promotion to the opponents of Hastings, and was, besides,
inclined to sympathize in their opinions; but he could not regard the
distracted state of affairs in British India without dreading the
influence it might have on his personal fortunes. He felt the extreme
difficulty that there was of taking any course without endangering
his prospects, and he looked to the future with a gloomy eye. At
this crisis his good angel appeared, in the shape of a sagacious
old gentleman; who, after listening to his expressions of doubt and
anxiety, said, “Young man, make yourself useful, and you will succeed.”
Shore, luckily for his own interests, accepted the maxim as the rule
of his life and conduct,――frequently repeated it to, and inculcated it
on, others; and he found the system it enjoined wonderfully efficacious
in promoting his interests under divers circumstances. His opinions
and feelings were avowedly hostile to the supremacy of Hastings; and
he was employed to revise one of the bitter philippics launched by the
vain and rancorous Francis against the dread governor, when the star of
the latter was thought to have fallen. Add to this, that Shore lent
his pen to prepare a memorial against the Supreme Court of Judicature,
and its chief-justice, Sir Elijah Impey, the former school-fellow, and
now unprincipled tool, of Hastings. These matters he managed with all
the skill and dexterity possible in the position of affairs; yet when
Francis, baffled and utterly routed, beat a retreat, it was with no
small reason that Shore conceived himself in danger of being consigned
to adversity. But his efforts to “make himself useful” had been so
apparent, that his services were deemed well worth securing.

The now triumphant governor, however, bore no good-will to Shore.
He did not forget that the latter had been among the allies of his
adversaries; and his nature, though in some respects great, and even
heroic, was not forgiving, any more than righteous or merciful. Yet
when he abolished the provincial councils, and instituted the Supreme
Council of Four, the first man whom he appointed to a seat in it
recommended that Shore should have the second. Hastings expressed much
astonishment at such a proposal: but his adviser answered, “Appoint
Mr. Shore, and in six weeks you and he will have formed a friendship.”
The prediction proved perfectly true; Shore held his position thus
conferred for years, and frequently had to appear as chief of the Board
during the absence of Hastings from the seat of government. He remained
in India till Hastings quitted it, in 1785, with triumphal honors. They
sailed for England in the same ship, and, during the voyage, Hastings
addressed to Shore an imitation of an ode of Horace――an occupation of
time which might not have occurred had he scented the fiery tempest
that was awaiting his arrival.

When separated from the delightful companion of his voyage, whose
conversation had been so pleasing, Shore, the ever-prosperous hero
of one maxim, had, unfortunately, no opportunity of practicing it.
His mother had died the year before, and he was thus deprived of the
pleasure which he had often looked forward to enjoying in her society.
He felt dull and solitary: he had been absent from the country for more
than sixteen years, and, doubtless, many of the old friends who had
watched his youthful career with interest and satisfaction, had sunk
into the grave. His confirmed Indian habits were not quite convenient;
he felt the want of sympathy; and, perhaps, he began to make the
appalling discovery that it is not good for man to be alone, and that
a helpmate would be particularly acceptable. At all events, as fortune
had hitherto bestowed upon him success in life, chance now threw a
little romance in his way.

His younger brother had been educated to the clerical profession,
and was at this time residing with his wife near Exeter. Thither
Shore――tired of himself, of his London friends, and of walks over
Westminster bridge before breakfast in cold November mornings――bent his
way. On arrival he found that his brother and sister-in-law were from
home; but he found full and complete consolation for their absence.
A snow-storm had detained at the house a young lady of great personal
attractions, by whom he had the felicity of being courteously received
and entertained. Their interview was fatal to any dreams of celibacy
in which Shore might have indulged. Suddenly crept around his heart
a flame which would have seemed more natural in the gay and gallant
inhabitants of places where Italian maidens lean on marble balconies
on warm nights, and listen to lovers’ tales, than in the sage and
reflecting descendant of the ancient couple, in whose memory “the Shore
trees,” sung of by Wordsworth, were planted on the summit of the Oker
Hill; and who, moreover, had just exchanged his dwelling amidst the
garden-houses of Eastern nabobs for the frost and sleet of an English
winter. But if his love was as sudden and inspiring as Romeo’s, it was
destined to be more happy in its results. Before the sun had gone down
his affections were engaged; he retired to rest, doubtless pondering
on what a day may bring forth; he was now as resolute in cultivating
his charmer’s favor, as he had formerly been in making himself useful:
ere three months had gone over she was his wife; and, during half a
century, they had cause to be grateful for the Providential snow-storm.

Within the fortnight after his marriage, Shore, perhaps for the first
time in his life, found it extremely difficult to act on the principle
which had hitherto proved so advantageous. He was offered a seat in
the Supreme Council of Three, established under Pitt’s India bill,
and requested to return to the East, where it was anticipated that
his experience would be of infinite value to Lord Cornwallis, the
newly-appointed governor. His situation was a little perplexing; but
at length he consented to forego the blessings of home for the sake
of advancing his fortunes, which were of greater consequence since
he was no longer single. He accordingly sailed from Portsmouth, and
sought refuge from his dark and distressing thoughts in a perusal of
the Company’s records. He had again abundant opportunities of proving
his industry and usefulness; and particularly employed himself in the
settlement of the revenues of Bengal, Behar, and Oresa; and in 1789,
with increased reputation but impaired health, set his foot once more
on his native soil. He took up his residence in the county where his
infancy had been spent, and appeared as a witness at the trial of
Hastings, of whose conduct he did not wholly approve; though he thought
himself bound to treat it with indulgence.

The adventures of John Shore were not yet ended. He was called upon
once more to “make himself useful,” and to reap the fruits of having
done so in times past. He had gone to Devonshire to take a long lease
of a house there, when intelligence reached him that Lord Cornwallis
had resigned his high office, and that the succession to it was within
his grasp. Pitt wished to introduce into the English empire in the
East the pacific system which he had led Parliament to enjoin, and
rightly conjectured that Shore was the man to do so with effect. The
offer, however, was so unexpected and undesired, that he at first
resolved on declining the high distinction, and hurried to London to
explain his reasons for taking such a course. On returning home and
announcing this refusal to his wife, she disinterestedly begged him to
sacrifice all domestic consideration; and thus persuaded, he declared
he saw that he must be a great man in spite of his teeth, and received
the splendid and lucrative appointment. Burke immediately protested
against the office being filled by one who had been connected with
Hastings; but the Court of Directors answered, that Shore was regarded
by their body as one of the ablest and most upright servants of the
Company. Having been previously created a baronet, he set sail in the
autumn of 1792, and after a long voyage reached, in the brilliant
capacity of Governor-general, the same town which he had once entered,
apparently in a dying state, to write for an annual salary of twelve
pounds a year, to pay an exorbitant rate for a wretched and unwholesome
lodging, and to endure poverty with the consoling assurance that if he
made himself useful he would succeed.

Soon after the arrival of Sir John Shore in India, the celebrated Sir
William Jones died; and Shore, who afterward became the biographer of
the great scholar, succeeded him in the presidency of the Asiatic
Society. On taking the chair he paid an eloquent tribute to the virtues
of his deceased friend. He took measures for the advancement of true
religion in Bengal, and was corresponding with several eminent men
on the subject when he was plunged into a war with the Rohillas――the
sequel to that sanguinary contest upon which Hastings had entered under
circumstances so unjustifiable. A single battle, however, settled the
matter.

In 1796, Sir John Shore had introduced to him no less famous a
personage than the future illustrious hero of Waterloo. On that
occasion he remarked, that if Colonel Wellesley ever had an opportunity
of distinguishing himself, he would do it greatly. It appears that Sir
John was successful in such prophetic efforts; for he is related to
have expressed a similar prediction in reference to Sir Robert Peel,
when that eminent politician was entering upon his eventful and mutable
career.

In 1797, Shore had the honor of an Irish peerage bestowed upon him;
and next year relinquished his office, and sailed for England, when he
was succeeded by the Marquis of Wellesley. The peaceful policy he had
pursued then went out of fashion; it was condemned by his successors;
and he took little concern in Indian affairs, though nominally a member
of the Board of Control, and a privy-councilor of Indian appeals.

Long after returning to his native land for the third time, after
a long, arduous, and successful career, when gliding quietly down
the stream of life, Lord Teignmouth was nominated President of the
British and Foreign Bible Society on its formation, a dignity, the
duties of which he was well fitted to discharge. He was a man of the
utmost philanthropy; and the spread of divine truth and light among
nations and people sitting in darkness was an enterprise into which he
was calculated to enter with an ardor assuredly not exhibited in his
worldly pursuits, nor displayed in his poetic effusions.

The remainder of Lord Teignmouth’s private life was that of a refined
and well-educated English gentleman. He appeared to his neighbors an
amiable, estimable, and religious man, who could hardly have cared
much for the pomp and power to which his usefulness had conducted
him. He died in peace and honor, in 1833, leaving a name which is
associated with industry, excellence, integrity, and humanity; not with
high genius, indeed, but with all those qualities of heart and soul
which give a man comfort and happiness during the days of his earthly
pilgrimage, and impart consolation to his spirit in the hour when the
lamp of life is flickering and about to expire.




DEAN MILNER.


In the middle of the last century, hard by a church dedicated to St.
Mary――on a spot at that time considered somewhat rural in appearance,
but since absorbed by the even then very populous town of Leeds――stood
an humble, unornamented cottage, the outer door of which was studded
with nails, like that of an ancient peel or a modern prison-house; and
there a Yorkshire weaver, of the name of Milner, lived in comparative
poverty. He is stated to have been characterized by sagacity, industry,
and self-denial, but nevertheless had not proved particularly
successful in the trade he followed; having besides, like many persons
of a higher rank, suffered severely from the effects of the rebellion
of 1745. Though not blessed with much intellectual culture, he had,
as is common with his class, a full appreciation of the manifold
advantages of a sound education; and vowed that he would not shrink
from personal sacrifices that his children might at all events enjoy
that invaluable possession. He was already the father of two boys,
one of whom afterward attained worthy celebrity, when, on the 11th of
January, 1750, Isaac Milner, the third of the family, first saw the
light.

So many of those famous personages whose illustrious footprints have
been traced in the foregoing pages, with a view to the encouragement
of youths aspiring to excellence, could boast of gentle lineage and
hereditary associations, that it is impossible not to experience
something like a sensation of relief, and to feel the charm of variety,
in turning to the career of a man without any such pretensions――not
incited by the ambition of adding to a name that had been feared or
respected in another day, and whose position in early life was not
rendered easy by wealth, or “shone upon from the past.” Cradled under
the roof of a cottage, apprenticed during seven years as a factory boy,
and clutched from the loom by fraternal partiality, to be employed as
usher in a provincial school, he raised himself by intellectual vigor
and perseverance to places of honor and importance; and he was extolled
among his great, learned, and reverend contemporaries, in his various
characters of academic, historian, divine, and philosopher.

From infancy, or, in any case, as far back as his memory would go,
Milner was animated by a strong affection for his elder brother, author
of the well-known “Church History,” who, in pursuance of their sensible
parents’ laudable resolution, had been placed at the grammar-school
of the town. Doubtless, by one so closely united to him in bonds of
tenderness and relationship, the future dean would in childhood be
taught to read, and inspired with that restless and singular love of
knowledge which rendered him, in later days, so peculiarly eager and
ardent in the pursuit, acquisition, and investigation of any subject
which circumstances brought under his notice or chance cast in his
way, no matter how unconnected ordinary mortals might deem it with the
regular duties and avocations pertaining to the station he occupied.
The elder brother, originally intended to pursue his father’s trade,
soon became so distinguished in the school, that one of the teachers
was in the habit of recommending his pupils to apply to Joseph Milner’s
memory in regard to questions of history and mythology, observing
that he was more easily consulted than dictionaries, or the Pantheon,
and quite as much to be relied on. The natives of the hamlet speedily
began to gaze at him as a “marvelous boy,” and testified their respect
by calling him “the learned lad.” Nor at the fireside of the family
cottage did he lack encouragement. The earnest artisan manifested the
utmost desire that the young scholar should have every aid within their
reach to promote his improvement in learning, and one Saturday night
astonished the little circle by the tidings that he had just spent the
money which ought to have purchased a joint of meat on a Greek book
for his son, being unable to procure both out of the slender earnings
of the week. The brothers forced their way together through great
difficulties; each arrived at distinction in his sphere of labor;
and perhaps few more pleasing instances of brotherly love continuing
could be cited than that which they, from first to last, exhibited.
As early as his sixth year, little Isaac was led by the hand of his
future benefactor to school, whither he continued to trudge daily for
some years under the same guidance and protection. His progress in
juvenile studies was most rapid and satisfactory: he soon learned to
translate Ovid and Sallust with tolerable correctness; and he, in due
time, commenced taking lessons in Greek, under auspices which must have
delighted his father’s heart, and tempted his imagination, however
calm, to indulge in visions of a golden future for the hopeful boy.

In the ninth year of his age, Milner’s young mind had the advantage
of being opened and impressed by a visit to the mighty metropolis,
though how, at that date, he happened to be taken on such a journey
unfortunately does not appear. However, he is related to have been in
London when news of the capture of Quebec by General Wolfe arrived. It
was bawled through the streets by watchmen at the midnight hour, and
bonfires blazed in triumph; and then he was told, for the first time,
about grim-visaged war and the odious French. Assuredly he heard enough
of them before the close of his long life, in that age of great and
portentous events.

About this period the father of the Milners was cut off amidst his
efforts to educate his offspring and promote their welfare; and thus
seemed to be defeated all the wishes and hopes which the cleverness of
the traveled little lads had created in the bosoms of their friends.
It was necessary, indeed, to make the best of matters; and the elder
brother being otherwise disposed of, it was deemed prudent to put Isaac
out to a trade. The town being one of the greatest markets for woolen
cloth in the kingdom, the inhabitants of the surrounding villages were
employed in the manufacture. Accordingly, Milner was sent to work at
and be initiated into the mysteries of a factory, which, in his case,
must have been sadly against the grain. Kirke White, when placed in
a situation somewhat similar, complained of being most unhappy, and
of wanting something to occupy his brain. And Milner, doubtless, had
little more relish than the boy-poet of “Clifton Grove,” who perished
in his youthful fame, for the trade to which he was now apparently
doomed for life. To a youth conscious of great abilities, and whose
extraordinary faculties had been already recognized by teachers, such
an occupation must have been almost worse than the labor of a slave;
for, praiseworthy as aspirations after success, arising from the
practice of such honest industry, may generally be, they were not of
the kind to call forth those talents which subsequently made their
possessor president of a college, vice-chancellor of a university,
professor in the chair that had been occupied by Newton, dean of a
cathedral, and one of the most fascinating conversers of his generation
in the country that produced him, and also one of the most celebrated
mathematicians and philosophers of his day. He studied, during hours
not devoted to work, Greek and Latin books; probably perused on Sundays
the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” which was always a source of real pleasure to
his spirit; and perhaps even gained some acquaintance with the works
of Shakspeare, Milton, and other great English authors, with which
he was familiar in his advanced years. He was soon to have larger
opportunities and a fitter scene for the refreshment and cultivation of
his powerful mind, thirsting for knowledge.

[Illustration: MILNER RESCUED FROM THE LOOM.]

The rector of the grammar-school had manifested much interest in the
young Milners; and they were not quite unaided in their hour of need.
By the generous exertions of several kind friends, and the well-timed
liberality of others, Joseph, the elder brother, had been sent to
Cambridge, and had there so conducted and distinguished himself,
that when he left the university the head-mastership of the Hull
grammar-school was conferred upon him, principally by the influence
of the grandfather of Wilberforce, an appointment which led to a
friendship not unimportant in its results to the gentle philanthropist,
and to the success of the views he held. And now the heart of Joseph
Milner was turned toward the prospects of his brother, and he pondered
what could be done to promote his welfare and happiness. He therefore
requested one of the clergymen in Leeds to examine the lad, in order
to ascertain and report as to his qualifications for becoming usher in
the school. The reverend gentleman thus commissioned proceeded to the
factory, where he found Milner seated at work with a classical author
on each side. An examination fully proved, that though removed for
a considerable time from school, his diligence and love of learning
had, in the mean time, amply supplied the place of instruction, and
that he was quite competent to undertake with propriety, and discharge
with credit, the tutorial duties in question. There still remained the
important part of the business, which consisted in obtaining to the
youth’s leaving the factory the consent of the owner, who, however,
does not appear to have been so severe a taskmaster as the imaginary
Wodgate Bishop. In any case, after a brief negotiation, he agreed to
forego the remaining years of the apprenticeship; and entering the
work-place, he made the heart of young Milner leap with joy and rejoice
at the magic words, “Isaac, lad, thou art off!” In after years, he did
not forget the comrades by whose side he had toiled and spun. He was
ever really and unaffectedly humble; ready to acknowledge his original
companions, and to minister to their necessities if they were poor. He
was never ashamed of his juvenile employment, nor had he reason to be
so; and when he encountered those who had known or labored with him in
obscurity, it was with the same frankness, courtesy, and cordiality,
but at the same time with the shrewdness, animation, and intrepidity,
with which he met lordly guests at Rose or Lowther Castle. In this way
he showed his rare nobility of soul.

Being happily freed from the manual labor which was unsuited to his
abilities, Milner repaired straightway to Hull, and proved a most
efficient assistant in the institution presided over by his brother.
His department in the establishment was the instruction of the younger
pupils, among whom he found Wilberforce, who was a lad of spirit,
though delicate, and considered so remarkable for his powers of
elocution, that it was customary to place him on a table and make him
read aloud for the benefit of the other boys. Milner had, years before,
besides constructing a sundial, given evidence of a decided bias toward
mathematical studies; and he was now, while striving to accomplish
himself in the classics, formally initiated into the elements of the
science with so much profit, that when the scholars were engaged
with lessons in algebra, and any difficulty occurred, the usher was
immediately called upon to solve the problem, which he usually did with
a promptness and facility not unworthy of one destined to be seated
in the Lucasian chair. Joseph Milner had no cause to repent of having
saved the talents of his brother from being lost amid the dust, noise,
and wheels connected with the preparation of woolen cloth for Russian
and German merchants; and he acted toward his gifted relative with
exemplary and beneficent kindness. The keen and steady energy with
which the latter pursued any object of inquiry that was presented
to his attention――a characteristic that sometimes even exposed him
to ridicule――was calculated to impart confidence to any attempt made
toward his promotion in life; and it was determined that he should,
in the year 1770, go to the university at which the reputation of his
brother had been formed.

It seems that the elder Milner accompanied the embryo President of
Queen’s College to his destination. Their circumstances, as well
as economical considerations, led them to adopt, on their long
journey, that mode of traveling much more pleasant to contemplate
than experience, with which we are in some degree familiar, from the
descriptions of those great novelists who flourished in the reign of
the second George, and who left such interesting pictures of life and
manners as exhibited at the period. They accomplished the distance from
Hull to Cambridge on foot, with occasional lifts by the way in a wagon,
to recover from fatigue. On their arrival, Isaac was entered at Queen’s
College as a sizar, at a time when the privilege, in a pecuniary point
of view, which he enjoyed as such, entailed the disagreeable necessity
of performing various menial but by no means humiliating duties. Among
these was ringing the chapel bell, and serving up the first dish to the
fellows at dinner. On one occasion, when so busied, he was luckless
enough to overturn a mess of soup on the floor, instead of placing it
on the board, and was sharply rebuked for his awkward clumsiness;
whereupon he excited much derisive laughter by exclaiming, in the
dialect of his native country――“When I get into power, I’ll do away
with this nuisance!” The threat, thus expressed on the spur of the
moment by the modest and diffident sizar, was more religiously executed
than most promises uttered in such a frame of mind; and when raised to
academic dignity, he altogether abolished the services of which that he
had been rendering formed so irksome and invidious a part.

Notwithstanding the ungrateful and troublesome tasks thus devolved
upon him, Milner’s success at the University was great. He enjoyed
one advantage――not always granted to men springing from so humble an
origin――in a personal appearance which could not fail to prepossess
beholders. His form, above the usual height, was cast in admirable
proportions, and his presence striking; and his regular and handsome
features expressed the talent of his brain, the benevolence of his
mind, the kindness of his heart, the serenity of his temper, and the
frankness of his disposition. His mental faculties were, as time passed
on, placed beyond question by the brilliant success he achieved; and
the fulness and variety of his colloquial powers rendered him the
soul of the circles he frequented, either in Cambridge or London, and
his listening audiences comparatively subservient. His mind became
so marvelously comprehensive in its grasp, that it could master the
details of any subject; and so universal was his information, that
there were few trades on which he could not enlighten those who made
them the business of their lives. He was, perhaps, a little more
zealous than discreet in collecting his vast stores, and he was in the
habit of reflecting from them with a pen in hand to take notes.

One very singular instance is given of his zeal in the acquirement of
apparently uncongenial knowledge. Late in life, when his portrait,
by Kerrick, was engraved, and his friends were anxious to have his
coat-of-arms on the print, the then dean, on being applied to, at
once declared that he had, of course, no armorial bearings, but he
entertained no objection to be furnished with such as had nothing
ridiculous about them. It was, however, a constant maxim with him that
any knowledge which comes in one’s way is worth gathering, and his
attention being thus attracted toward heraldry, he procured books, and
succeeded in gaining much curious information on the subject in which
he had no natural interest.

Throughout his earthly existence, Milner was distinguished by piety,
purity, and integrity; and though ready enough to converse on other
subjects with sportive levity, he never alluded to that of religion
without the utmost sincerity and the most becoming seriousness. On
entering the University he studied indefatigably, and with a result
which must have been highly gratifying to his anxious relatives.
In 1774 he took the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and that year the
moderators not only assigned him the dignity of senior wrangler, but
likewise the title of _Incomparabilis_. On attaining this distinction,
Milner ran off, in the pride of his heart and intellect, to indulge
in the extravagance of ordering a seal, with the head of his immortal
predecessor, Sir Isaac Newton, engraved on it.

He was now admitted as a member of the Hyson club, which had been
formed in 1758, and could boast of several names known to fame. About
the same period, the appointment of tutor to a Polish prince was
placed within his acceptance, but declined; and his reputation as a
mathematician was so unquestioned, that the papers he made out for the
use of his pupils were much prized; and there even occurred an instance
of a bed-maker being bribed to procure some of them by stealth, to
be copied by a student belonging to another college. Yet it was not
merely with mathematics that his attention was now occupied. Various
philosophical subjects were subjected to his learned faculties; his
intellectual performances had secured him friends, and he had shown
the independence of spirit by standing alone, among the students of
the college, in a refusal to attach his name to a petition against
subscription to the Articles of the Church. To this fact he referred
with satisfaction in later days, in his encounter with the Bishop of
Peterborough, whose denunciation of the sin and danger of giving people
the Bible to read, unaccompanied by the Prayer-book, had brought him
into the controversial arena.

At the age of twenty-six Milner was ordained deacon, and next year was
admitted to priests’ orders, having in the interval been elected a
fellow of his college, of which he became tutor in 1777. At that date
he took the degree of Master of Arts. He got into the habit of now
and then assisting his friends by officiating in country churches in
the neighborhood; and he was presented to the rectory of the parish
of St. Botolph. Milner had already contributed several papers to
the “Transactions of the Royal Society,” of which he, in due time,
became a fellow; and he was led to embark, with all the ardor which
characterized him, on the study of chemistry. Eminently successful in
this pursuit, he proceeded to deliver public lectures on the science.
It appears, however, that the experiments he made considerably impaired
his health; and this unfortunate circumstance prevented him from
undertaking much public labor in his clerical capacity; but he studied
scripture and theology with critical interest, and thus laid the
foundation of his extensive knowledge of divinity. He was in the habit
of going to spend part of the Cambridge long vacation with his brother,
in whose house now resided their aged mother, a woman of mental vigor
and activity, and to whose shrewd and talkative humor several amusing
anecdotes bear witness. When at Hull, in this way, Milner disdained
not to return to his duties as usher. To the boys he could be gay
and frolicsome, and they relished alike his playful manner and the
clearness with which he explained what they could not understand
without such assistance.

In 1784, Milner was chosen Jacksonian Professor of Natural and
Experimental Philosophy; and in the same year took part in the
institution of a society for the advancement of philosophy and general
literature, which only enjoyed a brief existence.

When Wilberforce was living in the house of an aunt, who held
Methodistical views of religion, and was suspected of being impressed
with such doctrines, his rich and sapient grandsire delivered himself
of this alarming and oracular saying: “Billy shall travel with Milner
when he is of age; but if Billy turns Methodist, he shall not have
a sixpence of mine.” It did come to pass that, after Wilberforce
was elected member for his native shire, and his acquaintance with
Milner was renewed, he requested the company of his former instructor
on a Continental tour. Accordingly they started on their excursion
in the autumn of 1784, accompanied by the young, wealthy, and
eloquent senator’s female relatives. It is related that, during this
expedition, the travelers being on one occasion in imminent danger of
being dashed over the brink of a precipice, from the weight of their
vehicle overpowering the horses, Milner leaped out, and, grasping
the wheels, exerted his great physical strength so effectually,
that the danger was obviated. During their wayfarings they met, in
Switzerland, the celebrated Lavater, in whose conversation Milner was
much interested. Shortly afterward Milner visited his friend at Bath,
when “the volatile representative of the county of York” was attacked
by a serious illness, and subsequently at his temporary residence in
Westmoreland, which being filled with guests of distinction, furnished
the divine with a fair field for the display of his wonderful power and
versatility. He held conversations with his host on religious subjects,
and exercised no slight influence on the mind and opinions of the great
philanthropist, in whose schemes for the freedom and welfare of the
human race he warmly sympathized.

In the year 1786 Milner took his degree of Bachelor of Divinity, and
about the same time was an active member of the Board of Longitude,
instituted for the purpose of considering and reporting to government
any discoveries calculated to mitigate the perils of navigation. He was
regarded as one of the most talented men at Cambridge, where he was
considered as an excellent lecturer. As Jacksonian professor he gave
alternate courses on chemistry and experimental philosophy, the former
of which were especially well attended; and he continued to occupy the
chair till his preferment to ecclesiastical dignity.

About his thirty-eighth year he was elected President of Queen’s
College; and in this capacity he is reported to have aimed at affording
encouragement to learned men belonging to the foundation, and
introducing such improvements in the reformation of abuses, and other
means, as were calculated to conduce to the welfare of the students,
and the honor of the university. Four years later he took the degree of
Doctor of Divinity, on being appointed to the deanery of Carlisle, of
which he took formal possession by reading prayers in the cathedral.
As a preacher he was most effective: his voice, in which he took
pride, was sonorous and magnificent; his eloquence was, on the whole,
dignified and impressive; and when it was known that he was to preach,
as he was in the habit of doing almost every Sunday during his periodic
residence, in the cathedral of the ancient city, the aisles and every
part of the building were thronged with people of all religious
persuasions. Indeed it was remarked, that on such occasions you might
walk on the heads of the crowd; and even those who did not entirely
agree with his doctrines, admitted the ability with which they were
urged, and the striking light in which they were placed. Nor did he
court popularity by the brevity of his discourses; for we read, that on
an Ash Wednesday he preached to a thronging congregation in the chapel
of Whitehall, on “the one thing needful,” for no shorter space than an
hour and twenty minutes.

Milner’s presentation to the deanery was closely followed by his
election to the Vice-chancellorship of the University, of which he
was so distinguished a resident; and in 1809 he was unexpectedly
re-elected to the office: having, in the mean time, been called to fill
the mathematical chair, which a century earlier had been occupied by
the ever-illustrious Newton.

The ties which, amidst all his triumphs, had hitherto been instrumental
in binding the Dean of Carlisle to the world, were about this period
weakened by domestic losses. His mother had already gone to her grave;
and in 1797 his brother, who had just been appointed to the vicarage
of Hull, breathed his last. The latter bereavement touched Milner’s
heart to the core; he began to feel less concern with earthly affairs,
to exhibit greater earnestness in his professional duties, and to set
his affections more steadfastly on things above. His life, indeed,
was far from being without its enjoyments and consolations. He looked
upon his summer residence at Carlisle as, in some measure, a period
of relaxation, associated on terms of intimacy with the families in
the vicinity, and derived pleasure from the hospitalities that were
practiced, and the company that assembled at the mansions of Lord
Lonsdale and the bishop of the diocese. He was prepared to converse
with those whom he met on the subjects with which they were most
familiar, in a style joyous, jocund, or grandiloquent. “He talked,
also, to his chosen and intimate friends,” it has been said, with
power, “but not in the same fitful strain. To them, from the abundance
of the heart, he spoke on the theme which engages the latest thoughts
of all men, the retrospect and the prospect; the mystery within, and
the dread presence without; the struggle, and the triumph, and the
fearful vengeance; and whatever else is involved in the relations which
subsist between mortal man and the eternal source of his existence. To
search into those relations, and into the duties, and hopes, and fears
flowing from them, was the end which Isaac Milner still proposed to
himself, under all his own ever-varying moods.”

Milner, with affectionate devotion to the memory of his deceased
brother, repaid the essential obligations which in youth he had
incurred, by editing and improving the “Church History,” written
to disseminate the theological views he held; and added thereto a
biographical sketch of the author. Nor, in the midst of affluence and
reputation, did he forget the wants of his more humble relatives; to
whose necessities, as to those of the poor of his native place, he
ministered with a bountiful hand. In Carlisle, also, he contributed
toward the various objects of public charity; he was ever anxious to
serve those who, in private, applied to him for assistance; and he
subscribed liberally toward the erection of the new churches, which
were rendered necessary by the large population of the old Border city.

In 1819, having previously been introduced to Dr. Chalmers, Milner
wrote to the magistrates of Edinburgh, urging the claims to the
Professorship of Natural Philosophy in their gift, and then vacant,
of that eminent Scottish divine, whom he described as “a man of great
genius, varied talents, and sound principles, both religious and civil.”

After attaining the age of threescore and ten years, this distinguished
man died on the 1st of April, 1820, and was buried in the chapel of
that college of which by intellectual industry he had risen to be the
head.




DAVID HUME.


Though any attempt to excuse or palliate Hume’s erroneous views and
opinions in regard to religion――the dissemination of which he is said
to have regretted――would be little less than high treason against
Christianity and civilization, his example, in other respects, is
of infinite value. His career was characterized by resolution,
independence, and self-command, at a time when these qualities were
not much in fashion; and his life is a lasting protest against the
idea, that the habits of a literary man are necessarily lax in respect
to pecuniary affairs. Moreover, he must be acknowledged as prince
among the historians of England. He still retains his ascendency after
the lapse of an eventful century; and his great work is looked to as
the natural source of information on the subject of which it treats.
The intelligent reader is animated by feelings of admiration after
perusing its inimitable pages; while the less informed goes to it for
guidance and instruction. Yet much of this mighty memorial of his great
intellect was composed in the face of a reception so galling to a proud
spirit, and so discouraging to a heart panting for fame, that most men
would, under the circumstances, have thrown down the pen in blank
dismay; but Hume, notwithstanding his temporary disgust, had courage
and genius fully equal to the occasion. He felt how glorious was the
prize at stake, and pushed bravely forward to snatch it. And it is,
indeed, impossible too highly to admire the calm, intrepid, unshrinking
perseverance he displayed in thus consummating, in spite of all the
clamor that the earliest volumes elicited, a work which he ere long had
the consolation of knowing the world would not willingly let die. Such,
doubtless, has often been the lot of those who write for immortality!

The pedigree of this illustrious personage, who frankly confessed
to the charm of an ancient name, was such as might satisfy the most
exacting genealogist. Indeed, it is traced in the books of heralds,
through potent barons and mighty earls, to the Saxon conquerors of
Britain; though it does not appear that he was fully aware of a fact,
which, to say the least, would have been reflected on with complacency.
But as the subject is not altogether uninteresting to many, it may be
here adverted to with brevity.

When the Norman Conquest took place, a Northumbrian prince――whose
grandmother was daughter of an English king, and whose brother became,
by marriage with the heiress of the Nevilles, progenitor of those
barons slain on the field of Barnet――was driven to seek refuge on
the north side of the Tweed, where he founded that powerful feudal
connection known as the house of Dunbar, which fell in the fifteenth
century. One of its branches, and the inheritor of much of its power,
was the baronial family of Home, whose chiefs bestowed such lands
as came into their possession on their younger sons. One of these
cadets――the historian’s ancestor――was thus gifted with Tyninghame, a
fertile estate in Lothian; but being, unlike his remote descendant, an
irreclaimable spendthrift, he totally dissipated this paternal grant.
It happened, however, that his son, a youth of promise, was received
into favor by the head of the clan, and planted at the Ninewells, on
the pleasant banks of the Whitadder, where his successors, whose names
no minstrel has sung, vegetated for three hundred years. In fact,
though residing close to the Border, they do not appear to have fought
in the wars which desolated the vicinity, nor even to have speculated
in the precarious trade of cattle-lifting. They seem neither to have
been puissant knights nor “rank reivers;” nor were they in request
when a charter was to be attested, or an eldest son served heir to his
father. But they paid a species of “black mail” to the English captain
of Berwick, received protection, lived in peace, speared salmon, and
cultivated their fruitful lands. In the reign of Queen Anne, one of
these lairds, whose sire’s heart’s blood seems to have stained the
blade of an exasperated sheriff, went in youth to the Scottish capital,
and was in due time called to the bar; but without pursuing the legal
profession further. He was considered a man of attainments, and took to
wife, in 1708, the daughter of Sir David Falconer, Lord President of
the College of Justice. By this lady he had two sons and a daughter, of
whom David Hume was born, at Edinburgh, on the 26th of April, 1711.

The consideration of a distinguished lineage certainly imparted to
Hume’s heart a calm satisfaction and colored, though in the slightest
degree, his writings; but as he was deficient in sympathy with the
past, it could not infringe on his philosophic mind, perplex his
clear intelligence, or influence his serene judgment. The political
sentiments in which he was nurtured were destined to exercise a much
greater effect on his life and works. His father’s residence was
situated in a district where the lords of the soil were, with rare
exceptions, deeply tinged with Jacobite principles. Their interest and
inclination alike prompted an adherence to the cause of the ancient
line of kings; and at the very time when the future historian first
saw the light, the accession to power of a Tory ministry had conveyed
hope and animation to their breasts. Thus when he began to creep about
and lisp forth inarticulate sounds, complaints of real injuries and
imaginary insults sustained by his relatives since the Revolution
would greet his childish ears, and perhaps enter into his young soul.
In his fourth year, these restless worthies proposed to hold a public
meeting with a view of obtaining a redress of their grievances; but as
the authorities deemed that it might prove a cause of embarrassment
to the newly-established government, it was sternly interdicted,
and precautions were taken to repress any attempt to disobey the
official mandate. David’s fierce clansmen bit their gloves, shook their
heads, and vowed revenge. Several of them risked and lost all in the
insurrection of 1715; his chief and a near kinsman were committed to
the Castle of Edinburgh for their devotion to the house of Stuart;
and amidst scenes of tumult, disorder, and confiscation, the first
few years of Hume’s life passed over. Perhaps, indeed, to his brother
and himself having been minors at the time may be ascribed their not
having assumed the white cockade, and that the acres held for centuries
by their ancestors were not appropriated by some intriguing agent
for forfeited estates, or seized by a factor with few scruples of
conscience and sufficient dexterity in arithmetical mystification.

At an early age――indeed almost in infancy――Hume lost his father; and
his widowed mother, though young and handsome enough to have aspired
with success to a second husband, devoted her whole time and attention
to the rearing and education of her children. David soon began to
manifest an ardent love for his books. As a boy he was particularly
docile, well behaved, and attentive to his studies, without being
remarkable for the display of precocious talents. The family property
had, of course, gone to his elder brother; and as the portion of a
second son was not such as to encourage for a moment the idea of
passing his life without labor, he felt under the necessity of
bringing his abilities into active operation. With this view he was
sent to fit himself for exertion by completing his education at the
university of his native city, where he went through the usual academic
course with comparative credit and success.

His extraordinary ability at this period is beyond all question, for a
letter written to a youthful intimate at the age of sixteen proves that
his marvelous talent was then exhibiting itself. Having been fired with
that enthusiasm for literature which continued to be his ruling passion
and chief delight, he impressed his guardians with a high opinion of
his studious disposition; and they, taking into account his steadiness
of conduct and sobriety of demeanor, arrived at the conclusion, that
the Scottish bar would be a proper sphere for the exercise of that
intellectual industry of which he daily gave signal proofs. His tastes,
however, were rather unsuited to pursuing the profession successfully;
and he states that he was generally engaged in devouring Cicero and
Virgil while he was supposed to be occupied with the more practical
studies of Voet and Vinnius. At eighteen the law appeared utterly
nauseous to him, and his aversion to it as the business of life became
extreme. He pondered and reflected; he could think of no other method
to push his way in the world than as a scholar and philosopher, and
this prospect pleased him infinitely for a season; but his health
giving way under the pressure of severe mental application, a reaction
came, and his ardor quite expired. He abandoned all thoughts of the
law as a profession, and removed to the residence of his brother. The
change of air and scene had a beneficial influence, and the young
philosopher applied to the family doctor to restore his health and
spirits. The latter laughed at his patient’s imaginary ailments; but,
at the same time, accompanied his unwelcome raillery by the extremely
palatable advice to drink a pint of claret a day, and take plenty of
equestrian exercise. Hume attended to the prescription, daily swallowed
a proper quantity of the grateful beverage, and rode some ten or twelve
miles on horseback. Though caring little for rural pleasures, pursuits,
or recreations, he seems to have really enjoyed himself at this period:
he soon gathered strength from his exercise in the open air; and,
from being a tall, lean, and raw-boned lad, he passed to the other
extreme――his complexion became ruddy and his countenance cheerful. His
pursuits seem to have been diversified. He studied Latin, English,
French, and Italian. He read books of morality, and was captivated
with their beautiful representations of virtue and philosophy; and he
listened, not without gratification, to stories about the fortunes
of their race from some knightly clansman or old freeholder. The
traditionary lore and local associations were apparently, it must be
confessed, quite lost upon him: he was without local ambition; and
the scenes of his boyhood, when he has occasion to mention them, are
alluded to with the same cold dignity with which he writes of places
which he had never seen. His intellect was so severely original, that
it disdained to draw one particle of inspiration from buildings and
battle-plains which have since been invested with so pleasing a charm,
and made the subject of glowing verse. There is no sign of his having
viewed Norham Castle, Flodden Field, and Halidon Hill, or ridden
through “the rich Merse,” and perambulated the ancient capital of the
eastern marshes, or gazed on the “desolate grandeur” of Home, with
romantic enthusiasm, poetic perception, or provincial pride. While
accumulating information in regard to distant countries with industry
and rapidity, he altogether neglected or scorned the precious metals
which lay in his way; and while contemplating the perfections of Roman
poets, he had not a thought to spare to the Border ballad-makers, whose
verses Scott toiled to preserve and restore. He had therefore small
temptation to linger amidst the fields, meadows, and woods through
which he had roamed in his thoughtful childhood. He felt, indeed,
that such an expenditure of time was by no means in harmony with his
circumstances; and, believing that business and diversion would give
him peace of mind and relief from anxiety, he resolved to betake
himself to a more active life, and entered on a course, of all others,
at variance with his natural bent toward studious retirement and
philosophic reflection――that of commerce. In doing so, he confessed
that he could never wholly give up his pretensions in learning but with
his latest breath. He merely laid them aside for the time, with a view
of resuming them to greater advantage. In reality, he was actuated by
an ardent and consuming passion to achieve literary fame and found
a philosophical reputation when he formed his determination――a most
inauspicious frame of mind, assuredly, with which to enter upon the
harsh duties of mercantile existence!

About the beginning of March, 1734, Hume started for Bristol. He
visited London in his way, and then traveled onward. He had obtained
introductions to several leading merchants in the place; and on
reaching his destination established himself in the counting-house of
one of them, in the hope of forgetting the past, preparing for the
future, and enriching himself by commerce. But the petty cares, the
perpetual bustle, and the perennial annoyances of such a career, were
found, as might have been anticipated, utterly intolerable to a person
to whom legal studies had appeared irksome and unattractive; and, after
a few months’ trial, he relinquished his new situation, with all its
coarse, uncongenial duties, and those prospects of remuneration which
are so seldom realized.

Hume had already, according to his own statement, collected materials
for many volumes. He, therefore, passed over to France, with the
view of prosecuting his studies in some rural retreat. No doubt he
could have done so at the time-honored mansion of his fathers, but
circumstances had occurred since he left which rendered it impossible
to return there with any feeling of comfort; so he made a short stay
in Paris, and then repaired to Rheims, in the north of France, where
he spent some months in literary retirement. “I there,” he writes,
“laid that plan of life which I have steadily and successfully pursued.
I resolved to make a very rigid frugality supply my deficiency of
fortune, to maintain unimpaired my independency, and to regard every
object as contemptible except the improvement of my talents in
literature.”

Having formed this wise and prudent determination, he removed to La
Flèche, in Anjou, where he prepared his “Treatise on Human Nature;”
and then he returned to London, to superintend the publication, and
endure the suspense. Being issued in 1738, the work, to use his own
expression, fell still-born from the press; though when subsequently
published in separate essays, it was a little more successful.

Having thus, at the age of twenty-seven, embarked and made an
inauspicious voyage on the uncertain sea of literature, Hume, without
even waiting to know the fate of his work――for which a publisher had
given the sum of fifty pounds――turned his face northward; and, perhaps,
with some slight regret that he had relinquished the profession of the
law, and deserted the merchant’s desk, sought the agreeable seclusion
of his family’s fair domain, which he found his brother laudably
occupied in improving and enhancing in value. Among its old trees,
pleasantly shading the gentle acclivity whence burst the nine fountains
which gave a name to the place, and with which the argent lion on his
ancestral shield was charged, Hume experienced so much satisfactory
enjoyment in “retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books,” that, though
the ideas and tastes of his relatives could not have harmonized very
readily or easily with his own, he would, in all probability, had
other matters been equal, have chosen to pass his life there. But the
ambition for literary fame continued strongly to animate and influence
him; and his time was chiefly spent in grave reading, deep meditation,
in restoring his knowledge of the Greek language, and in corresponding,
among others, with his friend Henry Home, afterward celebrated as Lord
Kames.

Such was his position, when the last Marquis of Annandale, a Scottish
nobleman, whose eccentricity took the form of lunacy, having read some
of the hapless essays, was so charmed with something he saw in them,
that he conceived a passionate wish to obtain the services of the
learned author as his tutor. Hume was induced, by the temptation of an
ample salary, to accept the office of companion to this weak-minded
man, and had his temper severely tested in consequence. After holding
the luckless and invidious post for a year, during which the marquis
seems to have written a novel, relating to some events and love
affairs in his own life, Hume’s patience and placidity gave way, and,
throwing up the situation, he became candidate for the Professorship of
Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh, which, although powerfully supported,
he was unable to obtain, on account of his well-known sentiments on
religious subjects.

Matters, however, ere long, began to assume a pleasanter aspect. An
honorable appointment, as private secretary to General St. Clair, uncle
of Lord-chancellor Loughborough, was almost immediately bestowed on
him, as if by way of solace for his depressing defeat. The General had
originally been destined for an important expedition to Canada, which
somehow ended――or, rather was metamorphosed――into an incursion on the
coast of France. On returning, Hume retreated to country quarters, and
wrote a defense of the expedition, which has since been printed; and
shortly afterward he accompanied General St. Clair on an embassy to the
courts of Turin and Vienna, in the double capacity of secretary and
aid-de-camp, wearing the uniform of an officer. His time, while in this
position, was passed agreeably, in good company, and with considerable
profit in a pecuniary point of view.

Meantime his “Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding,” being
the substance of his former work in a new shape, was published in
London, but with scarcely greater success than the original; any
interest it excited being merely of a temporary character. However,
his natural cheerfulness bore him up against his repeated literary
disappointments; and he returned to Scotland to delight his kinsfolk
and acquaintances with narrations of his adventures in lands beyond the
sea, and to digest the frustration of his hopes as well as he could.
Still resolute of purpose, he wrote, during a two-years’ retirement,
his “Political Discourses,” which were given to the world in 1752,
and excited interest and attention both at home and abroad. Indeed,
though in some measure overshadowed by the celebrated work which his
friend Adam Smith produced fourteen years later, they unfold and
enforce those views of economical science which are now recognized and
adopted, for better or for worse, by all English statesmen. Moreover,
they have, in the highest degree, the merit of originality; and their
style is so admirable, that they can be perused by general readers
at once with profit and pleasure. At the same time he composed his
“Inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals,” which, notwithstanding
his own high estimate of its comparative merits, was little noticed
or regarded. The former emanations of his great intellect were now
beginning to attract observation, and he was gratified by finding
that answers antagonistic to the views they maintained were gradually
appearing; but he discreetly formed the resolution of not being drawn
into controversy by such effusions, and inflexibly kept his purpose in
this respect.

Hume had now attained the age of forty, and, though there certainly
exists evidence which makes one suspect that he had not always proved
that rare impenetrability to female blandishments for which his
biographers have given him credit, there was, at this time of life,
small chance of his being betrayed into a matrimonial alliance. His
brother, therefore, aroused himself to the duty of transmitting the
name, and continuing the succession, and, in 1751, wedded the daughter
of a neighboring family. This country gentleman was a person of retired
habits; he had a strong aversion to every thing savoring, or even
having the appearance, of vanity; and he was so extremely prudent in
his actions, that, with the exception of his marriage, he never took
any step without having previously calculated the consequences to his
satisfaction. When the latter momentous event occurred, the philosopher
felt a natural longing to have a tenement of his own. His mother, whom
he describes as a woman of singular merit, and whom he had in her
lifetime treated with much filial kindness and affection, had been in
her grave for years; and he proposed “to take up house in Berwickshire”
with his sister; but duly weighing and deliberately considering the
matter, he came to the conclusion that a town was “the true scene
for a man of letters;” and, removing to Edinburgh, he exercised so
much frugality in disposing of his slender income that he was enabled
to live in comfort and contentment. Yet he was not, by any means,
parsimonious, and ever was ready, on fitting occasions, to prove his
generosity by charitable and beneficent actions.

The year 1752 was an important one in Hume’s life. He was then
appointed Librarian to the Faculty of Advocates, after a severe and
spirited contest, in which, besides the junior members of the bar, his
chief allies were the ladies of “modern Athens,” who made strenuous
efforts and exerted their utmost fascinations in his behalf. When the
triumph was achieved he found himself in a most advantageous position
in regard to an excellent and well-stocked library, which fortunately
suggested to his brain the scheme of furnishing the world with a
classical history of England, then a serious desideratum in national
literature. “Being frightened,” he states in his autobiography, “with
the notion of continuing a narrative through a period of seventeen
hundred years, I commenced with the House of Stuart, an epoch where I
thought the misrepresentation of faction began chiefly to take place.”

When the first volume, recording the events in the reigns of James
I. and Charles I., was issued, in 1754, the effects of the author’s
earlier training were sufficiently apparent to kindle the wrath of one
party without flattering the prejudices of the other. Accordingly, it
was assailed by one cry of reproach and disapprobation; the sale was
quite inconsiderable, and almost the only token of encouragement worth
having came from the Primates of England and Ireland, who advised him
to take heart, and proceed in his undertaking. But, whatever may be
thought of Hume’s historic leanings and political sympathies, it must
be admitted that he acted courageously, conscientiously, and without
fishing for the favor of those who had in their hands all the patronage
and disposal of such places and rewards as he could have aspired to. He
followed what appeared to him the true and just course, notwithstanding
the storms to which he felt he would on that account be exposed; and
his genius, more potent than had been the swords of his insurgent
kinsmen, threw a wall of defense around the memory of the exiled race
which, with all its defects, succeeding writers, whatever their ability
and energy, have never been skillful and vigorous enough to scale or
break down. Nevertheless, the reception of his work inspired him with
feelings of such dislike for the British public, that he resolved upon
leaving the country, renouncing his name, and passing the remainder of
his days on the Continent; but a French war luckily put an end to his
scheme of self-expatriation, and he determined to persevere with his
laborious and ungrateful task. In 1756 his second volume appeared, and
proved not less obnoxious than the first; but by that he had, as he
says, “grown callous against the impressions of public folly.” It was
fortunate, in any case, that he did not succumb till the tyranny was
overpast. His victory was secure, slowly as it might approach.

He had already published the “Natural History of Religion,” which was
severely censured; and when the author had arrived at his fiftieth
year, his matchless and magnificent “History of England” was completed
in six volumes. His easy, elegant, and interesting style ere long
rendered the work highly popular. Hume was by universal consent,
placed on a lofty pedestal of fame; and, though its reception had
originally been so disheartening, the sum obtained for the copyright,
and for his former productions, together with his economical habits,
had made him not only independent but, as he considered it, opulent.
He, therefore, looked forward to passing the remainder of his days in
peace, and in his native land, congratulating himself on having never,
in his struggle for fortune, courted the smiles of any great man, or
treated the humble with discourtesy. He was, though plain and careless
in manner, eminently qualified, by his frank and social humor, to
enjoy the company of his chosen friends, with whom, in spite of their
wide differences of opinion on the most serious subjects, he was ever
on terms of affectionate intercourse and uninterrupted friendship.
Nevertheless, within two years, he consented to forego his cherished
plans, at the earnest and repeated solicitations of Lord Hertford,
who was going as Embassador to Paris. Thither Hume accompanied that
nobleman, and was shortly after appointed Secretary of Embassy. In
1765, when Lord Hertford departed to undertake the government of
Ireland, the historian remained in the French capital as Chargé
d’Affaires, and performed the functions pertaining to the office in a
manner highly creditable to his clearness of judgment, his talent for
business, and capacity for state affairs. In the gay and fashionable
circles of Paris his fame, station, and agreeable bearing, secured him
so hearty a welcome that ladies and princes, wits and philosophers,
vied in their attentions. It was there that, in an evil hour, he
consented, in a spirit of excessive amiability, to take under his wing
the frantic and erratic Rousseau, whose connection afterward involved
him in much trouble, and caused him infinite annoyance.

Hume returned to this country in 1766, and was, the next year appointed
Under-secretary of State for the department presided over by Marshal
Conway, an office which he retained for more than twelve months. His
annual income, the fruits of real industry, now amounted to a thousand
pounds a year; and, taking a house in the new town of Edinburgh, he
settled to spend his remaining days among his old and most attached
friends. For some time his peaceful existence was uninterrupted, but in
1766 his health became so precarious that he was under the necessity of
undertaking a journey to Bath, when he was attended by his friend and
remote relative, John Home, the author of “Douglas,” with whom he had
many a jocular debate about the correct orthography of their name, and
the comparative merits of port and claret. The illustrious historian
was fond of relieving his sinking spirits by a playful jest at the
expense of his clansman’s warlike propensities, and did not omit so
favorable an opportunity as that presented by the poet’s pistols being
handed, with much ceremony, into the traveling-carriage:

“You shall have your humor, John,” he said, “and shoot as many
highwaymen as you like; for,” he added, with as much melancholy,
perhaps, as a philosopher could well feel, “there’s too little life
left in me to be worth fighting about.”

It appears that the martial predilections alluded to were shortly
afterward gratified by a commission in the “Buccleuch Fencibles,”
though on this occasion they were not in requisition; unless, indeed,
to inspire the young soul of Walter Scott, who was then exercising
his precocious imagination at Bath, where he made the acquaintance of
the bard, soldier, and divine, whose fame his pen, more than fifty
years later, did something to extend and perpetuate. If the eye of the
great historian, from which the world and all its vanities were fast
vanishing, lighted on that lame boy, vigilantly guarded by a sarcastic
and high-spirited female, how little could he have supposed that there
was the being destined to invest with the charms of romance and the
glow of chivalry that old royal cause, which he had employed all his
wisdom and all his intellect to restore to public favor and render
permanently attractive!

Meantime the veteran philosopher and historian, deriving little or no
benefit from his visit to Bath, returned to die under his own roof. His
decline was gradual; and, to the last, his most ultimate associates
could not observe any diminution of gayety. He talked familiarly with
them during their calls, and alluded to his approaching dissolution in
a tone of whose levity even Dr. Smith, his most ardent admirer, could
not approve. Whatever twinges of doubt or dread in regard to the future
he might in his last hours experience, were encountered and borne with
the semblance of indifference and tranquillity. He could not, indeed,
feel the blessedness of those who have fought a good fight and kept
the faith; nor could he, like Addison, exclaim with hopeful and serene
resignation, “You see how a Christian can die:” but, five days before
his last, he wrote, “I see death approaching gradually without anxiety
or regret.” On the 25th of August, 1776, he breathed his last; and was
buried in a cemetery on the Calton Hill, where a monument to his memory
has since been erected.




ROBERT SOUTHEY.


Among “the laborers of literature” Southey was eminently distinguished
by skill, regularity, perseverance, and other qualities hardly less
essential to continuous and satisfactory success in his profession. Few
men have practiced more resolute industry, or exhibited the literary
character in a more estimable light; and his example, in this respect,
is peculiarly worthy of being presented to the attention of aspiring
and intellectual youths.

He was descended from a sturdy race of yeomen, who had been settled for
a considerable period in the county of Somerset. He would, it seems,
have liked well to believe that his ancestors had fought beneath the
cross in Palestine; but was fain to content himself with ascertaining
the less gratifying fact that one of them had risen in rebellion with
the reputed son of “the merry monarch,” and narrowly escaped the
fangs of such law as was administered by the ruthless and unsparing
chief-justice of the last popish sovereign of England. It happened
that, during the last century, a kinsman of the family being engaged in
trade as a grocer in the city of London, Southey’s father was sent to
try his fortune in the metropolis; his relations, in all likelihood,
regaling their fancies with the agreeable delusion that he would in
good time, and by some easy but mysterious process, attain the wealth
and dignity of a Whittington. The young apprentice, however, was
naturally, to a great extent, disqualified for pursuing his occupation
with success, being by birth and training excessively fond of rural
affairs and field sports. The sight of a dead hare carried along the
street brought tears to his eyes, and the mention of a greyhound made
his heart sick. Many a time, no doubt, did he sigh with heaviness for
the green pastures, running streams, and shady orchards of his native
shire, as he pensively took down his master’s shutters, and prepared
to drag himself through the care, toil, and uncongenial duties, which
were brought by each successive day in endless round. While thus
occupied, the Somersetshire lad, on the death of his employer, had
an opportunity of transferring himself to Bristol; and there he was
placed, with due form, in the establishment of a linen-draper, who kept
the principal shop in the rich old town. While thus situated learning
his business, and applying the yard-wand to crapes and muslins, it was
his fortune to become acquainted with the son of a widow lady, whose
relationship was miscellaneous, and who resided on a small estate
that had belonged to her husband’s forefathers for generations. The
bold draper speedily formed an intimacy with the family――got into
the habit of being a regular Sunday guest――became enamored of one
of the daughters, and took her to wife, after embarking in business
on his own account; though it does not appear that he ever enjoyed
much prosperity. Nevertheless, it was ordered that his name should
not sink into utter oblivion, even though his shop――which, true to
hereditary tastes, he had called the “Sign of the Hare”――was not the
most flourishing concern; for under its roof, on the 12th of August,
1774, Robert Southey was born; and he was so fat, large, and ugly an
infant, that the nurse in attendance expressed no slight disappointment
at his unprepossessing appearance. The space of two years, however,
served to change him completely in this respect; and by that time he
had manifested a peculiarly sensitive disposition. In childhood he was
often affected to tears by the songs, ballads, and stories, which were
sung, recited, or told by the affectionate inmates of his father’s
house to amuse and interest him; and in after life the author of “The
Doctor” never could listen to a tale of woe without experiencing
painful sensations and feelings of sadness.

Southey was still less than three years old when it was his fate to be
removed to Bath, and soon after placed, though by no means willingly,
at the school of a dame whose countenance seems almost to have
frightened him out of his wits. Indeed, her aspect was so forbidding,
that the little pupil was shocked at its excessive plainness, and
loudly expressed the terror with which he was inspired, entreating,
but vainly, to be sent home. His struggles and complaints proving of
no avail he was compelled to submit to this petticoat government until
his sixth year; and while under it conceived the idea of going, with
two of his school-mates, to an island, and living by themselves. As it
was to include mountains of sweetmeats and gingerbread, the place, as
may be supposed, was sufficiently fascinating to their imaginations.
Southey at this time lived with Miss Tyler, his mother’s half-sister,
a full-blown spinster of considerable personal attractions, but with
an imperious will and a violent temper. The discipline to which
she subjected the young poet, though irksome and despotic, was not
altogether disadvantageous to the rise of his intellect. He was not
permitted to play with any of his companions, and he was made aware
that to soil his garments was deemed an inexpiable crime; but being
much in the company of people older than himself, he mused and romanced
at an unusually early age; and he was soon, like other boy-bards,
inspired

    “By strong ambition to out-roll a lay,
     Whose melody would haunt the world.”

His original aspirations, however, were of a martial cast; he longed,
with all the enthusiasm of an incipient poet, to be a soldier, and to
possess the various weapons used in battle. On one occasion he was
lulled into a temporary feeling of full and complete happiness by being
allowed to take the sword of a military visitor to bed with him; and
sadly was he mortified, on awaking, to perceive by the morning light
that it had in the mean time escaped from his grasp, and disappeared.
On another, he incurred a sharp infliction of the horsewhip for
strolling from home with a barber’s assistant, who had promised to
furnish him with a suitable blade, but proved faithless to his plighted
word.

As soon as Southey had learned to read, one of his aunt’s friends
presented him with a number of children’s books, which he much prized
and eagerly perused; and thus, perhaps, was implanted in his glowing
breast the germs of that extraordinary passion for literature which
made him in later days regard the fame arising from it as the most
worthy and desirable, as well as least evanescent of any. Moreover,
his maiden guardian was extremely fond of frequenting the theatre, and
had an extensive acquaintance among people connected with histrionic
affairs. Thus, at the age of four, Southey was taken to witness a play,
which so much delighted him, that he speedily, conceived a keen relish
for the stage. He heard more of theatrical matters than of any other
subject; and soon essayed to write dramas himself. His aunt was also
much given to reading romances, and trained her little nephew to do
likewise.

Notwithstanding this unquestionable fascination held out by her, the
capricious sway which she exercised with incessant vigilance was so
much felt by the boy, that he rejoiced exceedingly when allowed to
return to his father’s house, where he enjoyed comparative freedom, and
could walk into the neighboring fields, which with him, at this period,
was the greatest of all pleasures and the chief of all delights.

Miss Tyler had sternly prohibited her charge being breeched, like other
juveniles of the day; and though he was six years old, and tall for
his age, she had forced him to wear a childish, fantastic dress. It
was now gladly exchanged for a garb befitting the dignity of ambitious
boyhood; and the youthful dramatist was placed at a day-school, kept by
a Baptist minister. There, though a docile boy, he received somewhat
harsh treatment, and the only flogging on record that he ever underwent
at the hands of a teacher; but he did not profit, to any extent, by the
tuition. In twelve months the reverend pedagogue died; and Southey was
sent to a boarding-school about nine miles from Bristol, at a house
which, in other days, had been the seat of a provincial family of
consequence. The broken and ruinous gateways about which the urchins
sported, the walled garden transformed into a play-ground, the oaken
staircase on which they aspiringly scrawled their names, and the
tapestry which covered the old walls of the school-room, conveyed to
the heart of the young rhymer mournful impressions and associations,
and produced an impression on his memory not soon effaced. When in the
pride of youthful and eccentric intellect, he visited the spot in
company with a versifying friend, and described it in his early poem,
the “Retrospect.” He knew well how to appreciate the ideas suggested by
such a scene.

Meantime, at this educational institution he managed, rather by
assisting his comrades than any guidance he himself had the advantage
of, to acquire some knowledge of Latin, which was only taught
occasionally by a Frenchman who came from Bristol for the purpose.
Southey and his fellow-imps were rather meanly fed; and their
ablutions, performed chiefly in a stream that passed through the
grounds, were conducted with much less precision and completeness than
would have satisfied the scrupulous cleanliness of the fastidious Miss
Tyler. Indeed, the carelessness habitually permitted and practiced in
this respect would with some reason have driven her into one of her
boiling passions, which such an event as the wedding of a servant-maid
never failed to raise. The seminary was, besides, much too disorderly
to be in any degree comfortable; yet the boys were not without days and
seasons of juvenile enjoyment. In spring each was allowed to cultivate
a small allotment of garden-ground, on which was grown salad, which
served for a frugal supper; and in the autumn there was a plentiful and
animating crop of apples and other fruit to gather from the adjoining
orchards. On one occasion they unfortunately exceeded all discretion,
and appropriated so liberally those set apart for the master’s use,
that grave suspicions were excited and acted on, their drawers and
boxes searched, and the whole plunder recaptured. The youthful band
knew well that a moderate extent of pocketing would not have been
inquired into. As it was, every apple was taken from them, and _Inopem
me copia fecit_ might have been the exclamation of each votary of
mischief, as he hung his head and reflected on the vexatious incident.
They were dressed in their best, Southey, doubtless, wearing his cocked
hat, when Rodney went from Bath to Bristol, to be entertained by the
corporation of the great commercial emporium; and they were marched
to a convenient spot on the wayside, to give him three cheers as he
passed. They exerted their lungs with no small effect, and the gallant
admiral returned the salute with right hearty good-will.

At this not very advantageous seminary Southey remained for twelve
months, but at the end of that period a panic occurred, in consequence
of some disease prevailing in the establishment; and the future
Laureate was withdrawn from its precincts in tremulous haste, and given
again into the safe custody of his irascible but affectionate aunt.

Miss Tyler had by this time deserted Bath and all its social and
theatrical delights. On the death of her mother she had taken
possession of the latter’s house at Bedminster; and it was deemed
expedient to deliver Southey over to her tender mercies, while his
father looked out from his linens and broadcloth for a proper school
at which to place the clever youth. In this old-fashioned retreat, the
successful biographer of the greatest of English admirals confesses
to having spent some of the happiest days of his boyhood. Even at
that early age his pleasure seems to have been in retirement, and his
satisfaction in secluded labor; he had little relish for boyish games,
and he found so much amusement in the garden among flowers and insects,
that, had his taste in this branch of study been encouraged and taken
advantage of, he might, perhaps, have figured as a distinguished
naturalist. But that was not his destiny. His pen, wielded by a willing
hand and directed by a suggestive brain, was his weapon; and before
thirteen he had indulged his young ambition by compositions of various
kinds, and his imagination by perusing and devouring the pages of
Tasso, Ariosto, and Spenser.

Meantime, as early as assorted with his worthy father’s convenience,
Southey was placed as a day-boarder at a school in his native city,
where he appears to have been tolerably well taught. He had already,
as has been intimated, aspiringly commenced composition in verse.
Wordsworth dated his love of rhyme, and the tendency which colored
his manhood, from his tenth year; but his future friend and eulogist
seems to have received the “poetic impulse” at a much less mature
time of life, and to have commenced gratifying his sensations and
prepossessions by practicing the “art divine” at an age when he could
hardly have learned to hold or handle his pen with any degree of
facility. Owing to his aunt’s histrionic predilections, Shakspeare, as
the prince of dramatists, had been put into his little hands almost as
soon as he could read; and he went through the historical plays with
rapture. It then occurred to him that there would, in all probability,
be civil wars in his day, similar to those of which he read; and he
conceived the ambitious desire of rivaling the valorous feats and lofty
fame of Richard Neville, earl of Warwick, the setter-up and puller-down
of kings. So imbued did his mind and spirit become with this notion,
that he began nightly to dream of tents, battle-fields, beating drums,
clashing spears, and all the “pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious
war.” Besides perusing with avidity the works of Shakspeare, he had
read those of Beaumont and Fletcher before he was eight years old;
and his fancy, thus stimulated, glowed with romantic thoughts and
charming visions. Moreover, he had already been present at numerous
plays, and listened with awakened and lively curiosity to interminable
conversations about their writers and actors, whom he regarded as the
greatest of men. In this way his first aspirations after authorship
naturally took the dramatic form; and he did not hesitate to express
his opinion on the subject with great confidence and complacency.

“It is the easiest thing in the world to write a play,” observed he
one day, at this period, to a female friend of his aunt, with whom he
happened to be on a journey.

“Is it, indeed?” she said, not a little surprised.

“Yes,” replied Southey; “for you have only to think what you would say
if you were in the place of the characters, and make them say it.”

Acting on this not very correct principle, he not only produced
pieces himself, but endeavored to persuade his puerile associates to
do likewise. In the latter attempt he, of course, found his zealous
efforts altogether futile, but experienced much consolation from the
pride derived by his gentle mother, when she discovered that her boy
was so highly gifted. These were not the days of popular literature;
and the worthy draper’s dusty shelf did not present to his son’s keen
appetite for knowledge any very various or interesting collection of
books; but Southey about this time had the good fortune to meet with
Spenser’s “Faëry Queen,” which charmed him much with its sweetness. He
was soon, however, removed once more from under the paternal roof into
more congenial company.

His aunt, Miss Tyler, took a small house near Bristol; and he was once
more handed over to her care. A brother of the restless spinster also
went to live with her――a strange, half-witted man, whose enormous
consumption of ale and tobacco astonished his young kinsman, and
brought on himself a premature old age. He had a strong affection for
Southey, and loved well to have a game at marbles with him when an
opportunity presented itself; though apparently, he was better pleased
to smoke a pipe and drink beer in the shady arbor during summer, or by
the kitchen chimney in colder and less agreeable seasons. Some of his
wise, old-world saws, his nephew did not soon forget.

During his twelfth and thirteenth years Southey, ever eager in his
beloved pursuit, exercised his poetic powers with much industry and
enthusiastic perseverance. When writing, he searched and labored
diligently to make himself master of the necessary historic facts and
information relating to the particular subject with which he happened,
from inclination, to be occupied. Even at this date he was fitting and
accomplishing himself, by solitary and unaided study, and by practice
in the coining and structure of sentences, for the career which
circumstances and a genuine love of such matters led and incited him
to select; and which he afterward did follow with an ardor, patience,
and resolution in the highest degree creditable to himself, though
rarely if ever equaled, and never surpassed by others. It was perfectly
natural that the members of his family and their relations should
experience a very justifiable elation at talents which were thus,
perhaps, a little too precociously displayed; and Miss Tyler, flushed
with pride at the acquirements of her clever nursling, insisted on his
being educated to one of the learned professions. In this proposal she
was, luckily, supported by Southey’s maternal uncle, a clergyman,
who handsomely offered to defray the expenses which this otherwise
satisfactory scheme would entail. Accordingly, in the spring of 1788,
it was resolved that the young prodigy should be sent to Westminster
School. His gayly-disposed aunt was rejoiced at so favorable an
opportunity for going to London――then no such easy business as at
present; and he was conveyed thither under her protecting wing.

After a short time spent in visiting some of the imperious lady’s
friends and acquaintances he was duly entered, and soon after had
the task of writing some Latin verses from Thomson’s “Seasons,”
which was a process quite new to him, and productive of some trouble
and perplexity. However, he surmounted the difficulties, and even
practiced himself so far as to produce about fifty verses on the “Death
of Fair Rosamond” from choice. But that classical effort satisfied
his ambition, and he never afterward strove to excel save in his
native tongue. At this period the success of the “Microcosm,” and the
reputation it won for its institutors, the Eton boys, set the ambition
of the Westminster scholars on fire, and a weekly paper, entitled the
“Trifler,” was speedily commenced among them. In this little periodical
Southey requested the insertion of some verses of his on the death of
a dear sister, but he was balked in his wish by a mortifying neglect.
He next, in conjunction with several of his new associates, projected
a paper bearing the title of the “Flagellant,” which only reached
nine numbers, when a fierce attack on corporal punishments annoyed and
enraged the head-master of Westminster so highly that he commenced a
prosecution for libel against the more responsible parties. Southey at
once confessed himself to be the author of the obnoxious article, and
he was, in consequence, compelled to leave the school. In the age of
boy-periodicals this was certainly a most provoking consequence of his
first effort at furnishing contributions, and misfortunes, according
to the proverb, seldom come singly. His expulsion from Westminster was
speedily followed by circumstances still more adverse and distressing.
His father who, behind the counter, had languished, like an animal
transplanted to an uncongenial climate, became bankrupt and died.

Southey was now sent to matriculate at Oxford. It had been intended
that he should enter at Christ Church, and his name had accordingly
been put down there. But the Westminster mishap having reached the
dean’s ears, that dignitary, alarmed at the idea of insubordination,
refused him admittance, and he consequently entered at Balliol College
in 1792. His views and opinions, in regard to the forms and discipline
of the place, were not such as to favor his profiting much by his
residence there; and, though destined by his well-meaning relations for
the Church, he seems never to have cherished the prospect of clerical
honors with any degree of mental satisfaction. Yet, with all his
eccentric tenets and sentiments, he was staid and decorous in demeanor,
and meritoriously refrained from the excesses which he too frequently
witnessed.

Southey was, by this time, animated and deluded by all the too
sanguine credulity and glowing enthusiasm which so often mark and
cloud the morning of genius, and lead its possessor astray. While in
a state of intellectual fever and political excitement he made the
acquaintance of Coleridge, with whom he soon devised the fanciful and
bubble-like scheme since known and ridiculed as “Pantisocracy.” This
consisted of fantastic plans for collecting a number of discontented
youths, as brother-adventurers, and forming a colony in the New
World, on a thoroughly social basis. Southey wasted much time and
care on this chimerical idea; and it was decided that the aspirants
to perfect earthly content and felicity should commence operations
by purchasing, with their common contributions, a quantity of land,
which they were all to spend their labor in cultivating. Each was
to have a fair share of work assigned to him, while it was arranged
that the female emigrants――for one important regulation provided that
they were, without exception, to be married men――should manage all
domestic matters. Southey luxuriated in golden dreams and visionary
anticipations; his ardent spirit swelled and rose high. All obstacles
disappeared before his enthusiastic gaze, and he engaged the hand
and affections of a dowerless but captivating damsel in his native
place, who rejoiced in the very romantic name of Edith, and had no
insuperable objections to accompany him to the land of promise, which
lay sweetly, as his fancy pictured it, ready to receive them on the
banks of the Susquehannah River, flowing with milk and honey. So far
all went as smoothly with Southey as a total inexperience of the real
world, and full and entire confidence in his own untried powers of
action, could render matters to a strong imagination. But there was
yet a lioness of no ordinary ferocity in the way. Miss Tyler had still
to be informed, and the startling intelligence that her hopeful nephew
had, without consulting her wishes, selected a partner for life, was
instantly productive of one most inconvenient result. It brought upon
him the sudden and rebounding torrents of her wrath. The night was
rainy, but she was cut to the heart; and, mercilessly turning him out
of doors, she never condescended to see his face again. This was a
sufficiently portentous commencement for the Pantisocratic form of
society; and the scheme, as might have been foreseen, proving utterly
impracticable, the day-dream vanished into thin air when the most
distant effort was made to realize it.

Southey was now, for the first time, thrown entirely on his own
resources, and that struggle for existence by exertion, which
invigorates the mind and influences the understanding, began in
earnest. Under no circumstances could his ambitious spirit have
been still at this date. The stream was still near its rise, and
fretted itself into foam against each opposing rock; but the time was
approaching when its course was to be more smooth, and its waters
not less clear. His first step was to arrange with Mr. Cottle, of
Bristol, for the publication of “Joan of Arc,” with which he had been
for a considerable time occupied, and the next to deliver a course of
historical lectures, which were numerously attended. Nevertheless,
it appears that his pecuniary affairs were not by any means in a
flourishing condition at this crisis.

In 1794 he had, in conjunction with his friend Mr. Lovell, under
the names of Moschus and Bion, published a volume of poems; and
about the same period Southey, then glowing with revolutionary zeal,
composed his “Wat Tyler.” It is spoken of as a production of no
merit, and utterly harmless from its weakness. Long after the author
had recanted his early heresies, it was published surreptitiously to
annoy him, and he, in self-defense, applied for an injunction against
the printers. But the Chancellor refused to interfere in the matter,
on the ground of the peculiarly objectionable principles which the
book contained. The writer of this hapless――and, as it turned out,
perplexing――revolutionary _brochure_, in after life thus accounted for
its unwelcome existence:

“In my youth, when my stock of knowledge consisted of such an
acquaintance with Greek and Roman history as is acquired in the course
of a scholastic education, when my heart was full of poetry and
romance, and Lucan and Akenside were at my tongue’s end, I fell into
the political opinions which the French revolution was then scattering
throughout Europe; and, following those opinions with ardor, wherever
they led, I soon perceived that inequalities of rank were a light
evil compared to the inequalities of property, and those more fearful
distinctions which the want of moral and intellectual culture occasions
between man and man. At that time, and with those opinions, or rather
feelings (for the root was in the heart, and not in the understanding),
I wrote ‘Wat Tyler,’ as one who was impatient of all the oppressions
that are done under the sun. The subject was injudiciously chosen;
and it was treated as might be expected by a youth of twenty, in such
times, who regarded only one side of the question. Were I to dramatize
the same story now, there would be much to add, but little to alter; I
should write as a man, not as a stripling; with the same heart and the
same desires, but with a ripened understanding, and competent stores of
knowledge.”

Next year, while “Joan of Arc” was still in the press, Southey was,
with a view to his welfare, urged and persuaded to accompany his uncle,
Mr. Hill, to Lisbon, where that gentleman was chaplain to the factory.
Consequently, when the epic poem appeared, its author had left the
country; but not until he had contracted a matrimonial alliance, under
circumstances so romantic as to put to shame the inventive faculty of
novelists, and furnish another instance of truth being often stranger
than fiction. His reverend friend and patron was under the impression
that a change of scene and society would effectually dissipate and
banish all fine visions of love, emigration, and social perfection on
the banks of a North American river: but Southey clung to the object
of his affection with poetic indiscretion and disinterestedness,
and took a very conclusive precaution that the first part of this
anticipation should be falsified. On the eve of departure for the
continental excursion, he took the bold and irretrievable course of
privately leading the adored Edith to the altar, where he received
her hand as his bride, and united their earthly fortunes forever. It
is stated that they parted immediately after their marriage, at the
portico of the church; and the bridegroom set off on his travels.
Doubtless, in subsequent years he had no cause to repent of having
thus baffled the well-meant designs of his relative, anxious as the
latter unquestionably was to promote his interests; and many, as well
as Southey, who have, after a similar fashion, defied the fears of the
wise, and rushed desperately on matrimony, have found in the duties
which attend it, the best incitements to exertion, and the elements of
honorable success in life. Yet early marriages in circumstances like
his are extremely unsafe to stand upon; and Southey’s kinsman was quite
justified in telling him to beware.

In the year 1796 Southey joyfully returned to England where his poem
had in his absence been published; and he began to form the notes he
had made while abroad into “Letters from Spain and Portugal.” He found
it necessary to accept the fulfillment of an old promise of pecuniary
assistance from a very intimate college friend; and then he proceeded
to London, with the grand intention of studying and accomplishing
himself in the laws of the realm. He was duly entered as a student at
Gray’s Inn, and made an attempt to combine legal studies with poetical
prepossessions; but this, as might have been expected, proved quite
futile. Law and poetry――the perusal of Blackstone and the writing of
“Madoc”――were not very harmonious conjunctions, as he soon discovered,
to the neglect of the former.

Sometime afterward Southey took a small house at Westbury, a beautiful
village, where, in the society of his beloved wife, he resided about
twelve months, and spent some of his most satisfactory days. He then
produced more poetry than he ever did in the same space of time before
or after; and he enjoyed the particular intimacy of Sir Humphry Davy,
whose ardent genius was then making itself felt at Bristol. The rising
man of science took a deep interest in, and heard passages read from,
“Madoc,” as its composition was proceeded with by the aspiring and
painstaking author.

Southey was likewise employed, at this time, in preparing a volume
of minor poems, and a new edition of his “Letters from Spain and
Portugal,” to which he had paid a second visit; besides editing the
“Annual Anthology,” the first portion of which then appeared. His
literary occupations were so decidedly and undeniably to his taste,
and became so much “the life of his life,” that the idea of being
chained to the law, and harassed by the beckonings of conscience
in the direction of dry and dusty volumes, was gradually found to
be more irksome and intolerable. Thus his attention was wisely and
deliberately withdrawn from the concerns of a profession for which
he was not calculated, and wholly concentrated on literature. Indeed
the law is, of all others, a jealous mistress, and will accept of no
divided allegiance; and such a result as that at which the poet arrived
might easily have been foretold, in the case of one who commenced
the marvelous achievement of “eating terms,” with indulging in the
prospective pleasure of burning his law-books after he should, by their
aid, have amassed a magnificent fortune, and retired to enjoy it in
Christmas festivities among lakes and mountains.

Trusting now chiefly for support and distinction to his literary
effusions, Southey speedily became one of the most industrious
of living mortals. His devotion to his pursuits was intense and
unparalleled, and indeed so great, that he considered the correcting of
proof-sheets as a luxury of the highest kind. In fact, he seems to have
regarded literature as the most agreeable of worldly concerns, and the
fame arising from its successful cultivation as that kind of which a
wise man should be principally ambitious, because the most permanent.
This principle regulated his conduct and stimulated his exertions in
his chosen field. He guided himself by it with singular resolution; his
actions became extremely uniform; and the eccentric workings of his
youthful spirit having ceased, his life was as calm and cheerful as
could have been desired.

In 1801 Southey had the good fortune to obtain the appointment of
private secretary to the Irish Chancellor of the Exchequer, whom he
accompanied to Dublin; and in the same year published “Thalaba the
Destroyer,” an Arabian fiction of considerable power, beauty, and
magnificence. Soon after this, a pension was bestowed upon him by
Government.

Southey now deemed it advisable to settle on the banks of the Greta,
near Keswick, and pursued his avocations with keen and constant
diligence. He wrote perpetually. Each day, and each hour of the day,
had their appropriate tasks. He secluded himself much from society,
but found consolation in the company of his pretty numerous household,
and the well-stocked library which it was his fortune to collect and
possess. He now sent into the world, from his agreeable retreat, a
volume of “Metrical Tales,” and “Madoc.” After them appeared “The Curse
of Kehama,” considered as the most meritorious of his poetic works,
but founded on the Hindoo mythology, and therefore not peculiarly
interesting to general readers. Some years later he published
“Roderick, the last of the Goths,” a noble and pathetic poem.

In the mean time, Southey had not disdained the less pretending
species of composition. His “Life of Nelson” is considered the best
of his admirable prose works. When published, in 1813, it instantly
rose into popular favor, and was recognized by the public as a
standard biography. It was originally issued in two small volumes,
since compressed into one. He subsequently contributed to “Lardner’s
Cyclopædia” a series of lives of British admirals. Besides, he again
testified his biographic skill by a “Life of Wesley,” the celebrated
founder of Methodism. He evinced therein a minute acquaintance with
the religious controversies of the day, and presented curious and
interesting sketches of field-preachers and their performances. There
were successively other works, less generally admired, relating to
history, politics, morals, and philosophy. His numerous writings are
characterized by an easy and flowing style, yet they did not secure him
much real popularity; but this must, in a great measure, be attributed
to the nature of the subjects. His prose was described as perfect by
Lord Byron, who styled him “the only existing entire man of letters.”

Southey had, long ere this, relinquished the opinions which prompted
him to produce “Wat Tyler;” and when the “Quarterly Review” was
established in 1809, he became connected with the enterprise which was
then entered upon, and furnished several of the prominent articles to
that distinguished periodical in the earlier stage of its career.

Though not enjoying that measure of popular favor to which, as an
author of merit and a man of worth and prudence, he was justly
entitled, Southey ranked high among the writers of his day; and he was
fully appreciated by those most capable of judging critically.

In 1821, the degree of LL.D. was conferred on him by the University of
Oxford; and other marks of distinction were within his grasp, if he
had chosen to accept them. He was unambitious of public celebrity, and
cared little for going into the world. In fact, he is pronounced to
have mixed too little with his fellow men, and was therefore wanting in
that particular kind of intelligence and information which can only be
obtained by a free and familiar intercourse with the world. That “the
proper study of mankind is man,” is a doctrine with which he appears to
have had little or no sympathy, so long as he had it in his power to
say with truth:

     “Around me I behold,
    Where’er these casual eyes are cast,
      The mighty minds of old;
    My never-failing friends are they,
    With whom I converse night and day.”

One of Southey’s latest prose compositions consisted of his “Colloquies
on the Progress and Prospects of Society,” in which Montesinos is made
to converse with the ghost of Sir Thomas More.

On the death of Mr. Pye, the poet-laureate, the vacant dignity had
been offered to Sir Walter Scott; but the great Border Minstrel
declining to accept of it, used his influence in favor of Southey, who
was accordingly appointed. In this capacity he composed his “Carmen
Triumphale” and “The Vision of Judgment,” which, like the productions
of other laureates, encountered much ridicule. His latest poetical
emanations were, “All for Love,” and “The Pilgrim of Compostella.”

Southey’s repute as an author and political writer rose so high,
that he was offered a baronetcy, and election to the representation
in Parliament of a ministerial borough. However, his knowledge was
rather of books than human affairs; he was by no means qualified to
“make himself formidable” as a senator; he was ever in extremes, and
had no experience of that middle path which can alone be permanently
maintained in dealing with public affairs, and which is ever chosen by
those not incapacitated by nature to learn from the past, and meet the
shadowy future with prescience. Under these circumstances he acted with
wisdom and prudence: he considered that his fame and prosperity could
only be preserved by a resolute adherence to his studious occupations;
and he declined both distinctions, continuing his habits of ceaseless
reading and composition. It seems that, in his entranced devotion to
his literary projects, he had neglected that exercise which he had
declared so essential to health, and during his three last years he
became the victim of disease. The early partner of his joys and sorrows
had already sunk into the grave; and Southey had contracted a second
union with a lady known for her poetic accomplishments. He is said to
have left a considerable fortune――the result of his industry――at his
death, which took place on the 21st of March, 1843. He was buried in
the church-yard at Crosthwaite, in the neighborhood of his residence by
lake and mountain; and an inscription for the tablet to his memory was
furnished by the venerable Bard of Rydal Mount, who succeeded him in
the laureateship, and was, ere long, laid at rest at no great distance
from his former compeer.




THOMAS MOORE.


The original genius, exquisite sensibility, independent spirit, and
incorruptible integrity, which the greatest scholar of his age ascribed
in his will to this bright and fanciful bard from the “Emerald Isle,”
have been generally admired and acknowledged. Indeed, notwithstanding
his multitudinous and peculiar temptations to love patrician personages
not wisely, but too well, few men of genius have ever excelled or
equaled Moore in these important and laudable qualities for which Dr.
Parr gave him credit, any more than in the brilliancy of his intellect
or the strength of his domestic affections. That he passed through a
severe ordeal, and was exposed to many trials, can hardly be doubted.
The early recognition of rare talent is too frequently fatal to its
possessor; and the celerity of Moore’s transit from the humble parlors
in the Irish capital to fashionable saloons and the banquets of princes
was quite amazing, and well-nigh unprecedented. Yet he appears, without
ostentatiously and perpetually proving the fact by bellowing it into
the public ear, to have maintained his freedom of thought and action
almost unimpaired to the end of his life. The career of such a man is
necessarily fraught with interest and instruction; and the boyhood
of a poet is always a subject especially worthy of being dwelt upon,
as being replete with profit to the young and information to all.
Who, indeed, can read without emotion of the gentle Cowper, being
maltreated by his school-fellows at Westminster, and not daring to
lift his eyes above the shoe-buckles of the elder boys; or of Scott,
seated by some ruined edifice devouring ancient ballads, and gazing
with rapture on the landscape in view; or of Byron, stretched on the
old tombstone of Harrow, with the strong ambition in his mind and the
bitter disappointment in his heart that were destined to unite and
bring forth glorious but melancholy fruits; or of Wordsworth, the Bard
of Contemplation, receiving the poetic impulse while led to and fro on
the romantic banks of the Derwent? In a different and less attractive
scene must we look for the earliest aspirations and exploits of the
gifted youth whose songs, so gay, rich, and choice in their language,
afterward held the fair and courtly in mute attention――whose sparkling
wit proved so effective a weapon in political controversy; and whose
spirit qualified him so perfectly to unite his national music to
immortal verse.

Thomas Moore was born on the 28th of May, 1779, in the city of Dublin,
where his father, a decent and respectable tradesman, at that time
carried on a limited business as a wine-merchant. His mother appears
to have been a rollicking Irish woman, with much honest humor, and
no particular indisposition to indulge occasionally in an expletive,
indicating any thing rather than Asiatic repose or excessive respect
for the third commandment. This worthy dame, joyous and dashing, was
fond of all such festivities as came in her way, and of all such
society as she could obtain access to. She could, doubtless, sing
delightfully at the supper-parties she frequented, enjoy herself
without stint, when “the mirth and fun grew fast and furious,” and let
care and all its horrid concomitants wait for her attention till the
morning. In fact, she was blessed with no small portion of Hibernian
indifference as to the future. Moreover, she had the advantage of
being a strict and sincere Roman Catholic; and her husband also “held
the ancient faith,” though with a philosophical moderation which his
decorous spouse by no means approved of. Though a genuine Irishman by
parentage and nativity, Moore, strangely, advanced no imaginary claim
to estates confiscated for centuries, to wealth dissipated before he
entered the vale of tears, or to ancestral honors. He even declined the
distinction of having aristocratic kindred; and it must be admitted,
that without these aids to inspiration he contrived to do “excellently
well,” and leave a brilliant name. In one quality he assuredly was not
deficient, that of fervid nationality and warm love of his country.

Almost in the earliest stage of his existence the prophetic eye of
Mrs. Moore discerned signs of her little Tom being a marvelous child,
and he was nursed and reared with a view to his attaining due and
enviable eminence ere his sun set. The happy days of the boy have,
perhaps, too often no certain existence save in the imagination of the
same being when grown into a man, and looking on past scenes with that
enchantment which distance lends to the view. Gibbon remarks, that
while the poet gaily describes the short hours of juvenile recreation
he forgets the tedious daily labors of the school, which is approached
each morning with anxious and reluctant step. He declares that he
never knew the boasted happiness of boyhood, against the existence of
which, as a general luxury, he therefore enters a feeling protest;
but in this respect the experience of the fanciful Irish poet was
quite the opposite of that confessed to by the skeptical historian
of the Roman Empire. Moore was sent, with all convenient haste, to a
day-school, kept by a person who “quaffed his noggin of poteen” with
much less than proper consideration for his tutorial avocations. He was
afterward placed under Mr. Samuel White, who had been the preceptor of
Sheridan, and proved his want of prophetic skill by pronouncing the
future wit and orator an incorrigible dunce. At this seminary Moore
displayed a remarkable taste for music, poetry and recitation. This
was much strengthened by the master of the school, who encouraged a
habit of acting which was not in any degree relished by the majority
of his pupils. However, Moore speedily became a favorite “show
scholar,” and in that capacity had the gratification of seeing his
name in print at the age of ten, as one of the juvenile performers
who were to contribute to an evening’s entertainment at the private
theatre of a lady of rank. He began forthwith to compose in numbers,
and became more and more the delight of his mother’s eye. She watched
with tender anxiety and sanguine hope his extraordinary ascent, step
by step, of the social ladder; and he repaid her solicitude by a
filial devotion which no poetic triumphs were ever in subsequent life
allowed to interfere with. Being extremely ambitious in regard to his
worldly prospects, she early, despite the disabilities then attaching
to those of her religious faith, destined him for the bar, and afforded
him every opportunity of cultivating his mind and extending his
knowledge which her means and position permitted. He soon gave cheering
indications of being not unworthy of such anxious care, and was
highly applauded by his teacher, who, while doing so, did not neglect
so opportune an occasion of saying a good word for himself; and he
signalized his precocious powers at the age of fourteen by contributing
verses to the pages of a Dublin Magazine. “Master Moore” was already a
sort of celebrity on the banks of the Liffey.

The friends and relatives among whom the melodist was brought up were,
without exception, ardent in their Irish patriotism; and in 1792 he
was carried by his father to one of the demonstrative gatherings held
in welcome of the French Revolution, and was perched on the chairman’s
knee. The excitement of the festive scene, and the hallucination of
those who took part in it, may be judged from such toasts as that
recorded by him as having been enthusiastically sent round: “May the
breezes from France fan our Irish oak into verdure.” Surely, Donnybrook
Fair must ever afterward have seemed tame to those who were present at
such assemblies.

The young poet espoused these principles with warmth and sympathy;
and having been entered at Trinity College in 1795, supported his
opinions with a lively eloquence, which, as matters stood, might have
caused danger. He passed through the academic course with much credit,
was distinguished for his classical acquirements, took part in the
debates of the Historical Society, and was much admired for the wit
and playfulness he exhibited among his associates. Having brought his
collegiate studies to a termination, taken the degree of bachelor of
arts, and won the character of a most pleasant companion, he proceeded
to London in 1799, and had the happiness of being enrolled as a student
of law at the Middle Temple.

Meantime he had been prompt to seize every means of improvement, and
his innate talent for music had been cultivated with assiduity and
effect; he had gained no inconsiderable amount of classical learning;
and he had acquired some knowledge of the French and Italian languages.
In the middle of the year following his arrival in England, the
translation of Anacreon’s Odes, with which he had been engaged for some
time, was published by subscription. This work had been contemplated
by the eager and aspiring boy even in his school days, and it now
appeared, with a dedication to the Prince of Wales, to whom the poet
had already been presented. Its reception was most flattering; public
favor was bestowed in abundance, and it elicited this complimentary
impromptu――

    “Ah, mourn not for Anacreon dead!
     Ah, mourn not for Anacreon fled!
     The lyre still breathes he touched before,
     For we have one Anacreon Moore!”

The rhyming adventurer from the “Green Isle”――small in form but
sprightly in mind――was introduced to fashionable circles, excited the
curiosity and interest of royal personages, and charmed patrician
assemblies with his vocal powers. He had, moreover, the distinction
of dining twice at Carlton House with the Prince of Wales, and of
being admitted to a grand _fête_ given by his royal highness on
becoming regent. At a subsequent period he was one of the same exalted
individual’s keenest assailants and sharpest satirists.

In 1803, Moore, through the influence of his friend Lord Moira, to
whom he had been introduced by a Dublin Mæcenas, obtained an official
appointment at Bermuda, and went thither to undertake the duties
attached to it. The novelty of the situation might, for a brief
season, lend it some slight charm and attraction; but after a year’s
trial of the island he considered it intolerable, as might have been
anticipated in the case of one who had revelled in all the joys of
poetic celebrity, and whose delightful singing had been rewarded
in glittering halls with the dazzling and fascinating smiles of
aristocratic beauty. He therefore resolved on fulfilling its functions,
in future, by deputy; and after a flying visit to America, returned to
England.

Moore, soon after this brief absence from the world of wit and
fashion, published his “Odes and Epistles,” suggested by this rambling
excursion. In these poems, as in the volume given to the world under
the assumed name of “Thomas Little,” the glowing and irresistible
imagination of the bard led him to commit what were very generally
regarded as nothing less than most objectional offenses against
delicacy and decorum. Accordingly he was attacked in the “Edinburgh
Review,” with, as he conceived, so much and undeserved severity, that
he thought himself called on to challenge Jeffrey, as the responsible
editor, to mortal combat. In consequence, the poet and critic met at
Chalk Farm to enjoy the doubtful luxury of being fired at by each
other; but, fortunately, the interference of lurking police-officers
stopped the matter in time to prevent mischief, otherwise it is not
improbable――so great was their awkwardness――that it might have resulted
in involuntary suicide; at all events, the seconds seem to have been
in a position of no slight peril. If any thing could have added to
the absurdity of the affair, it would have been the report, which
asserted that the pistols, on examination, were found to contain paper
pellets, substituted in place of leaden bullets. This proved to have
been erroneous; but the whole transaction exposed the actors to much
tantalizing but well-merited ridicule. “A fellow-feeling makes us
wondrous kind,” and the parties principally implicated formed a close
and lasting friendship.

Having already essayed dramatic composition, in a piece entitled the
“Gipsy Prince,” Moore, in 1811, made a second attempt in an opera,
“M.P., or the Blue Stocking,” which was produced at the Lyceum
theatre with partial success. He was infinitely more fortunate in a
matrimonial adventure, made about the same period; after which he
removed from the metropolis, and chose a residence in Dorsetshire.
Then appeared the “Twopenny Post-bag,” a political effusion, in which
several eminent persons, holding opinions at variance with those of
the author’s patrons, were lashed with sparkling wit, sharp sarcasm,
and humorous pleasantry: but he was not unoccupied with projects more
worthy of his fine taste and beaming fancy. He now came forth with
his “Irish Melodies,” which are replete with real feeling and true
delicacy, and fully entitle him to be rewarded, as he desired, with the
proud title of “the Poet of the Irish people.” They are the happiest
emanations of his gay and fanciful muse. Among song-writers he is
almost unrivaled. No matter what may be the theme――playful or pathetic,
light or impassioned, his verse flows onward like a “shining river”
with graceful fluency; and his cadences tell how exquisitely the ear
was tuned to the expression of the sentiment, which had its origin in
the mind. It is as the producer of lyrics for the ancient music of his
country that he gave proof of his peculiar and felicitous combination
of power, and achieved so wide a reputation. He poured out these
verses with unexampled readiness and fertility. In some he appeared
not only as poet, but musical composer also; and his delicious words
and graceful music thrilled and captivated the public ear and heart.
His popularity had now risen high, but it soon appeared that his name
had not yet gathered all the fame which was to enrich it, when, in
1817, “Lalla Rookh” made its appearance. This Oriental romance, rich,
brilliant, and gorgeous, was his most elaborate poem. It had been
produced in frost and snow, yet his potent imagination had conjured
before him the sunniest of Eastern scenes, with all their splendor and
magnificence; and, what was a most important part of the business,
the manuscript is said to have brought him three thousand guineas.
When presented to the public, it was found to unite the purest and
softest tenderness with poetic fervor and lofty dignity. Its effect
was immediate and extensive; it was received with eager enthusiasm;
and the readers showed their appreciation by committing large
portions to memory. No doubt the English public were, at the time,
athirst for verse; but even under such circumstances nothing but high
merit, taste, fancy, feeling, and delicacy, could have ensured such
rapturous approval, and wrought such enchantment as Moore’s poem, rich
with imagery and ornament, now did, though on a subject by no means
calculated to interest the bulk of the community.

His next work, “The Fudge Family in Paris,” saw the light in 1818, and
was one of those brilliant trifles in which its author was considered
to be altogether unrivaled in his day and generation. It arose from
a passing visit made by the poet to the Continent, and ran through
successive editions. He afterward reproduced the actors in “The Fudge
Family in England;” but with a felicity and success utterly unequal to
the original effort.

Moore had now, as a poet, achieved splendid triumphs, and excited
immense admiration.

    “Crowned with perennial flowers,
       By wit and genius wove,
     He wandered through the bowers
       Of fancy and of love;”

while, in social points of view, few men, similarly situated, were more
courted by persons of rank and distinction. He had made comparatively
few enemies, for his satirical shafts, sparkling with wit, were
discharged with so much sportiveness, that they rarely created much
venomous feeling. The kindness of the heart from which they emanated
was naturally too great to admit of that being very frequently the
case. He continued, though tried by vicissitudes of fortune, to retain
all his amiable and domestic feelings in full vigor; his rural dwelling
seems to have had greater attraction than the gay and glittering
drawing-rooms, which he still now and then enlivened with the flashes
of his graceful wit and refined genius. He was a man of the world as
well as a poet and scholar, and he relished the taste of sparkling
glasses of “liquid ruby,” as well as the sight of bright eyes and
brilliant glances. He seems to have generally enjoyed himself with
little restraint; and ministered to the amusement of others without
compromising his personal dignity, or in any degree violating the
independence of his spirit. His wit and cheerfulness, when exerted,
were fascinating in the extreme, and he could at pleasure “set the
table in a roar.” One day, at a dinner-party where he was, the absence
of game having been lamented, one of the guests, struck with his fine
display, remarked――

“Why, gentlemen, what better game could you wish than ‘Moore game?’
Surely you have that in abundance.”

In the circles he frequented it was his lot to become intimate with
Lord Byron, to whom he had introduced himself by something resembling
a challenge; and when, in 1819, he made that journey to the Continent
which furnished him with matter for his “Rhymes on the Road,”
Moore visited the great, but erring and unhappy, author of “Childe
Harold,” then residing near Venice. It was then that the noble and
long-descended bard confided to his charge the autobiography, which
was ultimately consigned to the flames, after it had entailed on the
Irish melodist infinite trouble, anxiety, and annoyance, and that
shortly after the time when the conduct of the individual who acted
as his deputy at Bermuda had driven him from England, and involved
him in serious pecuniary difficulties and embarrassments. On leaving
Italy, Moore betook himself to Paris, where he was treated with high
honor and distinguished by a public dinner, which, as a mark of esteem
and admiration, was particularly grateful to the heart and feelings
of the accomplished exile. While there, he wrote the “Loves of the
Angels,” containing passages of great beauty, passion, and tenderness,
but considered inferior to the former effusions of his versatile muse.
This may be accounted for by its publication having been hastened by
the announcement of Lord Byron’s “Heaven and Earth,” understood to be
founded on the same passage of Scripture――a very sufficient explanation
of its holding a secondary place among its author’s productions. His
latest work of imagination was the “Epicurean,” an Eastern tale in
prose, and in a spirit of pure romance.

In 1825, Moore visited Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford, and was
entertained with wonted hospitality by the mighty novelist, who
did not fail to conduct his charming and interesting visitor to the
Rhymer’s Glen, and all the spots renowned in Border history and
tradition, which he was accustomed daily to haunt and draw inspiration
from. Yet it may fairly be questioned whether the sunny heart and
voluptuous imagination of the sentimental love-singer, which had
luxuriated in all the gorgeousness of Oriental scenery, and in the
meeting of “bright waters” in sweet and happy valleys, would be very
deeply impressed while viewing the purple peaks of Eildon, or crossing
the “Leader’s silver tide,” which were the pride and consolation of the
“last minstrel’s” checkered existence.

In 1825, Moore appeared before the public in the character of a
biographer, with the “Life of Sheridan,” which, though valuable and
amusing, was not considered fully to establish his reputation in
his new literary field. Indeed, it was the fashion of the day to
say that Moore had murdered the marvelous and witty orator, whose
skillfully-prepared and dexterously-delivered jokes had so often made
the walls of St. Stephen shake and resound with laughter and merriment.
“No!” exclaimed George IV., on hearing this grave charge; “but he has
certainly attempted his life.” Lord Brougham says, that the frankness
with which Moore gave the secret note-books of the famous wit to the
world, must almost have made their author shake in his grave.

Four years later, Moore was again an aspirant to public favor, with
“Notices of the Life of Lord Byron.” From the large space which the
poetic peer had during life filled in the eye of the world, and the
extraordinary reputation he had left behind him, this work was, and
could hardly fail to be, extremely interesting. Much had been expected,
however, on account of the close friendship that had existed, and the
frank intercourse that had taken place, between the distinguished
writer and the hero whose sayings and doings his pen aspired to
immortalize. Moreover, the mystery attached to the autobiography that
had been destroyed was not forgotten. The literary enterprise, when
executed, was not deemed quite satisfactory; it was encompassed with
perplexing and insuperable difficulties, and the book was necessarily
the reverse of faultless. In fact, even if he had the inclination, it
was almost impossible for him to comment with any degree of freedom
or severity on the failings and follies of a man with whom he had
been long on terms so intimate; even if the danger and delicacy of
the arduous task had not been indefinitely increased by respect and
consideration for the feelings of many persons then still living.

The notices of Byron’s life were followed by “Memoirs of Lord Edward
Fitzgerald,” whose career had attracted Moore’s ardent and most
consecrated sympathies. The life of this ill-fated nobleman was written
throughout with heart and feeling; and, perhaps, may be taken as the
most favorable specimen of its author’s prose style. Besides, he had
shown his prowess in political and religious controversy, in the “Life
of Captain Rock,” as also in the “Travels of an Irish Gentleman;”
and he contributed a history of Ireland to “Lardner’s Cyclopædia.”
These emanations are characterized by much of the beauty of language,
liveliness of remark, and tenderness of sentiment, displayed in his
metrical writings, but without being received with similar tokens of
approbation. The surpassing charms of his happy and exuberant verse,
ever displaying a fancy rich, spirited, elegant, and impassioned,
though not sublime, or always immortal, have been universally felt and
confessed; the enchantment they produced for a time on the public mind
and imagination, was beyond all dispute or question: but with his prose
works it was widely different. Whatever their intrinsic merits, they
have failed to rank in public interest or estimation with his poetic
compositions.

Nevertheless, the nature of some of them, the subjects to which they
related, and the principles they sought to maintain, support, and
vindicate, were such, that the Irish patriots of the period conceived
their author fairly entitled to share in the glories they were
acquiring, and the laurels they were reaping in the British Parliament.
This conclusion being arrived at, Moore was graciously requested
to leave his quiet and peaceful abode in Wiltshire, and appear as
a candidate for the representation of Limerick, in order that he
might “pursue the triumph and partake the gale.” He was not, however,
so ambitious of senatorial rank as to accept of an honor, which the
peculiar circumstances under which it could have been conferred, and
the conditions on which it would have been held, rendered, to say the
least, equivocal in character.

Moore, by the favor of his political friends, enjoyed a pension
from the crown during the latter years of his life; but they were
darkened, and his beaming intellect clouded, by the domestic losses and
calamities, which, at this period, he had to endure.

The once gay, vivacious, and captivating poet, died at his residence,
Slopperton Cottage, near Devizes, on the 26th of February, 1852, and he
was laid at rest in the green church-yard at Bonham.




SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.


Three months previous to the date when the ashes of Sir Godfrey Kneller
mingled with kindred dust, the first Englishman who, according to
the eloquent eulogium of Burke, added the praise of the elegant arts
to the other glories of his country, was cradled, with time-honored
formalities, in a borough town of Devonshire.

Joshua Reynolds was the tenth of the numerous family with which his
parents――a worthy and old-fashioned couple――were blessed. His father
was a scholar and divine, known and valued in the province for the
respectability of his learning, the innocence of his heart, and the
simplicity of his mind. Besides, he is stated to have been of so
singularly absent a tendency, that once, while performing a journey
on horseback, he dropped one of his top-boots by the way, without
perceiving the unusual and inconvenient loss he had met with. Doubtless
when he arrived at home, this laughable and disastrous incident would
furnish his fruitful dame, Theophila, with the text of a diffuse and
impassioned curtain-lecture, and, perhaps, make the reverend personage
considerably more careful when in future he escaped for a while
from his toils and fatigues as head-master of the grammar-school of
Plympton. There his distinguished son was born on the 16th of July,
1723; and there he was ere long inspired with the ambition of linking
his name indestructibly with that glorious art of which he became so
successful a cultivator.

The occasion of the high-fated infant’s presentation at the baptismal
font was rendered memorable by a mistake so awkward and peculiar, as
to furnish reasonable grounds for believing the mental characteristics
of the elder Reynolds to have been then at work. In any case, the
officiating clergyman was led by some process to pronounce the
Christian name of Joseph instead of that by which the child then
presented has since been known to the world, as well as registered in
the records of fortune and the rolls of fame. On the education of young
Reynolds much less attention was bestowed than might have been expected
from the circumstances of his birth; and he did not profit to any large
extent by such instruction as he received. He did not obtain any great
stock of classical knowledge; but his deficiency in this important
respect, though never supplied, was, in after days, countervailed and
thrown into the background by the information which he had acquired
in untiring study of Nature and perseverance in Art, in that commerce
with the most refined portion of the British public, of which, for many
long years, he had the advantage, and in the constant and familiar
intercourse which, during prosperous manhood, he maintained with men
of genius, intellect, and erudition. But, however little inclined to
pore over Latin and Greek books, his heart was, without loss of time,
turned toward an accomplishment which he afterward found of infinitely
greater value. Almost in infancy he began to show signs of his vocation
for the pursuit which made him one of the most remarkable men, and the
greatest painter, of his age; and his first effort was the copying of
some drawings made by his sisters. He was then in early boyhood, and he
next applied the artistic skill he possessed to the imitation of such
prints as illustrated the volumes in his father’s library; particularly
those in an old Book of Emblems, which was inherited, along with
her Dutch blood, from a grandmother, who had come from Holland. The
clerical pedagogue did not smile on these juvenile attempts, nor did
he look with a propitious eye on the direction his son’s talents were
taking. However absent scholars may be in regard to other matters,
especially those which chiefly concern themselves, they are usually
observant enough when the welfare and interests of their children are
at stake. Even Adam Warner awoke from day-dreams about the Eureka when
he saw the lordly chamberlain whispering soft tales in the ear of his
beauteous daughter; and Parson Reynolds, though so much occupied with
sage reflections that he could only find time to indicate to his wife
by monosyllables whether he would have tea or coffee on an afternoon,
opened his eyes to the fact, that Joshua’s industry in drawing and
coloring, with the rude materials within his reach, contrasted
disagreeably with his remissness in attending to the lessons of the
school over which he presided. Thus he denounced the boyish essays as
the offspring of pure idleness, and the author of them was destined
for the medical profession. Though, perhaps, this was decided on with
little consideration for his own wishes, Reynolds stated in after life,
that if such had been his fortune, he would have exerted himself as
strenuously to become an eminent physician as he strove with success
to be a great painter. However, the paternal views were suddenly and
fortunately changed.

Having, about his eighth year, met with the “Jesuit’s Perspective,”
young Reynolds read and digested its contents with so much earnestness,
that he was enabled to execute a drawing of the school-house on the
principles asserted in the treatise. This, when exhibited in the family
circle, quite astonished the anxious father, who, with gratified
pride, pronounced the execution wonderful; and he began to regard the
juvenile artist’s predilections with comparative complacency. Upon
this, Reynolds devoted himself more arduously to his chosen studies,
took likenesses of the inmates of the house, improved perceptibly in
execution, and quite neglected his school exercises. He was confirmed
in his love of art by reading Richardson’s “Treatise on Painting,”
which so captivated and inspired his mind and imagination, that
Raphael seemed to him the most marvelous name in ancient or modern
annals. Thus charmed and stimulated, he continued to make numerous
sketches and portraits, which were recognized by his friends as
evidencing progressive improvement. Nothing was now wanting but a field
in which to practice and bring to perfection the talents with which he
had been bountifully endowed, to confer pleasure on his fellow men, and
to refine their tastes.

While Reynolds was in his nineteenth year, a neighbor and acquaintance
of the family, observing that a provincial place was too limited a
sphere for the proper cultivation of such powers, recommended that
the aspiring lad should be placed under proper tuition in London.
Accordingly, in the autumn, the future knightly President of the Royal
Academy was on his way to the metropolis, and consigned to the care
and superintendence of Hudson, who, though at the period much employed
in the manufacture of portraits, was not possessed of any surpassing
skill or taste in art. A contract was entered into, that if the veteran
approved of his pupil’s conduct, he was to retain the latter’s services
for a term of four years; but he reserved the power of discharging the
assistant at pleasure. Perhaps, in this position Reynolds was merry
enough; for there were other youths in Hudson’s studio, and on warm
summer days they had opportunities of making agreeable excursions,
rambling about the country and admiring the scenery.

While thus situated, Reynolds had the gratification of exchanging
courtesies with a famous poet, who had aspired, without any particular
success, to excellence in the kindred art of painting. He was attending
a public sale of pictures; and just before the hero of the hour raised
his voice and brandished his hammer, the name of Pope was passed
round, and all respectfully made way for the friend of Bolingbroke.
Those who were near held out their hands; and Reynolds being among the
number, had the distinction of a gentle shake from those bony fingers
which had so often been made the instruments of bitter and brilliant
sarcasm. The wheel of time rolled round; the painter, seated among the
literary magnates of another generation, still felt pride in relating
this interesting little incident; his admiration of the crooked bard
was unabated; he was at great pains to procure a fan on which was one
of Pope’s efforts in painting; and the recollection of their meeting
filled him with satisfaction, even when youths, as in the case of
Northcote, were pressing forward, through crowds, to indulge in the
luxury of touching his own skirt.

Reynolds continued to pursue his artistic career under Hudson’s
inspection for two years, during which he drew many heads with so
unquestionable a success, that he thereby excited and inflamed the
jealousy of his instructor, who foretold, with a pang, that his pupil
would yet arrive at rare celebrity. At length he executed the portrait
of an elderly domestic, who acted as cook in the establishment, which,
on being exhibited in the gallery, was immensely applauded for its
superiority of style. The praise was by no means grateful to Hudson’s
ear. Perhaps it was more than flesh and blood could reasonably be
expected to bear with patience. In any case, he seized upon the first
decent pretext to pick a quarrel with the ambitious juvenile.

The latter had been one day requested to convey a picture to a certain
drapery-painter; but as the weather happened to be rainy, he concluded
that there would be no harm in delaying its delivery till next morning.
At breakfast, Hudson querulously inquired why it had not been taken the
evening before, and was informed that the rain had been the cause of
the delay.

“Well,” he exclaimed, “since you have not obeyed my orders, you must
leave my house.”

Reynolds pleaded for a brief reprieve, but in vain. He asked to be
allowed to write an explanation of the matter, and obtain his father’s
advice. But Hudson was inexorable; he adhered sternly to his harsh
mandate, and Reynolds, going to an uncle who resided at the Temple,
thence wrote to his father that he had been dismissed. The latter took
the affair into grave consideration, held a sage consultation with his
neighbor, Lord Edgecumbe, and directed the young artist to return home.
Retirement to the obscurity of Devonshire might delay the progress, but
could not altogether conceal the reality, of the talents which were to
establish for their possessor so splendid a reputation. His father’s
limited means rendered some effort for independence imperative; and
during the next three years he executed several portraits of much
merit, particularly one of a boy reading by a reflected light. When
viewing these pieces thirty years afterward, he is said to have
lamented that he had made so little progress in art; just as Canova did
a few months before his death, when gazing mournfully on his marble
statue of Esculapius in a villa near Venice.

Somewhere about 1745, Reynolds took up his quarters for a while at
Plymouth Dock, and employed his time in taking portraits of naval
officers and other persons in the vicinity. Most of the likenesses
then produced were good; but the example of Hudson had placed him at
a disadvantage. His sitters were generally represented with one hand
inserted in a waistcoat pocket, and the other stiffly holding a hat.
One gentleman did, indeed, request to be drawn with his headpiece
on, and his desire was complied with; but――alas for the vanity of
human wishes!――when the portrait was sent home, and scrutinized by
the capricious individual’s dame, she discovered, with inexpressible
horror, that the artist, true to habit, had placed a hat under the arm
in addition to that on the head!

Among those whose features he now transferred to canvas was Miss
Chudleigh, afterward the celebrated Duchess of Kingston, a young lady
of surpassing beauty, then on a visit in the neighborhood, and a
Captain Hamilton, of the Abercorn family, whose portrait was considered
admirable. Besides, he made the acquaintance of the future Lord
Keppel, and when that gallant personage was appointed Commodore on the
Mediterranean Station, the artist was invited to accompany him in the
“Centurion.”

Reynolds had, some time before, lost his venerable father; and he had
now to act entirely on his own judgment and discretion. But having
been long and enthusiastically eager to visit Italy, and being in
possession of funds sufficient to defray the expense, he availed
himself of the friendly proposal, and sailed in May, 1749. Having
visited various places of interest, and been introduced, at Algiers,
to the Dey, he landed at Port Mahon, in Minorca, where he was treated
with much courtesy, and entertained with great hospitality, by the
governor. There he added to his skill and means by painting portraits
of many officers on the station; but at the same time encountered, and
suffered from, an accident of considerable severity. One day as he
was refreshing himself with a ride, his horse suddenly took fright,
ran off, and rushed wildly over a precipice. The rider was not unhurt
by the fall; and indeed his upper lip was so sadly bruised that part
of it had to be cut away; so that a scar, which remained visible to
the close of his life, was the consequence. Meantime he proceeded to
Rome, where he had been advised to place himself under the tuition of
Battoni; but on examining the works of that master he deemed it most
judicious to trust to his own perception, and concentrate his study on
the paintings that had stood the test of time and criticism. In this
resolution he persevered, with so little reference to the inclemency
of seasons that he was attacked, while pursuing his investigations,
with a serious cold. The effect of this mishap was permanent. It
brought on the deafness which reduced him to the necessity of using
an ear-trumpet while engaged in conversation, and furnished his
acquaintance (Goldsmith) with the well-known and oft-quoted lines in
the “Retaliation,”――

    “When they talked of their Raphaels, Corregios, and stuff,
     He shifted his trumpet and only took snuff.”

While at Rome, Reynolds was less employed by English travelers than
might have been anticipated; and he seems to have considered the time
so occupied as being almost lost. Before leaving, however, he executed
an approved likeness of himself, and an interesting parody on Raphael’s
“School of Athens.” He remained as long as the state of his finances
rendered prudent, and afterward gave it as his mature opinion, that any
artist, with large views, should rather live on bread and water than
forego advantages never enjoyed a second time, and not to be found but
in the Vatican. Michael Angelo he regarded as “the Homer of Painting.”
On his way home, at the foot of Mont Cenis, he encountered his old
master, Hudson, in company with Roubiliac the sculptor. The former
hurried on, with hot speed, to gratify his eyes with a sight of the
“Eternal City;” and accomplished his purpose so hastily that he arrived
at Calais in time to cross in the same packet with the pupil, whose
excellence had excited his apprehensions and kindled his ire.

Reynolds had been absent for about three years from England when, in
the autumn of 1752, he had the gratification of setting foot on her
sacred soil. He immediately went to Devonshire, to recruit his health
and inspire vigor from fresh breezes and his native air. Early in
the next year he returned to London, and, quartering himself in St.
Martin’s Lane, commenced his professional career with earnestness
and resolution. His talents were such as, if properly exerted, could
hardly fail to meet with encouragement and lead on to fortune; and
their possessor not only recognized the great fact that unflinching
perseverance was essential to success, but maintained the opinion
that any one aspiring to excel in art must make it the subject of his
thoughts from the time he rises till he goes to bed. Nay, more; he
said that those aiming at distinction must work, whether willingly
or with reluctance, morning, noon, and night, and expect to find
their occupation no pastime, but hard labor. Undoubtedly during youth
he carried this wholesome doctrine too far, in asserting that the
man would never make a great painter who looked for the Sunday with
pleasure, as a day of rest. But it is satisfactory, and ought to be
instructive, to understand――thanks, perhaps, to the dying precept of
Johnson――that he did not act on the pernicious doctrine to the end of
his career.

With all his taste, ease, felicity of invention, and power of rich,
harmonious coloring, Reynolds did not acquire his legitimate position
without a salutary struggle. His boldness, freedom, and brilliancy were
regarded as strange and objectionable novelties. The old dogs began
to bark. The portrait of a pupil whom he had brought from Rome, in a
Turkish dress, and known as “a boy with a turban,” gained notice and
excited observation. Hudson, perhaps nourishing the old wound in his
breast, declared that the youth’s painting was not so good as when he
left England; an eminent disciple of Kneller denounced it, as not the
least like Sir Godfrey’s――it would never answer; and others were by
no means sparing in sharp and invidious strictures. The artist was as
little guided by such remarks as was the disinherited knight by the
well-meant hints of the crowd around the lists at Ashby; but, moving
onward undismayed, he soon convinced the public that he would pursue
his chosen course and win high renown in doing so. He painted the
second Duke of Devonshire with a success which extended his reputation
in patrician circles; and universal attention was attracted by the
noble picture which he executed of his friend and patron, Lord Keppel.
But still his celebrity was too recent to be secure against the winds
and tides of capricious fashion, and a rival artist entered the field.
This was a Genevan, named Liotard, described as having little skill and
no genius, but who, by the patronage of persons of rank, was elevated
to an ephemeral and unmerited position. His works were wanting in
vigor――in fact, such as ladies paint for amusement; and they might have
passed with credit in an amateur exhibition. Such was the man before
whom the star of Reynolds, for a moment, paled, ere it shone fully and
inextinguishably forth. This unequal competitor had his little day; and
then, deserted by those who had mistakenly supported his pretensions,
he sank into the obscurity for which nature had intended him, and
retreated to the Continent.

Reynolds was a thorough Englishman. In other lands he had, with all his
outward coldness, shed tears on hearing the ancient ballad tunes of his
country played in the theatre; and his heart must now have swelled with
no small pride at the reflection that it was the first time a native of
England had been victorious in such a contest. The aspirations which,
for years, he had fondly cherished, were now to be gratified; and he
could rejoice in the thought that future generations would gaze with
wonder on his paintings, and hold his name in veneration. To pursue his
career with befitting dignity, he took an advantageous house in Great
Newport Street, where he lived for eight years. The grace and felicity
of his former efforts brought him abundant employment; his rooms were
filled with noble ladies and famous men; and his popularity rapidly
grew and increased. He was a diligent observer and student of life and
manners, had amassed a large store of general information, and could
appreciate the taste and capacity of his sitters sufficiently to speak
the appropriate word to each. He ever seized on the happiest attitude,
and thus transferred to his canvas the most fascinating glance of the
beauty, the liveliest expression of the wit, and the most thoughtful
look of the judge or statesman. His confidence in his own powers
strengthened with experience; and every new effort was hailed with
encouraging applause.

On the occasion of a visit to his native county, Reynolds accidentally
laid his hand on Johnson’s “Life of Savage;” and standing by the fire,
he leant his arm against the mantle-piece, opened the book, and began
to look through it. Gradually he became so completely absorbed with
the contents, that he continued in this position till he had perused
the volume; and then found his arm quite benumbed, his heart almost
enchanted, and his curiosity raised to be acquainted with the author.
This satisfaction was not long denied him. They met at the house of the
daughters of Admiral Cotterell, and Reynolds was as much delighted
with the conversation of his great contemporary as he had formerly been
interested in his pages. Moreover, he had the good fortune to make a
remark which won, with irresistible effect, on the heart of the sage.
The ladies were mournfully deploring the death of a friend to whom
they were under many obligations; “You have, however, the comfort,”
suggested Reynolds, with grave politeness, “of being relieved from the
burden of gratitude.”

“Oh, how shocking and selfish!” exclaimed the sisterhood; but the man
who had lived on a groat a day, and stood behind greasy screens to
conceal his worn-out clothes, appreciated this remark as being that of
a person who thought and decided for himself. He therefore defended
its justice in a clear and forcible manner, though, perhaps, without
conveying conviction to the minds of the decorous spinsters. At all
events, he was so pleased with his new friend that they left the party
together. Johnson went and supped at Reynold’s house; and thus was
commenced an intimacy which was only terminated by death. Johnson
became a frequent visitor, and went without ceremony to enjoy the great
painter’s society, who, on his part, declared that no one had, like his
illustrious friend, the faculty of teaching inferior minds the art of
thinking.

There is not, perhaps, in the wide world, so full of guile and
selfishness, a fairer field for the cultivation of friendship than that
which lies between the studio of the painter and the desk of the man
of letters. There is little ground for envy, but many incitements to a
generous rivalry; and the intercourse must be peculiarly advantageous
if the artist is endowed with poetic perception, and the author gifted
with an artistic eye. Reynolds and Johnson no doubt experienced, in
their respective pursuits, the benefit of their familiar meetings,
altogether independently of the pleasure derived from those hours of
social enjoyment which were irradiated by the matchless discourse
of Burke, and enlivened by the ludicrous displays of Goldsmith. His
friendship with Johnson led to Reynolds furnishing three papers for the
“Idler”――his first essay in literary composition, and in which may be
traced the ideas which grew into his lectures. The effort cost him much
thought and trouble: he sat up writing them all night, and had a sharp
illness in consequence. Besides this contribution to the “Idler,” he
supplied some notes to Johnson’s “Shakspeare,” published in 1705.

The year 1758 was, in a pecuniary point of view, one of the most
fortunate that Reynolds ever experienced; and he soon gave signs of
his prosperity by purchasing a mansion in Leicester Square, which he
inhabited ever after. It was a maxim with him, that an artist who
marries is ruined for life; and he seems to have guarded the passes
to his heart with singular vigilance, as we do not read of any fair
damsel making havoc in its chambers, though it is quite possible
that some early disappointment may have created this rare aversion
to matrimony. But whatever the origin of his prejudice on this point,
there is no question that a sensible woman who, without being ambitious
of prematurely dissipating her natural roses at midnight parties,
can take a becoming part in the innocent gayeties which brighten the
human heart, is a pearl of price; and why the artist should be the
worse of such an enviable companion any more than a poet or orator, is
a question which does stagger plain men, as it would, perhaps, have
puzzled the most philosophic of British painters. He acted on his
principle by living and dying a bachelor; but, in accordance with the
custom at that period pursued by men of the middle class, he placed one
of his sisters at the end of his board and in charge of his domestic
concerns: thus attempting to secure the comforts of a home without
being subject to connubial responsibility. Miss Reynolds, it appears,
scarcely realized or sustained the character of a perfect spinster. She
was possessed of great wit and talent; and though remarkable for her
good sense, she was too much given to essays of her skill in poetry and
painting to make a model housekeeper. Thus the internal affairs were
not conducted with any excessive taste or regularity; and the table
was distinguished chiefly by a rough plenty; little regard being paid
to order or arrangement. The dinner was generally a scramble, in which
the host took little or no concern; and the guests looked sharply
after their own interests. There was no splendor but great abundance.
Ease was more valued than comfort or elegance. Nevertheless, Reynolds
had furnished his new residence with much propriety, besides adding a
handsome gallery for the exhibition of his paintings, and an elegant
dining-room, often the scene of “the feast of reason and the flow of
soul.” There the literary giant of the day rolled his unwieldy body,
bit his dirty nails, and poured out his copious talk; though often a
little cowed by being face to face with that profound political sage
and prophet who alone could encounter the huge author of “Rasselas”
with advantage. Side by side were the greatest actor of the day,
and the restorer of that English ballad-poetry which fascinated the
young genius of the mightiest of dead and the most accomplished of
living novelists. In an uneasy posture, “staring right on,” was that
extraordinary being “who could write like an angel, but talk like
poor Poll.” With eyes reverentially fixed on men whom he could admire
without comprehending, stood Boswell, the minute chronicler of their
sayings and doings; while the master of the house――mild, gentle, and
unassuming, round in feature, florid in complexion, and of middle
stature――listened with lively, but calm and refined intelligence,
to the colloquial conflict of the wonderful specimens of the human
race whose features his easel has, in immortal colors, transmitted to
posterity.

It is doubtless a proud day with most persons who have struggled into
affluence, when they can set up an equipage of their own. Pepys, in his
gossiping diary, relates the mighty pleasure he felt when that joyous
day arrived for him; when he could disdain the humble shelter of a
hackney-coach, and drive about the park in his own chariot, even at the
disadvantage of having his pretty wife eyed with menacing admiration
by a royal duke. Reynolds conceived that the time had now arrived when
he might decorously indulge in a carriage, which he had magnificently
carved and gilded, the four seasons being emblazoned on its panels. The
pride and propriety of Miss Reynolds were shocked at this display. “It
is far too showy,” she complained with good reason. “What!” exclaimed
the owner, as he regarded his purchase with calm complacency――“would
you have a carriage like an apothecary’s?”

In 1762, the health of Reynolds rendering relaxation and a rural
excursion necessary, he repaired to Devonshire, accompanied by Dr.
Johnson, who thus had a favorable opportunity of seeing Plymouth, in
which he expressed particular interest. Falstaff regaling himself
with cheese and carraway pippins in Justice Shallow’s orchard, or
the Spectator enjoying the ancient hospitality of Coverley Hall, are
hardly more than equal in interest to the sage of Bolt Court, who knew
human nature only as exhibited in the streets and suburbs of London,
being refreshed with an adventure in the country. The two friends
were received with no small respect by men of rank, learning, and
distinction; and entertained at the seats of several noblemen in the
west of England. One of their hosts indulged Johnson with a feast on
new honey and clouted cream, of which the moralist partook in such
quantities, that the hospitable individual grew exceedingly alarmed for
the consequences. Reynolds bore off a prize of another kind――a large
jar of old nut-oil, which was carried home in his coach as a valuable
trophy. The change of air had a most beneficial effect on his health,
and he returned to town in a condition to pursue his labors without
interruption.

Reynolds was an ardent lover of his profession; his pride in art was
high, and he was ever ready, when there was occasion, to stand forward
in its defense. But his character was cold and stately; he deemed it
impossible for two artists in the same line to associate in friendship:
he thought Poetry the twin-sister of Painting, and found his companions
chiefly among literary men. It was natural, therefore, that when the
Literary Club was established in 1764, he should have been one of its
members. A man, however, is known by the company he keeps; and Reynolds
was disagreeably surprised to hear himself spoken of as “one of the
wits.” Perhaps the term did not convey the most pleasing sensation
to a person with a coach of his own and six thousand a year; and he
exclaimed, in alarm, “Why do they call me a wit? I never was a wit in
my life!”

His commissions had gradually become so numerous, that he found it
necessary to have several assistants to work out the minor details: he
had arrived on an enviable eminence; and though artists of ability made
their appearance, he still maintained his supremacy, and constantly
struck out wonders to vindicate his claim to the favor of the public.
In 1766 he painted the Queen of Denmark, before she sailed on her
ill-fated voyage. Coming events cast their shadows before; and he never
went without finding the hapless princess in tears. Reynolds increased
in wealth and reputation; his enthusiasm for art never cooled into
indifference, and he was never so happy as when putting life into
canvas. He rose betimes, and commenced operations; he spoke little when
occupied, but painted rapidly for six hours, and devoted the remainder
to society. He was animated by warm affections, and had a strong love
for children.

Reynolds was not one of the originators of the Royal Academy; but in
1768, when it was instituted, he was waited on by West, and requested
to give his aid in promoting the objects which the undertaking was
intended to serve. He was rather doubtful whether the scheme was likely
to be favored by Fortune; and he was one of those who had no relish for
engaging in an enterprise,

    “Save when her humorous ladyship was by
     To teach him safety.”

It was, therefore, after considerable hesitation, and a conference
of two hours, that he was persuaded to accompany the American artist.
Then ordering his carriage, he drove to the place where the promoters
were assembled. On entering the room he was saluted by all present as
“President;” but being still convinced that the scheme would prove
a delusion, he declined to accept the honor thus voted to him by
acclamation, till he had consulted Burke and Johnson, who advised
him to consent. The king, whose aid had at first been regarded as
doubtful, came forward to offer the Academy his royal patronage; and
that it might have the semblance of greater dignity, its president was
forthwith invested with the rank of knighthood. The latter was, by no
means, backward in fulfilling the functions with which he had been so
cautious in burdening himself. Of his own accord he undertook the duty
of preparing and reading discourses on the principles and practice of
art, for the instruction and guidance of the students. Of these he
wrote fifteen; the delivery of which extended over several years. They
were pronounced by Sir Thomas Lawrence to be “golden precepts, which
are now acknowledged as canons of universal taste.”

In 1773 Reynolds paid visits to Paris and Oxford. At the latter place
he received, amidst much applause, the honorary degree of Doctor of
Laws, in company with Dr. Beattie, of whom he produced a celebrated
picture on returning to London. About the same date he went to his
native district, and was elected mayor of Plympton. This mark of
esteem from his townsmen seems to have given him particular pleasure.
Accidentally meeting with the king shortly after, at Hampton Court, he
stated that it had afforded him more satisfaction than any distinction
he had met with: “Always,” he added, with the skill of a courtier,
“excepting that which your majesty graciously conferred on me――the
honor of knighthood.”

Sir Joshua was chosen a member of the Academy of Florence, and, in
accordance with its rules, required to furnish a portrait of himself.
This he accomplished with his wonted success; and it was added with
pride to their interesting collection.

In 1780 he commenced a series of allegorical figures for the window
of the New College chapel at Oxford. These were followed by the
“Nativity,” which being sold to the Duke of Rutland, perished in a
fire at Belvoir Castle. About this time he made a tour to inspect the
Continental galleries. On returning, he sustained a paralytic attack,
which much alarmed his friends, but his recovery was speedy; and he
quickly proved that his powers had suffered no decay, by the production
of his “Fortune-teller,” his portrait of Miss Kemble, and that of Mrs.
Siddons, in the full might of her beauty and power, as the Tragic Muse.
While engaged with the latter, he wrote his name on the border of her
robe; and on the great actress looking at the words, and smiling, he
remarked, with one of his most courtly bows, that he could not lose
such an opportunity of sending his name down to posterity on the hem
of her garment. When at work, he is said to have been in the habit
of using enormous quantities of snuff. Thus, while occupied with the
large picture of the Marlborough family at Blenheim, a servant was
ordered by the duchess to sweep up the snuff that he had let fall on
the carpet. However, when the man entered with a broom, Sir Joshua
quietly requested him to let it remain till he had finished; observing,
that the dust would do more harm to his painting, than the snuff could
possibly do to the carpet.

On the death of Allan Ramsay, the king’s painter, Reynolds was, at the
request of his majesty, induced to accept the vacant office. He soon
after produced “Love unloosing the Zone of Beauty,” and a portrait of
the notorious Duke of Orleans. Then he gave his time and attention to
painting the “Infant Hercules Strangling the Serpents,” for the Empress
of Russia; who acknowledged his attention by a note of thanks from her
own imperial hand, a gold snuff-box, on which was her likeness, and a
purse of fifteen hundred guineas.

[Illustration: SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS AT BLENHEIM.]

Sir Joshua had now reached his sixty-sixth year; his fame was high; his
influence on the taste and refinement of the country was not disputed;
and his artistic powers remained unimpaired. His career had indeed
been characterized by the strictness and temperance essential to the
possession of “a healthy body and a vigorous mind;” he had realized a
fortune; he had associated with the noble and beautiful of the land;
and his wealth, his heavy purse, and hospitable table, gave him dignity
in the eyes not only of many who were incapable of appreciating his
merits, but of others to whom his fine abilities were no mystery. But
his days were numbered. In the month of July, 1789, while finishing a
portrait of Lady Hertford, he was aware of a sudden loss of sight in
his left eye; and, laying down his pencil for the last time, he sat
for a while in sad and pensive reflection. Goldsmith had already been
laid at rest in the Temple Church; the eyes of Burke had overflowed
with tears, and his voice faltered by the death-bed of Johnson; and the
immortal painter was ere long to follow. He in a short time altogether
lost the sight of his left eye, and determined to paint no more;
yet under this affliction he strove to appear happy, cheerful, and
resigned. His illness was borne with much fortitude, and whatever he
had to suffer was endured without complaint or irritability. He amused
and diverted himself in his drawing-room by changing the position of
his pictures, and exhibiting them to his friends. Besides, like some
imprisoned knight of old, he took a fanciful liking for a little bird,
which became so tame and docile that it perched on his hand, while he
fed and talked to it almost as he would have done to a human being.
At length, one bright summer morning, the feathered warbler made its
escape by an open window; and Sir Joshua was so inconsolable for the
loss, that he roamed for hours about Leicester Square in the hope of
seeing and recovering so harmless and cheerful a companion.

On the occasion of the gold medals being bestowed on the students of
the Academy in 1790, Sir Joshua went thither for the last time, with
all due pomp and circumstance, to deliver an address. With unabated
admiration, he recalled to their memory the triumphs achieved by the
genius of his great idol, and concluded by earnestly desiring that the
last words he should pronounce from the presidential chair might be the
name of Michael Angelo. The crowd being unusually large, a beam in the
floor gave way with a loud crash. All rushed to the door, stumbling
over each other, except the venerable president, who remained silent,
composed, and dignified. Fortunately no damage was done, and the
proceedings were resumed.

Sir Joshua offered to the Royal Academy his collection of paintings by
the great masters at a low price. But, much to his mortification and
amazement, his proposal was declined; and he exhibited them publicly in
the Haymarket for the benefit of his servant Ralph. This transaction
gave rise to the suspicion that Reynolds shared in the profits; and two
lines of Butler――

    “A squire he had whose name was Ralph,
     Who in the adventure went one-half,”――

were applied with audacious and merciless malevolence. He was soon
beyond the reach of such assailants and their weapons of offense. After
a visit to Beaconsfield, the residence of his mighty friend Burke, his
health and spirits sunk with the rapidity which frequently heralds
a speedy dissolution; and on the 23d of February, 1792, he expired,
with little apparent pain, in the sixty-ninth year of his prosperous
life. His body was laid in St. Paul’s Cathedral, by the side of Sir
Christopher Wren; and a monument, graven by Flaxman, has since been
erected to his memory.




SIR FRANCIS CHANTREY.


The artistic genius of England, however potent and exuberant it may be,
has never been so freely or prominently displayed in sculpture as in
poetry or painting; nor has it had equal encouragement. The creations
of the sculptor’s fancy and the emanations of his skill, unquestionable
as may be their merits and real their beauties, have never ranked
very high in the favor of the multitude. Many, whose sympathy might
otherwise be followed by more substantial tokens, understand full
well that a portrait costs less, and is more readily appreciated by
their neighbors, than a marble bust; and even with those few who pride
themselves in rivaling the Medici in their patronage of art, and lay
the flattering unction to their souls that they know something about
it, the popularity of sculpture is by no means excessive. But the name
of Chantrey is one which his countrymen have reason to regard with
patriotic pride and satisfaction. He formed his style on the beauty and
manliness of his native land; he was thoroughly her own. His taste in
this respect was created when the inhabitant――while a boy――of a quiet
and secluded village; and it was adhered to with splendid results when
he was depicting statesmen, warriors, orators, and poets――our Pitts,
Wellingtons, Grattans, and Scotts. Instead of struggling in vain to
recall cold shapes and uncongenial visions from remote antiquity and
distant realms, he embodied in simple but fascinating works, for the
instruction and gratification of native talent and taste, the life,
manners, and costume which came around him in his daily existence.
Thus his works are not only more popular than those of the sculptors
who had preceded him, but they are fitted to excite no small portion
of that sympathy which one feels when gazing on the canvas, whereon
the features of some distinguished man or beautiful woman have been
gloriously portrayed by the pencil of Reynolds or Raeburn. His success
in this line first secured him general notice; and they are not
inferior to any that ever were produced; while his statues executed for
public places, with those singularly plain and unadorned pedestals,
wisely calculated not to detract from the effect of the more important
part of the composition, exhibit surpassing grace and vigor of outline.
The story of a great sculptor’s life can, with rare exceptions, be soon
told; his existence being unmarked except by the works which he sends
into the busy world from his solitary, secluded, and laborious studio.

Francis Chantrey was born on the 7th of April, 1782, at Norton,
a little village in the county of Derby. His father, a stout and
sagacious yeoman, cultivated with frugal industry the small estate he
was fortunate enough to possess; and the future sculptor doubtless
delighted, when a sportive child, to lend a helping hand in the
operations of the season. The worthy farmer died when his son was
in boyhood, little anticipating that the latter was destined to
touch the hearts of men by a process and after a fashion which were
hardly dreamt of in the philosophy of the tillers of Derbyshire soil.
Indeed, hardly any thing could have been more improbable; for unless
it were the statues in the quaint, curious, and terraced old garden
of some “large-acred” aristocrat, he had no opportunity of gazing on
any specimens of art likely to excite his imagination or guide his
aspirations. Nevertheless, at an almost infantine period of existence
he gave indications of his natural bent; and ere long, in communion
with nature and all its beauties, he was inspired by the fine feelings
and ambitious desires which afterward animated his spirit to splendid
efforts, and nerved his hand to resolute toil in completing the
conceptions of his ardent brain. The contemplation of natural objects
in all their simplicity filled his young heart and memory with lovely
and charming images, which in other days contributed to his success,
established his reputation, and laid the foundation of his lasting fame.

Chantrey was about eight years old when he lost his father, and was
thus early deprived of the paternal influence and direction. His mother
soon after yielded herself, and such charms as she could boast of,
for a second time, into matrimonial bonds; and though she reared her
fanciful boy with great care and tenderness, and survived to witness
his artistic achievements, perhaps his exhibitions of talent and
inclination were less attended to than they might otherwise have been.
However, he was educated with the ordinary solicitude, though to what
precise extent does not appear.

On leaving school, he was occupied with agricultural operations. Like
the Scottish poet, Burns, he could hold the plow to some purpose, as in
after life he used to relate. Besides, he accomplished feats in mowing;
in the barn wielded his flail with signal prowess, and, doubtless,
found favor in the eyes of those laughing rustic beauties, who look
so enchanting and leap joyously at hay-makings and harvest-homes. But
whether his friends and acquaintances regarded him as one _gaudentem
patrios findere sarculo agros_, or the reverse, he had long since
began to develop a turn for art, by making various models in clay for
amusement, though without any idea that it would ever create for him
a splendid reputation, and conduct him to a position of dignity and
honor. At this period, no doubt, he caught among those steep Derby
Hills, celebrated in verse, that love of field-sports which ever
actuated him. He liked the exercise and delighted in the recreation. He
became a keen fisher, an excellent shot, and had a fancy for dogs. In
after life, and on fitting occasions, he was almost as indefatigable in
rural sports as in his professional exertions; and in the indulgence
of his humor in this respect he was not daunted or deterred by
unpropitious weather.

When Chantrey had arrived in his seventeenth year, his relations deemed
it proper to take his prospects into their serious consideration; and
they came to the conclusion of placing him in an attorney’s office at
Sheffield. Thither, therefore, he was conducted with that object; and
had it been realized, his artistic predilections might speedily have
altogether vanished; but

    “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends,
       Rough-hew them as we may.”

[Illustration: CHANTREY’S EARLY STUDIES.]

The intention of Chantrey’s guardians and his apparent destination were
changed by an accident, which, though seemingly trifling in itself,
was of the utmost importance in his career. He was passing along the
street, and staring about with all the wonder of a youthful peasant,
when suddenly some figures in the window of a shop arrested his eye,
and filled his heart with an irrepressible longing to be a carver of
wood. This wish he repeated with so much ardor and earnestness, that
his friends saw reason to accede to a desire, which was evidently
the result of no mere ephemeral sentiment. They had, of course, as
little idea of sculpture as they had of the moon, or the north pole,
or the Chinese empire. A picture, indeed, they could have admired. A
lady shining on the painter’s canvas, in all the pride of gems and
rich attire, would have raised their wonder: but the severity of
marble catches not the popular fancy; and had the boy’s tendency been
explained, they would still have been in the dark as to what he would
be at. Luckily, common sense taught them that it would be downright
stupidity to place at the dreary desk a lad whose heart was set upon a
very different occupation from that of copying deeds. They, therefore,
consented to his being apprenticed to a wood-carver in the town; and
he entered on that course which led him on, from small beginnings, to
affluence and celebrity. It happened that at his new master’s house
he had the good fortune to make the acquaintance of a distinguished
draughtsman in crayon, and immediately exhibited a lively interest in
that individual’s occupations. He took infinite pleasure in seeing him
paint, and was careful to make himself as useful and agreeable as was
in his power. In this way he soon felt ambitious of following art as
a profession, in some higher field than that to which his labors were
then confined. He had already made all the progress in carving which,
under the circumstances, could be achieved by skill, perseverance,
and enthusiasm. During the intervals of business he did not waste or
dissipate an hour of his precious time, but was constantly at study;
and even at the midnight hour he might have been found in his lodgings,
with a light burning, engaged with groups and figures, and working with
the utmost spirit and the rarest diligence.

This system did not exactly quadrate with the views of his employer,
who, naturally enough, wished his pupil to be a workman and not
an artist. Moreover, Chantrey, finding his tastes in this respect
perpetually thwarted, and his desire becoming uncontrollable, grew much
too enthusiastic in his aspirations to be longer limited or restrained
by ordinary circumstances. Therefore, though only six months of his
term of servitude remained unexpired, with the impatience of genius he
gave his master all the wealth he possessed to cancel the indentures,
gained a little money by taking portraits, repaired to London, and,
thus thrown into the mighty vortex, determined to triumph. But with the
hereditary caution and common sense, which were finely exhibited by
him throughout life, he made “the hardest circumstance a helper and a
slave,” and at first sought employment as assistant to a wood-carver,
that he might live by the craft he had resolved to leave, while
pursuing those studies that were so nobly rewarded, rather than make
any premature attempt to win that fame which he instinctively felt must
one day be his in no small measure.

He reached the metropolis in his twenty-second year, and shortly after
his arrival was induced to pay a visit to Ireland, with the intention
of making a tour through that country; but while in Dublin he suffered
so severely from a fever, that his life was for some time despaired
of. Fortunately, he was restored to health, and returned to London,
having during the illness lost his hair, which he never recovered.
His appearance was fine and prepossessing; his mouth was beautifully
formed; and he was complimented on bearing a remarkable resemblance
to the greatest of English dramatists. In disposition he was frank,
fearless, and communicative; and his affability and familiarity in
company were acknowledged: but, at the same time, he was a man of the
world, and would never, for a momentary triumph, commit himself by a
conversational indiscretion.

On returning from the “Green Isle,” and having about the same period
made an excursion to the Continent, he devoted himself with zeal,
anxiety, and earnestness, to his professional studies and pursuits.
He still continued the occupation of a certain portion of his time as
a carver, and executed several figures in wood, which are still in
existence as interesting memorials of the great sculptor’s earlier
career. Doubtless he had his struggles, and did not forget them when
better times came. On the contrary, he was ever prompt to encourage
rising artists; he excused their shortcomings, and recommended their
works; and when unable otherwise to serve them, though not in any
respect negligent of his pecuniary concerns, he was not slow to use
his purse for that purpose. Neglecting no means which might aid him
in ascending the steep and slippery pathways of fame, he turned his
attention to portrait-painting, and obtained some notice on account
of the success of his efforts. But, like Pope, he found an insuperable
barrier to excellence in the defectiveness of his sight.

Meantime he had continued his exertions and improved his powers in
that department of art with which his name is now associated, by
modeling the human form in clay, and arraying it with pieces of
drapery, studying attentively the best and most picturesque attitudes
in which it could be represented. One of his first works was a bust
of Mr. Raphael Smith the artist, whose paintings had exercised so
much influence on his early career; but it was that of the celebrated
Horne Took which gained him fame in the metropolis. Then appeared
his colossal head of Satan, which, by its gaze of dark and malignant
despair, attracted notice; and the artist had reason to look to the
future with hope.

When Flaxman ventured on marrying a very accomplished woman, Sir
Joshua Reynolds shook his head at the perpetration of such a piece
of eccentricity, and frankly told the struggling sculptor that he
had thereby ruined himself for life. The spirit of prophecy did not,
however, rest on Leicester Square, for to the inspiration of his wife
Flaxman attributed his subsequent successes. Example is more powerful
than precept; and Chantrey profiting, perhaps, by that so spiritedly
set by his more classical contemporary, resolved on taking a similar
step.

In 1811 he married his cousin, who brought him so considerable a
fortune, that he was enabled to pursue the success he had achieved with
a feeling of greater security; and he was soon intrusted by the city of
London to execute the statue of George the Third, to be placed in the
council-chamber at Guildhall, as well as with many private commissions,
which added to his reputation.

He now undertook a professional tour in Scotland, and executed, besides
other works, statues of the famous Lord Melville and Lord President
Blair, as also an admirable bust of Professor Playfair, for Edinburgh;
and on returning, he was commissioned by Government to execute some
monuments for St. Paul’s Cathedral.

About this date, Chantrey had the penetration to perceive and the
fortune to secure in Allan Cunningham, the popular biographer of
British artists, an assistant who united literary capacity and a
fertile pen to the shrewdness and indefatigability usually supposed to
appertain to the natives of North Britain. That Scottish adventurer,
the son of a gardener to the person from whom Burns rented his farm,
after having been apprenticed to a builder, composed a volume of songs,
and came to push his fortune in London. He was now engaged by Chantrey,
who had a sharp eye to his own interest, as clerk in his studio, and
superintendent of his works.

At the conclusion of the war, Chantrey made a journey to Paris, which
he had previously visited at the peace of Amiens, and inspected the
various artistic works in the Louvre with much interest. From this
point his progress in public esteem was steady and gratifying. On
returning from the Continent he commenced the monument of the Two
Sisters for Lichfield Cathedral; and when this exquisite specimen of
his skillful fancy was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1817, it was
regarded as marvelous for its grace, pathos, and beauty. The press
to see it was unprecedented; mothers wept over the representation;
children lovingly kissed the figures; and the effect it produced on
the minds of beholders was deep, impressive, and enduring. Soon after
he produced the statue of Lady Louisa Russell, daughter of the Duke
of Bedford, fondling a dove in her bosom. She stands on tiptoe; and
the attitude of the figure is said to be so singularly natural, that
a little child of three years old coming into the sculptor’s studio
held up its little hands to the figure, and addressed it under the
impression that the form was a living one.

In 1818, Chantrey was worthily elected a member of the Royal Academy,
and as his presentation work executed a bust of West, its venerable
president. Becoming about the same time a member of the Royal Society,
he presented a bust of the celebrated Sir Joseph Banks, then president.
Next year he went to Italy, and while at Rome he had much friendly and
familiar intercourse with Canova and Thorwaldsen. With the former he
enacted the amicable ceremony of exchanging cloaks on parting.

In 1820, Chantrey’s admiration of Sir Walter Scott induced him to
request the northern poet to sit for his bust. This being agreed to, it
was finished in 1822, and presented to the illustrious bard six years
later, on condition of his sitting for another, which was accordingly
executed. It ultimately passed into the possession of Sir Robert Peel.
These are by many considered not only the most felicitous of Chantrey’s
busts, but the most striking portraits of the great Borderer’s variable
countenance. The original has been viewed by multitudes at Abbotsford,
always with the highest admiration by those most qualified to judge
of its merits. The ample forehead, so full of thought and sagacity;
the penetrating eye, which had looked with rapture on many a frowning
fortress and fair landscape, and the mouth, grave but humorous,
are portrayed with rare and fascinating skill. The whole face is
represented with fine effect, and has altogether the expression likely
to be produced when Chantrey was chiseling, and laughing merrily at
some happy remark which had just escaped from the “Great Unknown.”

The few years following that on which this memorable sitting occurred,
were the busiest of the eminent sculptor’s life. Between 1823 and
1826 he is stated to have received the largest number of commissions,
and to have labored in their execution with intense devotion and
exemplary industry. Nor was he without another kind of encouragement,
which, whatever may be said to the contrary by the very persons who
would most loudly rejoice in having it, has always proved strangely
fascinating to the imaginations of men of talent. Royal and patrician
favor was freely bestowed upon him throughout his career; and he knew
how to use without abusing it. He enjoyed the countenance of successive
sovereigns, was distinguished by the honor of knighthood, and had the
comfort of believing that George the Fourth, who, with all his faults,
understood something of such matters, appreciated his artistic genius.
When this statue was erected on the grand staircase of Windsor Castle,
his Majesty, patting Chantrey familiarly on the back, said, “I have
reason to be obliged to you; for you have immortalized me.”

Among the numerous and admirable statues which attest Chantrey’s power
and success in this branch of his art, a few may be mentioned: as that
of William Pitt, in Hanover Square; George the Fourth, in Trafalgar
Square; James Watt, in Westminster Abbey; and the Duke of Wellington,
in front of the Royal Exchange. Watt’s statue at Glasgow, Roscoe’s at
Liverpool, and that of Canning in the hall of the latter town, have, as
draped figures, rarely been surpassed. Dalton’s statue at Manchester,
exhibited in 1837, is likewise thought to be of great merit; and one
of his early, though great, monumental efforts was that of Perceval,
in All Saints’ Church, Northampton. But there are seen, elsewhere
than in his own country, monuments from his hand to commemorate
the deeds, the virtues, and achievements of the departed great. He
furnished an equestrian statue of Sir Thomas Munro to adorn Madras;
and for the State-house of Boston he executed a statue of Washington,
which is ever mentioned with praise and honor. The hero of the War of
Independence stands erect, and wrapped up in thought. The costume,
which the sculptor knew well how to deal with, is a military cloak,
which displays the historical figure to advantage; and the effect is
altogether good and imposing.

Chantrey’s genius was most prolific and successful in busts. It is
stated, that such was his art, that he could generally seize on the
likeness of a head in an hour; but, both in his conceptions and in
working them out, he was particularly fastidious. He was singularly
quick and skillful in seizing the very best expressions which the
countenances of his sitters were capable of presenting.

In 1839 a perceptible and melancholy change came over the famous
sculptor; and at length, on the 25th of November, 1841, he expired.
He left a large fortune, the result of his industry; and munificently
destined it to the service and promotion of the fine arts in his native
land. With a view to its responsible application to the intended
purpose, he constituted the President and Council of the Royal Academy
his trustees forever.

In his works, Chantrey trusted entirely to form and effect; and
his dislike to ornament appears to have been almost excessive. His
successful efforts were the result of deep reflection, a fine taste,
and a noble imagination. He strove to exhibit the perfections of
nature, and to impart an air of grandeur to all his productions.
He commenced art where Art itself began. Nature was, from first to
last, his chief study, the safe school in which he learned his art,
and the exhaustless fountain from which he drew the inspiration that
carried him onward to lasting fame as a truly English and really
great sculptor. He thought that an artist should daily ponder what to
avoid, as well as what to imitate; and unlike his predecessors, who
were perpetually striving to rival the productions of by-gone ages,
he wisely aspired rather to guide the future than follow the past. He
had imbibed in youth a fondness for landscape scenery, which he could
represent with success; and he made many interesting drawings when
traveling to view the marbles and pictures in Italy.

He was plain and unpretending in manner; and, as became so great a man,
above all little affectations in society, which, however, he liked and
relished. Under his own roof he was distinguished by hospitality and
kindliness of spirit; and his house was frequently the resort of men
who had won renown in art, science, or literature.




SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN.


The architectural skill and superiority of this illustrious man were
most conspicuously displayed in the age which his rich genius adorned.
A multitude of buildings bore honorable testimony to the fertility
of his brain, and the success of his undertakings, at a time when a
terrible devastation had rendered such services as he rendered to his
country peculiarly necessary; and later generations have confessed with
high pride and admiration, that the inscription, “_Si quæris monumentum
circumspice_,” has lost none of its point.

The pious architect of so many churches was closely connected by
birth with the ecclesiastical establishment, whose edifices he did
so much to improve and beautify. The family to which he belonged was
of Danish extraction, but had been settled on English ground long
ere it produced the most famous representative of the name. From a
branch planted in Warwickshire came Sir Christopher’s grandfather, who
traded and flourished as a mercer in the city of London, and left two
sons. The elder obtained the bishopric of Ely, suffered and survived
persecution, and went down to the grave in peace, after many trials
and vicissitudes. The ambition of the other was seemingly less lofty
in degree, and his existence less checkered. However, he became a
royal chaplain, dean of Windsor, and rector of Knoyle, in Wiltshire,
and had the good fortune to marry one of those young ladies known and
sighed for as heiresses. In due time, on the 20th of October, 1632,
Christopher Wren was born at East Knoyle.

Like many destined to eminence, the future architect was an exceedingly
weak, small, and delicate child; and more than ordinary care was
required in rearing him. From this cause he was for several years
educated by a domestic tutor in his father’s house, which at this
period received in its oak hall the Elector Palatine. Wren took care to
recall to memory the pretty long visit, when he afterward addressed to
that prince a rather high-flown epistle, calling attention to some of
his youthful inventions, among which were the instrument for writing
with two pens and the machine for sowing corn. The boy showed much
fondness for classical learning, and was sent to Westminster School to
pursue his studies for a while, under the auspices of Dr. Busby. There
he exhibited his remarkable powers of mind, as well as a strong liking
for the pursuits of mathematics and astronomy, rather than the useful
art with which his name was afterward associated. But his father was a
man of talent and ingenuity, and of such architectural taste as to have
attracted the notice of Charles the First, to whom he was chaplain in
ordinary. This circumstance, in all probability, gave Wren’s mind a
bias toward the profession in which he achieved the triumphs on which
his fame chiefly rests, and led to his raising up, in the face of the
world, visible and enduring monuments of his greatness. Every step of
his juvenile career, however, was marked by the vigor, prudence, and
intelligence befitting one destined for European celebrity.

At the age of fourteen Wren was removed to Oxford and entered at Wadham
College, where he was speedily recognized as “a rare and early prodigy
of universal science,” and distinguished by much attention. He proved
his mathematical knowledge by writing on spherical trigonometry; he
invented several instruments; he translated Oughtred’s “Geometrical
Dialling” into Latin; and at the instance of Sir Charles Scarborough,
a celebrated physician and mathematician, he formed some admirable
architectural models from pasteboard. In his eighteenth year he took
the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and soon after published an algebraical
tract relating to the Julian period. While he was thus achieving
academic distinction, Wren’s pillow was visited by a dream, which
Aubrey deemed not unworthy of being chronicled and recorded. He was
staying at his father’s residence in Wiltshire, in the year 1651; and
one night, among the visions which his brain conjured up in sleep, he
saw a great battle in a market-place unknown to him. He marked the
bloody strife for victory, the rapid flight for safety, and the keen
pursuit for vengeance; and among those who sought to escape the cruel
carnage he perceived a young cousin of his own, who had formerly gone
with the king into Scotland. Probably, on waking, he thought little
more of the matter; but next evening, the kinsman, whose retreating
form had been so strangely presented to his sleeping fancy, appeared
unexpectedly, after dusk, at the rectory-house, and surprised its
inmates with the startling news of the king’s forces having sustained
a defeat at Worcester, where he had been. Surprise was, of course,
depicted on the fair and intelligent countenance of the Oxford scholar,
at an occurrence which seemed so natural a sequel to his dream of the
previous night.

But Wren wasted not much time in musing over dreams. He was so busy and
enthusiastic in the pursuit of knowledge, and so dexterous in turning
it to account, that he was spoken of as a “miracle of a youth.” He soon
took the degree of Master of Arts, and was elected a Fellow of All
Souls. He was exemplary in his conduct, and regular and temperate in
his habits.

The great abilities and scientific acquirements of the Wiltshire
miracle becoming widely known, he was, about his twenty-fifth year,
appointed Professor of Astronomy in the Gresham College. About the time
of his entrance upon its duties, this blushing youth, as he frankly
described himself in one of his lectures, had a memorable interview
with Cromwell, whose son-in-law, being fond of mathematics, had sought
the learned professor’s acquaintance, and cultivated it by frequent
invitations to his house. While dining there one day, he suddenly found
himself face to face with the mighty Protector, who stalked in without
ceremony, and took his place at table. After a while he fixed his eyes
on the future architect to the kings of the house of Stuart.

“Your uncle has long been confined to the Tower,” he remarked after a
pause, during which he keenly surveyed the short but dignified person
of the youth.

“He has,” replied Wren, with some stateliness; “but he bears his
affliction with patience and resignation.”

“He may come out, if he will,” said Cromwell.

“Will your highness permit me to tell him so?” asked Wren, with
eagerness.

“Yes, you may,” said the Lord Protector.

Wren seized an early opportunity of retiring, and, with something
of boyish delight, hurried to his venerable relative with the glad
tidings; but the imprisoned prelate disdained the thought of obtaining
liberty from the great usurper, and, after denouncing the proposal with
ardent indignation, declared that he was determined to tarry the Lord’s
leisure, and owe deliverance to Him only. The Restoration soon after
set him free.

Wren resigned his chair at Gresham College when promoted to the
Savilian Professorship of Astronomy at Oxford, where had for years
existed the club out of which arose the Royal Society, of which
he became a member, and afterward president. His reputation as a
successful cultivator of the sciences had already extended his
reputation to foreign lands, when he gloriously proved his possession
of a very different and more popular kind of accomplishment. He had
previously attracted the attention of the king, who must have been
aware that the youth had been unostentatiously storing his mind with
that minute knowledge of architecture which proved his source of power;
and at the age of twenty-eight he was summoned to Whitehall, and
informed that the time had arrived for putting his powers to the proof.
He was appointed to assist at the public works then contemplated:
namely, the building of a new palace at Greenwich, the embellishment of
Windsor Castle, and the completion of old St. Paul’s, whose interior
had been used as a stable by Cromwell’s troopers, and its beautiful
pillars defaced and applied to the most sordid purposes. The Government
were in no haste to commence operations. Perhaps

    “The delay was wrought by want of thought,
       As well as want of heart.”

At all events, Wren remained unemployed for two long years; and at the
end of that period, delay having done its work, and there appearing no
prospect of his talents being in requisition, he manifested symptoms of
impatience. Under such circumstances ambitious spirits are not seldom
troublesome, and Wren, no doubt, bore himself like other people; but
his complaints were cut short by the offer of an office at Tangier,
whither he was requested to go and direct the defenses of the harbor
and citadel. The young architect did not pause long to consider the
course he should pursue: an ample salary was indeed rather tempting;
but, with characteristic decision, he declined the appointment, and
returned to Oxford.

The condition of St. Paul’s, however, was such as could not be
altogether disregarded. Soldiers had converted the body of the ancient
church into quarters for their horses; the beautiful pillars of Inigo
Jones’s portico had been hewed and broken down, and large portions of
the roof had fallen in. The spectacle it presented was woeful in the
extreme, and could no longer be overlooked; and, accordingly, Wren was
commissioned to survey the building and furnish plans for its complete
restoration.

While preparing designs with that view, he made a tour to France for
the purpose of widening and improving his conception of architecture,
and visited the most admired works of the greatest professors of his
art in that country. In Paris he viewed, and made drawings of, the
various edifices, and took due notice of every thing likely to elevate
his ideas and improve his taste. He had, moreover, the distinction of
being introduced to Bernini, the celebrated sculptor.

“I would have given my skin for Bernini’s design of the Louvre,” said
Wren, with becoming ardor; “but the old reserved Italian gave me but
a few minutes’ view. It was five little designs in paper, for which he
had received as many thousand pistoles. I had only time to copy it in
my fancy and memory.”

He strove to make himself acquainted with the most esteemed buildings
in the city and its vicinity. With a mind refreshed by travel, and an
eye impressed with the fabrics it had gazed on, Wren gladly enough
returned to England, having, as he stated, surveyed and brought with
him “almost all France on paper.” He was now enthusiastically intent
on proceeding with the restoration of St. Paul’s; but there had arisen
among the commissioners disputes, which effectually checked his
eagerness. Public works are, in their progress, too frequently victims
of private whims; and Wren now found so, to his dismay. Those who had
been intrusted with the management of the business formed themselves
into two parties. One of these obstinately contended that the church
should be merely “patched up” to the best advantage; while the other
were zealous for the full and complete restoration proposed by Wren.
The architect, whose fortitude and patience were ever remarkable,
reasoned with them in that calm tone which he ever adhered to under all
annoyances; but he argued in vain. Suddenly the Great Fire not only put
a period to the strife, but opened up a large stage for the genius and
energy of this truly great Englishman, whose schemes speedily became
the talk of Europe.

The dreadful conflagration had destroyed the principal part of St.
Paul’s, while helplessly damaging the remainder; and Wren, perceiving
that any efficient repair was now utterly impracticable, conceived the
idea of associating his name with a grand ecclesiastical structure
worthy of the capital of royal England. His path, however, was not
yet quite clear; for the hearts of the commissioners, “untraveled,
still returned” to the old building, and another effort was made to
reconstruct it. The rubbish was removed, and the enterprise entered on;
but the fall of a pillar soon indicated how vain and futile such an
attempt really was.

Wren was on a visit at Oxford, when he received the intelligence of
this disaster; and perhaps he felt that his day of triumph had at
length arrived. He forthwith wrote and recommended a total removal of
the ruins of the former church, and the erection, from the foundation,
of a cathedral that should exhibit the taste and dignity of the
country. Nevertheless, so perverse is human nature, when a change of
opinion involves a confession of error, that the system of “patching
up any how” was persisted in till the middle of 1668, when it was
resolved that a new cathedral should be built. Wren now applied himself
to the production of several designs and models for the contemplated
structure, and, in due time, they were laid before the proper
authorities. It appears that, whatever credit pertains to the rejection
of the best and adoption of the worst plans, must be assigned to that
royal duke whose insane bigotry and superstition afterward cost him the
proudest crown in Christendom. The architect’s temper did not give way;
but he shed tears at the injudicious selection.

Operations were forthwith commenced in earnest, but though there was
practiced none of the tardiness which had characterized the preliminary
arrangements, the gigantic magnitude of the work occasioned a delay of
years; and it was not till the third quarter of the eventful century
had passed that the scorched ruins were altogether removed, and the
first stone laid by the great architect, under whose superintendence
it was completed in the comparatively brief space of thirty-five
years. Previously to the work being entered on, Wren had the honor of
knighthood conferred on him; and about the same period he married a
lady of Oxfordshire; though he had reached his forty-second year――an
age at which men are generally rather disinclined to relinquish their
freedom. He was speedily blessed with a son, who, in 1700, laid the
last and highest stone of the cathedral, in presence of the principal
persons employed in the building. Wren subsequently planned no fewer
than fifty new ecclesiastical edifices for the metropolis; and no
man, however high in that art, which is half a science, and therefore
requires mathematical knowledge in its votaries, ever imitated with so
much success the churches of Italy. His mind was vigorous, his judgment
accurate, and he excelled in unity and elegance.

In July, 1669, he had experienced the satisfaction of seeing the first
of his architectural designs realized. This was the theatre at Oxford,
founded by Archbishop Sheldon. It was opened with great and imposing
solemnity; and the munificent founder marked his appreciation of the
skill displayed in the building by presenting Wren with a golden cup,
and appointing him one of the curators for life.

Meantime the plague of London had drawn public attention to the
defective state of its architecture, and the great conflagration had
afforded an opportunity of introducing extensive improvements. Wren
then stood forth as an architect capable of making a new and extensive
city arise, phœnix-like, from the ashes. He earnestly desired to give
beauty and dignity to a capital of whose greatness, in other respects,
he spoke in language of enthusiasm. His proposal was to run a spacious
street, in a direct line, from St. Paul’s to the Exchange, another to
the Tower, and a third westward to Piccadilly. The bank of the river
was to be adorned with a terrace, and there he proposed to place the
halls of the twelve great city companies. This scheme, which had the
warm support of the king and his ministers, was all but frustrated by
the citizens, who found that it unfortunately interfered too much with
the rights and property of private individuals to be realized to any
satisfactory extent.

About this period he was sauntering with Charles the Second through
the hunting-lodge at Newmarket, in reference to which his majesty
remarked――

“These rooms are too low.”

“An’ please your majesty, I think them high enough,” said Wren, as he
walked up, carrying his figure, which was the reverse of tall, with
much of the stateliness of those cavaliers whom, in boyish days, he had
seen at his father’s deanery. Charles, with a merry twinkle of his eye,
squatted down to Wren’s height, saying, as he did so――

“Ay, Sir Christopher, on second thoughts I think they are high enough,
too.”

Sir Stephen Fox, progenitor of that family which has since produced so
many celebrated persons――a man who had risen from obscurity to high
honors in the state――persuaded the king that a military hospital should
be founded. Wren furnished designs for, and superintended, the building
at Chelsea, which was not completed till the reign of William and Mary.
He also prepared designs for the palace of Winchester. In 1784 he was
appointed Comptroller and Principal Officer of the Works at Windsor
Castle.

Wren had been born and bred among men who, from their position, took a
lively interest in political affairs; and, in spite of his multifarious
duties, he was far from declining such distinction in that sphere as
was not likely to interfere with his professional pursuits. He was
indebted to the people of Plympton――the native place of Sir Joshua
Reynolds――for his first election to the House of Commons, in 1685.
After the Revolution he was returned for New Windsor, and became a
great favorite with that daughter of the banished king who then shared
the English throne with her Dutch consort. She admired his genius, and
perhaps appreciated the affection which he entertained for the kingly
race whose errors had been her husband’s opportunity. Being pleased
with the situation and scenery of Hampton Court, she commissioned the
architect, who had done honor to the patronage of her merry uncle
and her gloomy sire, to furnish designs for a splendid palace, to be
connected with the pile which Cardinal Wolsey had reared and made over
to the bluff Killer of Wives and Defender of the Faith. The queen was
presented with several designs, and selected one which did credit to
her character for taste and elegance, but the sanction of the royal
Dutchman was required before she could finally decide. That great
prince and soldier was a hero, though, unfortunately for his fame,
one of no very scrupulous nature; and heroes are generally men of one
design. If the question had been how to raise in England funds to carry
on the war against France, his judgment would hardly have erred; but
the construction of a palace was a different matter; and he chose and
stuck by the very plan which had been prepared as a foil to the others.
The queen was forced to yield, and the architect sighed at being thus
obliged to erect a palace of which he disliked the plan; but regret
could produce no remedy for the evil, and the work was proceeded with.
He next designed Greenwich Hospital, and during the reign of Queen Anne
he continued to enjoy from that royal lady a favor and protection not
unworthy of a grand-daughter of Charles the First.

The distinguished architect, however, had not pursued his prosperous
course without making enemies; and the time at length arrived when they
could gratify their hoarded malice. When the first representative of
the House of Brunswick left his delightful Electorate to ascend the
throne of Great Britain, Wren was in his eighty-second year; and though
so often thwarted in his designs during three reigns by citizens, and
kings, and commissioners, he had done wonders, and on every side there
were traces of his rare and fertile genius. The new sovereign, however,
was almost as devoid of taste or capacity as he was destitute of virtue
or popularity; and, from the beginning, he regarded the venerable
architect with an inimical eye. After a lapse of four years the public
learned, with astonishment and indignation, that Sir Christopher was
dismissed from his office, and replaced by a wretched pretender,
to whose undistinguished name Pope has given a somewhat unenviable
notoriety.

The old knight had lived too long, and seen too much of the world, in
a most eventful age, to be very deeply affected by this circumstance;
though the insult touched his friends to the heart. He removed from
his official residence in Scotland Yard, and betook himself to rural
retirement. He had long survived his first wife; and not relishing
a prolonged widowerhood, he sought and found a second bride in the
daughter of a peer of Ireland. He now took a house at Hampton Court,
where he passed the greater part of his remaining years in study and
contemplation of the Holy Scriptures, which cheered his solitude and
consoled him in his preparation for a higher state of existence. He
indulged in a sleep in his easy chair after dinner, maintained the
utmost serenity, and exhibited all his wonted vivacity. Gradually his
limbs, which had been active, failed; and his movements thus became
dependent on the assistance of others. Now and then he rejoiced in a
visit to the metropolis, to inspect the repairs of Westminster Abbey,
and look once more on the dome of St. Paul’s. His intellect remained
unimpaired long after his bodily vigor had ceased. A journey between
London and Hampton Court, then a more formidable affair to a person of
advanced age than it has since become, proved more than his frame could
endure, and, after a short illness, he died on the 27th of February,
1723. His corpse was consigned to the vaults of the magnificent
cathedral, which stands alike the monument and the master-piece of his
architectural genius, as his most appropriate epitaph is the brief
inscription which has been alluded to at the commencement of this
sketch. Sixty-nine years later the surrounding earth was disturbed
on the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds; and the mortal remains of the
illustrious painter, whose magic pencil had redeemed Englishmen from
the reproach of being indebted to foreign nations for artistic skill,
were, with much pomp and circumstance, laid by the side of the great
architect, in the consecrated cemetery.




DR. WILLIAM HUNTER.


The name of Hunter is still of high account in the profession, which
was raised and adorned by the talents and virtues of the two brothers.
Indeed it is as inseparably connected with the progress of medical
science in Great Britain, as is that of Wren with architecture, or
that of Erskine with trial by jury. The career of the elder of the
distinguished brothers is well worthy of attention, and eminently
calculated to stimulate industry.

Dr. Hunter was not only a Scotchman, but to some extent a patriot;
and an adventurer of mark or likelihood from that country, without
a genealogy, would be like the year without the spring, or like the
spring without the flowers. It serves to support his pride, and to
sustain him in his poverty. In this respect the great physician was
not deficient, his grandfather having been a younger son of Hunter
of Hunterstone, chief of the name. Moreover, the parentage of this
eminent man was respectable; for about the beginning of last century
his father resided, in all the pride of territorial dignity, on the
small hereditary estate of Long Calderwood, in the county of Lanark.
The laird was, no doubt, a frugal-enough swain, with ideas as
old-fashioned as the language in which they were expressed; but who
lacked not sagacity, nor a stout heart and a strong hand. He had need
of such qualities; for, however barren or the reverse might have been
his acres, it appears that “the leddy,” though doubtless exemplary
and diligent in “doubling his joys and all his cares dividing,” was,
if any thing, inconveniently prolific; for with alarming rapidity, as
years glided on, he was presented with no less than half a score of
children――a progeny surely large enough, in all conscience, to daunt
the bravest speculator on the probabilities of the future.

In the rustic abode, most likely one of those “thatched mansions” at
that period commonly the residence of the lesser proprietors of the
soil of North Britain, on the 23d of the merry month of May, 1718――if,
indeed, all seasons were not then alike in that impoverished country,
where, in the words of the clever but clumsy satirist,

    “No flowers embalmed the air but one white rose,
     Which on the tenth of June by instinct blows,”――

William Hunter, destined to be one of the most famous of medical
practitioners, anatomists, and lecturers, was born and swaddled, with
the usual form and ceremony. He was the seventh child of his parents;
and ten years later, in the same place, appeared his brother, who is
styled “the Prophet of the Healing Art,” and whose wise countenance,
as portrayed by the potent pencil of Reynolds, made Lavater
exclaim――“That man thinks for himself!”

Young Willie was, no doubt, a shrewd, grave, talented boy, whose time
was divided between learning that quantity of Latin prescribed by
statute to the son of every owner of a portion of Caledonian soil,
however stern and wild, poor or paltry, it might be. Indeed, in his
case there was another reason for attention to classical learning, it
being originally intended that the Church of Scotland should have the
benefit of the talents and abilities with which Nature had blessed him.
Sir Robert Walpole boasted over his cups that, if the intention of
his taking orders had been carried into effect, he would have one day
been Archbishop of Canterbury; and had Hunter applied his intellect as
vigorously to the study of divinity and Scottish ecclesiastical affairs
as he did to those of the profession of which he became so eminent
a member, he might possibly have climbed to the position, earned
the fame, and exercised the influence, of an Erskine, a Blair, or a
Chalmers. It was otherwise appointed:

    “Scire potestates herbarum, usumque medendi
     Maluit, et mutas agitare inglorias artes.”

At the distance of a mile and a half from his paternal mansion stood
the village of Kilbride; and there, in the school-room belonging to
the parish, some “Dominie Sampson,” whose sayings and doings have been
consigned to oblivion, imparted instruction with a stentorian voice,
and flourished the odious leathern scourge, before which many an erring
urchin has shrunk, and winked, and howled. To this establishment, in
all probability, would Hunter travel daily, on the back of a donkey or
shaggy pony, with a wallet on his shoulder; save when, to his heart’s
delight, a fall of rain or a snow-storm afforded a decent pretext for
remaining at home, and making his escape at noon to the weekly market,
or to one of the four parochial fairs held during the year.

At the customary age he was sent to the University of Glasgow; and
no doubt, as it would likely be his first visit, gazed with wonder
on such buildings as were there to be seen. The place was then very
different from what it has since become. But to a boy, who hitherto
had witnessed no scene more striking than a rural fair, who had only
dreamt of greater things while reposing on a summer’s day by the margin
of some haunted and murmuring streamlet, or while driving the cows
in the gloaming to the modest grange, the venerable precincts of the
college and of the ancient cathedral, described with so much felicity
in the pages of “Rob Roy;” the battlemented mansion, that had lately
been the residence of an archbishop; the tall masts of the vessels that
had brought colonial produce to an extending market; and last, though
not least, the Exchange, whose covered pavement was traversed by those
proud “Virginians”――the aristocracy of tobacco――who wrapped themselves
closer in their red cloaks, shook their flowing wigs, grasped more
firmly their long gold-headed canes, and raised their eyes with haughty
stare, when any inquisitive stranger approached the scene of their
operations, must have seemed grand indeed.

Hunter now commenced his theological studies; and the sagacious sire
rejoiced in the prospect of seeing his son “wagging his head in a
pulpit.” But after a term of five years an obstacle to pursuing his
course occurred, which could not be overcome without outraging his
conscientious convictions. In fact, he entertained an insuperable
repugnance to some of the articles of faith to which he was required
to assent; and, sacrificing whatever prospects of preferment he had
on the shrine of duty, he resolved to venture upon a new field, and
make medicine and the art of healing the study and occupation of
his life. He was still a boy, “showing a maiden chin,” without that
wisdom which is commonly, but not seldom erroneously, supposed to lurk
about the beard; and it can not be questioned but that hope would
extravagantly gild any future that his fancy might conjure up. Yet,
strongly as he might have felt within him the spirit and the faculty to
ascend the hill of life, and wave his cocked hat in triumph from its
summit, he could hardly contemplate such enviable success as it was
his good fortune to seek and find. Little, it may be well conceived,
could he foresee how rapidly he was to emerge from obscurity, and be
recognized as one of the most celebrated votaries to a profession at
once delicate and laborious in that illimitable city of which, at his
father’s hearth, he had heard wondrous tales and accounts exciting
curiosity.

Meantime, returning to his native district in 1737, he formed an
intimacy with Dr. Cullen. This afterward celebrated man was a native
of Hamilton. He had received an ordinary Scotch education, served an
apprenticeship to an apothecary, and made several voyages in a vessel
trading to the East Indies in the capacity of surgeon. He had commenced
practice in a Lanarkshire parish, the clergyman of which had married
Hunter’s sister; and at the manse of his brother-in-law doubtless
our hero made Cullen’s acquaintance. The conversation of the latter
exercised a mighty influence on the mind of his new friend; and when
he had settled as a practitioner at Hamilton, a small town situated on
the Clyde, Hunter entered into a sort of partnership with him. They
even meditated it being of a permanent nature; but subsequent events
rendered such a scheme altogether inexpedient, and it was abandoned
with advantage to both. Nevertheless, it was pursued for years with
mutual profit. Being equally and earnestly desirous of improvement,
they agreed that each should pass a winter at one of the colleges,
while the other should remain and attend to the patients who relied
on the establishment for medical aid. Cullen’s seniority gave him the
privilege of taking the first session; and so signal was his progress,
that he was enabled to impart valuable information to his young
associate. After a season, they parted in friendship, to divide the
world between them; and while his former companion in arms was winning
metropolitan honors and achieving innocent, though not bloodless
victories, Cullen was by no means shrinking from the exertions which
establish a reputation. Hunter seems to have disdained the company
of a fair being to comfort and console him in his way through this
troublesome world; but his northern friend and contemporary was not
so remiss or self-denying. He forthwith strengthened his position
by taking to wife the daughter of some neighboring worthy; but his
abilities were not to be confined within narrow limits. He attracted
the notice of men of pride and nobility――was patronized by the ducal
houses of Hamilton and Argyle――filled professorial chairs in Glasgow
and Edinburgh――influenced, in no inconsiderable degree, the opinion
of medical men as to the science of physic――exhibited delightful
amiability in private life; and, leaving behind several works to
vindicate the high estimation in which he was held, he breathed his
last in peace and prosperity. Having thus briefly sketched Cullen’s
career, let us return to mark the footsteps of his redoubted countryman
in pursuit of wealth and eminence.

Hunter went, in his turn, to the romantic capital of Scotland, and
attended the lectures of several professors of distinction. In the year
1711 he set off to gratify his eyes with a sight of London, having
obtained an introduction from a printer in Glasgow to James Douglas,
who, as a surgeon and teacher of anatomy, had fattened in the rich
South. This individual had early emigrated, but had not altogether
lost his sentiments of nationality; and he had, perhaps, a keen eye
to his own interests. Besides, he was a man of mark, and the author
of several works of merit. He is spoken of by Pope and Harwood as an
enthusiastic collector of the various editions of Horace, and eulogized
by Haller for the art and ingenuity of his anatomical preparations.
Doubtless at that date there were presented fewer letters recommending
raw Scottish lads to the notice of their enriched countrymen, than when
Wilkie charmingly depicted a similar ceremony. In any case, Douglas
gave the young aspirant a gracious reception, and asked him to repeat
his visit. Being engaged at the time with an elaborate treatise on the
bones, he was anxious to enlist the services of some trustworthy youth
as a dissector, and perceived that Hunter had the sense and acuteness
requisite to qualify him for the situation. He therefore courteously
invited our hero to live in his house, assist in his dissections, and
superintend the education of his son.

When the curious and adulating Boswell had his cherished hopes crowned
by an introduction, in the parlor of Tom Davies, to the great man whom
he had long worshiped at a distance, and nervously blurted out, “I do
indeed come from Scotland, but I can not help it,” Johnson said with
truth. “That, sir, is what a great many of your countrymen can not
help.” Such, however, was not the case with Hunter, who had sufficient
influence to achieve a respectable position at home if he had wished.
The offer of Douglas was, nevertheless, tempting. He requested time to
consider it; and going to the house of a practitioner with whom he was
staying in Pall Mall, he wrote to his partner and to his father on the
subject. Cullen immediately approved of his accepting the post; but the
laird, who was in his seventy-eighth year, and looked upon a journey
to London as a most formidable affair, was already impatient for his
son’s return, and was with no small difficulty prevailed on to give his
consent. Matters were at length accommodated; and Hunter took up his
quarters under the roof of Douglas as pupil and assistant, and entered
vigorously upon his new duties.

This was, unquestionably, an auspicious commencement of his career;
for his patron was high in his profession, a Fellow of the Royal
Society, and Reader of Anatomy to the Company of Surgeons. Besides,
public opinion was not yet violently excited against the inhabitants
of the sterile north. The “silver-tongued Mansfield” had, it is true,
ridden from Perthshire to Middlesex, “drunk champagne with the wits,”
and distinguished himself at the bar; but he was not yet lord chief
justice nor an English peer. Wedderburn had not yet crossed the Tweed
to grasp successfully at the great seal. Lord Bute had still to be
pulled out of the apothecary’s chariot at a cricket-match to play at
whist with, and become the favorite of, Frederick Prince of Wales. On
the other hand, Wilkes had not indulged in what Lord Chatham called
“the expensive delights” of contested elections, nor in the profanity
and licentiousness of Medenham Abbey. His services as embassador to
Constantinople had to be declined, and “The North Briton” to be called
into existence to avenge the slight. Poor, deluded Churchill, was
sitting on the forms at Westminster with Lloyd, Cowper, and Warren
Hastings. The time had to come when he could “blaze the comet of a
season,” by applying such terms as “the poor, proud children of leprosy
and hunger,” to the natives of an ancient and noble land, whose powers
he did not comprehend, and whose achievements in art, science, law,
letters, and commerce, he possessed not the prescience to divine. The
events of 1745 had yet to fill the citizens of London with anger and
apprehension; national animosity had still to be excited to madness by
public appointments being almost exclusively bestowed on bare-legged
Highlanders. Hunter was, in some respects, an adventurer, and one
of whom his country had reason to be proud; but it was well that he
arrived and struck his root in public favor before the frenzied cry had
gone forth.

Douglas was not disappointed in the expectations he had formed of his
assistant’s worth and ability, which he stimulated in various ways. He
enabled him to enter as a dissecting pupil at St. George’s Hospital,
and to attend a class for anatomy, besides a course of lectures on
experimental philosophy, given by Dr. Desaguliers; and Hunter availed
himself so earnestly of such advantages, and became so expert in
dissection, that his excellent instructor was at the expense of having
several of his preparations engraved. This aid, so well calculated to
afford encouragement, was rendered just in time; for within twelve
months after Hunter’s spirited expedition southward his employer died;
and having apparently married past middle age, he left a widow and two
children, with whom his talented _protégé_ continued to reside for the
next eight years.

In 1743, Hunter, ever aspiring and energetic, contributed a paper on
the structure and diseases of the cartilages to the “Philosophical
Transactions;” and, three years later, was appointed Lecturer to the
Society of Naval Surgeons. For the first course he received seventy
guineas, which was the largest sum ever in his possession up to that
date, as he declared when carrying it to his lodgings, in a bag, under
his cloak. But he had not yet learned prudence; and the amount was
soon reduced to such dimensions, that he was reluctantly compelled to
postpone the second course for a fortnight, from want of the money
to pay for advertising them. This circumstance taught him, after a
somewhat stern fashion, that in worldly affairs caution and economy
are essential elements of success. In 1747 he became a Member of
the College of Surgeons; and, next year, went to Leyden. There the
anatomical preparations of Albinus inspired him with enthusiastic
admiration, and he was fired with the worthy ambition of emulating
their excellence. On returning to this country he commenced practice as
a surgeon.

As a medical practitioner, with anxious and laborious duties in
the widest of all fields――the metropolis of England――Hunter was
conspicuously successful; and, in truth, there are few more responsible
occupations. The person to whom is raised the vail which conceals
the privacy of domestic life from the public eye, exercises no small
influence on multitudes of his fellow-creatures. His aid is invoked
to relieve bodily and mental suffering in seasons of distress and
perplexity. Lives are confided to his skill, and the peace of families
to his honor. To society, therefore, his character and conduct are
matters of no inconsiderable interest. Hunter showed himself eminently,
and in all respects, worthy of his position. He displayed remarkable
tact in winning the confidence of his patients; and, even when he gave
signs of being more than ordinarily doubtful of success in his efforts
on their behalf, anxious friends and relatives placed implicit reliance
on his tried skill and sagacious judgment. His merit and ability were
speedily recognized by election to important offices in two hospitals,
being recommended thereto by the most eminent surgeons of the day. His
manner and personal appearance contributed much to his success, and he
began to distance all competitors in the field which he gradually chose
for the exercise of his skill and experience. In 1750 the degree of
Doctor of Medicine was bestowed on him by the University of Glasgow;
and in the summer of the next year he visited his native district,
where time had wrought considerable changes among his relations.

His father had died shortly after consenting to his remaining in
London; and his eldest brother had since followed. But his mother yet
lived at Long Calderwood, of which he had become proprietor on his
brother’s decease. Nor had romance altogether disdained to alight on
the unpretending mansion and its homely grounds. A cabinet-maker,
fresh from the regions of Cockaigne, had settled at Glasgow, and
ventured to pay his addresses to one of the sisters. He was the
reverse of disagreeable, and “Miss Jenny” was quite content to be
his. Her relatives, indeed, conceived that a match would compromise
their gentility, and protested against its being consummated; but
this “penniless lass wi’ a lang pedigree” resolved, at all risks,
to secure herself against the possibility of becoming an old maid,
took the bit between her teeth, and insisted on having her own way.
Then, questionless, preparations would be made for a gay wedding, and
numerous guests would be bidden. Smugglers would supply foreign wine
and brandy. The gun, the farmyard, and the pigeon-house, would furnish
the table; friends and kinsfolk would congregate from all directions;
damsels, with the prospect of a bridal ceremony and a dance, would
willingly submit to the inconvenience of passing the preceding night
six in a room; while men combining something of the haughty spirit of
the Master of Ravenswood with a moiety of the pedantry displayed by
the Baron of Bradwardine, would in hay-lofts luxuriate in such sleep
as is not always vouchsafed to kings reclining under gilded canopies.
Another event of greater importance had occurred. Hunter’s brother
John, the youngest of the brood, after attempting to work for some time
at his brother-in-law’s trade, despaired of success in that path of
life, and returned home. He soon became tired of remaining idle, and
joining Dr. Hunter in London, threw all the ardor and energy of his
great mind into surgery, and ultimately arrived at the highest honors
of his profession. He had been three years in the English metropolis,
and won considerable reputation at the time of Dr. Hunter’s visit to
Scotland. As for the latter, he was now full of hope and courage; and
his engagements were such that he could only stay for a few weeks. But
he gave instructions for repairing and improving the house of Long
Calderwood, and for purchasing any adjoining lands that might happen
to be offered for sale. One day, while riding in a flat part of the
country with his old comrade, Cullen, the young Glasgow professor,
pointing out to his former colleague his birth-place, said, “How
conspicuous Long Calderwood appears to-day!”

“By St. Andrew!” exclaimed Hunter with unwonted energy, emphasis, and
enthusiasm, “if I live I shall make it still more conspicuous!”

There was, in this frank utterance, something of that glowing romance
which generally animates and stimulates great men; and the future fully
proved that this confidence in his own power and determination, however
high, was not in any degree misplaced. When he was held in esteem by
his sovereign, when his name and talents were known and respected in
every part of Europe, when the scientific societies of foreign capitals
were proudly conferring honors upon him, and when he was in possession
of wealth and enviable reputation, he could reflect on this frank
expression of sentiment without any of the regret experienced by those
who indulge in such aspirations without having calculated the toil and
labor necessary for their realization.

In 1756 Hunter became one of the physicians to the British Lying-in
Hospital; in the two succeeding years, a Licentiate of the Royal
College of Physicians, and a Member of the Medical Society. In 1762
he published his “Medical Commentaries,” written in a correct and
spirited style. Having been consulted by Queen Charlotte in the latter
year, he was subsequently nominated Physician Extraordinary to her
Majesty. He now found it necessary to admit his pupil, Mr. Hewson,
who had for some time assisted at his lectures, as his associate. On
the institution of the Royal Academy, the king appointed Hunter to the
Professorship of Anatomy. In fulfilling the duties thus devolving upon
him, he exhibited boundless zeal and singular mental vigor, as also
ingenious resource in adapting his science to purposes of painting and
sculpture.

When Goldsmith was, on the same occasion, graciously honored with
the Professorship of Ancient History, he complained to his familiar
friends, with some show of reason, that honors bestowed upon one in
his circumstances were too like ruffles given to a man who had not a
shirt to his back. With Hunter the case was widely different. By this
time he was a rich man; and――what was of more consequence――actuated by
the laudable ambition of making his wealth minister to the progress of
the profession, in whose ranks the greater part of it had been earned.
Accordingly, having set apart a sum sufficient to insure independence
to his declining years, he proposed to expend a large amount of his
hoarded treasure in the erection of an anatomical theatre, and to
found a perpetual professorship; provided the Government would grant
a proper site for a building. His request in this respect, being made
to George Grenville, then prime minister, was not, of course, complied
with. He was not, however, to be baffled in his purpose; and on failing
to obtain the co-operation of Government, though Lord Shelburne
handsomely offered to head a subscription list with a thousand pounds,
he purchased a piece of ground in Great Windmill Street, where, at his
own expense, he built an amphitheatre and museum, as well as a large
and commodious mansion, to which he removed in 1770. The museum was at
first furnished with the numerous specimens of human and comparative
anatomy collected by him during previous years; but his efforts and
expenditure did not cease at this point. He gradually added to the
stores by purchasing various collections of note, particularly that of
Dr. Fothergill, who directed in his will that it should be offered to
Hunter considerably below its estimated value. Besides, he procured a
number of fossils, a splendid cabinet of rare coins and medals, and a
magnificent library, well stocked with Greek and Latin volumes. By and
by his medical friends felt honored in contributing presents; and the
institution became known and valued throughout Europe.

In 1775 Dr. Hunter published his most famous work, “The History of the
Human Gravid Uterus,” illustrated by large and splendid plates, and
dedicated to his majesty. Several additions in matters of detail were
made to the book from his papers, after the author had gone to his long
rest. In 1780 he was elected an Associate of the Royal Medical Society
of Paris. On the death of Dr. Fothergill he was chosen President of
the Society of Physicians, and soon after a Foreign Associate of the
French Academy of Sciences, as well as of the Royal Medical Society of
Paris.

As a lecturer his powers remained unimpaired; and though in stature
rather under the middle size, he was well formed, and engaging
enough in person and deportment to set off to advantage discourses
composed with clearness and illustrated to admiration. He continued
to deliver them till within a few months of his death. In his last
years he was attended by his nephew. This was Mr. Baillie, son of a
Scotch clergyman, brother of the celebrated poetess of that name,
and afterward a distinguished physician. The youth had studied at
Glasgow and Oxford, and he now came to be drilled into excellence by
his experienced kinsman. He was to this end employed in arranging
preparations for the lectures, conducting the demonstrations, and
superintending the operations of the pupils. He subsequently undertook
the continuance of his uncle’s lectures, in conjunction with Mr.
Cruickshank; but, ere long, his extensive practice compelled him to
relinquish the duty. Dr. Hunter having, contrary to the advice and
solicitation of his friends, risen from bed during an attack of the
gout to give a lecture, was seized with paralysis, and felt that his
end was approaching; nor did he shrink from the presence of the great
despoiler, whose ravages he had so often checked. His resignation was
singular. “If I had strength to hold a pen, I would write how easy
and pleasant a thing it is to die,” he said, turning to Dr. Combe,
shortly before breathing his last, which he did on the 30th of March,
1783. Within a week he was interred in the vault of St. James’s Church,
Westminster.

The museum, on which he had expended so large an amount, was bequeathed
to the University of Glasgow, its use for thirty years being reserved
in favor of Dr. Baillie.

To his young and rising relative he left by will his patrimonial
estate; but as it was evident that, in this settlement, he had been
actuated by the annoyance consequent on an irritating dispute between
himself and his illustrious brother, in regard to the merit of a
discovery which both claimed, Baillie declined availing himself of the
circumstance. He therefore, with a touching and becoming generosity,
abandoned the property to his uncle, in whose mind it was associated
with a hundred endearing recollections――kith, and kin, and home――the
freaks of boyhood, and the vague aspirations of a clouded and cheerless
youth, destined to be so nobly redeemed by the exertion and industry of
a useful manhood.




BLACK.


On the afternoon of an autumnal day in the last quarter of the
eighteenth century, two gentlemen, who had considerably passed the
prime of life, and looked like confirmed, but highly-respectable
bachelors, as indeed they were, might have been observed to leave the
vicinity of the South Bridge of Edinburgh at a leisurely pace. They
had just succeeded in negotiating the hire of a room, where, with
several of their literary friends, they proposed to hold a convivial
meeting once during every week of the winter that was coming on. In
pretty light spirits, from having proved themselves men of the world
by bringing this important matter to a satisfactory conclusion, they
were――it might be――discussing and denouncing the ridiculous prejudice,
as they believed it to be, which prevented their countrymen making use
of snails as an ordinary article of food, and vowing that they would,
ere long set an example in this respect which should have the effect
of divesting the public mind of such an absurd delusion; though it
must be confessed, that when they did attempt to execute this bold
intention they suddenly discovered that their appetites had taken an
unceremonious flight. Each of these personages was distinguished
by amiability of character, and utter unconsciousness of the guile
and wickedness that prevailed around him. Their studies and pursuits
were somewhat similar; and though frequently taking opposite views
of debated questions, they were ever bosom friends. But in dress and
manner they presented a striking contrast. One wore on his slender but
active person garments plain to affectation, and might have easily
passed for a member of the Society of Friends but for his cocked
hat. He conversed with force and animation, always displaying much
original information; but the accents that came from his lips, which
parted while listening, were undiluted Scotch; and his bearing was so
remarkably simple, that it was necessary to mark the thin, intellectual
face, the high, thoughtful forehead, and the keen, penetrating eye,
before being aware that he had “stuff” in him, or was more than an
ordinary citizen. The other was of a different stamp. He wore a sort
of academic dress; but it had received such careful and harmonious
additions, as proved that he was by no means indifferent to external
decorations and the propriety of costume. His aspect was comely and
prepossessing; his manner was correct and graceful; he was evidently a
person of elegant tastes and no inconsiderable refinement; and he used
a musical voice to speak good English, with a punctilious accuracy of
expression not often heard so far north at that time.

The former――the plain, unvarnished Scot――was Dr. Hutton, the
ingenious philosopher, who thought out and published the “Theory of
the Earth” that goes by his name, having previously shown his public
spirit, and rendered essential services to the agriculture of his
native country, by bringing, at much exertion to himself, an improved
system of husbandry from the rich and fruitful shire of Norfolk, and
introducing it into the district where he possessed a small estate. His
companion, whose countenance looked that of a being inwardly satisfied
with himself and all who came around him, was Dr. Black, the eminent
Professor of Chemistry in the northern capital; he whose experiments
tended to open up that path of scientific discovery which others have
since so successfully pursued.

Joseph Black, than whom few men have ever lived and died more truly
respected by his daily associates, was a native of France. He was born
in the year 1728, on the banks of the Garonne, hard by the place where
that river visits the city of Bordeaux. There his father, who belonged
to Belfast, had settled as a wine-merchant, and married the daughter of
an individual engaged in the same trade. But with all these temptations
and advantages in one of the largest and most opulent of French towns
to embark the boy in the commercial pursuits which formed the business
of his nearest relatives, young Black was very early destined to a
medical career. Arrangements were made with that view; and at the age
of twelve the future chemist left his home and native soil, to be
fittingly educated at the grammar-school of the flourishing Irish
sea-port town from which his worthy sire had emigrated to the fair
land of vines. For several years he pursued his preparatory studies
in Belfast; and his maternal grandfather being, though resident in
Bordeaux, connected by birth and some territorial possession with
Scotland, Black was, most likely from that cause, transported in his
eighteenth year to Glasgow, and entered as a student at the University.
He was immediately introduced to, and patronized by, the Professor of
Natural Philosophy, with whose son he formed a juvenile intimacy, which
was cemented by the similarity of their tastes.

About the date of Black’s arrival at this college, it happened
that the celebrated Cullen――he who influenced the career of Dr.
Hunter――made his first public appearance at that seat of learning, in
the capacity of Lecturer on Chemistry; his reputation speedily crept
abroad, and the attendance at his class became large. The clever
and acute French student was brought under the notice of Cullen,
who, being frank and generous to his pupils, almost to a fault, made
himself perfectly accessible at all hours, and treated them with much
respect. He immediately perceived the bent of Black’s genius; and
not only recommended, but strongly urged, him to apply himself with
determination to cultivate the science of chemistry, and gave him every
assistance in doing so. Cullen was not, perhaps, a first-rate chemist
himself, but he had an admirable method of imparting instruction;
and his gifted pupil’s preference for the study became so apparent,
that he was ere long employed to assist his friend and teacher in the
experiments of the classroom; and, when thus occupied, exhibited so
much address and dexterity as contributed in no small degree to the
success and fame of the lectures.

Black was still engaged in medical studies, and in order to complete
them under advantageous circumstances he repaired, in 1751, to
Edinburgh, where he stayed in the house of a cousin, who held one of
the professorships. Having, during three sessions, attended all the
requisite classes, he duly took the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
On that occasion he chose for his theme a chemical topic――the acid
arising from food and magnesia alba. Next year he, “still achieving,
still pursuing,” communicated his further ideas on the subject to
a scientific society, in a paper which was then read by him, and
afterward published in the second volume of “Essays, Physical and
Literary,” and gave an account of a most important chemical discovery.
This was the existence of an aërial fluid, which he called fixed air,
the presence of which gives mildness, as its absence gives causticity,
to alkalies and calcareous earths.

In 1756, on Cullen’s removal to Edinburgh, Black was appointed
Professor of Chemistry and Anatomy at Glasgow in his stead; but not
relishing, nor feeling particularly qualified for, the anatomical part
of the business, he requested and obtained the assent of the heads of
the university to an exchange, which he effected with the Professor of
Medicine. While in this position he matured and made public his theory
of latent heat, and explained to a society in Glasgow his experiments
on the subject, in the clearest and most satisfactory manner; and
this proved a principal leading step to the discoveries of Laplace,
Lavoisier, and others: though they niggardly and enviously abstained
in their dissertations from giving him that credit in the matter to
which he was so justly entitled. In 1764 he had as one of his pupils
the celebrated Watt; and it proved most fortunate for the interests
of science and for the fame of both, that these great men were thus
brought together.

Dr. Black was, in 1766, recalled to Edinburgh to fill the professorial
chair of Chemistry, which was rendered vacant by the appointment of
his old friend and adviser, Cullen, to that of Medicine. During the
remainder of his career he was regarded as one of the chief ornaments
of the university, as well as a most distinguished member of the
literary circle which then adorned the Scottish metropolis, where his
private character was highly esteemed. He continued his researches
with perseverance and success; and his lectures were so remarkable for
ease and elegance of style, novelty of information, and originality of
reasoning, that few students ever left college without having attended
a course or two. His devotion to the duties of his professorship was
so complete, that it interfered materially with the spread of his
fame, as others were thus allowed to pass him in that very path of
discovery which his genius had illumined and opened up. A paper which
he furnished, on the “Effects of boiling upon water in disposing it to
freeze more readily,” was published in the “Philosophical Transactions”
for 1774; and an “Analysis of the water of some hot springs in
Iceland,” appeared in the Scottish “Philosophical Transactions for
1791.” In due time he became a member of the societies of London and
of the city where he resided, and, moreover, had the distinction of
being selected as one of the eight Foreign Associates of the Academy
of Sciences at Paris. His lectures on the “Elements of Chemistry,”
delivered in the University of Edinburgh, were, as late as 1803,
published in two volumes, by Professor Robison.

While thus achieving scientific triumphs, the pecuniary affairs of
Dr. Black had flourished better than even the most inquisitive of his
neighbors had supposed; and the manner in which he disposed of his
money by his will was peculiar and characteristic. When he felt the
approaches of age, and found it necessary to employ an assistant, about
his sixtieth year he had a list drawn up of persons who had a claim on
his bounty, and whom he wished to inherit his treasure; and he destined
it in such proportions as seemed consistent with the extent of care and
solicitude to which they were entitled at his hand.

His health had long been in a delicate state, insomuch that he was
under the hard necessity of refraining from writing an account of his
brilliant discoveries, as the exertion of doing so for any continuous
period invariably brought on a spitting of blood; and he felt himself
in no condition to encounter the criticism or engage in the controversy
likely to follow such a publication. Moreover, he is said to have been
apprehensive of a long sickness, which for many reasons he anxiously
wished to avoid. This fate was averted by the sudden nature of the
summons he received to another world. On the 26th of November, 1799,
while he was seated at table partaking of such abstemious fare as he
had lately restricted himself to, the messenger of death was upon him,
and struck the fatal blow. His servitor went into the room according to
custom, but observing the cup of the venerable philosopher in his hand,
as if about to be raised to his lips, and naturally supposing him to
be in deep thought, he noiselessly withdrew. Entering soon after, he
perceived his master still in the same posture, but on going up to the
chair, was beyond measure surprised to find that the lamp of life had
gently expired.




BRINDLEY.


Few more remarkable men than Brindley have appeared in these latter
times. He was not only the architect of his own fortune, but added
enormously to the wealth of others, and to the public resources. In the
acquirement of that knowledge which gave him the power of accomplishing
great schemes, he had none of the appliances and facilities which
competence furnishes and wealth commands; but he possessed advantages
which were of more value to a man like him――a mind not to be startled
at the prospect of its faculties being exerted――a resolution which,
in the true spirit of industry, held difficulties at defiance――and a
determination whose intellectual efforts circumstances could not baffle
or subdue.

James Brindley was born in the year 1716, at Tunsted, within the county
of Derby. His father had reduced himself to extreme poverty by habits
of dissipation and extravagance. Accordingly, any education that
Brindley received at school was, no doubt, of the very slightest and
most limited description. It appears, however, that the statement of
his inability to read and write is quite incorrect; several specimens
of his penmanship having been produced. He is said never to have been
instructed even in the first principles of mechanics, but was able
by a peculiar process of his own invention, to make most accurate
calculations. Besides, his memory adhered with amazing tenacity to any
facts or information committed to its keeping: and by such means did
this unquestioned benefactor of his kind countervail his deficiency of
early training and scientific knowledge.

Having passed a few years in agricultural operations――plying with
the flail or whistling at the plow――he was, at the age of seventeen,
apprenticed to a millwright at Macclesfield, in Cheshire. In this
situation his ideas were rapidly enlarged, and his faculties sharpened
by experience in the trade which he had selected, probably from
feeling that it would accord better with his tastes than the labors
of the husbandman had done. His mechanical genius now began to
develop itself, and to become perceptible; and so apparent was his
progress in obtaining a knowledge of the business, that his employer
frequently when absent from the mills, left him to execute pieces
of work without finding it necessary to give any instruction in
regard to them. Moreover, the different millers by whom they were
employed soon discovered his superiority, and infinitely preferred his
services to those of the master or any of the workmen belonging to
the establishment. On approaching manhood, Brindley himself felt that
he was destined for higher matters; and vague presentiments of better
days in store occupied and agitated his powerful mind as he resolutely
pursued his daily labors. Little could he imagine that he, the poor
journeyman of a rural millwright, should, ere long, be the instrument
of contributing materially to the national wealth; but it was ordered
that it should be so.

Meantime his employer became so advanced in years, that he was
incapable of working with effect. Brindley wisely seized the
opportunity of applying his skill and ingenuity to the business, proved
quite equal to the occasion, and exerted himself with so much success,
that he not only kept it up against all competitors, but rendered it so
flourishing a concern, that the old man and his family were enabled to
live in comfortable circumstances. Indeed the apprentice was now the
more skillful mechanic of the two, and he about this time gave proof of
such being the case.

The aged worthy happened to be engaged in the construction of a
paper-mill at some distance from his own workshop, and had proceeded
to a considerable extent with the operation, when some one skilled in
such matters observed that he was merely throwing his employer’s money
away. This remark reached the ears of Brindley, who, though perhaps
by no means so zealous for his master’s fame as the last minstrel
was for that of the jovial harper who had taught him when a youth,
resolved that it should be redeemed from such a reproach. He therefore
determined to go and inspect the work in question; though that was
not in any respect convenient, his time being otherwise occupied. But
“where there’s a will there’s a way;” and one Saturday evening he set
off on foot, without apprizing any one of his intended excursion, and,
having obtained a sight of the object of his journey, returned on
Monday morning in time for his work, after having walked a distance of
fifty miles. He was altogether without the advantage of having seen
a mill of the same kind before; but, nevertheless, was by this brief
and cursory survey enabled to comprehend every thing necessary to its
being properly completed. Taking the work under his superintendence,
he brought it to a termination that gave the proprietor perfect
satisfaction.

Brindley’s reputation after the success of this undertaking rose high
in the neighborhood, and he was induced to commence business on his own
account. His abilities soon became widely known and appreciated, and he
was extensively employed. He reaped much credit from the erection of
an engine intended to drain a coal-mine at Clifton, in that bustling
Lancashire where the cries are ever “Onward!” and “Haste!” which was
afterward the sphere of his scientific triumphs, and with the history
of which his name is so honorably linked. Under his auspices this piece
of work proceeded with unexpected and amazing rapidity, notwithstanding
the difficulties by which it was encompassed.

About this period a silk mill was being erected at Congleton, in
Cheshire. The more intricate machinery was intrusted to a more
experienced person, and Brindley was engaged merely to furnish the
larger wheels and coarser apparatus. It soon appeared, that in this
division of labor the Derbyshire aspirant had been treated with less
than justice. He was constantly compelled to point out and rectify the
errors and blunders; and at length, tiring of the irksome and invidious
task, he resolutely refused to remain in a subordinate capacity to a
person whose inferiority, in all that related to the matter in hand,
was proved incontestably by the experience of each succeeding day.
Then his employers, seeing how the case really stood, and prudently
considering that their own interests were concerned in Brindley’s
services being retained, appointed him sole manager of the work; which
he not only brought to a satisfactory conclusion, but added several
improvements of no inconsiderable value or importance.

While his name was rising and his reputation increasing, he had the
good fortune of becoming known to the Duke of Bridgewater. The latter
was no ordinary man. The youngest of five children, who successively
died off, he was, in boyhood, regarded as so sickly that his life was
despaired of and his intellect doubted. On this account his education
was for a time neglected. However, he was sent on a Continental tour,
under the guidance of a traveling tutor, and no doubt used his eyes to
better purpose than had been anticipated by his guardians, or than
his immediate pursuits would have led them to suppose. On returning to
England, he set about enjoying himself after the fashion of the day.
He appeared as the owner of race-horses, as a gentleman-rider, as the
frequenter of aristocratic assemblies, and as the successful suitor of
a celebrated beauty. It was on the last point that his fate turned.
Circumstances of a peculiar nature interfered with the matrimonial
project, and prevented the union. The young duke vowed perpetual
celibacy, declared he would never address another female in accents of
gallantry, and abandoning fashionable society, with all its pains, and
pleasures, and excitements, retired, with honor, to his estates in the
county of Lancaster.

Fortunately this representative of Lord Chancellor Ellesmere was
gifted with an ardent diligence which his illustrious progenitor might
have envied, and he forthwith began to develop the resources which
lay dormant in his hereditary possessions. Mr. Gilbert, a person who
had been much engaged in mining operations, became his assistant, and
exhibited a spirit of energy and perseverance kindred with that of his
employer. Brindley’s provincial fame was now not inconsiderable, and he
soon became acquainted with the young patrician, who had fled from the
wiles of noble matrons, and the fascinations of their fairer daughters,
to bleak coal-fields and barren moors.

The man who was now introduced to the then thin and slender duke,
who had escaped from race-courses, ball-rooms, and gaming-tables,
to earn for himself the proud and honorable title of the “Father
of British Inland Navigation,” was plain in appearance and boorish
in manners. But whenever he spoke bystanders listened with pleased
surprise at the enterprising courage which his words betokened; and
his conversation was in no small degree indicative of one of the
strong, rough, resolute, master minds, whose workings――stern and
independent――frequently benefit largely the human species, and minister
to the civilization of the wide world. He was just such a man as the
duke stood in need of for the carrying out of his plans of improvement,
and he readily consented to take service with that view.

The first undertaking on which Brindley entered in his new position
was the Bridgewater Canal. Having surveyed the ground, and reported
that it presented no insuperable difficulties, an Act of Parliament was
obtained, and the enterprise proceeded with under his superintendence.
The self-taught engineer was branded by turns as an enthusiast, a
madman, and a person unworthy of trust; but his intellectual courage
and unshrinking confidence in the expedients of his own bold, powerful,
and original mind defied all such assaults; and he remained unmoved
by the sneers, scorn, and ridicule directed against his projects.
His heart and soul were in the enterprise, and obstacles disappeared
before his determined will. Strangers came from afar to view the
gigantic operations, and marveled at the facility with which the plain,
hard-headed, illiterate man, found means to handle huge rocks, and
remove them at his pleasure. This pursuit completely monopolized his
thoughts and occupied his attention; he cared not for recreation or
amusement. Unceasing industry seemed the law of his being. When in
London he was once persuaded to go to the theatre, but declared that
the whole scene so confused his ideas, and unfitted him for business,
that he would, on no consideration, repeat his visit.

He appears to have had no idea of the beauties of nature, nor any
perception of the objects which make up fine scenery. When under
examination by a committee of the House of Commons, he was asked for
what purpose he conceived rivers to have been created? and, after a
slight pause, replied,

“Undoubtedly to feed canals.”

To the end of his extraordinary career, this wonderful man was occupied
in his favorite pursuits, and his application to the subject was
intense throughout. While the Grand Trunk Navigation Canal, to which he
devoted so much thought and energy, was progressing toward completion
under his auspices, and he was feeding his mind with visions of the
great things it was to accomplish, his death, hastened by mental
exertion, took place at Turnhurst, in Staffordshire, on the 27th of
September, 1772.




WATT.


Among “famous men,” Watt occupies a most distinguished position as a
real benefactor of the world. Though he stated that he knew only two
pleasures――idleness and sleep, study and business might not improperly
have been added. His industry and perseverance eminently qualified
him for a career of invention and enterprise, and he pursued it with
almost unparalleled success. His intellectual faculties were exercised
without ceasing to the end of his long and momentous life; he practiced
constant meditation; and he was thus enabled to minister more than any
of his contemporaries to the progress of material civilization.

James Watt was born on the 19th of January, 1736, at Greenock, where
his father was a merchant. He was first instructed in reading by
his mother, and then placed at a day-school; but being exceedingly
delicate, his attendance was somewhat irregular. When absent from
school, he was far from suspending the exercise of those faculties
which afterward accomplished so much; for his mind was of so inquiring
a nature, that he began almost in childhood to manifest a strong and
ardent taste for geometry and mechanics. This was probably, in some
measure, inspired by the example of his grandfather and uncle, both of
whom had excelled as teachers of mathematics.

It is related that a person one day calling on his father, and
observing the little boy busily occupied in drawing numerous lines on
the hearthstone with a piece of chalk, remarked that the child ought
to be sent to school, and not allowed to idle away his time in such a
manner.

“But,” said his father, “look what he is about before you condemn him.”

The gentleman then looked, and in no small degree was he surprised to
see that he was studiously attempting to solve a geometrical problem.
His natural bent thus becoming evident, his father encouraged it by
providing him with a set of tools; and he showed his comprehension of
the uses to which they might be put by forming several childish toys,
and among others, an electrical machine.

His mother’s relations resided in Glasgow, and there he frequently
went on a visit, when his ardent love of knowledge and his faculty
of learning were matters of considerable astonishment. Doubtless,
his rich and enthusiastic conversation enlivened some of the
extraordinary supper-parties, where the guests of the wealthy but
frugal traders, who altogether eschewed the idea of earlier or more
extensive entertainments, partook of the evening fare, and indulged
in the cold punch, just in such measure as the means or inclination
of the host permitted or prompted. At all events, it appears that he
had no objection to steal a few hours from the night when he could
find listeners to his various and interesting stories and enlivening
discourse.

On one occasion he was chidden by his aunt for continuing to take off
and put on the lid of a tea-kettle, holding by turns a cup and a silver
spoon over the steam, watching its rise from the spout, and catching
and counting the drops of water formed by condensation. So early was
his active mind engaged in investigating the “condensation of steam.”

Though he had given considerable attention to several other subjects,
mechanics was his favorite study; and in conformity with his own wish
he was, at the age of eighteen, indentured to an instrument-maker in
Cornhill, London, who employed him chiefly in preparing and adjusting
sextants, and other nautical instruments. His apprenticeship was
brought to a premature termination by a relapse of bad health, which
obliged him to return to the banks of the Clyde.

Some time after this a visit to Glasgow suggested to his mind the
scheme of commencing business there, with the little instruction he had
received. But not being qualified by the requisite freedom of craft or
guild, he had the mortification of finding that his plan was incapable
of being carried into execution. It was vain to plead or remonstrate.
The members of the corporate body, principally concerned, were deaf to
entreaty. They strenuously adhered to

    “The good old rule, the simple plan,
     That they should take who have the power,
     And they should keep who can;”

and sternly refused him permission to open even the very humblest
workshop.

From this rather tantalizing difficulty, the University rescued
the man destined to increase the resources of his country, and add
immeasurably to the power of his species, by granting him a room within
the building, and appointing him mathematical instrument-maker to the
college. While in this position he executed some small instruments,
which still exist, and exhibit most skillful and dexterous workmanship.
His earliest drawings of steam-engines are likewise preserved, and are
described as being distinguished by neatness, strength, and accuracy of
outline. He enjoyed the favor and intimacy of several celebrated men,
who were then professors in the University; among whom were Adam Smith,
Professor Simson, and Dr. Black, whose discoveries in heat aided him
much in his inventions. Moreover, his workshop was the resort of all
such students as interested themselves in scientific matters. Indeed,
they are said to have consulted him as an authority almost conclusive,
when any difficulty presented itself which baffled their knowledge; and
Watt never allowed his course to be barred by any obstacle that could
possibly be overcome by resolute efforts of intellect, and a determined
application of industry. He studied anatomy, chemistry, and natural
philosophy, and occupied many a leisure hour with inquiries into the
nature of steam. Though unacquainted with the mysteries of music, he
undertook the construction of an organ, and, by dint of perseverance,
furnished an instrument exhibiting many improvements, and capable of
delighting the most fastidious performers. And all this time his daily
devotion to his business was most exemplary, and quite uninterrupted by
his reading or speculations, which were pursued in hours not taken up
with the labors of his craft. The principle upon which he then acted in
this respect guided him throughout life.

Before he reached the age of twenty-four, Watt’s attention had been
attracted to the employment of steam as a mechanical agent. His
friend, Mr. Robison――afterward Professor at Glasgow and Edinburgh――had
suggested its application to wheeled carriages, and they made
experiments together. Watt doubtless thought much, and submitted the
question to close, earnest, and vigilant study. But it was not till
1763 that his abilities were practically applied to the discovery,
which has associated his name inseparably with the progress of the
world. At that period the model of an engine was sent to him to be
repaired by the Professor of the Natural Philosophy class; and on
his examining it with care and attention, all the impressions which
he had conceived as to the imperfections of the atmospheric machine
were at once renewed in his mind. He therefore devoted himself to
its improvement with diligence and determination. He soon perceived
that the rapidity with which water evaporates depends simply on the
degree of heat that is imbibed, and that the latter circumstance is in
proportion to the vessel’s surface containing the water. He likewise
arrived by experiment at a knowledge as to the coals requisite for
the evaporation of any given quantity of water, the heat at which
it boils under various pressures, and several other points never
before ascertained with accuracy. Bringing his genius to bear on the
matter, he proceeded to attempt remedies for the two chief defects of
Newcomen’s engine――the necessity of cooling the cylinder before each
stroke of the piston by the injection of water, and the non-employment
of the engine as a moving power of the expansive force of the steam.

Having overcome the first defects by a process which saved three
fourths of the fuel required to feed the engine, and at the same time
added considerably to its power, Watt was gradually conducted to an
improvement which effectually removed the second imperfection; and thus
he effected the fundamental amendments in the engine, that, as has been
remarked, it appears a thing almost endowed with intelligence.

Having progressed thus far in his object, Watt had a difficulty of a
very formidable character to surmount; namely, that of bringing his
discoveries into public notice, without any considerable means of his
own at command. Moreover, he had to contend with the opposition of
such persons as conceived their interests to be at stake. However, he
had just provided himself with a witty, cheerful, and accomplished
wife, and thus furnished an additional spur to exertion. In this
emergency he applied to an early friend, Dr. Roebuck, who had just
founded the Carron Iron Works, to advance the requisite capital, which
was agreed to on condition of the profits being shared. A patent was
accordingly obtained, and an engine erected; but Roebuck soon after
meeting with reverses in his daring speculations, the sagacious
inventor was under the necessity of establishing himself in Glasgow as
a civil engineer, and as such obtained high reputation in furnishing
surveys and estimates for canals, and other public operations, of which
Scotland was then the scene.

At length, in the year 1774, he accepted the proposal of Mr. Boulton, a
celebrated hardware manufacturer in Birmingham, that he should remove
thither, and enter into partnership on equitable terms. An extension
of the patent was forthwith obtained for twenty-five years from that
date; and Watt’s genius having now a field, entered on its career of
public triumph. Though he shared the fate of most inventors in being
perpetually involved in lawsuits, he succeeded in realizing an ample
fortune. His scientific achievements were duly appreciated by those who
were qualified to judge of their merits; and in 1785 he was elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society, being subsequently chosen one of the eight
Foreign Associates of the French Institute. The University of Glasgow,
which had first befriended him, conferred the honorary degree of LL.D.
in 1806.

Near the end of his life he engaged in the construction of a machine
for copying pieces of statuary and sculpture. His friends claim for him
the distinction of having discovered the composition of water.

This illustrious mechanist passed the last years of his long and
memorable life in the society of his family and friends. He died August
25, 1819, in his eighty-fourth year, and was buried in the church of
Handsworth, near Heathfield, his residence in Staffordshire.

A monument to his memory, graven by the hand of Chantrey, was erected
in Westminster Abbey, and on it was placed this inscription by Lord
Brougham:

                       Not to perpetuate a name
          Which must endure while the peaceful arts flourish,
                              But to show
               That mankind have learned to honor those
                  Who best deserved their gratitude,
                               The King,
                 His Ministers, and many of the Nobles
                      And Commoners of the Realm,
                        Raised this Monument to
                              JAMES WATT,
         Who, directing the force of an original genius, early
              exercised in philosophical research, to the
                          improvement of the
                             Steam-engine.
                Enlarged the resources of his country,
                      Increased the power of man,
          And rose to an eminent place among the illustrious
                         followers of Science,
                And the real benefactors of the world.




ADAM SMITH.


If there are “suppressed characters” in literary and scientific, as
well as in parliamentary history, the great apostle of political
economy is certainly not of the number. Indeed, the posthumous glory
he has derived from his most celebrated work, goes far to justify
Southey’s enthusiastic preference of the fame arising from authorship
over all others. After the lapse of a century, his name is still
familiar in the mouths of men, and still continues to gather fresh fame
as it flies along the stream of time. The maxims of policy which he
taught are now inseparably associated with the recollection of a long
controversy, a memorable struggle, and a triumph under extraordinary
circumstances. But without venturing to expatiate on the latter
somewhat exciting topics, it may be possible to furnish a sketch of the
learned Doctor’s earthly career, not altogether uninteresting to youths
accustomed to “mark, learn, and inwardly digest.”

The father of this famous professor of political science had originally
practiced in Edinburgh as a writer to the signet; for so an attorney is
there styled. He had afterward become private secretary to the Earl of
Loudon, who held the now abolished office of Secretary of State for
Scotland; and when his lordship’s career in that capacity terminated,
the elder Smith was appointed Comptroller of the Customs at Kirkaldy, a
small Fifeshire town, situated on the Firth of Forth. Removing thither
to fulfill the duties of the office, and perhaps finding himself more
solitary in his new sphere than he had been in the capital, he married
a very amiable and affectionate woman, bearing the “conquering name” of
Douglas. He was not, however, spared to see the son whose achievements
have saved his memory from oblivion, for, somewhere about the beginning
of 1723, he departed this life; and a few months later, on the 5th of
June, the birth of Adam Smith took place.

The future economist had not, in infancy, the advantage of such strong
health as enables children to frisk, and riot, and tumble about without
danger. It required all the care and attention which a widowed and
disconsolate mother generally bestows upon an only son, to sustain his
weakly and delicate constitution against the perils which beset beings
in that immature season of earthly existence; and she executed her task
with so much real tenderness and solicitude, as to have been charged
with the venial fault of too readily gratifying his whims and humors.
Unbounded indulgence toward a child is certainly highly imprudent; but
it does not appear that it either spoiled Smith, or produced in his
case any other evil consequences.

Another, and a more substantial kind of danger, he is related to have
been on one occasion exposed to. The tribes of gipsies, who then
infested the country, carried on a most indiscriminate system of
plunder. Nothing came amiss to them that was not too hot or too heavy;
and they not only anticipated the doctrine of buying in the cheapest
and selling in the dearest markets, but acted on it to an extent which
would make teachers of economy “stare and gasp” with surprise and
horror. They seem to have loved the trade of pillage, “not wisely,
but too well;” for, though it is not difficult to understand their
motive in appropriating the pigs, poultry, and game of the district,
periodically favored with their portentous presence, it is certainly
not so easy to imagine what advantage they found in carrying off, and
burdening themselves with, their neighbors’ children. But, whatever
their views in this predatory system, the little boy destined to
become the author of the “Wealth of Nations,” narrowly escaped their
clutches. When he was three years old, his fond mother carried him
on a visit to the family of her brother, who resided at Strathenry;
and one day, while there, he was playing noiselessly about the door
of the house, when up came a gang of gipsies. The sight of a child,
thus alone and helpless, was a temptation not to be resisted; and the
scene may readily be fancied. Some tall prophetess, whom Sir Roger de
Coverley would have called “a baggage,” dressed in a long, faded, red
cloak, would separate herself from the troop, and, after turning and
carefully glancing round on all sides to ascertain that she was safe
from the eyes of fair-haired Christians, insure the fatal silence of
her tiny victim, by placing in his hand a rosy-cheeked apple. Then,
stealthily lifting him up, she would with cunning caresses deposit his
slight form beneath her cloak, and hastily rejoin her comrades. And
now there was every probability of Smith being brought up to a life of
theft and vagrancy, passing his nights in plundering hen-roosts and
breaking game preserves, or seated by some watch-fire blazing within a
circle of stones, and uttering “uncouth gibberish” to damsels, whose
dusky brows seemed to tell of their Eastern origin, and whose “white
teeth and black eyes” might well, indeed, excite the admiration of
that susceptible old knight so finely portrayed by the pen of Addison.
Fortunately, however, he was soon missed; and the alarm that he had
been kidnapped was sounded in time to give his uncle the opportunity
of being, according to Dugald Stewart, the happy instrument of
preserving to the world a genius which was destined not only to extend
the boundaries of science, but to enlighten and reform the commercial
policy of Europe. The stout kinsman would, doubtless, run quickly to
the stable, saddle his mettled steed, and throw himself on its back.
Then, setting out in pursuit, he speedily came up to the migratory
band, who, feeling quite secure, had encamped in Leslie Wood. He
joyfully rescued the terrified child from their keeping, and hurrying
back, restored him in safety to his weeping and agitated parent.

At a proper age after this adventure, Master Adam, still the pride
and delight of his mother’s eye, was placed in the parish school of
Kirkaldy, which at the time was, luckily for him, taught by a man of
considerable ability and repute. The youth took kindly to his book.
His delicate health rendered him unfit, or, at all events, averse to
playing any active part in the games and pastimes of his class-fellows.
He avoided the field or the market-place, where his rough and hardy
compeers, caring not a jot for sun or dust, exercised their limbs
at golf, or urged the flying ball, sometimes to the destruction of
windows; and he engaged not in those puerile displays of strength and
skill, out of which the pugnacious and aspiring imps, not seldom,
came with livid faces and bloody snouts. Instead of boisterous mirth,
he loved quiet retirement; and while the others were taking part in
mischievous freaks and diversions he was reading, and laying the
foundation of the peculiar habits of self-communion which distinguished
his subsequent career. His memory was tenacious, and he rapidly stored
up information to be used when the proper time arrived. When in
company, he, even at this date, displayed those peculiarities which
afterward characterized him. He was generally absent and inattentive to
the conversation going on; the motion of his lips could be observed as
he muttered to himself; and his manners were artless and simple in the
extreme.

At the age of fifteen, Adam climbed to the top of a coach, and was sent
to be entered at the University of Glasgow. While there, he manifested
great partiality for mathematics, the chair of which was then filled by
the celebrated Professor Simson, the restorer of Euclid; his other bias
being toward natural philosophy. He remained in the city on the Clyde
for three years, and subsequently acknowledged infinite obligations
to the institution. Luckily for Smith, and several other eminent men
who have since flourished, a person of the name of Snell had, in the
year of the Revolution, bequeathed an estate in the county of Warwick
for the support, at Balliol College, Oxford, of Scottish youths,
who have, for a certain period, been students at Glasgow, in whose
professorial body the patronage is vested. Smith was selected as one of
the exhibitioners on this foundation, and repaired to Oxford, with the
prospect, as his relatives believed, of appearing ere long as a divine
of note and reputation. He did not in after life confess to having
owed much to the seat of learning to which――thanks to old Snell’s
laudable liberality――he had thus been admitted; but it must be taken
into account that Scotchmen of his generation, however reflecting,
were violently, and perhaps excusably, prejudiced in regard to much of
what they witnessed in a country so much wealthier than their own. In
any case, the philosophic Fifeshire lad luxuriated in his favorite
subjects and speculations in private; and was equally assiduous and
successful in his study of languages, both ancient and modern. He
became intimately acquainted with the poetry, and gained a knowledge of
and mastery over the language, of England, which more than counteracted
the effects of his Northern education. In his efforts to acquire the
art of composing with ease, freedom, and elegance, he translated much
from foreign models, particularly from the French; and this method he
ever recommended to those who aspired to accomplish themselves, or
to improve their style in the structure and formation of sentences.
During his residence at Oxford his secret studies unfortunately
provoked the suspicion of his academic superiors, who thought fit to
pay an inquisitorial visit to his chamber. They found him engaged in
an intellectual banquet on Hume’s “Treatise of Human Nature,” then
recently published, and considered somewhat dangerous fare. This they
seized, proving at the same time their respect for the principle of
“reciprocity” by bestowing upon him a severe reprimand in exchange.
Whatever his chances of ecclesiastical preferment, and however great
the anxiety of his friends that he should take orders, they were
wrecked and defeated by his opposition to the long-cherished scheme.
He, contrary to the wishes of his relatives, totally abandoned the idea
of a clerical career, left the classic precincts of Oxford University,
and resided with his mother for the next two years, without doing any
thing in particular or fixing upon any plan of life.

The intellectual faculties of Smith were at this season in almost as
great peril of being lost to the world as when he had been carried by
gipsies into the recesses of Leslie Wood. The crisis of his fate had
arrived, and while pondering in his solitary chamber, or subjected to
embarrassing questions at Kirkaldy tea-parties, he must often have
mused, with concern, over the magnitude of the sacrifice he had made
in relinquishing the course which had been chalked out for him. It
was really one of no trifling character, for the circumstances of his
native land, never very favorable, were then such as to render it in
the last degree difficult for youths, even of the most respectable
parentage, to discover a career worthy of being followed. A chivalrous
writer of this generation, in his zealous defense of a new school of
artists, apparently flushed with triumph, and under the impression,
not only that things are sadly out of joint, but that he was born to
set them right, travels out of his way to suggest a new school of
philanthropists, and recommends some half-dozen thorough-bred gentlemen
to take to the green-grocery trade or some other of the kind, just to
show that there is nothing dishonorable in such occupations, and thus
regenerate society. The sagacious Scots of another day seem to have,
to a considerable extent, anticipated that counsel, though without
pretending that they were thereby entitling themselves to the credit
of any very sublime or beneficent self-sacrifice. Smith’s friend, the
romantic author of “Douglas,” whom Nature seems to have designed for a
knight-errant, was somewhat unreasonable in his complaint――

    “Sprung from the haughty nobles of the land,
     Upon the ladder’s lowest round I stand;”

for hundreds of the younger sons of ancient and honorable families were
glad if they could, without having their gentility openly impeached,
gain a livelihood as merchants in the provinces, or even as tradesmen
in the Canongate. Nor was it on younger sons only that Fortune
bestowed such merciless kicks. Caledonian noblemen of long pedigrees,
high names, and sounding titles, were found in situations aught but
dignified. One peer kept a glove shop in Cornhill. Another, still less
fortunate, employed each day in contriving how he was to fall in with
a dinner. A third, on being arrested, was so dirty in his person,
and so shabby in his dress, that the officer of justice stubbornly
refused to credit the possibility of his being a man of rank. Even
“females of quality” were not exempt from the miseries of the period;
for one Scottish baroness was hostess of a tavern whose character was
not the highest, and pleaded the privilege of her order when sued for
keeping a disorderly house. What prospect was there in a state of
society thus overcast for a youth, whom his plebeian name would all but
disqualify for the position of a traveling tutor, and whom absorption
in intellectual contemplation rendered utterly unfit to figure as a
man of business? We shall soon see.

Among the cadets of patrician houses who in the Scottish capital had
sought a way of escape from the horrors which attend the union of
pride and poverty, none had struggled with greater perseverance and
success than that very distant kinsman, but close friend, of the great
philosophic historian of England, since known to fame as Lord Kames.
Having been educated by a tutor under the roof of his father, a Border
gentleman of Jacobite leanings, and studied law at the University of
Edinburgh, he was placed as apprentice in the office of a writer. But
feeling, like Lord Mansfield, a real calling for the bar, he deserted
the attorney’s desk before completing the term agreed on, and not only
distinguished himself in his professional exhibitions, but by his deep
learning and acute genius won a very extensive reputation as an author
on various subjects. Smith had the advantage of being appreciated by
this eminent jurist, philosopher, and agriculturist; and he prudently
availed himself of the circumstance. In 1748, the Economist came forth
under his patronage to lecture, in the Scottish metropolis, on rhetoric
and the belles lettres, the professorship for which had not then been
founded. This Smith continued to do for two years, at the end of which
he was sufficiently recognized as a man of talent and erudition to
be elected to the Logic Chair in the University of Glasgow, where he
discharged the duties with much ability. He departed widely from the
course that had been pursued by his predecessors, and directed the
minds of the students to subjects of a more useful and interesting
nature than they had been accustomed to.

Smith was now, indeed, in a position which was favorable to the proper
display of his extraordinary powers; and within twelve months of
his election he had the good fortune to be nominated and chosen as
Professor of Moral Philosophy. Such he continued for the next thirteen
years, which, when they had long passed, he was in the habit of looking
back on with a feeling somewhat resembling regret, as they had formed
the happiest and most agreeable period of his existence. His public
lectures, though delivered in a plain and unaffected manner, were
always distinguished and rendered interesting by a luminous division of
the subject, as well as by full, fresh and various illustration. They
soon began to excite interest, and were attended no less for pleasure
than instruction. The commercial community was agitated by a spirit of
inquiry; the learned professor’s name rapidly spread; and young men
from all parts of the country were attracted to the College with a
view of profiting by them. The science, from the novel method in which
it was treated, became popular; and Adam was so much admired in his
capacity of lecturer, that, as in the days of Hotspur,

    “The speaking thick which Nature made his blemish
     Became the accents of the valiant;”

so the students of moral philosophy admiringly exerted themselves to
imitate their professor’s peculiarities in pronunciation and manner of
address.

At this period the men of letters in the Scottish capital projected and
commenced the first “Edinburgh Review;” and Smith, besides contributing
an article on Dr. Johnson’s “Dictionary,” addressed a letter to the
editors, containing observations on the state of literature in the
different countries of Europe. This effort at the establishment of a
great Northern periodical proved premature, and it was reserved for
another generation of “modern Athenians” to realize such a scheme.
After two numbers the journal spread its wings no more, and the copies
are now remarkably rare.

Fortune smiled more bountifully on the scientific Professor when he
sallied forth into the literary field, single-handed, and under his
own pennon. In 1759 he boldly challenged criticism with his “Theory
of Moral Sentiments,” which soon attracted public attention, and won
no slight applause. His friends, David Hume and Wedderburn, afterward
Lord Chancellor Loughborough, lent their aid to spread the reputation
of the book in London; and the historian soon had the happiness of
transmitting to the author flattering accounts of its reception. Among
others who were captivated with the performance was Charles Townsend,
then regarded as “the cleverest fellow in England,” and subsequently
immortalized in one of Burke’s most marvelous parliamentary speeches
“as the delight and ornament of the House, and the charm of every
private society he honored with his presence.” He had already become
connected with Scotland by wedding a dowager of high rank, and
vindicated his claims to respect as her consort in a very amusing
way. On accompanying his titled bride to her residence in “the land
of mountain and of flood,” the relatives and dependants of the lady,
in their eagerness to do her full honor, seemed rather inclined to
forget that a welcome was due to the brilliant and ambitious husband.
“For God’s sake, gentlemen,” exclaimed the prodigy, who could hit the
House of Commons between wind and water, “remember that I am at least
Prince George of Denmark!” He now declared that he would exercise the
privilege of a step-father, and put the boy-Duke of Buccleuch under
Smith’s tuition. Hume wished to settle the matter at once by having the
noble cub sent to Glasgow, but a different course was adopted. Townsend
was somewhat uncertain in his resolutions, and four years were allowed
to elapse before the necessary arrangements were made. Then Smith
received a formal invitation to attend the young duke on his travels;
and setting out, they arrived at Paris in the beginning of 1764.

Hume, whose ancient blood would naturally boil at the recollection of
the indignities he had suffered while, for a brief period, enacting
the part of keeper to an insane marquis, had been clearly of opinion
that no terms offered by Townsend would induce Dr. Smith to renounce
his professorship. He was mistaken. The latter considered that his new
position afforded him an opportunity of observing the internal policy
of Continental states, and thus completing the system of political
economy which his brain was occupied in thinking out. On arriving in
Paris, he immediately addressed to the Rector of the University a
letter announcing his resignation. It was accepted by the professorial
body with regret; a meeting was convened; a fitting tribute was paid
to his genius, ability, and learning; and honorable testimony was
borne to the high probity and amiable qualities which had secured
their possessor lasting esteem among his colleagues. Meantime Smith
and his pupil, having remained a fortnight in Paris, proceeded to
Toulouse, and there fixed their residence for eighteen months, during
which the Doctor formed intimacies with several men of distinction,
and made himself acquainted with the internal policy of the kingdom.
They then visited several places in the South of France, resided for
a while at Geneva, and then retraced their steps to the borders of
the Seine. There Smith counted among his associates many of the chief
men of letters and science, among whom were several of the political
philosophers known as Economists. The accredited founder of that
sect was the celebrated Quesnai, though he had been preceded by the
profound and acute Galiani. Harris and Hume had likewise done much
to popularize the doctrines. But Smith, whose attention had already
been occupied with the subject for the space of ten years, was the
first to see the whole bearing of their principles, and to trace their
consequences with care, and face them with confidence.

When Smith set foot on his native soil, in the autumn of 1766, he did
not return to the scene of his former triumphs, but consigned himself
to studious and laborious retirement under the roof of his worthy
mother. Old friends urged him to come within their reach, and give them
the benefit of his company; but his strong ambition to produce a great
and influential work, “like Aaron’s rod swallowed up the rest,” and he
was content to pursue his object in obscurity. He was in comfortable
circumstances, as the Duke of Buccleuch had, in consideration of his
tuition, settled on him an income of three hundred pounds a year,
and in other respects he was not unprepared for the mighty task. His
long residence in a commercial town, his foreign experience, and his
intercourse with the French economists and statesmen, had trained his
philosophic mind for the investigation of the subjects on which he
aspired to throw a new and enduring light. When employed in preparing
for the press, he generally walked up and down the room dictating to an
amanuensis, and he is said to have composed with as much slowness and
difficulty in his later years as in youth. The “Inquiry into the Nature
and Causes of the Wealth of Nations” did not make its appearance in
public till the spring of 1766. It was found to consist of five books.
The two first contain the scientific portion. The third is a historical
sketch of the progress of opulence. The fourth, the longest, treats of
the legislative interference by which governments have attempted to
make their subjects rich, and endeavors to show that all such schemes
retard instead of promoting the object in view. The fifth, which points
out the means by which the duties of sovereigns may be best performed,
and how a public revenue may be most judiciously provided, is in
reality a treatise on the art of government. This work, so important
in its results, saw the light just six months before David Hume was
laid in his lonesome grave, and he immediately wrote――“It has depth,
and solidity, and acuteness, and is so much illustrated by curious
facts that it must, at last, take the public attention.... If you
were here, at my fireside, I should dispute some of your principles;
but these, and a hundred other points, are fit only to be discussed
in conversation.” Gibbon, likewise, mentioned it with praise in his
immortal History; and Fox lent his aid to increase its fame by saying
in that House, where the author’s name has since been familiar as
a household word, and unquestionably too often used by others than
parliamentary giants――“The way, as my learned friend Dr. Adam Smith
states, for a nation, as well as an individual, to be rich, is for
both to live within their income.” It is admitted, however, that the
doctrines enunciated made less impression on the minds of Fox and his
allies, than on that of the young and disdainful minister who, toward
the close of the century, had to stand the brunt of their impassioned
eloquence. Johnson, whose love for Smith was not excessive, interposed
his ponderous influence to shield him from Sir John Pringle’s diverting
allegation――that Smith, not being practically conversant with trade,
could not be qualified to write on matters relating to it. “That is
quite a mistake,” said the sage, indignantly: “a man who has never
been in trade may write well on trade; and there is nothing which
requires more to be illustrated by philosophy than trade does. As to
mere wealth, that is to say money, it is clear that one nation, or one
individual, can not increase its store but by making another poorer;
but trade procures what is more valuable, the reciprocation of the
peculiar advantages of different countries. A merchant seldom thinks of
any but his own trade. To write a good book upon it, a man must have
extensive views. It is not necessary to have practiced, to write well
upon, a subject.”

During the two years following his greatest publication Dr. Smith
resided in London, and spent much of his time in that “bright
constellation of British stars,” forming the club without a name, which
Sir Joshua Reynolds had founded. But in 1778 he was appointed one of
the Commissioners of Customs in Scotland, and removed to Edinburgh
to attend to the duties attached to the office, which, though they
required little exertion, were sufficient to divert his attention
from literary undertakings. His mother, now an extremely aged woman,
came to live with him; as did also Miss Douglas, an elderly cousin,
who had formerly superintended his domestic arrangements at Glasgow.
He had collected a valuable library, and being apparently of Horace’s
way of thinking, in regard to there being no splendor in money unless
it shines in a temperate expenditure, he was generous in his gifts
and hospitable in his manner of living. He soon began to feel some of
the infirmities of age, but his health and strength did not give way
till the death of his female relatives, when he was left in a position
somewhat more solitary than he relished, and he became still more
engrossed with his meditations.

Kay’s series of portraits and caricature etchings enable the curious
inquirer not only to have before him the style of dress and appearance
of the author of the “Wealth of Nations” at this period, but even
to form a tolerably accurate conception of what a day with him must
have ordinarily been. One seems to see him, as he is prepared after
breakfast to set out for the Custom House, standing before the table,
with his cane in one hand, and the other on some page of his latest
work, which lies open before him. He descends the stair, and issues
slowly into the street, muttering to himself, and indulging in a laugh,
which must be very favorable to the digestion of his morning meal.
And what can it be that excites his risibility? Is he chuckling over
the solution of some knotty problem in political science, or does the
manly and dignified figure of his acquaintance, Lord Rockville, in
the distance, recall to his memory the never-ending joke about the
Grassmarket pavement, having one evening most suddenly risen up and
struck that urbane and polished legal sage in the face? These two
fishwomen, whom he meets, look as if they had some notion; but no, by
St. Bride! the weather-beaten jades really mistake the philosopher
for a lunatic, and express their surprise that he is not in custody.
He neither sees nor hears them, however, but continues to laugh and
soliloquize.

“Heigh, sirs! isn’t that waesome?” ejaculates one, as she shakes her
head and becomes mute from very pity.

“And he’s so well put on, too!” observed the other, with a sigh, as
she marked his careful attire, from the cocked hat and flowing wig to
the ruffles at his wrists and the buckles on his shoes. Our venerable
hero now approaches the Custom House, and as he reaches the door,
the gigantic porter, who keeps guard, salutes him with ceremonious
formality. But what is the Economist about now? Exercising his muscles,
or teaching the big janitor sword exercise? Not at all. He is only,
with the most complete unconsciousness of doing any thing of the kind,
imitating with his gold-headed cane every flourish that the man has
made, before entering the building where the Board is sitting for the
transaction of business connected with the collection of the revenue.
He exchanges courteous salutations with his colleagues, among whom are
a tall, stately scion of the noble house of Cochrane, and Capt. Edgar,
a gentleman of eccentric habits, but a thorough man of the world, and
valued by the Doctor, because, being rather out of place at a Customs’
Board, and luckily an excellent classical scholar, he is quite ready
to devote the official hours to the task of amusing the philosopher.
Accordingly, this personage, celebrated in verse as the _beau dîneur_,
and Dr. Smith, renowned for having taught the world how nations are
bound together by the reciprocal benefits of commerce, occupy their
time with the recitation of passages from the Greek authors. Then a
paper bearing the signature of one of the Commissioners is handed to
the Economist, but instead of appending his own name, he copies that of
the person who has already signed it. He now rises and sallies forth
to indulge in a quiet walk about the Meadows, a fashionable place of
resort; and after dining, he repairs to the “Poker Club,” to spend the
remainder of his waking hours in the company of Black, and Hutton, and
John Home.

Now and then Dr. Smith paid a visit to London. On the last occasion of
his being in the metropolis he had been engaged to dine with tall Harry
Dundas, afterward Lord Melville, then the real “Cock of the North.”
He happened to arrive too late, and the guests, among whom were Pitt,
Grenville, and Addington, had taken their places at table; but on
his entrance, they, with one accord, rose to receive him. The Doctor
offered an apology for being so late, and begged them to resume their
seats; but they said, “No, we’ll stand till you are seated, for we are
all your scholars.”

In the year 1787 the veteran philosopher was elected Rector of Glasgow
University. He was touched by the compliment, and in acknowledging
it, stated that no preferment could have given him so much real
satisfaction, because the term of years, during which he had been a
member of the Society, had formed by far the most useful, and therefore
the happiest and most honorable, period of the life whose closing
scene was now gradually drawing nigh. His last illness was painful
and lingering, but in the summer of 1790 the angel of death gave no
uncertain signals of approach. In accordance with an old Scottish
custom, certainly more honored in the breach than the observance, Dr.
Smith had been in the habit of inviting his intimate associates to
supper on Sundays. This, it should be mentioned, was, at that date,
practiced by men whose character for Christian piety was beyond all
reproach or question; and the Economist’s adherence to it can not,
with any show of reason, be cited in support of the tendency to
infidelity, which has been, rightly or wrongly, imputed to him. It
was a July evening when they last assembled, and the gathering was, as
usual, pretty numerous; but the host found himself incapable of taking
that part which he had so often done; and feeling himself unable to
entertain them, he requested their permission to withdraw. On taking
his leave, he said, “Indeed, gentlemen, I believe we must adjourn
this meeting to some other place.” A few days brought release from
his sufferings. He had just given orders for the destruction of all
his manuscripts, with the exception of some detached essays, which,
being left to the care of his executors, were afterward published;
when he breathed his last in a state of complete mental resignation.
He was most tenderly sympathized with in his pangs by a circle of
sorrowing friends, who had learned fully to appreciate the powers of
his intellect, the comprehensiveness of his views, the extent of his
attainments, and the benignity of his disposition.


THE END.




 Transcriber’s Notes:

 ――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).

 ――Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.

 ――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.

 ――Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.






End of Project Gutenberg's Footprints of Famous Men, by John G. Edgar