whatever comes within the usual category first thought seriously of religion; it was of accomplishmen's and was not excluded by the peculiar rules or prejudices of sect:linguists, musicians-bold and graceful equestrians, but not dancers: critics in (Bowdler's) Shakspeare, who would have shuddered at the name of a play-house: all devoutly religious, all zealous quakers-nay, the handsomest of the three, about the age when beauties make their debut at Almack's, already in esteem as a preacher. That Cymon should have left Earlham deep in love, and with stern resolutions for study, was natural; the wonder is that he did not depart buttonless and broad brimmed. then also that Miss Hannah first confessed her tenderness, and their engagement was readily sanctioned by her parents, although his worldly prospects were no longer so bright as when the acquaintance began. The succession to the Irish estate had opened, but his claim was disputed; a suit had commenced, and his lawyers honestly warned him that there was at least an equal chance of the decision being against him; if that were the issue, the remainder of his paternal property in England would not exempt him from the necessity of choosing some profession. His mother, too, had now enGay pictures of college life, but especially tered on a second marriage, and this provisions of tall hunters and the Curragh of bably inferred a further diminution of exKildare, had had much to do with his first pectations. The Gurney family, however, consent to go to Dublin; but he dismissed were generous and tender-hearted ;-and all these, and du. ing the four years to which old and young of them had by this time his Irish residence extended, he was ex-formed not only a warm liking for him, but clusively the student. Aware of his defi- a high estimate of his talents and his whole ciencies, on his arrival he quartered himself character. They were wise, too-for sad with a private tutor near the capital; and folly it is in any parents to cross a young there so well employed a few months that, woman of superior understanding, when she on entering the University, he was pro- has deliberately given her affections to a nounced not inferior to any freshman of that gentleman of honor and principle, who has term and he continued to labor so assidu- means enough for a fair start and has shown ously, that before he took his degree he was his capacity for industry. After the engageconsidered an excellent mathematician, and ment was completed, he parted from them in classics not below any of his rivals. The at Edinburgh; they to journey homewards most formidable of these was John Henry by the eastern road; he to make his way North, afterwards eminent at the Irish bar, by himself to Dublin. The last night they and, during a too short space, in the House were together happening to be a blowy one, of Commons; they became and were ever Miss Hannab requested a promise that he after, in spite of all differences of opinion, would not take any of the shorter passages, attached and intimate friends. They divid- which she supposed to be attended with aded between them the principal prizes at ditional risks, and he promised accordingly. Trinity; and they seem to have been thought From some accident his travels were not the ablest speakers (of their standing) in smooth, and the term being at hand when the Historical Society. But the best evi- he reached Lancashire, the temptation to dence as to Buxton's whole academical ca- embark at once was considerable; but Buxreer is found in the fact that, towards its ton kept his word, and proceeding through close, he was invited to fix his ambition on Wales to Holyhead, arrived safe-though the Parliamentary representation of the Uni- late-at Trinity College, where his appearversity, by a circular so signed and support-ance was a happy relief to his fellow-stued that, in North's opinion, there could have been no doubt of his success at the next election. This was a rare and splendid compliment in the case of so young a man, and an Englishman; he was greatly flatter ed--but would not rashly commit himself; and he had good reason for his reserve. He had during his under-graduateship paid two or three visits at Earlham, and in the last long vacation the Gurneys carried him with them on a tour into the Highlands of Scotland. That was an eventful tour for him. was, he says, in the course of it that he It dents; for the Liverpool packet, in which it was supposed he must have taken his passage, had foundered in mid-channel, and out of 119 persons whom he had seen embark, and many of whom had urged him to accompany them, only one escaped to tell the tale. On his arrival he received still more unfavorable reports as to his lawsuit, and, after some little hesitation, dismissed wholly the parliamentary proposal. He considered all worldly prospects as worthless, unless a speedy union with Miss Gurney were included; and to enter the House of Com mons would be to put it out of his power and services, was at length induced to restore to engage in any course of professional in-him to his place. They afterwards becaine very dustry. Moreover, he had a settled opinion, good friends, and the salutary effect of the changes introduced by Mr. Buxton was at in which we are old-fashioned enough to length admitted by his leading opponent; nor, concur, that no man should sit in the legis- except in one instance, did he ever contend lature unless his pecuniary position be one against them again. On that occasion Mr. Buxof perfect independence. Mr. North relucton merely sent him a message, 'that he had tantly acquiesced in his arguments, and that better meet him in the counting-house at six The book-keeper's matter was at an end. He took his degree o'clock the next morning.' with great honor-was soon afterwards opposition was heard of no more."-p. 41. married, and went to live in a cottage near his mother in Devonshire. Before the year In the early part of his married life Mr. ended his first child was born, and the Irish Buxton regularly accompanied his wife to ended his first child was born, and the Irish her Quaker chapel: from 1811 he appears lawsuit was determined against him; and his anxiety to do something for himself hav- to have divided himself pretty equally being been made known to his own and his tween that and "the ministry of the Rev. Josiah Pratt, in Wheeler Chapel, Spitalwife's relations, he received ere long an offer of employment in the Hanbury brew-fields." To Mr. Pratt's preaching he ever ery, with the prospect after three years' probation, of a share in the business. This met all his desires; he removed immediately to the spot, and devoting himself to the concern with the same zeal that had distinguished his academical life, he soon made himself thoroughly master of it. At the end of twelve months the partners gave him a house on the premises; in 1811 he was taken into the firm-bringing with him, we presume, some considerable capital; and during the seven ensuing years the brewery in Spitalfields occupied the man. afterwards referred as the source of "bis escapes "Mr. Back and I (he says) went into the brewery to survey the repairs which were going on; we were standing upon a plank, with only room for two, face to face; we changed places in order that I might survey a spot to "Soon after his admission, his senior part- which he was directing my attention; his hat ners struck by his energy and force of mind, was on-I was uncovered; as soon as we had placed in his hands the difficult and responsi- changed places, several bricks fell from the ble task of remodelling their whole system of roof, and one struck his head; his hat in some management. It would be superfluous to enter measure averted the blow, but he never recointo the details of his proceedings, though, per-vered the injury, and died shortly afterwards haps, he never displayed greater vigor and of an oppression of the brain."-p. 55. firmness than in carrying through this undertaking. For two or three years he was occupied from morning till night in prosecuting, step by step, his plans of reform: a single example may indicate with what spirit he grappled with the difficulties that beset him on all sides. Again, in December, 1817-by which time he had ceased to be resident at the Brewery "On Saturday last, in consequence of an almost obsolete promise to sleep in town when all "One of the principal clerks was an honest the other partners were absent, I slept at Brick man, and a valuable servant; but he was wed- Lane. S. Hoare had complained to me that seded to the old system, and viewed with great veral of our men were employed on the Sunday. antipathy the new partner's proposed innova-To inquire into this, in the morning I went into tions. At length, on one occasion he went so far as to thwart Mr. Buxton's plans. The latter took no notice of this at the time, except desiring him to attend in the counting-house at six o'clock the next morning. Mr. Buxton met him there at the appointed hour; and, without any expostulation, or a single angry word, desired him to produce his books, as he meant for the future; to undertake the charge of them himself, in addition to his other duties. Amazed at this decision, the clerk promised complete submission for the future; he made his wife intercede for him; and Mr. Buxton, who valued his character the brewhouse, and was led to the examination of a vat containing 170 ton-weight of beer. I found it in what I considered a dangerous situation, and I intended to have it repaired the next morning. I did not anticipate any immediate danger, as it had stood so long. When I got to Wheeler Street Chapel, I did as I usually do in cases of difficulty,-I craved the direction of my heavenly Friend, who will give rest to the burthened and instruction to the ignorant. From that moment I became very uneasy, and instead of proceeding to Hampstead, as I had intended, I returned to Brick Lane. On examination I saw, or thought I saw, a still further declension of the iron pillars which supported this immense weight, so I sent for a surveyor; but before he came I became apprehensive of immediate danger, and ordered the beer, though in a state of fermentation, to be let out. When he arrived he gave it as his decided opinion that the vat was actually sinking, that it was not secure for five minutes, and that if we had not emptied it, it would probably have fallen. Its fall would have knocked down our steam-engine, coppers, roof, with two great iron reservoirs full of water-in fact, the whole brewery."—p. 74. In his letters we now have frequent lamentations over infirmity of spirit-clear perceptions of the worthlessness and the nothingness of this world's affairs, vehement resolutions henceforth to live only for the world to come, ever-recurring bemoanings that he has not been able to renounce his interest in the business or even in the pleasures of this transitory scene. Thus : : "This habit of full engagement of the mind has its advantages in business and other things, but is attended with this serious disadvantage, that it immerses the mind so fully in its immediate object, that there is no room for thoughts of higher importance and more real moment to creep in. I feel this continually-the hours and hours that I spend in utter forgetfulness of that which I well know to be the only thing of importance! How very great a portion of one's life there is in which one might as well be a heathen!"-p. 54. spent in Ireland, he was as much a sportscommonly called business ever was or will man as any man not wholly without what is be. Not more regular was the Meeting or Chapel at the opening of another keen week of his Gylery, than the escape from London and all its concerns for as many weeks as he could spare during the autumn and winter, and the eager occupation of almost every hour of them in the sports of the field. He was as unwearied in fishing and shooting as Chantrey er Davy-as fond of dogs as Scott -as complete a horseman and as knowing in horse-flesh as Charles Apperley. Since dogs have been mentioned, we must not pass an anecdote of this period of Buxton's life, in which his nerve and decision and good feeling are strikingly told. He has been spending a Wednesday with his brother-inlaw Mr. Hoare at Hampstead. A few days afterwards he writes to his wife, then in Norfolk: Spitalfields, July 15, 1816.-As you must hear the story of our dog Prince, I may as well tell it you. On Thursday morning, when I got on my horse at S. Hoare's. David told me that there was something the matter with Prince, that he had killed the cat and almost killed the new dog, and had bit at him and Elizabeth. I ordered him to be tied up and taken care of, and then rode off to town. When I got into Hampstead I saw Prince covered with mud, and running furiously, and biting at everything. I saw him "The true cause of my disquietude arises from bite at least a dozen dogs, two boys, and a man. a certain feature in my own mind, which I can Of course, I was exceedingly alarmed, being perhardly describe; a kind of unregulated ardor suaded he was mad. I tried every effort to stop in any pursuit which appears to me to be of him or kill him, or to drive him into some outgreat importance, which takes captive all my fa- house, but in vain. At last he sprang up at a culties, and binds them down to that pursuit, boy, and seized him by the breast; happily I and will not let them or me rest till it is accom- was near him, and knocked him off with my plished. I hate this; it is so unpleasant to whip. He then set off towards Loudon, and I wake, and to go to sleep, with your head full of rode by his side, waiting for some opportunity vats and tubs; and I disapprove it more than I of stopping him. I continually spoke to him, hate it. No man, I think, can have more ab- but he paid no regard to coaxing or scolding. stract conviction of the folly and futility of such You may suppose I was seriously alarmed, engagement of heart upon objects so utterly dreading the immense mischief he might do Í trifling and undurable. I see that it is an infir- was terrified at the idea of his getting into Cammity; I deeply feel that it chokes the good den Town and London, and at length considerseed, and is a most pernicious weed, and I feeling that if ever there was an occasion that the breaches that it makes in my own quiet; yet so much am I its slave, that it will intrude into the midst of such reflections, and carry me off to my next Gyle. How sincerely I do often wish that I could direct this fervent energy about temporals into its proper channel: that I could be as warm about things of infinite importance as I am about dust and ashes."-p. 56. justified a risk of life, this was it, I determined to catch him myself. Happily he ran up to Pryor's gate, and I threw myself from my horse upon him, and caught him by the neck; he bit at me, and his struggles were so desperate that it seemed at first almost impossible to hold him, till I lifted him up in the air, when he was more easily managed, and I contrived to ring the bell. I was afraid that the foam, which was pouring Nothing of this will surprise anybody from his mouth in his furious efforts to bite me, anybody-might but whoever knows the general course of might get into some scratch, and do me injury Mr. Buxton's history must feel some surso with great difficulty 1 held him with one hand while I put the other into my pocket and forced prise that all through life, except the period on my glove; then I did the same with my other task-works. From the moment of peace the fabrics of France and Italy acquired fresh energy, and having immense advantages in material and climate, needed only the legislation of the heartless science" to achieve a ruinous discomfiture of the domestic industry. If we except the unhappy people of the Hebrides and the opposite coasts, all reduced at one fell swoop, the gentry to poverty, the peasants to destitution, by the sudden abolition of the barilla duty-no class suffered more fearfully than the ingenious community among whose long lines of low, frail, many-windowed tenements the big brewhouse towered like some Egyptian temple over Fellah hovels. They were his immediate neighbors; while they had money to spend, too a great part of it had been spent in the produce of his vatsbut in their better times they had been on the whole inoffensive as well as profitable neighbors they included many decent well-ordered families-not a few of them frequenters, like himself, of the Wheeler Chapel. The situation of these people in hand, and at last the gardener opened the door. saying, "What do you want?" "I've brought you a mad dog," replied I; and telling him to get a strong chain, I walked into the yard, carrying the dog by the neck. I was determined not to kill him, as I thought if he should prove not to be mad, it would be such a satisfaction to the three persons whom he had bitten. I made the gardener (who was in a terrible fright) secure the collar round his neck and fix the other end of the chain to a tree, and then walking to its furthest range, with all my force, which was nearly exhausted by his frantic struggles, I flung him away from me and sprang back. He made a desperate bound after me, but finding himself foiled, he uttered the most fearful yell I ever heard. All that day he did nothing but rush to and fro, champing the foam which gushed from his jaws; we threw him meat, and he snatched at it with fury, but instantly dropped it again. The next day when I went to see him I thought the chain seemed worn, so I pinned him to the ground between the prongs of a pitchfork, and then fixed a much larger chain round his neck; when I pulled off the fork he sprang up and made a dash at me, which snapped the old chain in two! He died in forty eight hours. I shot all the dogs, and drowned all the cats. The man and boys who were bit are doing pretty well. Their wounds were im-vited, of course, the appearance among mediately cut and burnt out."-p. 59. them of our never-failing brood of seditionmongers-some of those vicious and there It was also during the busiest of his brew-fore unprosperous adventurers, who are ership that he addicted himself to the study of Political Economy, embraced zealously some of the most fashionable of its doctrines, and being touched with the propagandist spirit of this new sect, was willing to revive his practice of speaking, disused since the days of the Dublin Historical Society. The important citizen was welcomed into a debating club held in the legal part of the town, and composed principally of lawyers, but not without some intermixture of lay aspirants. Here he encountered his old schoolfellow Horace Twiss, who had some difficulty in recognizing the honest elephant of Greenwich in the keen dogmatist from Spitalfields. This, probably, was another of the carnal exercitations that called for black marks in his diary; but he ere long found redeeming use of the accomplishment it had advanced. His first public exhibition as a speaker was in a good cause, and one in which his situation made it especially his duty to bestir himself that of the poor weavers of Spitalfields. While the Continent was shut up by the long war, our silk-manufacture at home flourished; every encouragement was given to the investment of capital in it, and the rapid growth of a population dependant wholly on their skill in its nice and delicate always ready to turn the misery of the ignorant into the weapon of their own ambition--that is, their rebellion against the rules of all civilized society. Doctor Watson and Lieutenant Thistlewood were first heard of in connexion with the Spitalfields meetings and riots of 1816. It is no particular reproach to those agitators that they never directed their efforts against the curable causes of the distress with which they pretended to sympathize :---either the habitual improvidence of our operative classes, who almost universally indulge in early marriages-abstinence from which is the rule for all the upper ranks, except the eldest sons of very opulent familiesand who, having surrounded themselves with wives and children, seldom, very seldom, think of saving anything out of their wages when they are high, but leave the chances of sickness and the certainty of old age to take care of themselves, and consume in gross pampering of their appetites the money that might, if rightly husbanded, go far to secure an independence for old age, and even to rear their progeny for modes of life better than their own ;-or yet the cruel conceit of those charlatans who, having taken up any theory, however new, are always eager for reducing it to immediate row been so pleased by the spirit and temper of the meeting, and so strongly felt the claims that had been urged, that he had sent them 5,000l." But this was not the only testimony of approbation from without. There was a chorus of praise from the newspapersfor paper-millers and type-founders and type-owners may be as sensitive on the subject of property as lords or brewers: and, moreover, the postman brought bushels of private encomium-and among the rest, the first letter tha Wilberforce wrote to his destined successor. It contained these words: "I cannot claim the merit of being influenced practice, at whatever cost of pain and sorto however many; or the still more culpable folly of authoritative statesmen in allowing their policy to be guided by the pertinacity of such presumptuous and irresponsible inferiors. In these respects the demagogues of 1816 were no worse and no better than those of any subsequent excitement: but they were more rash in avowing the real objects of their hostility than any of our leading agitators between 1793 and 184, because the splendid termination of the war had left the Whigs utterly prostrate, and none would have listened to them if they had ventured to put themselves in the front rank with the less alarm-only by regard for the Spitalfields' sufferers in ing symbols of some ambi-traitorous delu- the pleasure I have received from your perfor sion; which of course they were in a con- mances at the meeting. It is partly a selfish dition to adopt successfully in 1830, and feeling, for I anticipate the success of the efforts have only eschewed since when (lucki- which I trust you will one day make in other ly for all parties) bound over by the occu-instances in an assembly in which I trust we pancy or close expectancy of Downingstreet. In 1816 the radicals were left to by which we are actuated and in the objects to themselves, and they spoke plainly; avowedly then, as indubitably ever since, the one great object was the Cobbett Sponge; and neither Duke nor Archbishop saw more clearly than Messrs. Truman and Hanbury, that if faith were openly broken with the national creditor, he-whose name is indeed Legion-could never fall alone. But Buxton was kind of heart as well as shrewd, and no one will suspect him of having been mainly, even though unconsciously, swayed by other motives than those of religion and humanity, when he made his debut in public speaking as the advocate of those afflicted and in part misled artisans. A meeting at the Mansion House was attended by many men of note in the commercial world, and the speeches and the subscriptions (43,3691.) were alike honorable to the City. Buxton's address was admired. Lord Sidmouth was then, and throughout many perilous years, Secretary for the Home Department-in which office the single hearted benevolence of his character, combined with undaunted bravery, and a kindliness of manner which never detracted from the dignity of his position, enabled him to do more for his country than was ever done by the wits that ridiculed and the rhetoricians that eclipsed him. His share was small and reluctant in the inci pient liberalism which, on the earliest opportunity, shook him off as an inconvenient memento of the ante-Huskissonian ages On the second day he sent for Mr. Buxton "to inform him that the Prince Regent had shall be fellow-laborers, both in the motives which our exertions will be directed." "This communication," says the biographer, "may be deemed almost prophetic." We have no doubt that, like many other prophecies, it owed much of its fulfilment to itself. At all events. that field-day at the Mansion House proved to be the second turning point of Buxton's history. 66 He was now launched upon that stream of labor for the good of others along which his course lay for the remainder of his life... Having done what he could in relieving the miseries of his poor neighbors, he soon entered upon a wider field of benevolence."-p. 64. It is our humble opinion that if his field had never extended beyond Spitalfields, he could and must have done more good to his species than was accomplished by all his subsequent "stream of labor." But to proceed-in the course of the following autumn, being on a visit to his wife's relations in Partridgeshire, he was pressed by one of them to attend a Bible Society meeting in the neighborhood, and there delivered a second speech, which extended his reputation and strengthened his confidence. Mrs.. Fry now struck in; she had by this time applied herself to the condition of prisons throughout the empire--nay, throughout the world; and though she had a ready fellowlaborer in Mr. John Gurney, more help was wanted, and the help that Buxton could give would be the more welcome, because he did not, like herself and her worthy brother, actually belong to the Quaker body. |