cordial spirit of concern (more promptly felt than testified), which served at once both to excite, and to restrain expressions; which at the moment of delivery could not endure the seal of silence, but which touched with diffidence a subject that surpassed its powers.

"St. Martin's Vicarage, January, 1823."

172

No. VIII.

CHARLES SHAW LEFEVRE, Esq.

MR. LEFEVRE was born in Yorkshire, in 1759, and was the only son of the Rev. George Shaw, who had patrimonial estates in that county, and who lived to the great age of ninety-two years, an exemplary and enlightened member of the Church of England. He received his education at Trinity College, Cambridge, of which he became a fellow, after having finished his academical studies with distinction. He then was entered at Lincoln's Inn, intending to follow the profession of the law. In due progress he was called to the bar, and for several years went the midland circuit.

In 1789, he married Helena, only daughter of John Lefevre, Esq., of Old Ford, Middlesex, whose name he assumed. and by the death of that lady's father, shortly after their marriage, became possessed of an ample fortune, and fixed his residence at the house of his venerable mother-in-law, near Reading, in Berkshire. From this time he pursued the law no longer as a profession, but merely as a liberal study: he did not, however, withdraw himself from business, but became an active magistrate for Hampshire; and so distinguished himself in that character by his assiduity and intelligence, that on the death of Mr. Serjeant Kerby, he was chosen, and continued for several years, to be perpetual chairman of the quarter sessions. He was afterwards made recorder of Basingstoke.

In 1796, Mr. Shaw Lefevre extended the sphere of his utility, and was returned as a member of parliament for the borough of Newtown, in the Isle of Wight. He continued

to sit in parliament from this time to the last dissolution in 1820: but it was at the general election in 1802, that his political connection with the borough of Reading commenced. At that period, the inhabitants of Reading, conceiving that the old interest which had long preponderated there might be overturned, looked out for a man of character and opulence, that would come forward as their champion and assert their independence. In this critical conjuncture all eyes were turned towards their neighbour, Mr. Lefevre, as the fittest person for this purpose. A few friends accordingly waited on him with a tender of their services, and he answered nobly to their call. A contest ensued of the most severe nature; but under such a leader, and so supported, the conflict was not long doubtful, and it ended in the return of Mr. Lefevre by a decided and triumphant majority. Once seated for the borough, he was afterwards so firmly supported by his friends, that he maintained his post through four successive elections, against all opposition. At the last general election in 1820, in consequence of his declining health, which had obliged him to seek a milder climate, he, with great reluctance, withdrew from public life, and resigned into the hands of his constituents the trust which he had held so long, so honourably to himself, and so advantageously to the borough of Reading.

We have reason to know, that the uniform and steady support of his friends at Reading had made an indelible impression on Mr. Shaw Lefevre's mind and heart, and that the most mortifying circumstance of his long and severe indisposition was the utter inability it laid him under of expressing personally to all his friends, after his return to England, the deep sense of his continued obligations to them, from their first notice of him down to the period of his political separation from them. If the borough of Reading is now as free and open a borough as any in England, not excepting Westminster itself, it ought never to be forgotten that it is mainly indebted for this high distinction to the bold measures and manly co-operation of Mr. Lefevre. He may be called

in this respect the founder of its political independence: as by his exertions a spirit of uncontrolled action, and of resistance to all dictation, has been excited that never can be laid again.

In his parliamentary votes and conduct Mr. Shaw Lefevre was not servilely or factiously addicted to any party, but maintained on all great occasions the character of an independent country gentleman. To jobs of all sorts, to every kind of peculation, or waste of the public money, — he had the most decided enmity. In early life he was a warm advocate of parliamentary reform; and although he doubted of the expediency of carrying that measure into effect during the ferment of political opinion which prevailed at the commencement of the French Revolution, yet, that once past, he was one of its sincerest and most constant supporters. In the enumeration of Mr. Lefevre's qualities, it ought not to be omitted that he was eminently a man of business; and on this account, as well as on account of his intimate acquaintance with the forms and proceedings of the House of Commons, he discharged most successfully the unostentatious but very useful and laborious duties of a member of committees; and in these it will be admitted, by all who knew him, that he had few equals, and no superior.

Indeed it was the leading principle of Mr. Lefevre's life to consider every service that it was in his power to render to the public as no more than the discharge of a just debt due to society from men of all stations, and particularly from men of a high station; it was accordingly with this view, that when the country was menaced with invasion during the last war, and government called upon the people to enrol themselves in volunteer corps, he raised a troop of yeomanry cavalry in his own neighbourhood, and obtained the command of it. This command he resigned only with his life, as there was something in the union of the citizen and the soldier very congenial to his views, and as he considered this sort of force at once the cheapest and the most coustitutional defence of the country.

Such were the public principles and public conduct of Mr. Lefevre. If we trace him into the retirement of private life, we shall find him there also equally attentive to the punctilious discharge of all his duties. Habitual good humour, gentleness, and benevolence, marked his daily intercourse with his family. The value of these qualities, those only can appreciate who lived within the calm and bright sphere of their operation; and if it is in the abstraction of these that the poignancy of domestic affliction consists, so it is in the tender and treasured recollection of them that it finds its best consolation. A large circle of political friends and common acquaintance will bear ample testimony to his popular manners and deportment, to his quick perception of every man's character, to his suitable address, to his social talents, and to his frank and hearty hospitality.

As the family of Mr. Lefevre constituted one of the chief sources of his happiness, it would be an unpardonable omission if we did not state that he has left behind him three sons, Charles, John, and Henry. Charles, the eldest son, is married to a daughter of the late Samuel Whitbread, Esq., and may be considered as not more the heir of his father's property, than he is of his father's principles. The second son, John, who obtained the honour of Senior Wrangler, at Cambridge, is a fellow of Trinity College, and is now pursuing his legal studies. The third son, Henry, is still at the same university. In this manner, Mr. Lefevre enjoyed the happiness, the greatest that can occur to a father, of seeing all his children in his own life-time, either well settled, or with their characters and habits so well established as to leave no anxiety on his mind as to their future course and final

success.

Mr. Lefevre died on the 27th of April, 1823, at his house in Whitehall-place, London; in the 64th year of his age.