MEMOIRS

OF

SIR THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON,

BART.

EDITED BY HIS SON,

CHARLES BUXTON, ESQ., B.A.

" The longer I live, the more I am certain that the great difference between men, between the feeble and the powerful, the great and the insignificant, is energy — invincible determination — a purpose once fixed, and then death or victory. That quality will do anything that can be done in this world ; and no talents, no circum- stances, no opportunities, will make a two-legged creature a man without it."

Extract of a Letter from Sir T. Powell Buxton.

THIRD EDITION.

LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.

1849.

London : Printed by WIM.IAM CLOWES and SONS, Stanifuid Stn-«-t.

TO

MISS BUXTON,

IN CONJUNCTION WITH WHOM THIS WOEK WAS COMPILED,

THE

THIRD EDITION OF IT IS INSCRIBED

" Who is the honest man ? He who doth still, and strongly, good pursue ; To GOD, his neighbour, and himself most true."

HCRBEBT.

PREFACE.

A GENERAL and very reasonable objection is made against memoirs written by near relatives, and yet the danger to be apprehended from their partiality is not perhaps quite so great as it might seem. At any rate it is not wholly avoided by transferring the task to a stranger. It has been well observed, that " biographers, translators, editors — all, in short, who employ themselves in illustrating the lives or the writings of others — are peculiarly exposed to the ' lues BoswellianaJ or disease of admiration." * Now a near relative may be espe- cially liable to this infirmity ; but then he is especially on his guard against it. He cannot eulogise : he must state facts, and leave the reader to draw conclusions for himself.

The task of compiling my father's memoirs was placed in my hands by his executors, partly because those whose literary abilities would have pointed them out as fitted for the task were not at leisure to undertake it ; and partly because it involved the perusal of a large mass of private papers, which could not well have been submitted to the inspection of any one not a member of his family. I could hardly refuse so interesting, though responsible, a duty.

A considerable portion of this work relates to the emanci- pation of the slaves in the West Indies; and I cannot help feeling some anxiety lest it may give a false prominence to my father's exertions in the accomplishment of that event, which was, in fact, achieved by the strenuous efforts of many men,

* Macaulay's Essa)-s, vol. ii. p. 146.

PEEFACE.

working in very different spheres. It was not for me to attempt to write the history of that extensive movement. The object set before me was to show, as plainly as possible, what sort of person my father was, so that the reader should feel as if he had been one of his most intimate friends. I was bound, therefore, to confine my narrative to his individual proceedings, excluding whatever did not bear, directly or indirectly, on the elucidation of his character. Hence it has resulted that very slight notice is taken in these pages of the exertions of my father's coadjutors in achieving the downfal of British slavery.

It ought, perhaps, to be noticed, that the expressions of affection towards those (and especially one) most dear to my father, with which his letters and papers abound, have been generally omitted.

I beg most gratefully to acknowledge the valuable contri- butions I have received from several of my father's friends, the advice and assistance given by others, and the documents and papers put into my hands by those who enjoyed intimate com- munication with him, before I was of an age to share in that privilege.

Since the first edition of this work was published, many anecdotes and letters have been communicated to me, which will be found, I think, to add considerably to the interest of the narrative.

London, 1848.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

1786—1802.

Notices of the Buxton family — Mr. Buxton of Earl's Colne — Birth of Thomas Fowell Buxton — Child- hood— School-days — His Mother's influence — Abraham Plastow • — Bellfield — Earlham — Letters from Earlham Page 1

CHAPTER II.

1802—1807.

Education in Ireland — Donnybrook — Emmett's Rebellion — Dublin University — Correspondence — Engagement to Miss H. Gurney — Historical Society — Escape from Shipwreck — Correspondence — Success at College — Invitation to represent the University in Par- liament — His Marriage . . 11

CHAPTER III.

1807—1812.

Enters Truman's Brewery — Occu- pations in London — Letter from Mr. Twiss — Correspondence — Death of Edward Buxton — Ex- ertions in the Brewery . . 23

CHAPTER IV.

1812—1816.

First speech in public — The Rev. Josiah Pratt — Increasing regard to religion — Dangerous illness — Its effect on his mind — Removes to Hampstead — Disappointments and anxieties — Reflections — Nar- row escape — Letter to Mr. J. J. Gurney Page 34

CHAPTER V.

1816, 1817.

Adventure with a mad dog — Dis- tress in Spitalfields — Mr. Buxton's speech — Letters — Establishment of Prison Discipline Society — Death of Charles Buxton — Jour- ney on the Continent — Letters — Incident at the Brewery — Book on Prison Discipline ... 47

CHAPTER VI. 1818, 1819.

Election, 1818 — Letter from Mr. J. J. Gurney — Thoughts on entering Parliament — First speech on Cri- minal Law — Committees on Cri- minal Law and Prison Discipline — Letters — Debate on the Man- chester Riot 66

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VII.

1820, 1821.

Election — Domestic afflictions — Letters — Cromer Hall — Priscilla Gurney— Correspondence— Speech on Criminal Law . . Page 82

CHAPTER VIII.

SLAVERY. 1821—1823.

Mr. Buxton is chosen by Mr. Wilber- force as his Parliamentary suc- cessor — Common confusion of "Slavery" with "Slave Trade"

— Previous impressions on Mr. Buxton's mind — Priscilla Gur- ney's dying words — He studies the subject — Long deliberations

— Fear of servile revolt — Under- takes to advocate the question — Letters from Mr. Wilberforce — Reflections — Suttee — The Qua- kers' petition — Letter to Earl Bathurst — The first debate on Slavery — Mr. Canning's amend- ments — Ameliorations in the Slave's condition recommended to the Colonists — Letter to Sir James Mackintosh 103

CHAPTER IX.

SLAVERY. 1823—1826.

Excitement in the West Indies — The negroes refuse to work — Severe measures — Death of the Missionary Smith — The Abolition- ists bitterly reproached — Mr. Buxton's plan — Interviews with Mr. Canning — Popular clamours

— The Government draws back — Anxieties and doubts — Letter from Mr. J. J. Gurney — The Debate — The Government gives way — Mr. Buxton attacks them

— Encouragements from Mr. Wil- berforce — Mr. Brougham's Speech on Smith's case — Its effect on the country — Mr. Wilberforce retires

— The small number of Abolition-

ists in Parliament — Dr. Lushing- ton — Mr. Macaulay — Mr. Buxton's policy — Free people of colour — Treatment of Mr. Shrewsbury — Debate — Deliberations — The London petition — Mr. Denman's motion — A year's pause Page 120

CHAPTER X.

1822—1826.

Cromer Hall — Shooting — A cour- teous poacher — The sporting pro- fessor — Mr. Buxton's delight in horses — His influence over the young — Maxims — Letter to a nephew — His love of a manly character — His gentleness — Ship- wreck at Cromer — Perilous ex- ploit — His religious influence — Kindness to the poor — Letter on style — Correspondence — Martin's Act — Correspondence — Letter to a clergyman on his new house 138

CHAPTER XI.

1826, 1827.

The Mauritius Slave Trade — Mr. Byam and General Hall — Mr. Buxton studies and undertakes the question — Touching incident — Debate — Committee of Inquiry — Stormy election at Weymouth — Letters — Laborious investigations — Frightful attack of illness — Unexpected recovery . . 156

CHAPTER XII. 1827, 1828.

Meditations — Rev. C. Simeon — Letter to Lord W. Bontinck • — Suttee abolished — Mr. Buxton removes to Northrepps — Debate on Slavery — Mr. Buxton's reply — The free people of colour — Interview with Mr. Huskisson — Thoughts on his illness . . 105

CONTEXTS.

CHAPTER XIII. 1828, 1829.

The Hottentots - Dr. Philip — Van Riobc-ch's regrets — Miseries of the Hottentots — Dr. Philip's re- searches — Mr. Buxton's motion — The Government acquiesces — Let- ter from Dr. Philip — The Order in Council sent out — Letter to Mr. J. J. Gurney — The Hottentots set free — • Alarms die away — Happy result — The Kat Kiver settle- ment Page 175

CHAPTER XIV. 1829.

Catholic Emancipation — Reflections — The Mauritius slave trade — Agreeable news — The Mauritius case revived — Letter to Mr. Twiss — The Government admit the ex- istence of the slave trade — Its complete extinction — Mr. George Stephen — Mr. Jeremie . . 184

CHAPTER XV.

1829, 1830.

Letters— Papers — Mitigation of the Penal Code — Illness and death of his second son 194

CHAPTER XVI.

SLAVERY. 1830.

The public begins to arouse itself— Increasing popularity of the subject — Gradual change in the views of the leaders— Mitigating measures despaired of — Determination to put down slavery thoroughly and at once — Spirited meetings in Lon- don and Edinburgh — The Govern- ment outstripped by the Aboli- tionists — Mr. Buxton's appeal to the electors — The cruelty of sla- very in its mildest form . . 208

CHAPTER XVII.

SLAVERY. 1831.

Religious meditations — The Duke's declaration — Change of Ministry — The Whig Government does not

take up the subject of slavery — Quakers' petition — Decrease of the slave population — Debate — The Government still tries to lead the Colonists to adopt mitigating mea- sures— Parliament dissolved — Let- ter from Bellfield— Letter to a son at college — Dinner at the Brewery — Anecdotes —Reflections — Death of Mr. North — Correspondence

Page 216

CHAPTER XVIH.

8LAVEEY. 1832.

Insurrection in Jamaica — Lords' Committee — Letters to Lord Suf- field — Speech at public meeting — Position of parties — State of the Colonies • — Policy of the Govern- ment—Debate, May 24 — Mr. Bux- ton insists on dividing the House

— Formation of the Committee — Religious persecutions in Jamaica

— Result of the Committee — Letters 236

CHAPTER XIX. 1833.

Opening of the session— Government undertakes the slavery question — Increase of public feeling — Anxiety as to the intentions of Govern- ment — Negotiations — Day fixed for the motion — Disappointment — Agitation resolved on — White- ly's pamphlet — Compensation — Anti-slavery meeting — The nation aroused — Delegates summoned — Meeting of delegates . . . 254

CHAPTER XX.

SLAVERY. 1833.

Debate, May 14 — Mr. Stanley's speech • — Resolutions passed — Blame attributed to Mr. Buxton — Letters — Bill brought in — Debate on apprenticeship : On compensa- tion— Progress of the bill through the House of Commons : Through the House of Lords — Passed —

Letters 268

b

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XXI.

1833, 1834.

Letters — Good accounts from the West Indies — Baron Rothschild — Occupations of the spring and summer — Endeavours for the be- nefit of the negroes — Rev. J. M. Trew — The day of freedom, August 1, 1834 — Conduct of the negroes — Letters . . Page 284

CHAPTER XXII. 1834, 1835.

Inquiry into the treatment of abori- ginal tribes in British colonies — Address to the King on the subject — Caffre war • — Aborigines' Com- mittee— Letters — Lord Glenelg's despatch — Visit from a Caffre chief — Mr. Biixton turns to the subject of the slave-trade of foreign na- tions — An address to the King agreed to 301

CHAPTER XXIH. 1835, 1836.

Accounts from the West Indies — Motion for Committee of Inquiry — Correspondence — Writings, Ja- nuary, 1836 — Committee on Ap- prenticeship, March, 1836 — Letters — Letter from Mr. Johnston — Irish Church questions — Speech on Irish Tithe Bill, June, 1836 . . 316

CHAPTER XXIV.

1836.

Scotland — Capercailzie — Letters — Habits of life at Northrepps — Order — Love of poetry — His do- mestic character — Letters . 332

CHAPTER XXV.

1837, 1838.

Aborigines' report — Correspondence —Election— Defeat at Weymouth

— Letters— Efforts to shorten the apprenticeship of the negroes — Mr. Buxton's hesitation — The ap- prenticeship abolished . Page 349

CHAPTER XXVI.

1838.

New plan for the suppression of the slave-trade — Laborious investiga- tions — Collection of evidence — Letter to Lord Melbourne — Com- munications with the Government — Abstract of his views — Horrors of the trade — Capabilities of Africa 363

CHAPTER XXVH.

1838, 1839.

Communications with Government, and with private individuals — African Civilisation Society — Pre- paration of ' The Slave Trade, and its Remedy,' for publication — Departure for Italy . . . 373

CHAPTER XXVIII. 1839, 1840.

Journey through France and Italy — Mont Cenis in a snow-storm — Rome — Italian field sports — Boar- hunting — Shooting on the Nu- mician Lake — Adventure with robbers —The Jesuits — St. Peter's and the Vatican — Prisons and hospitals of Rome .... 385

CHAPTER XXIX.

1840.

Mr. Richards' recollections — Prisons at Civita Vecchia — Italian ban- ditti — Gasparoni — Illness — Na- ples — Pompeii — Prospect of a war between Naples and England — Excitement at Naples — Mr. Buxton returns to England . 408

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XXX.

1840, 1841.

Great public meeting in Exeter Hall

— Prince Albert in the chair — Mr. Buxton created a Baronet — Preparations for the Niger Expe- dition — Agricultural Association

— Ventilation of the ships — Sir Fowell Buxton's health begins to fail — "The Friend of Africa" — Public meetings • — Letter to the Rev. J. W. Cunningham — Day of prayer for the Expedition — Prince Albert'8 visit to the vessels — The Expedition sails — Letter to Cap- tain Trotter .... Page 432

CHAPTER XXXI.

1841.

Correspondence — Journey to Scot- land — Deer-stalking — Return home — Good news from the Niger Expedition — Account of its pro- gress — Scenery of the Niger — Treaty concluded with Obi — His intelligence and courage — The Attah of Eggarah — Sickness ap- pears on board — The Model Farm — The Soudan and AVilberforce sent down the river — The news reaches England — Distress of Sir Fowell Buxton — The Albert proceeds up the river — Dense population — Agricultural produce in the markets — Some slaves libe- rated — The Nufls — Increased sickness on board the Albert — It returns to the Sea — Perilous descent of the river — Mortality

on board — Death of Captain Bird Allen — Opinions of the Commis- sioners as to the Expedition . Pago 446

CHAPTER XXXH.

1842, 1843.

Declining health — Efforts and views regarding Africa — The Model Farm brokep up — Letter from the Bishop of Calcutta — Country pursuits — Planting — Character- istic anecdotes .... 465

CHAPTER XXXIII.

1843, 1844.

Bath — Summer at Northrepps — Continued and increasing illness — Correspondence with Sir Robert Peel and the Bishop of Calcutta 481

CHAPTER XXXIV.

1844, 1845.

Summer at Northrepps — Anxiety respecting Sierra Leone — Mr. Freeman — Religious feelings — Marriage of his son — Increasing illness — His death and interment 492

Testimonial to his memory

500

Letter from the Rev. J. W. Cun- ningham 501

Appendix to Chapter XVII. . 507

LIFE

OF

SIR THOMAS FOWELL BUX1OT,

BART.

CHAPTER I.

1786—1802.

Notices of the Buxton Family — Mr. Buxton of Earl's Colne — Birth of Thomas Fowell Buxton — Childhood — School Days — His Mother's Influence — Abraham Plastow — Bellfield — Earlham — Letters from Earlham.

THE family from which Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton was de- scended, resided, about the middle of the 16th century, at Sud- hury in Suffolk, and subsequently at Coggeshall in Essex. At the latter place, W illiam Buxton, his lineal ancestor, died in 1624. Thomas, the son of William Buxton, claimed and re- ceived from the Heralds' College, in 1634, the arms borne by the family of the same name settled before 1478 at Tybenham in Norfolk, and now represented by Sir Robert Jacob Buxton, Bart.

Isaac Buxton, a merchant, and the fifth in direct descent from William, married Sarah Fowell, an heiress, connected with the family of the Fowells, of Fowelscombe in Devonshire.* From her was derived the name of Fowell, first borne by her eldest son, who married Anna, daughter of Osgood Hanbury, Esq., of Hoi field Grange in Essex. The first Thomas Fowell Buxton lived at Earl's Colne in the same county, but was residing at

* See Burke's Extinct Baronetage.

2 BIRTH OF MR. THOMAS POWELL BUXTON. [CIIAP. i.

Castle Hedingham when his eldest son, Thomas Fowell, the subject of this memoir, was born, on the 1st of April, 1786.

Mr. Buxton was a man of a gentle and kindly disposition, devoted to field sports, and highly popular in his neighbourhood, where he exercised hospitality on a liberal scale. Having been appointed High Sheriff' of the county, he availed himself of the authority of his office to relieve the miseries of the prisoners under his superintendence, visiting them sedulously, notwithstanding the prevalence of the jail fever. He died at Earl's Colne in 1792, leaving his widow with three sons and two daughters.*

The eldest boy, Thomas Fowell, was at this time six years old. Pie was a vigorous child, and early showed a bold and determined character. As an instance of this it may be men- tioned, that when quite a child, while walking with his uncle, Mr. Hanbury, he was desired to give a message to a pig-driver who had passed along the road. He set off in pursuit ; and although one of his shoes was soon lost in the mud, he pushed on through lonely and intricate lanes, tracking the driver by the footmarks of his pig's, for nearly three miles, into the town of Coggeshall ; nor did he stop until he had overtaken the man, and delivered his message.

One who knew the boy well in his early days said of him, " He never was a child ; he was a man when in petticoats." At the age of only four years and a half, he was sent to a school at Kingston, where he suffered severely from ill-treatment ; and his health giving way (chiefly from the want of sufficient food) he was removed, shortly after his father's death, to the school of Dr. Charles Burney, at Greenwich, where his brothers after- wards joined him. Here he had none of the hardships to endure to which he had been subjected at Kingston, and he found in Dr. Burney a kind and judicious master. Upon one occasion he was accused by an usher of talking during school-time, and

* Anna, afterwards married to William Forster, Esq., of Bradpole in Dorsetshire.

Thomas Fowell.

Charles, married Martha, daughter of Edmund Henning, Es<i , and died in 1817.

Sarah Maria, died in 1839.

Edward North, died in 1811.

178G— 1802.] HIS CHILDHOOD— SCHOOL DAYS. 3

desired to learn the collect, epistle, and gospel, as a punishment. When Dr. Burney entered the school, young Buxton appealed to him, stoutly denying the charge. The usher as strongly asserted it ; but Dr. Burney stopped him, saying, " I never found the boy tell a lie, and will not disbelieve him now."

He does not appear to have made much progress in his studies, and his holidays spent at Earl's Colne, where his mother con- tinued to reside, left a deeper trace in his after life than the time spent at school. Mrs. Buxton's character has been thus briefly described by her son : " My mother," he says, " was a woman of a very vigorous mind, and possessing many of the generous virtues in a very high degree. She was large-minded about everything ; disinterested almost to an' excess ; careless of difficulty, labour, danger, or expense, in the prosecution of any great object. She had a masculine understanding, great power of mind, great vigour, and was very fearless. With these nobler qualities were united some of the imperfections which belong to that species of ardent and resolute character." She belonged to the Society of Friends. Her husband being a member of the Church of England, their sons were baptized in infancy ; nor did she ever exert her influence to bring them over to her own persuasion. She was more anxious to give them a deep regard for the Holy Scriptures, and a lofty moral standard, than to quicken their zeal about the distinctive differences of religious opinion. Her system of education had in it some striking fea- tures. There was little indulgence, but much liberty. The boys were free to go where they would and do what they pleased, and her eldest son especially was allowed to assume almost the position of master in the house. But, on the other hand, her authority, when exercised, was paramount over him, as over his brothers and sisters. On being asked by the mother of a large and ill-managed family, whether the revolutionary principles of the day were not making way among her boys, her reply was, " I know nothing about revolutionary principles : my rule is that imposed on the people of Boston, — ' implicit obe- dience, unconditional submission.' " Yet the character of her son Fo\vell was not without some strong touches of wilfulness. He has described himself, in more than one of his papers, as having been in his boyhood " of a daring, violent, domineering

B 2

4 HIS MOTHER'S INFLUENCE. [CHAP. T.

temper." "When this was remarked to his mother, " Never mind," she would say ; " he is self-willed now — you will see it turn out well in the end."

During one Christmas vacation, on her return home from a brief absence, she was told that " Master Fowell had behaved very ill, and struck his sister's governess." She therefore deter- mined to punish him, by leaving him at school during the en- suing Easter holidays. Meanwhile, however, some disorderly conduct took place in the school, and two boys, who had behaved worst in the affair, were likewise to remain there during the vacation. Mrs. Buxton was unwilling to leave him alone with these boys, and on the first day of the holidays she went to Greenwich and fairly told Fowell her difficulty ; ending by saying that, rather than subject him to their injurious influence, she was prepared to forfeit her word and allow him to come home with her other sons. His answer was, " Mother, never fear that I shall disgrace you or myself; my brothers are ready, and so is my dinner!" After such a reply the resolution of a less determined parent must have given way ; but she undauntedly left him to his punishment.

Her aim appears to have been to give her boys a manly and robust character; and, both by precept and example, she strove to render them self-denying, and, at the same time, thoughtful for others.

Long afterwards, when actively occupied in London, her son wrote to her : — " I constantly feel, especially in action and ex- ertion for others, the effects of principles early planted by you in my mind." He particularly alluded to the abhorrence of slavery and the slave-trade, with which she had imbued him.

His size and strength well fitted him for country amusements ; and he early acquired a strong taste for hunting, shooting, and fishing, under the auspices of the gamekeeper, Abraham 1'lasfow. Tiiis gamekeeper was one of those characters occasionally to be met with in the country, uniting straightforward honest sim- plicity with great shrewdness and humour. He was well fitted to train his three young masters in those habits of fearlessness and hardihood which their mother wished them to pixx-ss. His influence over them is thus described by Mr. Duxton, in a letter dated

1786—1802.] AIHiAllAM PLASTOW. 5

"CromerHall, August 23, 1825.

'• My father died when I was very young, and I became at ten yours old almost as much tin- master of the family as I am of this family at the present moment. My mother, a woman of great talents and great energy, perpetually inculcated on my brothers and sisters that they were to obey me, and I \\asratherencouragedto play the little tyrant. She treated me as an equal, conversed with me, and led me to form and express my opinions without reserve. This system had obvious and great disadvan- tages, but it was followed by some few incidental benefits. Throughout life 1 have acted and thought for myself; and to this kind of habitual decision I am indebted for all the success I have met with.

•• Mv ' guide, philosopher, and friend,' was Abraham Plastow, the gamekeeper: a man for whom I have ever felt, and still feel, very great affection. lie was a singular character: in the first place, this tutor of mine could neither read nor write, but his memory was stored with various rustic knowledge. He had more of natural good sense and what is called mother-wit than almost any person I have met with since : a knack which he had of putting everything into new and singular lights made him, and still makes him, a most entertaining and even intellectual companion. He was the most undaunted of men : I remember my youthful admiration of his exploits on horseback. For a time he hunted my uncle's hounds, and his fearlessness was proverbial. But what made him particularly valuable were his principles of integrity and honour. He never said or did a thing in the absence of my mother of which she would have disapproved. He always held up the highest standard of integrity, and filled our youthful minds with sentiments as pure and as generous as could be found in the writings of Seneca or Cicero. Such was my first instructor, and, I must add, my best; for I think I have profited more by the recollection of his remarks and admonition, than by the more learned and elaborate discourses of all my other tutors. He was our playfellow and tutor; he rode with us, fished with us, shot with us upon all occasions." *

One among- many anecdotes remembered of this man may be recorded. The young Buxtons had been sent out hunting-, and, as usual, under Abraham's care. As they were approaching the

* This faithful servant died in 1836. "The tears," said Mr. Haubuiy, who visited him on his death-bed, '• trickled down his goodly countenance •while speaking of his rides long ago with his young master."

The following inscription on a mural tablet, in Earl's Colue churchyard, erected by the contributions of his neighbours, speaks their sense of his worth : —

" To the memory of Abraham Plastow, who lived for more than half a

BELLF1ELD. [CHAP. i.

scene of sport, Fowell made use of an improper expression, upon which the gamekeeper insisted upon his returning home at once, and carried his point.

Occasionally the holidays were passed by the children with their grandmother, either in London or at Bellfield, her country- house, near Weymouth.* The formality of her life in town was rather unpalatable to them ; even the exceptions to her rules were methodically arranged ; her Sunday discipline, for example, was very strict, but on one (and only one) Sunday in the year she gave the children the treat of a drive in the park. A visit to Bellfield was more attractive, and there young Buxton spent many of the happiest hours of his boyhood. The house, which, at the death of his grandmother, became his own (though till lately inhabited by his uncle Mr. Charles Buxton), is beautifully situated, commanding fine views of Weymouth Bay and the Island of Portland. To this spot he ever continued much attached, and his letters from thence always mention his great enjoyment of its beauties. He thus refers to an incident which occurred when he was a lad at Bellfield : —

" In passing with my brother Edward in a very small boat from Wevmouth to Poxwell, a sudden storm came on and the boat filled. We turned to the shore : he could not swim, I could. I placed him in the front of the boat and rowed with all my force through the surf; the boat overturned, threw him on shore, but I went down. I swam to the boat, and after considerable difficulty was also thrown on shore through the surf."

century, servant and gamekeeper, in the families of Thomas Fowell Buxton and Osgood Gee, Esqrs. : —

" Of humble station, yet of sterling worth; Awaiting Heaven, but yet content on earth : Quaint, honest, simple-hearted, kind, sh; Such was the man, to all our village dear ! He liv'd in peace, in hope resigu'd his breath. Go — learn a lesson from his life and death."

* Soon after her marriage with Mr. Isaac Buxton, they had visited this estate together, and she incidentally remarked to him, what a beautiful spot it would be for a country-seat. The next year, when she accompanied him thither again, she found, to her astonishment, instead of mere fie' -, an elegant COOntTJ-hoose, surrounded by lawns aud gardens.

1786—1802.] EARLHAM.

Weymouth was at this period the favourite resort of George III., and the king and royal family frequently visited Mrs. Buxton. Her grandchildren always retained a vivid impression of the cor- dial kindness of their royal guests.

At the age of fifteen, after spending eight years at Dr. Burney's, without making any great advances in learning, he persuaded his mother to allow him to reside at home ; and there he remained for many months, devoting the chief part of his time to sporting, and the remainder to desultory reading. When no active amusement presented itself, he would sometimes spend whole days in riding about the lanes on his old pony, with an amusing book in his hand, while graver studies were entirely, laid aside. At the same time his friends attempted to correct the boyish rough- ness of his manners by a system of ridicule and reproof, which greatly discouraged and annoyed him. It was indeed a critical time for his character ; but the germ of nobler qualities lay below ; a genial influence was alone wanting to develop it ; and, through the kindness of Providence, as he used emphatically to acknowledge, that influence was at hand. Before this period he had become acquainted with John, the eldest son of Mr. John Gurney, of Earlhain Hall, near Norwich, with whose family his own was distantly connected, and, in the autumn of 1801, he paid his friend a visit at his father's house.

Mr. Gurney had for several years been a widower. His family consisted of eleven children ; three elder daughters, on the eldest of whom the charge of the rest chiefly devolved, the son whom we have mentioned, a group of four girls nearer Fowell Buxton's age, and three younger boys. He was then in his six- teenth year, and was charmed by the lively and kindly spirit which pervaded the whole party, while he was surprised at finding them all, even the younger portion of the family, zealously occupied in self-education, and full of energy in every pursuit, whether of amusement or of knowledge. They received him as one of themselves, early appreciating his masterly, though still uncultivated mind ; while on his side, their cordial and encouraging welcome seemed to draw out all his latent powers. He at once joined with them in reading and study, and from this visit may be dated a remarkable change in the whole tone of his character: he received a stimulus, not merely in the acquisition of knowledge,

MR. GUBNEY, OF EARLHAM. [CHAP. i.

but in the formation of studious habits and intellectual tastes ; nor could the same influence fail of extending to the refinement of his disposition and manners.

Earlham itself possessed singular charms for their young and lively party. They are described at the time of his visit as spending the fine autumn afternoons in sketching and reading under the old trees in the park, or in taking excursions, some on foot, some on horseback, into the country round ; wandering homeward towards evening, with their drawings and the wild flowers they had found. The roomy old hall, also, was well fitted for the cheerful, though simple hospitalities which Mr. Gurney delighted to exercise, especially towards the literary so- ciety, for which Norwich was at that time distinguished.

A characteristic anecdote of Mr. Gurney has been recorded. He was a strict preserver of his game, and accordingly had an intense repugnance to everything bordering on poaching. Upon one occasion, when walking in his park, he heard a shot fired in a neighbouring wood — he hurried to the spot, and his naturally placid temper was considerably ruffled on seeing a young officer with a pheasant at his feet, deliberately reloading his gun. As the young man, however, replied to his rather warm expressions by a polite apology, Mr. Gurney's wrath was somewhat allayed; but he could not refrain from asking the intruder what he would do, if he caught a man trespassing on his premises. " I would ask him in to luncheon," was the reply. The serenity of this impudence was not to be resisted. Mr. Gurney not only invited him to luncheon, but supplied him with dogs and a game- keeper, and secured him excellent sport for the remainder of the day.*

Mr. Gurney belonged to the Society of Friends ; but his family was not brought up with any strict regard to its pecu- liarities. He put little restraint on their domestic amusements; and music and dancing were among their favourite recreations. The third daughter, afterwards the well-known Mrs. Fry, had indeed united herself more closely to the Society of Friends ;f

* This anecdote, which is still fresh in the memory of several of Mr. Gurney's children, was borrowed by Hook, in his tale of < > Gurney.

t See Memoirs of the Life of Elizabeth Fry. Charles Gilr-in, 1847.

1786—1802.] LETTERS FROM EARLHAM.

but her example in thi> respect had not as yet been followed by any of her brothers or sisters.

Such was the family of which Fowell Buxton might be said to have become a member, at this turning point of his life. The following letters were written to his mother during his visit to Karl ham.

" Earlham, October, 1801.

" My dear Mother, — I was very much pleased with all your last, excepting that part in which you mention the (to me at least) hateful subject of St. Andrew's.*

" It gives me pain to write, because it will you to read, that my aversion is, ever was, and ever will be invincible ; nevertheless, if you command, I will obey. You will exclaim, ' How ungrateful, after all the pleasure he has had !' Pleasure, great pleasure, I certainly have had, but not sufficient to counterbalance the unhappiness the pursuance of your plan would occasion me ; but, as I said before, I will obey.

" If you think fit, I shall return to Cromer on Wednesday. North- repps is perfectly delightful. I have dined many times with Mr. Pym : a letter he has received from his brother in Ireland says, ' Nothing but speculation, peculation, and paper exists in this unhappy country.' I am going to Lord Wodehouse's this morning, and to a ball at Mr. Kett's at night."

" Earlham, November 24, 1801.

" My dear Mother, — Your letter was brought while I was deliberat- ing whether to stay here, or meet you in London. The contents afforded me real joy. Before, I almost feared you would think me en- croaching ; yet Mr. Gurney is so good-tempered, his daughters are so agreeable, and John is so thoroughly delightful, and his conversation so instructive, which is no small matter with you I know, that you must not be surprised at my accepting your offer of a few days' longer stay in this country. Whilst I was at Northrepps, I did little else but read books of entertainment (except now and then a few hours Latin and Greek), ride, and play at chess. But since I have been at Earlham, I have been very industrious. The Princef paid us a visit this morning, and dines here on Thursday. " Your affectionate son,

" T. F. BUXTON."

" My visit here has completely answered," he says with boyish enthusiasm, in his last letter from Mr. Gurney 's house. •• I

* His mother had proposed to send him to the College at St. Andrew's. t Prince William of Gloucester.

10 INFLUENCE OF THE FAMILY AT EARLHAM. [CHAP. i.

have spent two months as happily as possible ; I have learned as much, though in a different manner, as I should at Colne, and have got thoroughly acquainted with the most agreeable family in the world."

In December, 1801, he returned to Earl's Colne ; but his mind never lost the impulse which it had received during his stay at Earl ham. Many years afterwards he thus refers to this early friendship, which he places first in an enumeration of the blessings of his life.

" I know no blessing of a temporal nature (and it is not only tem- poral) for which I ought to render so many thanks as my connexion with the Earlham family. It has given a colour to my life. Its influ- ence was most positive and pregnant with good, at that critical period between school and manhood. They were eager for improvement — I caught the infection. I was resolved to please them, and in the College of Dublin, at a distance from all my friends, and all control, their influ- ence, and the desire to please them, kept me hard at my books, and sweetened the toil they gave. The distinctions I gained at College (little valuable as distinctions, but valuable because habits of industry, perseverance, and reflection were necessary to obtain them), these boyish distinctions were exclusively the result of the animating passion in my mind, to carry back to them the prizes which they prompted and enabled me to win."

1802.] EDUCATION IN IRELAND— DONNYBROOK. 11

CHAPTER II.

1802—1807.

Education in Ireland — Donnybrook — Emmett's Rebellion — Dublin Uni- versity— Correspondence — Engagement to Miss H. Gurney — Historical Society — Escape from Shipwreck — Correspondence — Success at Col- lege — Invitation to represent the University in Parliament — His Marriage.

As there were reasons for expecting that her son would inherit considerable property in Ireland, Mrs. Buxton deemed it advisa- ble that he should complete his education at Dublin ; and, ac- cordingly, in the winter of 1802 he was placed in the family of Mr. Moore of Donnybrook, who prepared pupils for the univer- sity. It was shortly before the Christmas holidays that he took up his abode at Donnybrook, and he then found himself inferior to every one of his companions in classical acquirements ; but he spent the vacation in siren close study, that, on the return of the other pupils, he stood as the first among them.

Late in life he thus recalls this period in a letter to one of his sons, then under the roof of a private tutor : —

" You are now at that period of life in which you must make a turn to the right or to the left. You must now give proofs of principle, determination, and strength of mind, — or you must sink into idleness, and acquire the habits and character of a desultory, ineffective young man ; and if once you fall to that point, you will find it no easy matter to rise again.

" I am sure that a young man may be very much what he pleases. In my own case it was so. I left school, where I had learnt little or nothing, at about the age of fourteen. I spent the next year at home, learning to hunt and shoot. Then it was that the prospect of going to College opened upon me, and such thoughts as I have expressed in this letter occurred to my mind. I made my resolutions, and I acted up to them : I gave up all desultory reading — I never looked into a novel or a newspaper — I gave up shooting. During the five years I was in Ireland, I hud the liberty of going when I pleased to a capital shooting

12 EMMETT'S REBELLION. [CHAP. u.

place. I never went but twice. In short, I considered every hour as precious, and I made everything bend to my determination not to be behind any of my companions, — and thus I speedily passed from one species of character to another I had been a boy fond of pleasure and idleness, reading only books of unprofitable entertainment — I became speedily a youth of steady habits of application, and irresistible resolu- tion. I soon gained the ground I had lost, and I found those things which were difficult and almost impossible to my idleness, easy enough to my industry ; and much of my happiness and all my prosperity in life have resulted from the change I made at your age. It all rests with yourself. If you seriously resolve to be energetic and industrious, depend upon it you will for your whole life have reason to rejoice that you were wise enough to form and to act upon that determination."

From Donnybrook he writes to his mother, —

" Tell my Uncle Hanbury that no two clerks in his brewhouse are together so industrious as I am, for I read morning, noon, and night."

During his stay at this place, the country was disturbed by the breaking out of the " Kilwarden rebellion," instigated by the unfortunate Robert Emmett. To meet the danger, volunteer corps were hastily organised, one of which Mr. Buxton joined as a lieutenant. The current reports of the day are thus sketched by him in his letters to his mother : —

" Everybody abuses the Lord-Lieutenant. He received information from all parts of the kingdom that the rising was to take place on Saturday night, and all the preparation he made was to send 2500 men to take care of his house and family at the Park. The soldiers in Dublin had no ammunition. Colonel Littlehales, Mr. Marsden, and every officer of the Castle, were away from their posts ; and for two hours after the rising began, and while the rebels were murdering Lord Kilwarden, Colonel Brown, and all the soldiers they could catch, nothing was done by government.

" After the first alarm, however, had subsided, the soldiers collected in small parties, and the rebels were soon put to the rout ; before morn- ing. 10,000 pikes were taken, all the prisons in Dublin were filled with rebels, and from 200 to 300 are supposed to have been killed. and I watched last night at Donnybrook, with our pistols loaded, for it \MI< expected that they would attack the outskirts. However, they did not come. A great many Lucan people were found dead in Dublin. Kverv noted rebel was seen going to Dublin on Saturday evening. The gardener and workmen say there were 500 rebels at Mr. North's

1803.] DUBLIN UNIVERSITY. 13

gate that night. Only two mails came into Dublin on Sunday — one >jiped at Lucan and another at Maynooth."

" Dublin, August 7, 1803.

" Dublin is in appearance perfectly quiet again, but the minds of the people arc in rebellion. Pym, who goes by the name of Lord Sage, savs this is by far a more dangerous rebellion than the last, as it is more concealed. The plan was for three bodies of 6000 men each to enter Dublin ; one party to take the Castle, another the barracks, the other to spread about the city and murder every Protestant. Luckily, the hearts of all but about 6000 failed. The attack was to have commenced at two in the morning, but whisky, which was given to keep up their spirits, made them begin their outrage the evening before at nine. They were opposed by seventeen yeomen, and these brave rebels, who were ready to sacrifice their lives i'or their liberty, after four rounds of firing, all ran away from this small body 1*

''The Lord-Lieutenant is abused by every loyal person. People who slept in the Castle on the night of the rising say it must have been lost if the rebels had come."

Another incident of his stay at Donnybrook is thus mentioned. " A companion of mine, not knowing it was loaded, presented a pistol at me and pulled the trigger. It had often missed fire before, and did so then : immediately afterwards I pulled the trigger, it went off, and sent the ball into the wall."

After remaining a year at Donnybrook, he paid another visit to Earlham. " We are most completely happy here," he writes to his mother; " everything goes on well, and you need not fear that I am losing my time, for being with the Gurneys makes me ten times more industrious than anything else would."

In October, 1803, he returned to Dublin, and entered Trinity College as a fellow commoner. At that time there were four examinations annually in the Dublin University — making in all fourteen during the college course of the fellow commoners. At each of these a premium was given to the successful candidate in every division or class, if he had not already received one in the same year, in which case a certificate, which was equal to it in honour, was given instead.

* See 'Annual Register,' 1803; and Maxwell's 'History of the Irish Rebellion,' which gives an interesting account of Emmett's conspiracy,

14 FIRST SUCCESS. [CHAP. n.

At the end of the college course a gold medal was also pre- sented to those who, at each examination, had distinguished themselves in every subject (one failure being allowed).

Mr. Buxton at once commenced his studies with great vigour, and in his first examination obtained the second place. This success appears to have surpassed his expectations, and he thus writes to his sister: — Feb. 24, 1804. "I suppose you know how the examinations have ended — very much indeed to my satisfaction, and I am now reading away for the next. My mother is in ecstasies about my being so near getting the pre- mium." And in a letter to his mother he tells her, he is reso- lutely bent on getting it next time. He succeeded, and, this being his first triumph, he was not a little elated ; and he men- tions as " an exceeding addition to the pleasure" that he was the first Englishman, as far as he could ascertain, who had gained a premium at the Dublin University.

Before the autumnal examination, he writes to Mr. J. J. Gur- ney, who was then reading with a private tutor at Oxford : —

" College, Dublin, September 9, 1804.

"Your suppositions about my getting a certificate are, I am afraid, very unlikely to be realised. My antagonists are very tremendous. In the first place, there are North and Montgomery. I hardly know which of them I ought to dread the most; they are both excellent scholars, and men of the most unwearied application : next Wybrants and Arthur, both of whom I have had the pleasure of beating already. So far for college business ; I only wish you were here to beat every- body."

In a postscript to this very letter he mentions with boyish glee his having gained the certificate in question. A close friendship soon afterwards sprang up between Mr. Buxton and Mr. John Henry North, one of the *• tremendous anta- gonists" to whom he refers; and who afterwards distinguished himself both at the Irish Bar, and in the House of Commons.

Their course at college was nearly parallel, and as they did not on this or any succeeding occasion happen to be placed in the same division, they were never brought into competition. This friendship, maintained during Mr. .North's life, was one of the circumstances to which, in recollections of his college da\ .«,

1805.] ENGAGEMENT TO MISS H. GURNEY. 15

Mr. Buxton always recurred with the most lively pleasure. His mention of his friend at this early age is interesting : —

" His temper is cheerful, his taste remarkably elegant, and adapted to receive pleasure from the beauties of nature. His manners so cap- tivating that you must be pleased by them ; and his heart so good that you must love him."

Whenever Mr. Buxton could escape from Dublin, he visited Earlham, and an attachment, which he dated from the first day they met, gradually ripened, between him and Hannah, fifth daughter of Mr. Gurney ; till in March, 1805, they were en- gaged to be married.

But while in this direction a bright prospect opened before him, in another the clouds appeared to be gathering about his path. Other claimants* had come forward to contest his right to the Irish property ; his mother had undertaken an expensive lawsuit regarding it, and her hopes of success were already growing dim. At the same time the family property had been materially diminished by some unsuccessful speculations in which she had engaged.

Her son's letters, however, (addressed for the most part to Earlham,) bear little trace of anxiety : —

" April, 1805.

" The examinations are over, but, alas ! I cannot describe the disasters that have befallen me. Think how disagreeable a circumstance it must be to me to have all my hopes disappointed, to lose the certificate, to have my gold medal stopped, and, what is worse, to know that my Earlham visit, as it was the cause of my idleness, was the cause of my disgrace. Think of all this, and fetch a very, very deep sigh, — and look very grave, and then think how happy I must be to have to tell YOU, that my utmost examinationary hopes are realized, — that I have the cer- tificate and ' Valde bene in omnibus,' and, what is better, that I can

ascribe my success to nothing but my Earlham visit ! I am

sure that, if I had not thought that I was partly working for you, I never should have been able to read so much during this month. The examiner told five of my opponents that he was sorry he had not a premium for each of them. I was not ' cut up ' (as the college phrase is) during the whole examination, and if I have been the trumpeter of my own praise a little too much, you must remember that one slight

* Of the Yorke family.

16 HISTORICAL SOCIETY. [CHAP. n.

word of approbation from Earl ham would be more grateful to me than the loudest applause of the whole world besides."

He mentions in a letter dated May 15, 1805, that he had been spending1 the preceding fortnight " chiefly in reading English poetry ;" and he adds,

" I went yesterday, for the first time, to a schoolmaster who gives lectures on reading. I have long felt my deficiency in that most useful qualification, especially when I was last at Earlham, and I then made a firm resolution to conquer it. However, it was with difficulty I could keep my determination, for my companions have entertained themselves very much at the idea of my going to school to learn to read. But I expect to gain two very material advantages by this plan ; the first is, that perhaps it may afford you pleasure, and secondly, that, as I go im- mediately after dinner, it will furnish an opportunity for avoiding, with- out openly quarrelling with, a party of collegians, into whose society I have lately got, and whose habits of drinking make me determine to retreat from them."

" College, Dublin, September 29, 1805.

" My mind has lately been very much occupied with the considera- tion of the lawfulness of taking oaths, because my College pursuits would lose a great deal of their stimulus if I thought I should not go to the Bar, for the information which I may acquire here would be com- paratively of little use to any one but a lawyer. To remove or strengthen my doubts I have been reading ' Palcy's Philosophy,' and, indeed, he has almost convinced me that taking oaths is not the kind of swearing that is prohibited. I have endeavoured to free my mind from prejudice on one side, and interest on the other; and I think that if I felt a bias at all, it was against swearing, which arose from the fear of being actuated by my wishes, rather than by reason."

In October, 1805, he and his friend North took their seats together in the Historical Society.* In one of his letters he

* This was an association established by the students of the University, with a view of promoting the practice of elocution and the study of history, and was an object of great interest among them. Debates were held every •week durins; the last term of the year. After each debate, every member present named the one who in his opinion had spoken most effectively, and at" the end of the year the under-graduate who had gained the largest num- ber of suffrages received a silver medal. Another medal was the prize at the annual examination in history. No one was admitted into the socicty until the end of his second year of residence at the University ; and, conse- quently, two medals for eloquence, and two for history, were the largest number that any one could obtain.

1805.] HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 17

speaks of the dread with winch he looked forward to "such a tremendous thing" as addressing so large an audience. His first speech, however, met with unexpected success. One of his fellow collegians still remembers " its producing quite a sensa- tion among the under-graduates," and he himself thus writes to Earlham : —

" November, 1805.

" I did not answer your letter before, because I wished to state the result of my speech, which is beyond my utmost expectations. Five persons spoke besides myself: ninety-two members gave Returns, of which eighty-five were for me. A law exists in the Society, that if any one should get eighty Returns for a speech, he is to receive the ' remarhahk thanks.' There has never been an opportunity of putting tins law in force till now."

" Wednesday, December 25, 1805.

" I made a speech last night in the Historical Society, and, contrary to my former determination, I intend to speak once more. I am induced to do this by getting a great many more Returns than I had any reason to expect.

" I have, I fear, very little chance of getting the premium ; however, if I do not, I am perfectly satisfied with the result of my studies this term. I have taken very little sleep, amusement, or exercise lately, the consequence of which is that I have been very unwell."

His hopes were more than realised ; not only did he again carry off the premium, but the silver medal of the Historical Society was awarded him, of which he subsequently gained the other three prizes. At College, indeed, nothing but good fortune attended him. His exertions were uniformly crowned with success ; his mind found scope for its unceasing activity ; his circle of friends was choice, yet large ; and a zest was added to all enjoyments by the bright prospect afforded him at Earl- ham. The gradual overcasting of his hopes of wealth but little affected his spirits. He says, in a letter to a friend —

" I am very sorry to hear of your unhappinesses ; I wish I could do anything to alleviate them. I think I might very well spare happiness enough for a moderate person, and still have enough left for myself."

He some years after referred to his success in college as having " produced this amount of self-confidence."

" I was, and have always been, conscious that though others had

c

18 LOVE OF FIELD SPORTS. [CHAP. n.

great talents, mine were moderate ; that what I wanted in ability I must make up by perseverance ; in short, that I must work hard to win, but withal a sense that by working hard I could win. This conviction that I could do nothing without labour, but that I could do anything, or almost anything which others did, by dint of vigorous application ; this, coupled with a resolved mind, a kind of plodding, dogged determination, over which difficulties had little influence, and with considerable industry and perseverance; these have been the talents committed to my trust."

From the dissipation then too prevalent in the University he was happily preserved, partly by his close and incessant occupa- tion, partly by his Earlham connexion, and partly by his pre- vious education ; for although his letters up to this period con- tain no direct mention of religion, yet the Christian principles which his mother had instilled into his mind retained a certain influence ; while his natural firmness of character enabled him to disregard the taunts to which he was exposed. He found more difficulty in sacrificing to his academical pursuits the strong inclination for field sports which had been cherished at Earl's Colne, and which accompanied him . through life. In a letter to Earlham, dated May, 1806, he says, —

" One of the various advantages I have derived from our connexion is the check it has been to my sporting inclinations. I am thoroughly convinced that, had my mind received another bent, had my pursuits been directed towards sporting, its charms would have been irresistible. A lite dedicated to amusement must be most unsatisfactory. * * *

I think you need be under no apprehension in regard to having

too much inHuence over me : as to my being member for Weymouth, it is a totally chimerical idea, for, were I ever so willing, it is quite im- practicable, so you may lay aside all fears of my becoming a great man."

His letters to his mother at this period are chiefly confined to matters of business ; one trait in them is, however, too charac- teristic to be passed over without notice. Nearly all of them conclude with inquiries and directions about his horses, in which he always took so lively an interest, that it almost might be called personal friendship. " I mean," he tells iiis mother, '; to visit Weymotith before returning to Ireland, to see how my horses and relations do." He was, however, obliged to hasten his return to Dublin, and on his way thither he had a remark- able escape, the particulars of which lie thus describes : —

1806.] ESCAPE FROM SHIPWRECK. 19

" In the year 1806 I was travelling with the Earlham party in Scotland. I left them to return to the College of Dublin. In conse- quence of some conversation about the Parkgate vessels, with my pre- sent wile, then Hannah Gurney, she extracted from me a promise that I would never go by Parkgate. I was exceedingly impatient to beat Dublin, in order to prepare for my examination : when I reached Ches- ter, the captain of the Parkgate packet came to me, and invited me to go with him. The wind was fair; the vessel was to sail in a few hours ; he was sure I should be in Dublin early the next morning, whereas a place in the Holyhead mail was doubtful, and at best I must lose the next day by travelling through Wales. My promise was a bitter mortification to me, but I could not dispense with it. I drank tea, and played at cards with a very large party. About eight or nine o'clock they all went away, on board the vessel, and of the 119 persons who embarked as passengers, 118 were drowned before mid- night." *

The account in the newspapers of the loss of the Parkgate packet was seen by his late travelling companions, on their way into Norfolk ; and it was not till after a day of anxious sus- pense that they heard of his safe arrival in Ireland. At Lynn they received the following letter from him : —

" Have you heard of the dreadful accident which happened to the Parkgate packet ? You will see by the newspaper the particulars. I have been talking to-day with the only passenger who was saved ; he says that there were 119 in the vessel, and mentioned iriany most me- lancholy circumstances. Had I gone by Parkgate, which I probably might have done, as we were detained some time at Chester, and ex- pected to be detained longer, I should have been in the vessel, but I declared positively that I would not go. Can you guess my reason for being so obstinate ?"

It was during this tour in Scotland that his attention appears to have been drawn, with increased earnestness, to the subject of religion. "When at Perth he purchased a large Bible, with the resolution, which he stedfastly kept, of perusing a portion of it every day ; and he mentions in a letter, dated September 10, 1806, that quite a change had been worked in his mind witli respect to reading the Holy Scriptures. " Formerly," he says, " I read generally rather as a duty than as a pleasure,

* See ' Gentleman's Magazine,' September, 1 806.

c 2

20 STUDY OF THE BIBLE. [CHAP.II.

but now I read them with great interest, and, I may say, happiness."

" I am sure," he writes again, " that some of the happiest hours that I spend here are while I am reading our Bible, which is as great a favourite as a book can be. I never before felt so assured that the only means of being happy is from seeking the assistance of a superior Being, or so inclined to endeavour to submit myself to the direction of principle."

The College examination was now again approaching, and he was not so well prepared as usual, having given, as he feared, too much time to Optics, < of which science he speaks as " the most delightful and captivating of studies." lie writes to the party at Earl ham, —

" I do not, however, feel discouraged, but in a most happy, quiet mind ; more determined to work, than anxious about the result ; de- sirous of success for your sakes, and able to bear defeat alleviated by vour sympathy ; but, if reading can avail, I wilt be prepared."

After the examination was over, he says, —

" I never had such a contest. The Examiner could not decide in the Hall, so we were obliged to have two hours more this morning; however, I can congratulate you once more. * * * I venerate Optics for what they have done for me in this examination."

In the course of this examination he gave an answer to one of the viva voce questions, which the Examiner thought incor- rect, and he passed on to the next man ; but to the astonishment of the other undergraduates, Buxton rose from his seat and said, " I beg your pardon, sir, but I am convinced my answer was cor- rect." The Examiner, after some demur, consented to refer to a book of authority on the subject, and it proved that Buxton's answer was the one given in the latest edition of the work.

"November, 1806.

" I was strongly pressed to play at billiards yesterday, which of course I refused,* and was successful enough to pcrsuado the person to employ his evening in another way. He is a strong instance of their injurious effects. He told me that when ho was in town he wont

* He had given a promise at Earlham not to play at billiards while at college. His scruples respecting oaths and the use of anus were derived from his intercourse with so many members of the Society of Friends.

1806—1807.] SUCCESS AT COLLEGE. 21

regularly thivc times u day to tlie billiard table, and that playing at 4d. a irame, on an average, cost him 10s. a day. It is the most alluring, and therefore the most destructive, game that ever was invented. I have heard it remarked, and have indeed remarked it myself, that if any collegian commences billiard playing, he ceases to do anything else. * I have been employed all this morning in reading history. I rind that this study is useful, not only in itself, but also in giving a habit of reading everything with accuracy. * * * Every day brings us new accounts of disturbances in the remote parts of the country ; I am almost inclined to fear there will be a rebellion. I have been thinking a great deal lately of what I should do in case the corps were again established in college. There is to me no question so dubious or perplexing, as whether resistance against danger from an enemy is allowable : however, if I can trust my own determination, I shall not be at all swayed by the example of others, or by the disgrace which would attend a refusal to enlist."

A day or two later he continues : —

" I was extremely tired at the Historical Society on Wednesday night. I was made president, and you cannot imagine the labour of keeping a hundred unruly and violent men orderly and obedient. The all-engrossing subject here at present is the prospect of a rebellion, if I may say the prospect when I think there is the reality. Every day we hear of fresh murders; and the Bishop of Elphin, who is of the Law family, declared openly in the Castle-yard, that in the five-and-twenty years he had resided here, the people in his diocese were never in so desperate a state of rebellion."

On his return to England for a short holiday, he says —

" London, January 23, 1807.

" It is a very great pleasure to me that I can tell you some news, which I think will delight you. In the first place, I have arrived here safe and sound. In the second, I have for the twelfth time secured the premium, and valde bene in omnibus."

On the 14th of April in the same year he received his thir- teenth premium, and also the highest honour of the University — the gold medal. With these distinctions, and the four silver medals from the Historical Society, he prepared to return to Eng- land. At this juncture a circumstance occurred which might have turned the whole current of his life. A proposal was made to him by the electors to come forward as candidate for the representation of the University, and good grounds were given

22 TEMPTING PROPOSAL DECLINED. [CHAP. n.

him to expect a triumphant return. No higher token of esteem than this could have been offered to one without wealth or Irish connexion, and without the smallest claim upon the consideration of the University, except what his personal and academical character afforded. Such an offer it was not easy to reject, and he was, as he says at the time, " extremely agitated and pleased by it." He weighed the pleasure, the distinction, the influence promised by the political career thus unexpectedly opened before him ; and he set against these considerations the duties which his approaching marriage would bring upon him. Pru- dence prevailed, and he declined the proposal. His friend Mr. North writes to him : —

" I think all hearts would have been in your favour, if you had made your appearance — and still they cannot convince themselves that you intend to go boldly through with your resolution — 4 Come then, my guide, my genius, come along.' You were mistaken in thinking fortune (in one sense) a necessary qualification ; there is an honourable excep- tion for the Universities."

Mr. Buxton, however, had come to a deliberate decision, and it was not to be shaken. He reached England at the end of April, and in the following month his marriage took place.

In one of his papers he thus alludes to the closing circum- stances of his academical career : —

" On May 13, 1807, I obtained the object of my long attachment — having refused, in consequence of the prospect of this marriage, a most honourable token of the esteem of the University of Dublin. The prospect was indeed flattering to youthful ambition — to become a mem- ber of Parliament, and my constituents men of thought and education, and honour and principle — my companions, my competitors — those who had known me and observed me for years.

': I feel now a pride in recollecting that it was from these men I received this mark of approbation — from men with whom I had no family alliance, not even the natural connexion of compatriotism, and without high birth or splendid fortune or numerous connexions to recommend me. I suspended my determination for one dav. In my friends, who were astonished at the appearance of a doubt, am), having closely considered all points, I determined to decline the in- tended honour ; and from that day to this, thanks to God, I have never lamented the determination."

1807.] ENTERS TRUMAN'S BREWERY. 23

CHAPTER III. 1807—1812.

Enters Truman's Brewery — Occupations in London — Letter from Mr. Twiss — Correspondence — Death of Edward Buxton — Exertions in the Brewery.

THE first few months of Mr. Buxton's married life were passed at a small cottage close to his grandmother's seat at Bellfield, and in the neighbourhood of his mother, who had contracted a second marriage with Mr. Edmund Henning, and had left Essex to reside at Weymouth.

His expectations of wealth had been disappointed, and he found that his fortunes must depend upon his own exertions. After deliberate consideration, he relinquished the idea of following the profession of the law, and entered into negotiations in differ- ent quarters, with a view to establishing himself in business. For a while these were unsuccessful, and during this time he suffered severely from the pain of present inaction, and the obscurity that rested on the future. In after life, when refer- ring to this period, he said, " I longed for any employment that would produce me a hundred a year, if I had to work twelve hours a day for it." Nearly a year passed away before his anxieties were brought to a conclusion. The winter was spent at Earlham, where his first child was born. Soon afterwards, in a letter to his wife from London, he says, " I slept at Brick Lane ; my uncles Sampson and Osgood Hanbury were there, and revived my old feelings of good nephewship, they treated me so kindly. This morning I met Mr. Randall and your father. I think that I shall become a Blackwell Hall factor."

This intention was prevented by an unexpected turn in his fortunes, resulting from his friendly interview with his uncles. Within a few days Mr. Sampson Hanbury, of Truman's Brewery in Spitalfields, offered him a situation in that establishment, with

24 NETLEY ABBEY. [CHAP. in.

a prospect of becoming a partner after three years' probation. He joyfully acceded to the proposal, and entered with great ardour upon his new sphere of action. He writes, July, 1808, to his mother, " I was up this morning at four, and do not expect to finish my day's work before twelve to-night — my excuse for silence. I have not neglected your business." At the close of the year he succeeded Mr. Hanbury in the occupa- tion of a house connected with the brewery, in which he con- tinued to reside for several years.

During these years his correspondence was not extensive. Among the few letters which have been preserved is the follow- ing, addressed to his wife, who had accompanied one of her brothers to the Isle of Wight. Mr. Buxtoa had arranged to join them there ; but on arriving at Southampton, he found that all communication with the island was interdicted on account of the secret expedition then about to sail from Cowes, as it after- wards proved, to Walcheren.

"Southampton, June 15, 1809.

" Now that I have finished my coffee, I think I cannot employ my time more profitably or more pleasantly than in sending a few lines to you. I am afraid the embargo has been a great trouble to you. It was so to me when I first arrived, as the idea of spending some time with your party was particularly pleasant ; however, either by the aid of ' divine philosophy,' or from finding that the misfortune was irremedi- able, in a short time I was reconciled to my fate, and began to consider how best to enjoy what was within my reach. As I could not have the living companions that I most wished for, I went to a bookseller's shop to endeavour to find some agreeable dead ones, and having made choice of ' Tristram Shandy ' and a ' Patriot King,' I proceeded in their honourable company to the water side, took a boat, and went oft' to Netlcy Abbey. I thoroughly enjoyed this excursion. First I went all over the interior, and then walked leisurely round it at some distance, stopping and reading at every scene that I particularly liked. Then I went up into the wood, to a spot which seems to have been formed lor a dining-room. While the boatman was at dinner, I went over into the next field to a higher ground. I hope this did not escape you. The four ivy-covered broken towers just below, a party dining on the grass- plat, the intermediate distance of trees, and the sea behind, made it, I think, the finest view I ever saw. 1 only hope you have sketched it ; and, next to it, I should wish for a drawing of the nearest window from the inside — I mean the one that is tolerably perfect, with a great deal

1809—1811.] CORRESPONDENCE. 25

of ivy over the middle pillar. I had a pleasant row home, and have since been thinking about your party with the greau-st pleasure; and, ainonnst other thoughts connected with you, it has forcibly struck mo how beneficial it is sometimes to be amongst strangers, it gives such a taste and a relish for the society of those one loves."

TO MRS. HKN.MM;.

" December 3, 1809.

" My dear Mother, — I am very much obliged to you for your letter, which furnished me with several useful hints, though not upon the par- ticular subject on which I wanted information.

" As to the general propriety and duty of introducing Christianity into India, there cannot be, I imagine, a question ; but is this the pro- per season? is not our empire in India too unstable to authorize such an experiment? In short I wished to determine its political propriety, to examine it with the eye of a statesman, not of a Christian, and to in- quire, not what Fenelon, but what Machiavel would have said of it. The result which I have come to is, that it would be highly expedient, and perhaps the only measure which could reinstate our declining power in the East.

" Your letter shows powers of which I may make eminent use, but observe, I must qualify this praise by saying that it wanted method throughout the whole, and greater pains bestowed upon the parts.

" The Poor Laws is the next question I shall consider, and I expect great assistance from you. The only restrictions that I would suggest are a parsimoniousness of Scripture quotations, and a care against negli- gence in the dress of the parts, for, after all, appearance and style are more than matter ; a diamond is but a dirty pebble till it is polished. Virgil and his translator Trap only differed as to dress. The images, the incident", the characters are the same in both, yet the one is the best poem in the Latin language, and the other perhaps the worst in the English."

TO MRS. BUXTOST.

" July 14, 1811.

" I hope to take a long walk with , whose company is a great

treat to me. I agree with you that he is a striking instance of the su- periority of a domestic religious education. To be sure, to please my fancy, 1 should like a more robustious son ; but I should be most happy

to insure to my boy 's principle, and I would willingly resign all

those sterner and more manly qualities which from inclination I am apt to wish."

Although, during his term of probation at the brewer)-, he was closely occupied iu making himself master of his new vocation,

26 THE ACADEMICS. [CHAP. in.

he yet found time for the study of English literature, and espe- cially of political economy. " My maxims are," he writes, " never to begin a book without finishing it ; never to consider it finished till I know it; and to study with a whole mind." He admitted, in after-life, that even at this early period he had in- dulged a distant idea of entering Parliament ; and, in consequence of tliis, he continued to practise the art of public speaking in a debating club of which he was a member.

" I must tell you," he writes to Mr. North, December, 1810, " of a signal reformation which has taken place. I have become again a hard reader, and of sterling books. In spite of your marriage cause, I hold myself your equal in Blackstone and in Montesquieu, and your superior in Bacon, parts of whom I have read with Mallettian avidity. I have not been much at ' The Academics,' but it goes on famously ; your me- mory is held in the highest estimation — even our oracle Twiss speaks well of you. Grant and Bowdler are, I fear, gone from us."

His former schoolfellow, Mr. Horace Twiss, thus describes meeting him at this time: —

" We had been at school together at the celebrated Dr. Burney's, of Greenwich, and were very intimate.

" Buxton was then, as in after-life, extraordinarily tall, and was called by his playfellows ' Elephant Buxton.' He was at that time, as after- wards, like the animal he was called from, of a kind and gentle nature ; but he did not then exhibit any symptoms of the elephantine talent he afterwards evinced.

" I myself very often did his Latin lessons for him ; and, as he was somewhat older and much bigger than I was, I found him, in many respects, a valuable ally. When I was about twenty, I became a mem- ber of ' The Academics,' a society in London (like the ' Historical ' in Dublin, and the 'Speculative' in Edinburgh), where the topics of the day were debated. There I heard, on my first or second evening of attendance, a speech of great ability from a man of great stature : and I should have been assured it was my old schoolfellow I saw before me, but that I could not suppose it possible so dull a boy could have become so clever a man. He it was, however; and I renewed my friendly in- tercourse with him, both at the society and in private.

" Our c/ntms were- poor North, afterwards distinguished in Par- liament and at the Irish bar, who died at between forty and fifty; and Henry, the younger son of the great Grattan. We afterwards sat all together in the House of Commons, with some others of our fel-

1810-] WILLIAM ALLEN. 27

low-academic*, the two Grants and Spring Rice. Horner had been an academic, but he was before our time. Of late years, Buxton was chiefly resident in Norfolk, but our mutual goodwill continued to the last."

From childhood the duty of active benevolence had been im- pressed on him by his mother, who used to set before him the idea of taking up some great cause by which he might promote the happiness of man. On beginning to live in London he at once sought opportunities of usefulness, and in this pursuit he received great assistance from an acquaintance, which ripened into friendship, with the Quaker philosopher and philanthropist, William Allen. This good man had long been engaged upon objects of enlightened benevolence, and by him Mr. Buxton was from time to time initiated into some of those questions to which his after-life was devoted.

One of the most important of these had already dawned upon him. He writes to Mrs. Buxton, Dec. 1808: —

"I have one reason for wishing to remain in town, which is, that I am going to become a member of a small society, now instituting, for the purpose of calling the public mind to the bad effects and inefficiency of capital punishments."

And at a subsequent period he says —

" From the time of my connexion with the Brewery in 1808 to 1816, I took a part in all the charitable objects of that distressed district, more especially those connected with education, the Bible Society, and the deep sufferings of the weavers."

All these labours he shared with his brother-in-law, Mr. Samuel Hoare, of Hampstead, between whom and himself there existed then, and through life, a friendship and close fellowship, far beyond what usually results from such a connexion. With them was also linked his own brother Charles, who was resident in London, and was. the favourite companion of both.

Although Mr. Buxton was a member of the Established Church, circumstances had cherished in him a strong attachment to the Society of Friends, and to their silent mode of worship. He frequently spent the Sunday under the roof of Mr. and Mrs. Fry, at Plashet in Essex ; and even when at home, from the time of his marriage up to the year 1811, he generally attended

28 CORRESPONDENCE. [CHAP. in.

a Friends' Meeting. In a letter written on Sunday, Oct. 22nd, 1809, he mentions that he had been reading the fifth chapter of St. Matthew, "as a subject for reflection at Meeting," and adds, —

" I think I almost always have a good meeting when I read before it, without any intermediate occupation of mind. It was a great pleasure to me to be able to engage myself so thoroughly when there, as I had begun to think that I was rather going back in that respect. The verse that principally led me on to a train of thought was that ' Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.' This text is always very striking to me. It is so serious a thing to be only on a par with the generality of those you see around you. This evening I have been thinking what I can do for the poor this winter. I feel that I have as yet done far short of what I ought and what I wish to do."

TO MRS. BUXTON.

" September 23, 1810.

" I have passed a very quiet and industrious week, up early, breakfast at eight o'clock, dinner near six, and the evenings to myself, which have iji'cn well employed over my favourite Blackstone. I read him till near ten last night, and then Jeremy Taylor till past eleven, and could hardly give him up, he was so very entertaining a companion. * * * This morning'I went to Gracechurch Street meeting. I was rather late, which made me feel hurried, and prevented my having sufficient time to myself before meeting: however, I had made a little use of my friend Jeremy at breakfast, and this and last night's readings gave me occupa- tion for my thoughts. I saw William Allen, who wants me to call upon him to-morrow, as he says he has found a place for the boys' school as suitable as if we were to build one. This, 1 know, will please you, but will alarm you also, lest we should forget the girls.

" And now you will expect to hear something about my return. I must tell you that you cannot be in a greater hurry for me to come to Earlham than I am to get there ; for I do not think I have lately onjiij, cil anything so much as the time I spent there, and I hold it to be quite a treasure and a blessing to have such brothers and sisters ; I hope and believe, too, that it may be as useful as it is agreeable. Still I do not ft-el altogether confident that the stimulus which they have given me will lx> of any duration; for it is not inducements to do our duty that we «<• luivc already in abundance. They are, indeed, so many and so various, that, if we were only as prudent and as rational with re-

1811.] DEATH OF EDWARD BUXTON. 29

gard to our future, as we are to our present, none would utterly want religion but those who utterly wanted sense."

It has been mentioned that Mr. Buxton was the eldest of three sons. Edward North, the third brother, a wayward lad, had been sent to sea as a midshipman in an East Indiaman, com- manded by his relative Captain Dumbleton ; but in his first voyage he left his ship and entered the king's service. From that time his family had received no tidings of him, and by de- grees they became impressed with the painful conviction that he had died at sea. The suspense of five years was at last brought to an end by the arrival of a letter to Mr. Buxton from one of his brother's shipmates, announcing that he had arrived, in a dying state, at Gosport, and was earnestly desirous to see some of his relations. He had been attacked by dysentery while on board ship at Bombay ; and, feeling that his days were num- bered, he became intensely anxious to reach home once more.

Te hastened to England in the first ship by which he could obtain a passage ; and, on his arrival at Gosport, was carried to Haslar Hospital, whence he despatched a letter to his mother. This letter was unfortunately delayed, in consequence of its laving been directed to the house at Earl's Colne, which had )een parted with some years before, and the unhappy youth — he was only nineteen — in the morbid state of his feelings, became so strongly impressed by a sense of his neglect in never having communicated with his friends, that he felt persuaded they would low refuse to acknowledge him. A second letter, in which he )esou£jht that some one of the family would consent to visit him on his death-bed, reached Mr. Buxton, and in two hours he and

lis brother Charles were on the road to Gosport, which they ached on the following morning. With mingled emotions of lope and fear they set out for the hospital. Having been directed a large ward full of the sick and dying, they walked through the room without being able to discover the object of their irch ; till at length they were struck by the earnestness with

finch an emaciated youth upon one of the sick-beds was gazing at them. On their approaching his bedside, although he could scarcely articulate a word, his face was lit up with an expression of delight that sufficiently showed that he recognised them : but

30 DEATH OF EDWARD BUXTON. [CHAP. in.

it was not for some moments that they could trace in his haggard features the lineaments of their long-lost brother. A few days afterwards Mr. Buxton writes —

" Gosport, August 10, 1811.

11 It is pleasant to be with Edward, he seems so happy in the idea of having his friends about him. This morning I thought him strong enough to hear part of a chapter in St. Luke on prayer, and the 20th Psalm. Charles then went away, and I mentioned to him how appli- cable some of the passages were to his state ; he said he felt them so, and that he had been very unfortunate in having been on board ship where religion is so neglected; that he had procured a Bible, and one of his friends had sometimes read to him, but not so often as he wished. That he had hoped and prayed that he might reach England, more that he might confess his sins to me than for any other reason ; that, suppos- ing at length that there was next to no chance of this, he had dictated a letter to me upon the subject, which is now in his box. When I told him, that, as his illness had brought him into such a frame of mind, it was impossible for me to regret it, let the event be what it would, he said he considered it as a mercy now, but that nobody could tell what his sufferings had been. I then entered into a kind of short history of what I considered to be inculcated in the Testament, ' that Christ came to call sinners to repentance.' He felt consolation from this ; but again said that he had been indeed a sinner. I then told him that I hoped he did not ever omit to pray for assistance, and I added that Charles and I had joined in prayer for him last night. He seemed so much affected by this that I did not think it right to press the conversation farther. Does not all this furnish a striking proof how our sorrows may be con- verted into joys ? I can look upon his illness in no other light than as a most merciful dispensation. It is most affectingly delightful to see his lowliness of mind, and his gratitude to all of us. I cannot help thinking that his mind is more changed than his body."

The letter above referred to, which was found in Edward Buxton's sea chest, was as follows : —

' "H. M. S. ' Chiiionne.'

" My dearest Brother, — As this is the last letter you will ever receive from me, as I am now on my death-bed, I write to you to com- fort as much as you can my dearest mother and my dearest brother and sisters. As I have been sick and in misery a very long while, it will be caM!iLr me taking me from this troublesome world. I was on my \ to Europe, as only a cold climate could have cured me ; but God, whose will be done, has ordained that I should not see England, though I

1811.] DEATH OF EDWARD BUXTON. 31

should have died infinitely happier had I seen my dearest mother, Anna, and you, to have got your forgiveness for the irregularities I have carried on ; yet I feel you forgive me ; and though I have been a very great sinner for the small number of years I have lived, I die with the hope of being saved, by what I had been led to believe, and now wish I had much more followed, through Jesus Chiist.

11 Don't let the news of my death cast any of you down, as we all know it is a thing we must all come to ; and as you are the eldest and sup[H>rt of the family, comfort the rest as much as you can, not forget- ting to remember me to your dear wife. I have often thought of her kindness to me at Norwich before your marriage. And don't forget poor Abraham Plastow and Betty ; tell them I thought of them in my last.

" I can't say any more. The bearer of this, Mr. Yeates, is a truly good-hearted young man, and has been extremely kind to me while I have been sick, and while I was in the Bombay hospital. He will give you my pay and prize certificate, which you can get paid for at Somerset House ; and any other information concerning me you want, as I am too weak to write more. Adieu to you all.

" EDWARD N. BUXTON."

For about a fortnight after his brothers reached him the youno- midshipman survived. He had the comfort, so earnestly desired, of being nursed by his mother and of seeing once more his whole family.

" When he was told by Charles that I was come," writes his eldest sister, " he clasped his hands and gave thanks, but desired not to see me till he was composed; a tear or two that appeared he wiped off with his arm. He is so reduced and altered that I should not have had the least idea that it was he : neither in his hair, eyes, nor voice can you trace a resemblance. He looks the skeleton of a fine young man, handsomer than Edward was, as tall as his brothers, and of a dark complexion. He has had much satisfactory conversation with Fowell, lamenting that he had not followed his advice, and expressing that he had been enabled to pray much in coming over. Fowell read to him in the Bible yesterday. He was much affected, but comforted by it, saying he did not deserve to be so attended by his friends ; and to-day he said to my mother that it was a sign to him that he was partly forgiven, that his prayers were heard to see his friends again, and obtain their forgiveness. His mind is remarkably clear; indeed Fowell seemed not to know before how strong it was, or what serious feelings he had."

Edward North Buxton died at Haslar Hospital on the 25th of

32 EXERTIONS IN THE BREWERY. [CHAP. in.

August, 1811. His last words were addressed to his mother, saying that he was prepared for death ; that the prospect of it did not appear now to him what it had done formerly ; adding, with a remarkable expression of countenance, that " he hoped God would soon be so very kind as to take him."

His sister Sarah, in describing the solemn, and yet peaceful, meeting round the death-bed of the returned wanderer, thus mentions her eldest brother : — " Fowell, the head of our family, is a strong support ; and when religious consolation was so much wanted, he seemed most ready to afford it. The power of his influence we deeply felt : it was by far the most striking feature in the past remarkable month."

In 1811 Mr. Buxton was admitted as a partner in the brewery ; and during the ensuing seven years he was almost exclusively devoted to his business. Soon after his admission, his senior partners, struck by his energy and force of mind, placed in his hands the difficult and responsible task of remodel- ling their whole system of management. It would be superfluous to enter into the details of his proceedings, though, perhaps, he never displayed greater vigour and 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 M'ith the difficulties that beset him on all sides.

One of the principal clerks was an honest man. and a valuable servant ; but he was wedded to the old system, and viewed with great antipathy the young partner's proposed innovations. At length, on one occasion, he went so far as to thwart Mr. Bnx- ton's plans. The latter took no notice of this at the time, except desiring him to attend in the counting-house at 6 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 unexpected decision, the clerk yielded entirely; he promised complete submission for the future; lie made his wife intercede for him ; and Mr. Buxton, who valued his character and services, was induced to restore him to his

181 l.J EXERTIONS IN THE BREWERY. 33

place. They afterwards became very good friends, and the salutary effect of the changes introduced by Mr. Buxton was at length admitted by his leading opponent ; nor, except in one instance, did he ever contend against them again. On that occasion Mr. Buxton merely sent him a message " that he had better meet him in the counting-house at 6 o'clock the next morning," — and the book-keeper's opposition was heard of no more.

We may add, that, among other points wanting reform, he found that the men employed were in many instances wholly uneducated. To the remedy of this evil he took a more direct road than exhortation or advice. He called them together, and simply said to them, "This day six weeks I shall discharge every man who cannot read and write." He provided them a schoolmaster and means of learning, and on the appointed day held an examination. Such had been the earnestness to learn, that not one man was dismissed.

He was also very careful to prevent any work from being done in the brewery on the Sunday, and the strict observance of it which he introduced has been thoroughly maintained up to the present time.

The success which crowned Mr. Buxton's exertions in business materially paved his way to public life. He was gradually relieved from the necessity of attending in person to the details of its management, although he continued throughout his life to take a part in the general superintendence of the concern.

34 FIRST SPEECH IN PUBLIC. [CHAP. iv.

CHAPTER IV.

1812—1816.

First Speech in Public — The Rev. Josiah Pratt — Increasing regard to Religion — Dangerous Illness — Its Effect on his Mind, — Removes to Hampstead — Disappointments and Anxieties — Reflections — Narrow Escape — Letter to Mr. J. J. Gnrney.

MR. Buxro'N was, of course, closely bound to his London avo- cations ; but almost every autumn he spent some weeks at Earl- ham, enjoying the recreation of shooting, in company with Mr. Samuel Hoare. It was during one of these visits that he first addressed a public meeting. His brother-in-law, Mr. Joseph John Gurney, in September, 1812, insisted that for once he should leave his sport, and give his aid in the second meeting of the Norwich Auxiliary Bible Society, at which Mr. Coke and other county gentlemen were present.

His speech on that occasion is thus alluded to by Mr. J. J. Gurney* : —

" There are many who can still remember the remarkable effect pro- duced, in one of the earliest public meetings of the Norfolk and Nor- wich Auxiliary Bible Society, more than thirty years ago, by one of his speeches, distinguished for its acutencss and good sense, as well as for the Christian temper in which it was delivered. His commanding per- son, f his benevolent and highly intellectual expression of countenance, his full-toned voice, together with his manly yet playful eloquence, electrified the assembly, and many were those on that day who rejoiced that so noble and just a cause had obtained so strenuous and able an advocate."

Some indications have been already given of the increasing power of religious principle in Mr. Buxton's mind ; but he had

* ' Brief Memoir.' Fletcher, 1845.

t Mr. Buxton was upwards of six feet four inches in height; but his powerful frame and broad chest rendered his height less apparent.

1812.] THE REV. JOSIAH PRATT. 35

not yet been fully brought under its influence, nor had he acquired clear views as to some of the fundamental truths of Christianity. In 1811 he mentions that during a visit to Lynn he had met his friends the Rev. Edward Edwards and the Rev. Robert Hankinson, who recommended him to attend the ministry of the Rev. Josiah Pratt, in Wheeler Street Chapel, Spitalfields ; and to the preaching of that excellent clergyman he attributed, with the liveliest gratitude, his first real acquaintance with the doctrines of Christianity. lie himself says — " It was much and of vast moment that I there learned from Mr. Pratt." — lie wrote to Mr. Pratt thirty years afterwards, " Whatever I have done in my life for Africa, the seeds of it were sown in my heart in Wheeler Street Chapel."

With him, indeed, there was no sudden change, as in many men of well-known piety. Both nature and education had tended to prepare him for religion. His mind, ever disposed (in Bacon's words) to " prefer things of substance before things of show" — with a strong love for truth, and susceptible of deep feeling — afforded, perhaps, a fit soil for the reception of those truths, which at length struck deep root there. On the other hand, he regarded his tendency to become wholly absorbed in the work before him as a great bar to his progress in higher things. Thus he writes to one of his relatives at Earlham : —

" Hampstead, March 21, 1812.

" I had determined, before I received your last letter, to thank you,

dear C , myself, for much pleasure, and I think a little profit (much

less than it ought to have been), in observing the progress of your mind. It docs indeed give me real joy to see you and others of your family striving in your race with such full purpose of heart ; and the further I feel left behind — the more I feel engaged in other pursuits — so much the more I admire and love the excellence which I hardly endeavour to reach, and so much the more I perceive the infinite supe- riority of your objects over mine.

" When I contrast your pursuits with my pursuits, and your life with my life, I always feel the comparison a wholesome and a humiliating lesson, and it makes me see the ends for which I labour in their proper light ; and my heart is ready to confess, that ' Thou hast chosen the good part, which shall not be taken from thee.' How is it, then, with this contrast constantly staring me in the face whenever I think se- riously, that it has no effect, or next to none, on my practice ? I see the

D 2

36 INCREASING REGARD TO RELIGION. [CHAP. iv.

excellence of the walk you have chosen, and the madness of dedicating myself to anything but to the preparation of that journey which I must so shortly take. I know that if success shall crown all my projects, I shall gain that which will never satisfy me, ' that which is not bread.' I know the poverty of our most darling schemes — the meanness of our most delicious prospects — the transitoriness of our most durable posses- sions— when weighed against that fulness of joy and eternity of bliss which are the reward of those who seek them aright. All this I see with the utmost certainty — that two and two make four is not clearer ; how is it, then, that with these speculative opinions, my practical ones are so entirely different ? I am irritable about trifles, eager after plea- sures, and anxious about business : various objects of this kind engross mv attention at all times : they pursue me even to Meeting and to Church, and seem to grudge the few moments which are devoted to higher considerations, and strive to bring back to the temple of the Lord the sellers, and the buyers, and the money-changers. My reason tells me that these things are utterly indifferent; but my practice says that they only are worthy of thought and attention. My practice says, ' Thou art increased with goods, and hast need of nothing ;' but my reason teaches me, ' Thou art wretched and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.'

. ..." I have in this letter divulged the train of thinking which

is constantly recurring to my mind If I have said too much

in any part of it, I am sure I do not go beyond the truth in saying, that hardly anything comes so near my heart as my love for my sweet sisters."

The period had now arrived from which may be dated that ascendency of religion over his mind which gave shape and colouring to the whole of his after life.

In the commencement of the year 1813 he was visited by an illness which brought him to the brink of the grave. How momentous an era he felt this to have been, we may learn from the following paper, written after his recovery : —

"February 7, 1813.

" After so severe an illness as that with which I have lately been visited, it may be advantageous to record the most material circumstances at- tendant upon it. May my bodily weakness, and the suddenness with which it came, remind me of the uncertainty of life ; and may the great and immediate mercy, bestowed upon me spiritually, be a continual me- morial that ' the Lord is full of compassion and long suffering,' and ' a very present help in trouble!'

" I was seized with a bilious fever in January. When I first felt myself unwell, I prayed that I might have a dangerous illness, provided

1813.] DANGEROUS ILLNESS. 37

that illness might bring me nearer to my God. I gradually grew worse • and when the disorder had assumed an appearance very alarming to those about me, I spent nearly an hour in most fervent prayer. I have been, for some years, perplexed with doubts ; I do not know if they did not arise more from the fear of doubting than from any other cause. The object of my prayer was, that this perplexity might be removed ; and the next day, when I set about examining my mind, I found that it was entirely removed, and that it was replaced by a degree of certain con- viction, totally different from anything I had before experienced. It would be difficult to express the satisfaction and joy which I derived from this alteration. ' Now know I that my Redeemer liveth ' was the sentiment uppermost in my mind, and in the merits of that Redeemer I felt a confidence that made me look on the prospect of death with j)er- fect indifference. No one action of my life presented itself with any sort of consolation. I knew that by myself I stood justly condemned ; but I felt released from the penalties of sin by the blood of our sacrifice. In Him was all my trust.

" My dear wife gave me great pleasure by repeating this text — ' This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.' Once or twice only I felt some doubt whether I did not deceive myself, arguing in this manner: — ' How is it that I, who have passed so unguarded a life, and who have to lament so many sins, and especially so much carelessness in religion — how is it that I feel at once satisfied and secure in the acceptance of my Saviour ?' But I soon was led to better thoughts. Canst thou pre- tend to limit the mercies of the Most High ? ' His thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor his ways as our ways.' He giveth to the labourer of an hour as much as to him who has borne the heat of the day. These were my reflections, and they made me easy."

When the medical gentleman who attended him observed that he must be in low spirits, " Very far from it," he replied : " I feel a joyfulness at heart which would enable me to go through any pain." " From faith in Christ?" he was asked. " Yes, from faith in Christ " was his reply ; and, mentioning the clear view he now had of Christ being his Redeemer, he said, " It is an inexpressible favour, beyond my deserts. What have I done all my life long? Nothing, nothing, that did God service, and for me to have such mercy shown ! My hope," he added, " is to be received as one of Christ's flock, to enter heaven as a little child." A day or two afterwards he said, " I shall never again pass negligently over that passage in the Prayer Book, ' We

38 ITS EFFECT ON HIS MIND. [CHAP. iv.

bless thee . . . for tliiffe inestimable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ;'" and he broke forth into thanksgiving for the mercy, " the unbounded, the unmerited love," displayed towards him, in having the Christian doctrine brought home to his heart. When Mr. S. Hoare entered the room where he lay, Mr. Buxton fixed his eyes upon him and em- phatically said, " Sam ! I only wish you were as ill as I am !" When he recovered, he explained that he so greatly felt the effect upon his own mind, that he could not but wish his com- panion to share in the advantage. Again and again he declared how glad and thankful he was for his illness, and, at the same time, how anxious he felt lest the impression it had made upon him should become effaced.

After his recovery he thus writes to Earlham : —

" Perhaps you might think that your letters were not sufficiently valued by me if they remained unnoticed ; they were both truly wel- come, especially where they described your feelings at the prospect of the termination (I earnestly hope only the earthly termination) of our long and faithful union. My wife tells me that she said in her letter that I mentioned you all in my illness. This was but a languid de- scription of the extent and force of love I felt towards you, and of gra- titude to you, to whom I owe so great a portion of all that has been pleasant to me in my past life, and perhaps much of that which was

consolatory to me at that awful but happy period. C calls it a

chastisement, but I never felt it as such. I looked upon it when I was at the worst (and have not yet ceased to do so) as a gift, and a blessing, and the choicest of my possessions. When I was too weak to move or speak, my mind and heart were at full work on these meditations, and my only lamentation was that I could not feel sufficiently glad or grate- ful for the mercy, as unbounded as unmerited, which I experienced. This mercy was, to know the sins of my past life, that the best actions of it were but dust and ashes, and good for nothing ; that, by the righteous doom of the law, I stood convicted and condemned ; but that full and sufficient satisfaction had already been made by Him who came to save sinners ; and such was the case and confidence with which this conviction inspired me, that death was not attended \\ith a terror."

Fifteen years afterwards * he thus refers to the impressions made upon his mind during this illness. " It was then," he says, "that some clouds in my mind wore dispersed : and from

* Cromer, 1828.

1813.] BIBLE SOCIETY. 39

that day to this, whatever reason I may have had to distrust my own salvation, I have never been harassed by a doubt respecting our revealed religion." As his health and strength returned, he engaged with increased earnestness in supporting various bene- volent societies, especially the Bible Society ; and his common- place books during the years 1813 — 1816 are chiefly filled with memoranda on this subject. He came prominently forward in the controversy between the supporters of the Bible Society and those who united with Dr. Marsh * in opposing it.

These occupations filled up the short intervals of leisure afforded by his close attention to business ; and while he con- tinued to reside at the brewery few events occurred to vary his life. Some glimpses into the state of his mind are given in the

following letters : —

" Spitalfields, December 25, 1813.

" * * * I have often observed the advantage of having some fixed settling time in pecuniary affairs. It gives an opportunity of ascertaining the balance of losses and gains, and of seeing where we have succeeded and where failed, and what errors or neglects have caused the failure.

" Now, I thought, why not balance the mind in the same way — observe our progress, and trace to their source our mistakes and over- sights ? And what better time for this than Christmas-day followed by Sunday ? And what better employment of those days ? So it was fixed ; and consequently I refused invitation after invitation — to Upton, Doughty Street, Plashet, Hampstead, Coggeshall, and Clifton. And now for a history of my day. After breakfast I read, attentively, the 1st of St. Peter, with some degree of that spirit with which I always wish to study the Scriptures. To me, at least, the Scriptures are nothing without prayer ; and it is sometimes surprising to me what beauties they unfold, how much even of worldly wisdom they contain, and how they are stamped with the clear impression of truth, when read under any portion of this influence ; and without it how unmoving they appear.

" I also read Cooper's first Practical Sermon, the text — ' What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul ? ' This is a subject which, of all others of the kind, most frequently engages my thoughts. * Well, I went to church :

we had one of Mr. Pratt's best sermons, and I stayed the Communion. I could not but feel grateful to see so many persons who at least had

* Afterwards Bishop of Peterborough,

40 REFLECTIONS ON CHRISTMAS DAY. [CHAP. iv.

some serious thoughts of religion — especially that Charles and his wife were of the number, and I may 'add, that I was also. I am not so ignorant of myself as to think that I have made any suitable advances. No. Every day's experience is a sufficient antidote against any such flattering delusion ; for every day I see, and have reason to condemn, the folly, the insanity which immerses me — the whole of my mind and powers — in so trifling a portion of their interest as this world contains. But yet I feel it an inestimable blessing to have been conducted to the precincts and the threshold of truth, and to have some desires, vague and ineffectual as they are, after better things.

" In the evening I sat down, in a business-like manner, to my mental account. In casting up the incidental blessings of the year, I found none to compare with my illness : it gave such a life, such a reality and nearness, to my prospects of futurity ; it told me, in language so con- clusive and intelligible, that here is not my abiding city. It expounded so powerfully the Scriptural doctrine of Atonement, by showing what the award of my fate must be, if it depended upon my own merits, and what that love is which offers to avert condemnation by the merits of another : in short, my sickness has been a source of happiness to me in every way."

In the autumn of the following year he again alludes to that " one religious subject which most frequently engaged his thoughts." After speaking of the death of his early friend, John Gurney, as " a loss hardly admitting of consolation," he adds, —

" But it is surely from the shortness of our vision that we dwell so frequently on the loss of those who are dear to us. Are they gone to a better home ? Shall we follow them ? These are questions of millions and millions of centuries. The former is but a question of a few years. When I converse with these considerations, I cannot express what I think of the stupendous folly of myself and the rest of mankind. If the case could be so transposed, that our worldly busi- nesses and pleasures were to last for ever, and our religion were to produce effects only for a few years, then, indeed, our, at least my, dedication of heart to present concerns would be reasonable and prudent; then I might justify the many hours and anxious thoughts devoted to the former, and might say to the latter, ' The few inter- rupted moments and wandering, unfixed thoughts I spare you, are as much as your transitory nature deserves.' * * Alas !

alas ! how is it that as children of this world we are wiser than as children of light ? "

1815.] DISAPPOINTMENTS AND ANXIETIES. 41

In the summer of the year 1815 he removed from London to a house at North End, Hampstead, that his children, now four in number, might have the benefit of country air. The following extract is from his common-place book : —

" North End, Sunday, August 6, 1815.

"Being too unwell to go to church, I have spent the morning (with occasional wanderings in the fields) in reading and pondering upon the Bible ; viz. St. James's and St. John's epistles. How much sound wisdom and practical piety in the first, how devout and holy a spirit breathes through the second ! — the one exposing, with a master's hand, the infirmities, the temptations, and the delusions of man ; the other, evidencing the love he teaches, seems of too celestial a spirit to mingle much with human affairs, and perpetually reverts to the source of his consolation and hope : with him, Christ is all in all, the sum arid sub- stance of all his exhortations, the beginning and end of every chapter.

' ' I now sit down to recall some marked events which have lately happened. First then, Friday, July 7th, was an extraordinary clay to me. In the morning I ascertained that all the hopes we had indulged of large profits in business were false. We were sadly disappointed, for I went to town in the morning some thousands of pounds richer in my own estimation than I returned at night. This was my first trial ; next, about nine o'clock, a dreadful explosion of gunpowder took place in a house adjacent to the brewery ; eight lives were lost, and great damage done. For a long time it seemed beyond hope to expect to keep the fire from the premises. The morning changed me from affluence to competence, and the evening was likely to have converted competence into poverty.

" To finish all, at night my house was robbed. This, if we had heard it, might have seriously alarmed my wife, in her present delicate state of health. How easily can I bear the transitions of fortune, and see without murmuring, and even with cheerfulness, my golden hopes blighted ! but ' bitter indeed, and intimately keen,' would any wound be that affected her. I have often repeated these lines of Shakspeare : —

' Steep me in poverty to the very lips,

Give to captivity me and my utmost hopes,

I still can find in some part of my soul

A drop of patience —

But there, where I have garner'd up my heart,' &c.

" On the following Tuesday I went to Weymouth, and found the affairs of a friend, in whom I am sincerely interested, in a very bad state. This is to me a subject of much anxiety ; but on my return home I had another and a deeper trial. I found that it was necessary to in-

42 REFLECTIONS. ^ [CHAP. iv.

vestigate 's business, which seems involved in much difficulty.

These two events together have been very mortifying to me, but I have endeavoured to meet them with submissive fortitude. Yet I find that I can suffer my own misfortunes with comparative indifference, but cannot sit so easily under the misfortunes of those that are near to me ; but in this I hope to improve, and to be enabled to look upon trials, in what- ever form they appear, as visitations from the merciful hand of God. I hope my late uneasinesses have not been entirely thrown away upon me. They have brought me to feel the poverty and unsteadfastness of all human possessions, and to look upon life as a flower that falleth, while the grace and the fashion of it perisheth— as a vapour that ap- peareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. It has made me too (though still sadly deficient) more earnest and more frequent in my appeals and entreaties to God, that he would give me his wisdom to direct me, and his strength to support me ; and, above all, that he would emancipate my heart from the shackles of the flesh, and fix my hopes beyond all that is in the world, ' the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life.' Turn my heart to thee, O Lord ; make me to feel, daily and hourly to feel, as well as know — to act upon the per- suasion, as well as to be persuaded — that only in thee I can rest in peace, and only in thy service I can act with wisdom."

TO MRS. BUXTON, AT EARLHAM.

"Hampstead, Sunday, Oct. 29, 1815.

* * * u j have all the week set my mind on writing to you to- day, but this is not the only temptation that operates at present, for if I

have not your company I must have 's, who is in the next room

and seems very desirous of improving my Sunday by edifying converse on shooting. I ,have been quite comfortable since I returned to town, found things in tolerable order, and have been as busy as a bee. I do not know when I have had so many things of some importance to manage, or when I have spent my time in business more to my satisfac- tion. My rnind and heart have been instantly engaged in it, and I have thought as little of shooting, since I returned to business, as I did of business while I was shooting. I know you would not like the unset ile- ment of the plan I have in my head ; which is, after a few years, to live somewhere quiet in the country, and go to town for one week in a month. I think that with strict, unsparing rules, this is all that would bo nece.-- sary : the unscttlement would be no objection to me, for I do not find that change from one employment to another quite different produces it ; and I fancy that I could brew one hour, study mathematics the next, shoot the third, and read poetry the fourth, without allowing any one of

1815, 1816.] REFLECTIONS. 43

these pursuits to interfere with the others. This habit of full engage- ment of the mind lias 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 con- tinually,— 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 ! "

" Spitalfields, Nov. 1, 1815.

" I went this evening to a general meeting of the adult school. I was very much interested by it, and made a speech, which was received with shouts, nay, roars of applause ! The good that has already been done is quite extraordinary : exclusive of one hundred and fifty persons who have improved in reading, eighty-nine, who did not know their letters, can now read well. We had five exhibited, and their performance was grand ; but the effect upon their lives is still better than on their lite- rature. Then we had a variety of fine speeches. I do not much admire meetings of ladies and gentlemen, but the tradesmen speaking to the mechanics is a treat to me : first, it is so entertaining to hear them, such sublimity, such grandeur, such superfine images; one fine fellow harvested a rich crop of corn off a majestic oak, and the simile was received with a burst of applause. But if this is entertaining, the zeal and warmth with which they speak and act is very interesting ; and I really prefer their blundering heartiness to the cool and chaste per- formances of more erudite orators."

Writing in February, 1816, after being engaged at a distance from home in settling the affairs of some near connexions —

" So ends my history ; and I ought, and I do feel thankful that cir- cumstances have made me the instrument of doing some good, and communicating so much pleasure there. I found them all sad, and I believe they each felt that my visit had been a kind of blessing. So far, so good ; but do not imagine that I take the credit, or am elated at my own achievements. I have felt thankful to be the agent, but I do not forget that I am only the agent. I often wonder at the slow progress I have made of late years in religion, but in this one respect I feel differ- ent. I see the hand of a directing Providence in the events of life, the lesser as well as the greater; and this is of great importance to me, for the belief that your actions, if attempted aright, are guided and directed by superior wisdom, is to me one of the greatest inducements to prayer; and I do think that the little trials I have met with have materially contributed to produce with me a habit of prayer."

44 HIS RELIGIOUS CHARACTER, [CHAP. iv.

Long before that period, to which he, at least, referred his first real acquaintance with the truths of Christianity, the peculiar features of his disposition had been cast in strong and permanent relief; and the religious acts of his mind are deeply stamped with the fashion of its native character. It possessed one element which beyond all others gave shape to the development of his religious principles. This was his power of realising the conceptions of his mind and imagination with scarcely less force and vividness than that which realised external objects. Thus he grasped the idea of a future state, not "with a mere passive belief, but with a strong effective conviction, as a matter of fact of startling plain- ness, and which gave him to a remarkable degree a consciousness of the hollow vanity of all earthly pleasures and interests. But what chiefly marked his religious character was the absolute childlike confidence with which he clung to the guiding hand of his heavenly Father, wherever his path might lie. There was, in fact, no event in his life which he did not attribute to His immediate direction. " I do not want," he said, " to have religion proved to me : a superintending Providence is clear to demonstration. There is a proof of it," holding out his hand, and showing how perfect was its mechanism. This led to a con- stant habit of communicating his cares to his heavenly Father. " Prayer is throwing up the heart to God continually," he said, "not always using words, but casting- up the thoughts to Him. Everything leads me to prayer, and I always find it answered, both in little and great things." "When anticipating that a ma- terial improvement would take place in his circumstances, his prayers were constant and fervent that the proposed advantage should not be granted him, unless it would be good for him and his family. " If it be denied me," he observed, " I can only say and feel that I still thank God ; and if it is appointed for me, I am sure it will be safe and good. I am as easy to leave it as if it concerned only a 51. note." No one that ever attended his family prayers could avoid being struck by the intense earnest- ness with which he poured out his feelings upon his public under- takings before God. He spread the subject before Him, wrestling with Him in prayer for aid and guidance ; and though lie spared no exertions of his own, he always felt that God alone could give the increase. Nor when success had followed his efforts did he

1815, 1816.] TRUST IN PROVIDENCE. 45

forget Him from whom that success had been derived. Indeed, he habitually received the will of God, not only with submission, but thankfulness.

Again, and again, and again, in his papers of religious medi- tations, does he recur to the different events of his life, and trace with grateful pleasure the moulding hand of Providence. " The clusters of mercies received " are enumerated repeatedly in care- ful detail, and his appointment to the advocacy of the oppressed and neglected is always included as a source of deep thankfulness and wonder that such as he should have been permitted thus to labour in his Master's service. This strong reliance on the presiding care of God grew with him year by year, as his expe- rience widened, and he loved to count up the instances in which, as he firmly believed, he had seen the ways of himself and others directed by the hands of Providence to its own great ends. An unfinished paper detailing various providential escapes he had met with, refers, after alluding to many earlier ones, to one that oc- curred in the winter of 1815 : —

" 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 sur- vey a spot to which he was directing my attention ; his hat was on, I was uncovered : as soon as we had changed places, several bricks fell from the roof, and one struck his head ; his hat in some measure averted the blow, but he never recovered the injury, and died shortly afterwards of an oppression on the brain."

TO JOSEPH JOHN GURNET, ESQ.

"Hampstead, April 12, 1816.

" It is very true that I have been worried of late, but not about the Malt Tax, for that is only a question of profit, one that I could not re- gulate, and I find no disposition in my mind to regret what is irreme- diable. The thing which has given me uneasiness is the discovery of what I consider errors in the management of the department of the brewery which has fallen to me lately ; and these errors I am deter- mined to cure. Now this involves much labour — but labour I do not regard — and some anxiety, considering my inexperience upon many points connected with it ; but I cannot say that I have felt this much. The true cause of my disquietude arises from a certain feature in my own mind, which I can hardly describe ; a kind of unregulated ardour, in

46 LETTER TO MR. GURNEY. [CHAP. iv.

any pursuit which appears to me to be of great importance, which takes captive all my faculties, and binds them down to that pursuit, and will not let them or me rest till it is accomplished. I hate this ; it is so un- pleasant to wake, and to go to sleep, with your head full of vats and tubs ; and I disapprove it more than I hate it. No man, I think, can have more abstract conviction of the folly and futility of such engage- ment of heart upon objects so utterly trifling and undurable. I see that it is an infirmity: I deeply feel that it chokes the good seed, and is a most pernicious weed, and I feel 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 !

" If I cannot accomplish this, I wish we could divide it — I keep half for my business, and give you half for your book.f How can you, my dear brother, be languid and spiritless, with such a thing before you, and with such a capacity for doing it excellently ? Are you not ashamed that I should be more anxious about making porter than you are about making Christians? At it, my dear fellow! at it with vigour; but when you find your mind unsuited for it, write me another letter, for the last was a great pleasure to

" Your affectionate brother,

" T. F. BLXTOX."

* A " gyle " is the technical name for a brewing.

f On the ' Evidences of the Christian Religion.' See the Works of Joseph John Gurney.

1816.] ADVENTURE WITH A MAD DOG. -17

CHAPTER V.

1816, 1817.

Adventure with a Mad Dog — Distress in Spitalfields — Mr. Buxton's Speech — Letters — Establishment of Prison Discipline Society — Death of Charles Buxton — Journey on the Continent — Letters — Incident at the Brewery — Book on Prison Discipline.

AN incident which occurred during the summer of 1816 is thus mentioned by Mr. Buxton in a letter to his wife, who fortunately was absent at the time : —

"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 bite at least a dozen dogs, two boys, and a man.

" Of course I was exceedingly alarmed, being persuaded he was mad. I tried every effort to stop him or kill him, or to drive him into some outhouse, but in vain. At last he sprang up at a boy, and seized him by the breast; happily I was near him, and knocked him off with my whip. He then set off towards London, and I rode by his side, waiting for some opportunity of stopping him. I continually spoke to him, but he paid no regard to coaxing or scolding. You may suppose I was se- riously alarmed, dreading the immense mischief he might do, having seen him do so much in the few preceding minutes. I was terrified at the idea of his getting into Camden Town and London, and at length considering that, if ever there was an occasion that 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 struggled, but without effect, and I succeeded in securing him, without his biting me. He died yesterday, ravincr mad.

"Was there ever a more merciful escape? Think of the children being gone ! I feel it most seriously, but I cannot now write more fully.

48 ADVENTURE WITH A MAD DOG. [CHAP. v.

I have not been at all nervous about it, though certainly rather low, occasioned partly by this, and partly by some other things.

" I do not feel much fit for our Bible meeting on Wednesday — but I must exert myself.

" P.S. Write me word whether Fowell has any wound on his fingers, and if he has one made by the dog, let it be cut out immediately ; mind, these are my positive orders."

He afterwards mentioned some particulars which he had omitted in this hurried letter.

" When I seized the dog," he said, " 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 from his mouth in his furious efforts to bite me, might get into some scratch, and do me injury; so with great difficulty I held him with one hand while I put the other into my pocket and forced on my glove ; then I did the same with my other 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, carry- ing the dog by his neck. I was determined not to kill him, as I thought, if he should prove not to be mad, it would be a great 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 pitch- fork, 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 from the time he went mad."

He writes to his wife a day or two afterwards : —

" I shot all the dogs and drowned all the cats. The man and boys who were bitten are doing pretty well : their wounds were immediately attended to, cut, and burnt out.

1816.] DISTRESS IN SPITALFIELDS. 49

•• \Vliat a terrible business it was! You must not scold me for the risk I ran ; what I did I did from a conviction that it was my duty, and I never can think that an over cautious care of self in circumstances where your risk may preserve others is so great a virtue as you seem to think it. I do believe that if I had shrunk from the danger, and others had suffered in consequence, I should have felt more pain than I should have done had I received a bite.''

The winter of 1816 set in early, and with great severity ; the silk trade was almost stagnant, and the weavers in Spitalfields, always trembling on the brink of starvation, were plunged into the deepest misery. It was increased by the constant influx into the parish of the poorest class of London work-people, who could find no lodging elsewhere. A soup society had been long before established, but the distress far exceeded the means provided for its alleviation. Under these circumstances it was determined to hold a meeting on the subject at the Mansion House. Mr. Buxton and Mr. Samuel Hoare delayed their usual visit to Nor- folk, in order to explore and assist in relieving the sufferings of the Spitalfields poor.

TO MRS. BUXTON, AT EARLHAM.

" Spitalfields, Nov. 9, 1816.

" * * * S. Hoare and I came from Hampstead to attend a committee this morning, and afterwards visited the poor. The wretchedness was great indeed, but I felt most compassion for a poor old creature of eighty, living alone without a fire or blanket. She seemed quite be- wildered by the sight of silver ; her twilight of intellect was lost in grati- tude and amazement. Poor old thing ! that she, with all the infirmities of age, and without one earthly consolation, should look upon the prospect of a good meal as a cause of extravagant joy and real happiness, and that we, with the command of every comfort, in full strength, without a bodily want, should ever repine at trifling discomforts, is, I hope, a lesson. We are going to have a public meeting, and I trust a profitable one, for without a large supply of money we must suspend our opera- tions. George Kett sent me 50/. to-day."

" Spitalfields, November 22, 1816.

" I did not write to you yesterday because really I had not a moment's time ; the committees and my own business occupy every moment. I had a pleasant journey up to town. 1 had much upon my mind — our conversation about the eclipse. The vastness of the creation is indeed

E

50 MR. BUXTON'S SPEECH. [CHAP. v.

a subject for meditation. ' The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork.' ' When I consider the stars which thou hast made, and the heavens which are the work of thy hands, what is man that thou art mindful of him ?' How truly do these words describe the thoughts to which the vast spectacle of nature, especially the heavenly bodies, rolling in their appointed orbits, give rise ! What a sermon these are upon the mightiness of the Creator, and upon the insignificance of man ! and yet that we, who are truly dust and nothingness, should have the presumption to defy the power of the Almighty, to resist his commands, and to place our whole souls and hearts upon that which he tells us is but vanity ; this is (if nothing else were) a demonstration that the heart of man is ' deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.' On the other hand, that a Being so infinitely great should condescend to invite us to our duty, and to call that duty his service, proves as strongly that he has crowned us with loving kindness and tender mercy.

" I am well, and our proceedings about the poor prosper; — but oh, my speech ! When shall I be able to think of it ? I fear that I shall goto the meeting with it all in a jumble, and this would be wicked, as it would injure the good cause. I do try, I hope, not to mingle too much of self in my earnest desires for its success, and I am not forgetful of my usual resource in difficulty — prayer.

"I am now going to the workhouse. I shall reach Earlham on Tuesday. S. Hoare and Abraham Plastow will be with me, and I hope the latter will be treated with deserved distinction, as he was for the first twelve years of my life the dearest friend 1 had."

"November 27, 1816.

" Well, our meeting went off capitally. I felt very flat, and did not go through the topics I meant to touch upon, and upon the whole con- sidered it as a kind of failure ; but as I had entreated that what \vas best might be done, I did not feel at all disheartened, but, to my great surprise, all others took a very different sense of it.

" Tell dear Priscy I send her the ' Morning Chronicle,' that she may read Papa's speech, and I hope it will make her desirous of serving the poor."

A brief extract may be given from this speech. After men- tioning the causes which had produced, he says, " a degree, an expanse of distress utterly beyond my powers to describe," he continues —

" I could detain you till midnight with the scenes we have witnessed. From these rough minutes which I hold in my hand, taken on the spot,

1816.] MR. BUXTON'S SPEECH. 51

. ft .

in the very houses of the poor, drawn not from the fictions of a warm ima- gination, but from scenes of actual life — from the sad realities before us, I could disclose to you a faithful though a faint picture of such desperate calamity and unutterable ruin, that the heart must be stony indeed that did not sicken at the sight. First, I would lead you to the roof of a house hardly deserving the name of a garret; there sat three human beings, each seventy years of age — each with the ghastly lineaments of famine ; a few bricks were their only chair and their only table ; a little jof our soup their only provision ; a little straw and some shreds of an old coat their only bed ! Next, I would show you a family of nine ; the father disabled — the mother sickly— their furniture, their bed, their looms — every article of present use, the very implements of future labour, had been surrendered to the demands of hunger ! I will not exhaust your feelings by further recitals of what has met our eyes, but hasten to a larger topic.

" My Lord, I feel more and more that I cannot do justice to the dis- tress. I wish I could prevail upon you to see it with your own eyes. Come when you please, select almost your own street, almost your own house in that street, your own room in that house, and I undertake that in that room you will find a proof that our picture is faint and feeble. Come amongst us, and we will show you the father of a large family, whom we found in the act of pulling down his stove, to exchange it for food. The dread of future cold was less violent than the cravings of immediate hunger. Come by day, and we will lead you to a widow in the last stage of illness, yet — the only blanket of the dying wretch has been sent to procure bread ! Come by night, and we will show you the baskets and the sheds of our markets filled with these wretched crea- tures— there they find their nightly lodging, and there amongst its scraps and refuse they pick out their daily food. * * In ordinary times the poor are the best friends of the poor. There is (and happy is it) a sympathy in affliction (we find it as a ray of light amid the gloom), a fellow-feeling in distress, a kind of benefit society to which all the wretched are free, — a society not indeed enrolled and registered by Act of Parliament, but by higher authority, and with more awful sanction, by the instincts which Providence has implanted in the human heart ; but this is a virtue for better times. The poor man can hardly support himself, and therefore can hardly assist others. I do not mean to say that he does not. We have met with instances which have exalted our respect for human nature — instances which recall the widow recorded in the New Testament, who 'out of her want gave all her living;' — and the widow of Sarepta in the Old Testament, whose whole possession was ' a handful of meal in a barrel, and a drop of oil in a cruse,' yet she was willing to share them with the afflicted stranger. But if this prove

E2

52 LETTER FROM WILBERFORCE. [CHAP. v.

that the poor are not bereft of every ordinary support, is it not a lesson tons? If the poor man who is obliged to deny his unsatiated appe- tites,— who, having divided sufficient from his only loaf to support life, but not to satisfy hunger, hides the remainder for the next day's meal, — if he yet find some place for mercy in his soul, and, miserable himself, is yet impelled to share his remaining crust with the more miserable, — if the strong impulse of humanity urges him to so dear a sacrifice, does it not teach the man who is clothed in soft raiment and fares sumptuously every day, to give something more than the crumbs that fall from his table to the wretchedness that surrounds his gate ? But why this supe- rior mercy in the poor ? Because he has learned it in the school of affliction. He knows what it is to want bread, and this has opened his heart and enlivened his affections for those who are exposed to the rigour of the season and the craving importunities of hunger ; but the rich man cannot feel this. He can experimentally know nothing of what it is, when the poor man, willing to strain every nerve in labour, is denied the employment which might stanch the tears of his wife and appease the cries of his children, — when, like the wretch I have men- tioned, he is willing to suffer, if he might suffer alone, firm against his own afflictions, but, when he looks around him, sunk to the effeminacy of tears."

He might fairly be surprised by the universal attention which this speech received. Nothing could be more com- mendatory than the mention made of it in the newspapers ; and letters of congratulation poured in from all sides. One from Mr. Wilberforce, the first written by him to his future ally and successor, may be deemed almost prophetic.

" Kensington Gore, November 28, 1816.

" My dear Sir, — I must in three words express the real pleasure with which I have both read and heard of your successful effort on Tuesday last, in behalf of the hungry and the naked. * * * But I can- not claim the merit of being influenced only by regard for the Spitalfields sufferers, in the pleasure I have received from your performances at the meeting. It is partly a selfish feeling, for I anticipate the success of the efforts which I trust you will one day make in other instances, in an assembly in which I trust we shall be fellow-labourers, both in the motives by which we are actuated, and in the objects to which our exertions will be directed.

" I am, my dear Sir,

" Yours sincerely,

>' W. WlLUKKFORCB."

1816.] SUCCESS OF THE MEETING. 53

The speech reappeared in publications of the most widely dif- ferent character. It was republished by the Spitalfields Benevo- lent Society, as the best means of creating sympathy with their exertions ; it was republished by Hone and the democrats, as the best statement of the miseries permitted under the existing government ; and it was republished by the friends of that go- vernment, " because," said they, " it forms so beautiful a con- trast to the language of those wretched demagogues, whose infamous doctrines would increase the evils they affect to deplore."

" By this one meeting at the Mansion House," says the report of the Spitalfields Benevolent Society, " 43,369/. \vere raised." Two days after it had been held, Lord Sidmouth sent for Mr. Buxton, to inform him, that " the Prince had 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 5000/."

With these exertions for the poor around him, Mr. Buxton's public career may be said to have commenced. He was now launched upon that stream of labour for the good of others, along which his course lay for the remainder of his life. His letters show the eagerness of his desire to be employing his ener- gies in warring against the evils around him. " I want to be living in a higher key," he remarked, " to do some good before I die." His prayers were incessant that God would employ him as an instrument of spreading his kingdom, and of doing good to mankind. He had great delight in the service of his Lord and Master; nor did lie ever forget to thank God with deep gratitude when any opportunity, however trifling, was afforded him of exerting himself for others. To one of his relations, who had entered upon a benevolent undertaking which required considerable personal sacrifices, he writes, —

" For my part, I cannot lament for and pity those who make great sacrifices in compliance with conscience ; such dedication of self is, in my view, much more a matter of envy. Assuredly, if we could look at such sacrifices throughout their whole extent, in their consequences here to others, and hereafter to ourselves, we should perceive that the per- mission to be so engaged is a privilege of inestimable value. I am certain that you are only actuated by a conviction of duty, and shall I

54 MRS, FRY— VISIT TO NEWGATE. [CHAP. v.

repine and grieve because you are enabled to follow so high a director ? Or shall I not rather heartily rejoice that you are called to such a service, and that the call is not resisted ? I often think of those verses in the Acts, ' rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name ; and daily in the Temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and to preach Jesus Christ.' And so I am half inclined to envy you, and more than half to wish that, somehow or other, I were as well engaged."

It was no part of his character to indulge in vague desires without a bold struggle for their accomplishment. Having done what he could in relieving the miseries of his poor neighbours, he soon entered upon a wider field of benevolence.

One day, while walking past Newgate with Mr. Samuel Hoare, their conversation turned upon the exertions of their sister-in-law Mrs. Fry, and her companions, for the improvement of the prisoners within its walls ; and this suggested the idea of employing themselves in a similar manner. They soon entered into communication with Mr. William Crawford, Mr. Peter Bedford, and other gentlemen, who were also anxious to improve the condition, at that time deplorable to the last degree, of the English gaols.

The exertions of Mrs. Fry and her associates had prepared the way ; public attention had been drawn to the subject ; and in 1816 the Society for the Reformation of Prison Discipline was formed. In the list of the committee, Mr. Buxton's name stands between those of Dr. Lushington and Lord Suffield (then the Hon. E. Harborcl), both of whom were afterwards so closely associated with him in the attack upon negro slavery.

On January the 5th, 1817, he writes from Hampstead to Mrs. Bnxton, —

" After I had written to you yesterday, I went with Peter Bedford and Charles on a visit to Newgate. I saw four poor creatures who are to In1 executed on Tuesday next. Poor things! God have mercy on them ! The sight of them was sufficient for that day. I felt no further inclination to examine the prison. It has made me long much that my life may not pass quite uselessly ; but that, in some shape or other, I may assist in checking and diminishing crime and its consequent misery. Surely it is in the power of all to do something in the service of their Master ; and surely I among the rest, if I were now to begin and endeavour, to the best of my capacity, to serve Him, might bo the

1817.1 ILLNESS OF CHARLES BUXTON. 55

means of good to some of my fellow-creatures. This capacity is, I feel, no mean talent, and attended with no inconsiderable responsibility. I must pray that I may at length stir myself up, and be enabled to feel somewhat of the real spirit of a missionary, and that I may devote myself, my influence, my time, and, above all, my affections, to the honour of God, and the happiness of man. My mission is evidently not abroad, but it is not less a mission on that account. I feel that I may journey through life by two very different paths, and that the time is now come for choosing which I will pursue. I may go on, as I have been going on, not absolutely forgetful of futurity, nor absolutely devoted to it. I may get riches and repute, and gratify my ambition, and do some good and more evil; and, at length, I shall find all my time on earth expended, and in retracing my life I shall see little but occasions lost, and capacities misapplied. The other is a path of more labour and less indulgence. I may become a real soldier of Christ ; I may feel that I have no business on earth but to do his will and to walk in his ways, and I may direct every energy I have to the service of others. Of these paths, 1 know which I would most gladly choose : ' but what I would, that I do not ; but what I hate, that do I.' In short, the cares, and the pleasures, and the business of this world choke the good seed, and we are perpetually deceived. We would sow to the spirit, and we sow to the flesh ; we desire heaven, and we are chained to earth."

He now began to entertain thoughts of entering Parliament, and at the election of February, 1817, he went down to Wey- mouth, at the invitation of Mr. \V. Williams, to stand on the same interest. He did not, however, offer himself as a can- didate.

" Weymouth, Feb. 1817.

" I am far from regretting that I came, as I do not doubt it will secure me an independent seat next election : that word ' independent ' has been the obstacle upon this occasion. I intend to spend a good portion of the next two years in preparation for the House. I hope I shall either do good, or receive pleasure, when I get there : as yet, I have had in politics neither one nor the other. I am pining for home : nothing suits me worse than this kind of busy leisure ; too much to do to have time to myself, and too little to do to occupy my time."

" Hampstead, April 5.

" Last Sunday I was at Fakenham, with Charles, who is very unwell. God grant he may recover ! I have much to thank God about with re- gard to him, his increased and increasing piety and seriousness. For my- self I sometimes fear my treasure is too much in my business, it is too much

56 DEATH OF CHARLES BUXTON. [CHAP. v.

my amusement, the topic to which I turn with pleasure. South says, ' Whatsoever a man accounts his treasure, that he places his whole delight in : it entertains his eye, refreshes his fancy, feeds his thoughts, and affords him a continual feast.' God grant that I may so meditate in his law, and so dwell within the walls of his spiritual temple, that He, and my duties towards Him, may be my chief delight."

Soon afterwards he became absorbed in anxiety about his brother Charles, who had shown symptoms of a decline, which at length proved fatal. A more grievous calamity could scarcely have befallen Mr. Buxton. Though their characters stood far apart, the two brothers had some points of strong and endearing resemblance. The lively gladness of heart which threw a constant sunshine over the countenance of the younger, would often relax the graver brow of the elder brother ; and, indeed, though the pressure of care and business gave Mr. Buxton an habitually grave aspect, and though it was a part of his character to be so absorbed by the pursuit he had in hand as to seem abstracted, yet there was in him throughout life a vein of playfulness which showed itself often when least ex- pected. Even when he himself was somewhat silent and op- pressed, he courted the cheerfulness of others, and delighted in it. But the friend that could best enliven him was lost when his brother sunk into the grave.

TO MRS. BUXTOX.

" Weymouth, July 4, 1817.

*' My dearest Wife, — How difficult it is to pour out all the feelings of this day ; memorable as it will be to me, for as bitter pain on the one hand, and as strong and joyful gratitude on the other, as ever I passed through ! After such a tumult of feelings, I am now quite dull and confused, hardly crediting that it is anything but a dream, or that he that was my earliest friend, and so very near my heart, and with whom the ties of friendship were so exquisitely tender, should be passed away for ever, or rather for the short period of this pilgrimage ; but if I feel the grief of having these ten thousand links of brotherhood snapped asunder, I hope and I think that I do more strongly feel the strong and sufficient consolations that surround us. Dear as he is to me (and there is an inexpressible fondness over his memory), I would not recall him to earth. If this world be a state of probation, he has passed through it, and is, I am persuaded, with the Saviour on whom he depended. I

1817.] DEATH OF CHARLES BUXTON. 57

cannot say the satisfaction I feel in his state of mind of late — the deepest humility as to himself, mixed with the firmest confidence in the sufficient merits of Christ. ... I will now tell you events as they have passed. At Andover I found a letter from Anna, saying he was worse ; and that I might be too Jatc. I shall not easily forget the ride between Andover and Salisbury. I could only see the dark side, the deep and irreparable loss, and one chief joy of my life gone for ever. The re- mainder of the journey to Dorchester was rather anxious than anything else. I particularly desired to see him once more, and I strongly hoped to have that comfort, but at Dorchester I heard of his peaceful end. Poor dear fellow! Between that and Weymouth, after indulging for a short time in groanings for us who remain, I felt the deepest gratitude on his account. I was so happy in his fate, ani so sensible of the all- righteous hand which directed it ! ... Infinitely beyond all, how mer- ciful and gladdening it is that those words, ' in sure and certain hope of a blessed resurrection,' are not at all too strong to express my convic- tions about him ! He is bound to the very inmost recesses of i/iy heart, when I recall and call up in my heart a thousand endearing recollec- tions, his tenderness towards me, his playful manner, his ready sympathy in all that touched me, his nice sense -of honour and delicate feeling When all these rush into my mind (and they are twined round all the events that are past), I should be a mourner indeed if I had not an unfailing sense of consolation, ' a present help in time of trouble,' in the conviction of his happiness, and in the earnest hope of being again restored to him, in a state free from the impurities and imperfections of this world. Oh ! how I do long to take to the warning of his example, to detach myself from the frailties and vanities of this world, to become a disciple and soldier of our Lord Jesus Christ, to remember ' righteous- ness, temperance, and the judgment to come!' and how I do feel that this admonition, like other deep ones which I have had, may pass away, and that I may be one of those of whom it may be said, ' it would have been better for him never to have known the ways of righteousness !'

" His being now in the land of Spirits before his Maker, and in the company of his Redeemer, in whom he so fully believed, and whom he loved, gives to me a familiarity with death which I never experienced. There is, I have almost thought, a community and sameness of feeling between brothers which is only equalled by that between husband and wife. Oh ! how I feel that this is gone ! but I do not forget that I have others left, who are perhaps as dear to me, besides yourself, my love. I went into the room by myself, wishing to return thanks, with his remains before me, for the inexpressible mercy displayed to him, and to pray that we who are left may be preserved from evil.

'• Martha told me that Charles, on Tuesday, could not swallow ;

58 DEATH OF CHARLES BUXTON. [CHAP. v.

when she observed how sorry she was, he answered by repeating the story of the Samaritan woman at the well, and concluded by saying, ' Though I cannot eat, and though I cannot drink, yet if I can but drink one glass of cold water at that living spring, I shall never thirst any more.'

" When somebody said to him, ' We must repent and then we shall be forgiven by Christ,' he said, ' You begin at the wrong end : we must first seek Christ, then He will give us repentance and forgiveness.' He was fully aware the last moment was approaching, and his soul seemed at times as if it were already in heaven. Send this to my aunt Gurney and Anna ; with my dearest love to all."

" July 6, 1817.

" If we only consider the loss we have sustained, we must go mourn- ing all the day long; if we consider the gain to him, it extracts the anguish from the wound. I cannot help following him in his present state. He, with whose views and prospects, and feelings and joys, I have till within a few days been so conversant, is now in a scene so new, so grand, so inexpressible, so infinitely beyond the rags arid vanities of earth." — " I do not expect to feel Charles's funeral much," he says in another letter; " I have dwelt so much upon him as ascended to heaven, that I cannot, or rather do not, so very closely connect the idea of him and his remains. I mean, in committing them to the earth, I do not feel as if I were committing him there."

Twenty years afterwards, in reviewing the leading occurrences of his life, he thus refers to this event : —

" I know of no tie, that of husband and wife excepted, which could be stronger than the one which united Charles and me. We were what the lawyers call ' tenants in common ' of everything. He was, I think, the most agreeable person I ever knew. A kind of original humour played about his conversation. It was not wit; it was anything rather than that species of humour which provokes loud laughter ; it was not exactly naivete, though that comes nearest to it ; it was an intellectual playfulness which provided for every hour, and extracted from every incident a fund of delicate merriment. He died at Weymouth in the year 1817; — and thou knowest, O Lord, and thou only, how deeply I loved, and how long and how intensely I lamented him."

His brother's widow and children were the objects of his tender care. lie took a house for them near his own at Hamp- stead, and as his brother-in-law, Mr. Samuel Iloare, rrsidcd in the same place, the three families became ujiited in habits of the closest intercourse.

1817.] VISIT TO THE CONTINENT. 59

In the winter of 1817, Mr. and Mrs. Buxton and Mr. S. and Mr. J. J. Gurney went over to France, with the Rev. Francis Cunningham, who was anxious to establish a branch of the Bible Society at Paris. Mr. Buxton and his brothers-in-law took a great interest in this undertaking, and were also desirous to pro- cure information as to the excellent systems of prison discipline adopted in the jails of Antwerp and Ghent.

In crossing over to Boulogne the party met with an adven- turowhich might have turned out seriously. Soon after leaving Dover, they were surrounded by a dense fog, in which they drifted about for two clays and nights, without being able to con- jecture what course the vessel was pursuing. To this anxiety actual suffering was soon added, for the packet contained many passengers, and there was no sleeping accommodation, and scarcely a morsel of food on board. A few mouldy biscuits and a piece of cheese were furnished at a high price from one of the sailors, with which the hungry party were obliged to be con- tented. In the course of the second night the braying of an ass warned them of their near approach to land, and having narrowly avoided running the vessel ashore, a short dispersion of the fog at length enabled them to enter the harbour of Calais. After referring to this incident, Mr. Buxton proceeds in his diary : —

" I would not willingly forget the lesson taught of the value of food — of the pain of being restricted in it ; these lines will recall my feelings : —

' Take physic, Pomp, Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, That thou mayst shake the superflux to them.' "

The following are extracts from his diary : —

" Nov. 1, 1817.

" One cannot pass over from Dover to Calais without being struck with the immense expenditure which has been lavished upon the animo- sities of the two countries. We hear with astonishment of some hun- dred thousand pounds raised in England for the dispersion of the Bible through the world ; of 20,000/. per annum raised to send missionaries to communicate to heathen nations the blessings of Christianity. Such exertions excite our admiration, elevate our country in our eyes, and even oxalt our nature. But turn for a moment to the opposite picture, and observe ten times these enormous sums expended upon twenty acres

60 VERSAILLES— ST. CLOUD. [CHAP. v.

of land at Dover, and as many at Calais, — not to promote civilisation or happiness, but for purposes of mutual hostility, defiance, aggression, and bloodshed. I do verily believe that the true, genuine, valorous, mili- tary spirit, is the true and genuine spirit inspired by the enemy of man, and I hope that I shall never refuse or be ashamed to avow these strange, extraordinary sentiments."

" Paris, Nov. 10.

" Thus far I have thoroughly enjoyed my journey; the people are civil and engaging, and full of life. What an odd thing it is that our mutual rulers should have deemed it expedient that we should have spent the last twenty-three years in cutting each other's throats ; and that we should so often have illuminated at the grateful intelligence that ten thousand of these our lively friends were killed, and twenty thou- sand wounded ! Surely we must now think this a strange reason for rejoicing. Seeing the natives is an antidote to the pleasure of destroy- ing them. If it be our duty to love our enemies, the military prepara- tions are an extraordinary mode of displaying our affection. In truth it is a sad thing, that

' Straits interposed

Make enemies of nations, which had else,

Like kindred drops, been melted into one.'

" 11/A. — We went to Versailles to breakfast. Almost every bush has its statue. The fauns, tritons, Neptunes, heroes, Venuses, Dianas, mixed with the statues of Louis le Grand and Louis le Desire (whose features defy all meaning), present an assemblage of fiction and fact, much to the advantage of the former.

" After visiting Versailles, we went to St. Cloud. This is a very comfortable and splendid abode, the furniture very beautiful and costly, and as much surpassing Versailles in cheerfulness as falling short of it in melancholy grandeur. It is the second record of departed glory which we have seen to-day : the third comes more home to our hearts. We this night, on our arrival at Paris, heard of the death of our Prin- cess. We have all felt it as if she were bound to ourselves by the ties of kindred.

" 12th. — We went to the Palace of the Luxemburg, and there saw Talleyrand ; — a bishop in the reign of the King — an abjurcr of Chris- tianity when reason was deified — prime minister of Buonaparte till his Spanish expedition — one of the first to betray him — on his return offering his insidious assistance again to betray him — and now in full power !

"15M. — Went to the Legislative Assembly, and saw the rooms for the Peers. Wonderfully smart — too much so. Very different, indeed,

1817.] PRISONS OF GHENT AND ANTWERP. 61

are both these chambers from the negligent grandeur of the British Parliament.

" 16//J. — Francis Cunningham and I went to various persons for the purpose of establishing a Bible Society. We found only M. Juillerat at homo, with whom we had some encouraging conversation. His de- scription of the state of religion in the country is truly deplorable. The Protestants are sadly indifferent, and the Roman Catholics are either quite philosophically careless or thoroughly bigoted.

" Baxter says, in his Life, something of this kind : — ' I did not know till now what a great sin tyranny is, which thus prevents the propaga- tion of the Gospel :' and the difficulties we have this day felt in the establishment of the Bible Society from the restraints of Government have united me in the same feeling.

" Went again to the Louvre, and greatly admired the Italian paint- ings ; and, particularly, some of Claude's. I cannot like Rubens' great, sprawling, allegorical Deities."

His diary contains very full particulars relative to those pri- sons at Ghent and Antwerp which it was one purpose of his journey to examine. He was especially struck with the admir- able management of the Maison de Force in the former town, and he determined to lay his account of it before the Prison Discipline Society in London.

" At Ghent we were told that when Buonaparte was emperor he demanded of the Roman Catholic College an approbation of his mar- riage with Maria Louisa, which they steadily refused. Soon after, he sent them a bishop who was not properly ordained by the Pope, and they refused to obey him. On this he ordered a detachment of soldiers to surround the college, and to take every priest and student. He then sent them all off to his armies as soldiers ; and of 330 thus sent but fifteen returned alive ! "

" Sunday, Calais.

" Here we arrived at ten o'clock this morning, being compelled by the regulations of the fortified towns to travel some distance on this day. We regret this, as we would not willingly lend even our feeble counte- nance to the violation of the Sabbath, which this country everywhere presents.

" We all felt grateful for the encouraging intelligence that a Bible Society had been formed in Paris. I ardently hope that it may be the means of much direct good by the circulation of the Scriptures, and of much indirect good by causing intercourse between the Protestants of France and England. France, indeed, needs everything that can be

62 THE LONDON PRISONS. [CHAP. v.

done for her religious welfare. Religion is, as it were, almost abolished. I speak generally, but I trust, and indeed I am persuaded, that this generality admits of very many exceptions; but, altogether, there is little appearance of religion. The amusements and businesses of the Sunday — the utter absence of the Scriptures — the perpetual reiteration of ' Mon Dieu ' in every sentence — the indifference as to truth — in short, all that strikes the eye and the ear, indicates the absence of any spiritual understanding."

Upon Mr. Buxton's return to England he communicated to the Prison Discipline Society the information which he had acquired with respect to the Maison de Force at Ghent, and this led to a request from the committee that his description of it might be published. " When I sat down to this task," he says, in the preface to his book, " the work insensibly grew upon my hands. It was necessary to prove that evils and grievances did exist in this country, and to bring home to these causes the in- crease of corruption and depravity. For this purpose repeated visits to prisons were requisite."

Accordingly, accompanied by Mr. Hoare, Mr. William Craw- ford, and others, he visited at different times the principal Lon- don jails, and examined with the utmost care into every part of the system pursued in them.

TO THE REV. FRANCIS CUNNINGHAM.

" Spitalfields, Dec. 1817.

" Since my return I have been much engaged in the London prisons, and my inquiries have developed a system of folly and wickedness which surpasses belief. A noise must be made about it, and (will you believe it ?) I am going to turn author, and am preparing a pamphlet upon the subject of prisons.

" The recollection of our journey acquires new charms in my eyes, and I heartily rejoice we were induced to take it.

" Tell C that if the result should in any way diminish the quan- tum of misery that is endured, and of vice which is hatched in our prisons — if it should be the means of encouraging the Protestant ministers of France, and of dispersing the Bible through its forlorn population — I shall think we were almost repaid for the terrible, monstrous, shocking dangers we incurred when exposed to all the horrors of a calm.

" Can you give Major Close the name of the regiment, at Mont i which had no Bibles? If so, they will be immediately supplied."

1817.] REFLECTIONS. 63

TO A FRIEND.

" Dec. 1817.

" I never enjoyed my home more. I hardly ever was so sensible of enjoyment in it as since my return from France. To be happy I must be employed, and on a useful object, for between ourselves (but this is a profound secret) I am sick of having my heart in my vats."

He closed the year 1817 with the following reflections in his common-place book : —

" This year has been chequered with events of deep interest — some joyful and some dressed in the darkest sable. But how encouraging is it to be able to recognise in all, and especially in the mournful circum- stances of the year, the hand of a merciful Providence ! This day last year I Sj>cnt with my beloved brother ; together we went to our usual place of worship, to hear our (especially his) beloved minister,* and together we wandered through the future.

' But God has wisely hid from human eyes The dark decrees of Fate.'

" Very soon afterwards I was called to Weymouth to the election. I need not now enter into the reasons which induced me not to stand ; suffice it to say, I would not be dependent. With my determination I have been well satisfied. I fancy my election at a future period is very probable : if it will tend to my real good or the good of others, I believe it will be so determined by Providence ; if not, I earnestly pray God to avert the fulfilment of my wishes. I am too well aware of my own blindness to have my heart much set on it. : * While I was at

Weymouth, my sweet boy, Harry, got through the bars of his nursery window, and was discovered merely holding by his hands with the utmost unconcern. What was not his mother — what was not I spared ! * * * What shall I render to the Lord for all his mercies to me, of which (next to his inestimable love in the redemption of the world) my wife is fur the greatest ? * * * I often wonder at the goodness of God, in giving to one so unworthy so rich a treasure.

" Soon after my return from Weymouth began the heaviest affliction of my life — the illness, the gradual and perceptible decay, alas ! the death, of my dearest brother. No day passes in which something or other does not recall his beloved image, his lively manners, his unity of heart. I trust that few days pass in which I forget to thank God for this dispensation, and to rejoice that he has, as I doubt not he has, ' for this corruptible put on incorruption.'

* The Rev. Josiah Pratt.

64 INCIDENT AT THE BREWERY. [CHAP. v.

" His widow and her three children have been staying with us for some time, — much to my comfort, and, I hope, somewhat to hers. I have read and heard of acts of faithful affection ; but I never heard, or read, or saw anything to compare with the affection, kindness, attention, and generosity displayed by S. Hoare to her.

" On Saturday last, in consequence of an almost obsolete promise to sleep in town when all the other partners were absent, I slept at Brick- lane. S. Hoare had complained to me that several of our men were employed on the Sunday. To inquire into this, in the morning I went into the brewhousc, 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 ex- amination 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. Wrhen 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 irou reservoirs full of water, — in fact, the whole Brewery.

" How the new year may pass, who can tell ? I may not see the end of it ; but these are the active objects I propose for myself : —

To write a pamphlet on Prison Discipline.

To establish a Savings Bank in Spitalfiekls.

To recommence the sale of salt fish in Spitalfields.

To attend to the London Hospital, and to endeavour to make the

clergyman perform his duties, or to get him superseded. To establish a new Bible Association.

" May the grace of God assist me in these objects ; may He sanctify my motives, and guard me from pride, and may I use my utmost exer- tions, making His will mine."

In February of the ensuing year he published his work entitled ( An Inquiry whether Crime be produced or prevented by our present System of Prison Discipline.' "While composing it, he always began his writing with prayer that he might " be guided

1817.] WORK ON PRISON DISCIPLINE. 65

aright, and that he might do his duty without any regard to self, but simply for the service of God." The work was received with a degree of attention to which he had never aspired, run- ning through six editions in the course of the first year ; and a very considerable impulse was given to general feeling upon the subject of which it treated. The work was thus alluded to in the House of Commons by Sir James Mackintosh.

" The question of our penal code, as relating to prison abuses, has been lately brought home to the feelings of every man in the country by a work so full of profound information, of such great ability, of such chaste and commanding eloquence, as to give that House and the country a firm assurance that its author could not embark in any under- taking which would not reflect equal credit upon himself and upon the object of his labours."

Mr. Wilberforce wrote to him on the same subject, and, after warmly congratulating him on the weight it appeared to carry, he adds,

" May it please God to continue to animate you with as much bene- volent zeal, and to direct it to worthy objects. I hope you will come soon into Parliament, and be able to contend in person, as well as with your pen, for the rights and happiness of the oppressed and the friend- less. I claim you as an ally in this blessed league."

The good effects of this book were not confined to England : it was translated into French, and distributed on the Continent. It even reached Turkey ; and in Indiana gentleman of the name of Blair, having chanced to read it, was induced to examine into the state of the Madras jails. He found them in a wretched condition, and did not rest till a complete reformation had been effected.

<:c HIS FIRST ELECTION. [CHAP. vi.

CHAPTER VI.

1818, 1819.

Election, 1818 — Letter from Mr. J. J. Gurney — Thoughts on entering Parliament — First Speech, on Criminal Law — Committees on Criminal Law and Prison Discipline — Letters — Debate on the Manchester Riot.

IN the spring of 1818 a dissolution of Parliament took place, and Mr. Buxton now offered himself as a candidate for Wey- mouth. He did not take this step without much prayer for guidance in the matter. " It appears to me," he said, " to be the sphere in which I could do most for my Master's service, but I am perfectly willing to fill a lower place. It is only that I shall be as a common soldier instead of an officer : if I can but serve him, let him choose what work I shall do." While upon his canvass he thus writes from Bellfield : —

" June 4th.

" I think we shall have a contest and a sharp one, and the result is doubtful ; however, I am very comfortable, and not at all anxious. If it is right for me to succeed, I do not doubt I shall ; and if it is not right, I hope I shall not. I should return to privacy and the dear enjoyments of my own family without disappointment or vexation, and I think per- sonally as well content with little as with great things. Joseph, in our ride from Hampstead to London, mentioned a text which has been a very comfortable companion to me. ' In all thy ways acknowledge Him. and He will direct thy paths.' This text, and another, ' Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose heart is stayed on thee,' are con- stantly in my thoughts. My continual prayer is, that the Lord would work that termination which his infinite wisdom knows to be the best ; which is, I think, very probably praying against my own success."

" June 8.

" I am easy in my mind, leaving the event to Him who knows whether the busy engagements of a public life will draw mo nearer to, or separate me further from Him ; and who also knows whether He chooses me as an instrument of good ; and if lie docs, He will bring the means used to a successful issue."

1818.] CHOSEN MEMBER FOR WEYMOUTH. C7

Elections at this time presented very different scenes from what they now afford ; and, very frequently, the voters were anxious to decide the matter, as Irish counsel used to decide their causes, by fighting it out. This was so much the case at Weymouth, that Mr. Buxton was obliged to entreat his friends to use moderation towards their opponents. "Beat them," said he, " in vigour, beat them in the generous exercise of high prin- ciple— beat them in disdain of corruption, and the display of pure integrity ; but do not beat them with bludgeons."

Four days before the election terminated, he writes : —

" June 26, 1818.

" I am very nearly sick of the bustle, and my expectations of success are considerably diminished this morning ; but this is only my own opi- nion. I am exceedingly popular with my party, except as to one point. We (that is the party, for I have had nothing to do with it) have made

some most bitter attacks upon Sir for his conduct in Spain.

But when I heard from a private friend of his, that he was quite sunk and wretched, I expressed in my speech yesterday the disdain I felt at promoting my cause by slander, and said, that as he had been acquitted by a competent tribunal, he must be considered as innocent. The vio- lence of my party could hardly bear this, and for the first time they gave some indications of disapprobation. I told them plainly that I would do what I considered an act of public justice, though it offended every friend I had in the town."

TO MRS. BUXTON.

" June 29, 1818.

" The election is over. I am now going to the Hall to return thanks to my constituents. And so I am a member of Parliament. Well, I have not yet wished to decide the matter myself. My only feeling has been, if it is right, I trust it will take place ; and if not, I equally trust it will be prevented. I wish you were here to see me chaired. The town is in an uproar. The bugle-horn is at this moment playing, and hundreds of persons are collected on the Esplanade. Everybody has blue ribbons. I hope the children at Hampstead wear them."

Mr. J. J. Gurney writes to him on this important point in his career, —

" Norwich, 7 mo. 8th, 1818.

" My dear Brother, — My congratulations come late, which has arisen from want of time, not of interest. I have seldom felt more interested in anything than in thy parliamentary views. Many years have passed

F 2

G8 LETTER ON WHIG PRINCIPLES. [CHAP. vr.

over our heads since I first ex pressed my opinion to thee, that Parliament would be thy most useful and desirable field of action. My wishes are now accomplished ; and, till the Parliament meets, I shall indulge myself freely in pleasing anticipations of thy usefulness and thy success. Not to flatter thee, thou hast some qualities which fit thee admirably well for

this station Nor have I any fears of the effect of a public

career upon thy own soul. It is undoubtedly true that so extended a field of action will require at thy hands increased watchfulness and great fidelity ; but I am sure thy judgment is too sound, and thy heart too much alive to the dictates of plain truth, ever to allow thee to be puttied up for those things in which thou hast a stewardship indeed, but no fee.

' Not more than others thou deserv'st — But God has given thee more.'

Let the five talents become ten, and the ten, twenty, and let them be rendered up at last from hands pure and undefiled, to Him from whom they came !

" Nothing is more beautiful in the world of morals than the great man, in talents, who is the little child in religion. ..... With regard

to a political course I have only two things on my mind. I believe that one great object taken up upon safe, sound, and religious grounds, and pursued with unabating and unabatable vigour, is a much better thing for a man of talents, who is willing to be of some service in the world, than many objects pursued without accuracy, without perseverance, and with- out effect. Thou wilt, of course, be considered by everybody as the representative of the prison cause. To that cause thou art pledged. But in itself it will not afford thee sufficient scope. I fully believe that thy chief aim cannot be directed to any object so worthy of all thy efforts as the amelioration of our Criminal Code. It is a glorious cause to take up. My monitions are, I dare say, very pragmatical ; nevertheless, I shall add one more. Do not let thy independence of all party be the means of leading thee away from sound Whiyyism. I may shortly express my opinion that there is a great work going on in the world; that the human mind, under the safeguard of religious education, is advancing to the shaking off of many of its trammels, and many of its prejudices; that society is at present in a state of much corruption, but that, if this work goes on, generation after generation will become more enlightened, more virtuous, and more happy ; that the liberty of truth will prevail over every obstruction. I consider this progress of the human mind perfectly sale, as long as it takes its spring from the unchangeable and most reasonable principles of the Christian religion. I am sure that these principles must ever prevent, in those on whom they act, any steps towards wicked inno- vation and licentious change. But let us not admit any check to the

1818.] WISH TO DO GOOD. 69

progress of true light, whether moral, political, or religious; and let us take especial care to avoid the spirit of Toryism ; I mean that spirit which bears the worst things with endless apathy, because they are old; and with which reason and even humanity arc nothing, and the authority of creatures, as fallible as ourselves, everything."

TO MRS. BUXTON.

" Hampstead, Dec. 6, 1818.

"* * * I have passed a remarkably comfortable Sunday ; after break- fast I sat down to Law's Spirit of Prayer. I wonder why his writings are not more popular ; there is about them a warmth and a liveliness of persuasion, combined with a force of reason, which makes them very attractive to me. We then went to Wheeler-street Chapel, where Mr. Pratt gave us one of his best sermons. I dare say any other person of the party would have complained of their distractions if they had only been as attentive as I was ; but compared with myself in general, I had my mind much fixed on the service, and was much struck with many things in the Prayer Book which I have read a thousand times without notice. S. Hoare and I stayed the sacrament, which I entered into more I think than I ever did before. When I returned to my seat I went through a kind of service of prayer, which I by practice have formed ; first for myself, that I may press forward towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of Christ, and that I may be enabled to count all things but loss in comparison ; next that I may be led to useful objects — that I may be allowed to do something for the service of mankind ; then that my motives in this may be cleansed and purified, and that I may act as unto the Lord and not unto men. Next, for protection and health, and the blessings of this life — that is, if they are to conduce to my good, for I am

afraid to ask for anything absolutely The point, however,

which has been all day most upon my mind is a desire that I may work for others in Christ ; that is, that His Spirit may actuate me to do what good I can, that I may have the high privilege of being His servant, and that the performance of His will, and not the applause of man, may be the wages I seek. This verse has been very forcibly before my mind : — ' Never turn away thy face from any poor man, and then the Lord will never turn away his face from thce.'

" You will hardly believe that, at the beginning of the day, I had a kind of longing for Norwich Meeting. In the shape of religious service, a Friends' Meeting, with Joseph and Priscilla for teachers, is the most

congenial to my mind, more so I think than anything else

I saw Mr. Pratt after church, who is in high spirits, and says that a hundred Blacks in Africa are true Christians, and some of them are even missionaries."

70 PLANS FOR THE POOR. [CHAP. vi.

" Dec. 9.

" I rode to Upton to breakfast this morning, since which I have been engaged in some important calculations. These, however, have been interrupted by a visit from the manager of the Friar's Mount School. He gives the most satisfactory account of the expenditure of the money I raised for them last year ; two new schools have been established, and two, which were about to be given up, are revived. He has formed a plan by which six thousand children, now uneducated, will be instructed. The money is all that is wanting, viz. 4500/., and I think I shall try. You will suppose I am mad, but this is not the case. Certainly nothing of a charitable nature, in which I have ever been engaged, has given me so much satisfaction as these Sunday Schools ; and I feel, I hope, some gratitude for the great favour of being allowed to be an instrument of good to some hundreds of children during the past year. I never think of these schools without pleasure. With dearest love to you and the children, and with a joyful heart at the expectation of meeting you and them,

''Yours, "T. F. BUXTON."

It will be remembered that at the commencement of the year 1818 he had determined to carry out several plans for the benefit of the poor in Spitalfields, and for other purposes of a similar character. In a paper written on New Year's day, 1819, he enters very fully into the details of his exertions on each of the five tasks he had set himself, not one of which had been neglected. The first of them had been " to write a pamphlet on Prison Dis- cipline," and after alluding to the unexpected success of his work on that subject, he adds, —

" It has excited a spirit of inquiry on the subject, which I trust will do much good. I only hope that what has benefited others has not injured me. 1 cannot render myself insensible to the applause it has received. In my heart, however, I know that it is no work of mine, but that the Lord has been pleased, in great mercy, to make me one of his instruments in this work. Lord, I entreat thee, in this and in all things, to purify my motives, and to enable me to act as unto theo. and not unto man. Oh ! guard my heart from the delusions of vanity. Make me to know how frail and powerless I am in myself, and to cherish with grati- tude, but with humility, the inestimable privilege of being in any way thy servant."

The paper closes vvitli the following reflections upon the burden of responsibility which he had lately undertaken. It is interest-

1819.] THOUGHTS ON ENTERING PARLIAMENT. 71

ing to see in what spirit he entered that arena, on which he was for twenty years to fight the battle of the oppressed.

" Now that I am a member of Parliament, I feel earnest for the honest, diligent, and conscientious discharge of the duty I have under- taken. My prayer is for the guidance of God's Holy Spirit, that, free from views of gain or popularity, — that, careless of all things but fidelity to my trust, I may be enabled to do some good to my country, and something for mankind, especially in their most important concerns. I feel the responsibility of the situation, and its many temptations. On the other hand, I see the vast good which one individual may do. May God preserve me from the snares which may surround me ; keep me from the power of personal motives, from interest or passion, or prejudice or ambition, and so enlarge my heart to (eel the sorrows of the wretched, the miserable condition of the guilty and the ignorant, that I may ' never turn my face from any poor man ;' and so enlighten my understanding,' that I may be a capable and resolute champion, for those who want and deserve a friend."

Upon first taking his seat in Parliament, his attention was ex- clusively directed to the different forms of judicial punishment. In the beginning of 1819 he took part in two or three debates upon the subject of convict transport ships, the state of which was proved by Mr. Bennett and other members to be horrible in the last degree ; still the reformation of prisons was the subject nearest to his heart.

TO J. J. GURNET, ESQ.

" Feb. 25, 1819.

" When I last spoke (on the state of convict ships) there was no cry of question, but, on the contrary, marked attention: but alas! most un- deserved, for, like a blockhead, I rose, having nothing to say, without a moment's premeditation. This has mortified me, which proves that my motives are not purified from selfish desires of reputation ; and that all my anxiety is, not eagerness for the reform of prisons and the penal code, but, in truth, debased and alloyed by a desire for the reputation of T. F. B. I despise this vanity. On Monday next comes on the ques- tion of prisons; on Tuesday, the question of the penal code. On the latter I shall speak with my arguments and facts clearly before me. If I then fail, the failure is final— I may serve the cause as a labourer, but neither this, nor any other, as an advocate — and we must be satisfied. I endeavour to divest my mind of too much carefulness about the matter, persuaded that, whatever the event may be, that event is right both for me and for the cause."

72 SPEECH ON CRIMINAL LAW. [CHAP. vr.

On the 1st of March Lord Castlereagh's motion for a com- mittee to inquire into the state of Prison Discipline was carried, and on the next evening a motion for a committee on the Cri- minal laws was made by Sir James Mackintosh, and seconded by Mr. Buxton, whose speech met with success abundantly sufficient to dispel his fears of uselessness in the House of Commons.

He began by demonstrating that the capital code then existing was not a part of, but an innovation on, the ancient common law ; that, indeed, the greater part of these capital enactments had been made within the memory of man. " There are persons living," he said, " at whose birth the Criminal Code contained less than sixty capital offences, and who have seen that number quadrupled, — who have seen an Act pass, making offences capital by the dozen and by the score ; and what is worse, bundling up together offences, trivial and atrocious, — some, nothing short of murder in malignity of intention, and others, nothing beyond a civil trespass, — I say, bundling together this ill-sorted and incon- gruous package, and stamping upon it ' death without benefit of clergy.' "

His speech, the chief merit of which lay in the lucid and logical arrangement of a large mass of facts, tended to show that the law, by declaring that " certain crimes should be punished with death, had declared that they should not be punished at all. The bow had been bent, till it had snapped asunder. The acts which were intended to prevent evil had proved acts of indemnity and free pardon to the fraudulent and the thief, and acts of ruin and destruction to many a fair trader."

TO J. J. GURXEY, ESQ.

" Brick Lane, March 4, 1819.

" Well, the effort is over. Last night came on the grand question. I spoke for nearly an hour. I was low and dispirited, and much tired (bodily) when I rose. I cannot say I pleased myself. I could not, at first, get that freedom of language which is so essential, but I rose with the cheers of the House, and contrived to give much of what was on my mind. Everybody seems to have taken a more favourable opinion of the speech than I did. The facts were irresistible: and, for fear of tiring my auditors, I confined myself principally to facts. You will see by the papers that we obtained a victory. As for myself, I hope 1 did

1819.] ENCOURAGING SUCCESS. 73

force myself into something like indifference to my own success, pro- vided the cause succeeded."

TO THE REV. FRANCIS CUNNINGHAM.

"March 4, 1819.

u I made a long speech yesterday, with which the House seemed very well satisfied. I am on both the committees, for prisons and penal law, and so shall have enough to do. I however rejoice that I am in the House, for it is well worth while to sacrifice money, time, pleasure, everything except eternity, to such important objects. I often think of your advice, and wish for more of it. Last night I was meditating upon speeches, compliments, &c., and this reflection rushed upon my mind : ' And what of all these, if I forsake this book, the Bible ?' I am writing in a little room full of about twenty members, all talking, so excuse errors, and everything else."

At the close of the debate many of the most distinguished members of the House came up and introduced themselves to him ; Mr. S. Hoare sat under the gallery, watching, with delight, the success of his friend. " I am sure," said he afterwards, " if I had been received in the House as he was, I should not have recovered from the elevating effect of it for twenty years."

But the opinion of an impartial observer may be more valuable. Mr. "W. Smith (M.P. for Norwich) writes to Mr. J. J. Gurney —

" You will see the result of last night's debate by the papers. Buxton acquitted himself to universal satisfaction. The House is pre- pared to receive him with respect and kindness ; and his sterling sense, his good language, and his earnest manner, fully keep up the prepos- session in his favour, so that I recollect very few who have made their debut with so much real advantage, and seem so likely to maintain the station thus early assumed."

If we have dwelt at some length upon the success of this early effort in Parliament, it has not been from any wish to give his speeches more credit than they deserved. Their eloquence was less remarkable than their force; they were deeply stamped with his own character, which, as Mr. Wilberforce orice remarked, was that of " a man who could hew a statue out of a rock, but not cut faces upon cherry-stones."

His speeches were not sparkling or splendid ; their end was utility ; their ornaments, clearness, force, and earnest feeling.

74 THE PRISON BILL. [CHAP. vi.

He was not one of those orators, described by Lord Bacon, " that hunt more after words than matter, arid more after the choiceness of the phrase, the sweet falling of the clauses, and the varying and illustration of their works with tropes and figures, than after the weight of matter, worth of subject, or soundness of argument." He usually bestowed much care in preparation ; not in embellish- ing the style, but in bringing together supplies of facts, and marshalling them in one strong line of argument. Speaking, as he did, from the heart, and for the most part on subjects which appealed to the feelings as well as to the judgment, he sometimes rose into passages of impassioned declamation ; occasionally there was a burst of indignation, and not unfrequently a touch of playful satire ; but the usual character of his oratory was a lucid and powerful appeal to the reason of his audience.

In accordance with the motions on the 1st and 3rd of March, two select committees were appointed, in both of which Mr. Buxton was included. The one was to inquire into the feasi- bility of mitigating the Penal Code, of which he writes, March llth, 1819—

" I conjecture that no man on the committee goes so far as I go — namely, to the abolition of the punishment of death, except for murder ; but all go a very great way, and if we merely make forgery, sheep and horse stealing, not capital, it is an annual saving of thirty lives, which is something, and satisfies me in devoting my time to the subject. I am confident that our opinions on prisons and Criminal law will ultimately prevail ; in short, I am in high spirits on the whole matter."

The other committee was appointed to examine the state of gaols throughout the kingdom ; and here we may briefly state the final result of the exertions made for the improvement of Prison Discipline. The committee published its first report in 1820, and the government was thereby induced to bring in a bill for consolidating and amending the prison laws then in existence. This bill was referred for revision to a select committee, of which Mr. Buxton was a member.

"You will be delighted," he writes soon afterwards to a friend, "to hear that the Prison Bill is going on wonderfully well, beyond ;ill ex- pectation. I made a speech the first day, stating the principles on which I thought we ought to proceed, and the committee have subse-

1819.] THE PRISON BILL. 75

quently adopted almost all of them ; so that I do believe that this part of the business of my life will be done effectually."

After much patient investigation, a bill was prepared by the committee, and immediately adopted by the two Houses of Par- liament; and thus the English gaols, instead of remaining "the nurseries and hotbeds of crime, the almost inevitable ruin of all who entered within their walls," have become, generally speaking, places where the improvement as well as the punishment of the criminal is attempted. Perfection, of course, is not yet attained ; the new system has been of no avail in those prisons where exer- tions have not been used to enforce it : but no man can read the descriptions of the state of gaols, from twenty-five to thirty years ago, and compare them with those of the present day, without being astonished at the extent of the evil and of the reform.

JOHN HENRY NORTH, ESQ., TO T. FOWELL BUXTOX, ESQ.

" Dublin, April 14, 1819.

"During the whole of the last Circuit, which is just terminated, I was seized with an inexpressible longing to write you an interminable epistle, but the labours of Nisi Prius forbade, and, now that they are at an end, I have begun to think that, with the whole criminal law upon your hands, your prisons, penitentiaries, and ' Colony of Antipodes,' you will be better pleased to receive a moderate letter than one of overgrown dimensions. I hope I need not tell you with what exceeding pleasure I read your admirable book, or how delighted I was with the praises that were everywhere bestowed upon it. It has done you infinite honour. The general language applied to it here is, that it is the most interesting book that has been published for many years. I had some satisfaction, too, in observing a few little traits by which the author dis- covered himself to me immediately. The zeal that your exertions have excited in this country, on the subject of prisons, is really surprising. We have now a society in Dublin, for the improvement of prison dis- cipline, of wh'ch I am an unworthy member. Here is a committee of ladies, who visit Bridewell in turns every day, and who have in a very short time effected considerable improvement, and their example has been followed in some of our country towns. At the last Galway Assizes, Judge Johnson, in his charge to the Grand Jury, recommended this plan, and alluded to your book and Mrs. Fry's exertions in terms of the highest approbation. It will gratify you to find that the seed which you have scattered has fallen upon good ground."

70 PARLIAMENTARY ELOQUENCE. [CHAP. vr.

Mr. Buxton replies.

s

TO J. H. NORTH, ESQ.

" April 19, 1819.

" A report has reached me that you are likely to get a seat in Par- liament. Is there a bit of truth in it ? Is there the remotest probability of so joyful an event ? Pray do not conceal it from me a moment, for I speak only truth when I say it would materially add to my happiness. I have plenty of acquaintance, but hardly a familiar friend in the House, and this is a very needful thing. I much want some one with whom I can freely communicate, and who would honestly tell me when I am right and when I am in error ; and I need not tell you how fully my wishes would be satisfied if we were there together. Perhaps you will like to hear the impression the House makes upon me. I do not wonder that so many distinguished men have failed in it. The speaking re- quired is of a very peculiar kind : the House loves good sense and joking, and nothing else ; and the object of its utter aversion is that species of eloquence which may be called Philippian. There are not three men from whom a fine simile or sentiment would be tolerated ; all attempts of the kind are punished with general laughter. An easy flow of sterling, forcible, plain sense is indispensable ; and this, combined with great powers of sarcasm, gives Brougham his station. Canning is an exception to this rule. His reasoning is seldom above mediocrity ; but then it is recommended by language so wonderfully happy, by a manner so exquisitely elegant, and by wit so clear, so pungent, and so unpremeditated, that he contrives to beguile the House of its austerity. Tierney has never exerted himself much in my hearing. Wilberforce has more native eloquence than any of them, but he takes no pains, and allows himself to wander from his subject : he holds a very high rank in the estimation of the House.

" And now let me tell you a secret; these great creatures turn out, when viewed closely, to be but men, and men with whom you need not fear competition. I again, therefore, say ' Come among us,' and I shall be greatly deceived if you do not hold a foremost place.

"My line is distinctly drawn. I care but little about party politics. I vote as I like ; sometimes pro, and sometimes con ; but I feel the greatest interest on subjects sucli as the Slave Trade, the condition of the poor, prisons, and Criminal law : to these I devote myself, and should be quite content never to give another vote upon a party ques- tion. I am upon the Jail and Criminal law committees, and devote three mornings in the week to one, and three to the other ; so 1 am contented, and feel as little inclination, as ability, to engage in political contentions. My body is strong enough, but any stress upon my mind,

1819.] MR. NORTH. 77

just now, deranges me instantly. ' Indolent vacuity of thought ' is my only remedy ; but it is not a very convenient medicine for one who has such a multitude of engagements. How fares the law ? Is Ireland blessed with abundant litigation, or does poverty deny this, the chief of luxuri

"Never mind discouragements. If you live and labour, you must stand in the front of that society in which you may be placed, be it the Dublin Courts, or St. Stephen's. So I have always thought and said, and so I still think and say. I wish you were with us. I know you will be a Tory : you always were one in heart, and your wife will make you still worse : but we will contrive to agree together, for I am not a Whig. I am one of those amphibious nondescripts called Neu- trals ; but how can I be anything else ? I cannot reconcile to myself the doctrine of going with a party right or wrong. I feel with you that my objects would prosper much better if [I sat behind the Treasury Bench ; but then I must often vote against my convictions ; i. e., do wrong that right may come ; and I do not feel this to be my duty, even for prisons and Criminal law. Has Wyndham Quin's business made much noise in Ireland ? It occupied about a week of our time, and the House were so amused they would do nothing else. Smith's evidence was excellent, and true ; for Gould's there are more appropriate phrases. Plunkett made a speech which did not please the House : it was special pleading, which they hate."

TO MRS. BUXTOX.

" Weymouth, August 15, 1819.

. . . . " I suppose M. has given you a full account of our travels. During the first ten miles I did not quite recover my composure, nor forget the horror I experienced at the rape of my apples. All the remainder of the journey was very