Robert Smith, resided at Woodford, in Essex. He had, some years before this period, married a Miss Olier, the youngest daughter of a French emigrant, from Languedoc, driven over to England by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes; this emigrant married a Miss Barton, a collateral descendant of Sir Isaac Newton, through his mother's second marriage. Mr. Smith was, as we have stated, married to Miss Olier, but they parted at the church door, he sailed for America, she went home with her mother, with whom she remained until her husband's return from his wanderings. He was possessed of some money, which he diminished by roaming over the world for many years, and "by buying, altering, spoiling, and then selling about nineteen different places in England, till, in his old age, he at last settled at Bishop's Lydiard, in Somersetshire, where he died."

Mrs. Smith was a woman of noble mind and countenance, and reared her children in all the love and respect which these qualities command; even about her correspondence there was so great a charm, that whenever Sydney, or his brother Courtenay, received a letter from her, during the schoolboy days at Winchester, their young companions would gather round them and request to hear it read aloud. She died about the year 1805.

Sydney Smith was born at Woodford, in the year 1771, the second of four brothers and one sister. These were four odd, impulsive boys. They neglected play; gave every hour of leisure to study, often lying on the floor stretched over their books, discussing all the subjects arising, those often above "with a warmth and fierceness as if life and death hung upon the issue," and the result was, as Sydney Smith used to say, "to make us the most intolerable and overbearing set of boys that can well be imagined, till later in life we found our level in the world."

their years,

Robert and Cecil, the eldest and third sons, were sent to Eton, where Robert, called by his schoolfellows Bobus, being then only eighteen, distinguished himself much, and with Canning, Frere, and John Smith, writing The Microcosm, He went from Eton to King's College, Cambridge, where he obtained considerable reputation, and was considered an admirable composer of Latin verse; he went out to India in 1804 as Advocate-General of Bengal, and according to Sir James Mackintosh, "his fame amongst the natives was greater than that of any pundit since the days of Menu." He returned to

England in 1812, and obtained a seat in Parliament. He was not distinguished in the House, but his ability was considerable. Canning used to say "Bobus's language is the essence of English." He loved Sydney sincerely, allowed him one hundred pounds per annum for many years, gave him £500, and contributed towards the support of his son at College. One of Sydney's first acts as a clergyman, was the performance of the ceremony of the marriage of Robert with Miss Vernon, aunt to the present Marquis of Lansdowne. He stood by Sydney's death-bed, and his own death took place one fortnight later, and thus a hope, expressed by the former in 1813, was fulfilled

"Dear Bobus,

Pray take care of yourself. We shall both be a brown infragrant powder in thirty or forty years. Let us contrive to last out for the same, or nearly the same time. Weary will the latter half of my pilgrimage be, if you leave me in the lurch."

Sydney was sent, at the age of six years, to a school at Southampton kept by the Rev. Dr. Marsh, and was thence, with his younger brother Courtenay, removed to Winchester. His life here was a hard one, but yet he and his brother so much distinguished themselves, that a round-robin was signed by their schoolfellows and presented to Dr. Warton, the Head Master or Warden of Winchester, "refusing to try for the College prizes if the Smiths were allowed to contend for them any more, as they always gained them." Referring to this period, Sydney used to say-" I believe, whilst a boy at school, I made above ten thousand Latin verses, and no man in his senses would dream in after-life of ever making another. So much for life and time wasted." Possibly the whole spirit of wisdom, pervading his admirable paper, Too Much Latin and Greek*, has its inspiration from his recollection of this time. cast away.

He left Winchester as Captain, for New College, Oxford, entitled to a Scholarship, and afterwards to a Fellowship. He was too poor and too proud to mix much in College society. He was sent, by his father, in the interval between obtaining his Scholarship and his Fellowship, to Mont Villiers,

in Normandy, for the purpose of acquiring a knowledge of French, which he always afterwards spoke with fluency. He resided six months in France, but owing to the fierceness of the then raging Revolution, it was considered advisable for his safety that he should join one of the Jacobin Clubs of the town, and he was accordingly entered as "Le Citoyen Smit, Membre Affilié au Club des Jacobins de Mont Villiers."

Of his career in College little is told; he obtained his Fellowship as early as possible, and, from the time of its attainment, his father never gave him one farthing, but left him to support himself as best as he could upon the income of his Fellowship, about £100 per annum. He, however, not alone kept out of debt, but bound himself to pay £30, a debt which his brother Courtenay had contracted whilst at Winchester, and which, on leaving for India, he feared to declare to his father. Courtenay became Supreme Judge of the Adawlut Court, acquired reputation as a judge and Oriental scholar, returned in old age to England, and dying intestate about the year 1842, Sydney became possessed of one third of his fortune.

On leaving College, Sydney was inclined to adopt the Bar as his profession, but his father having educated Robert to the law, and having sent Courtenay and Cecil to India, had first resolved to send Sydney as a supercargo to China, but now pressed him to enter the Church: he agreed, and as he tells us, "When first I went into the Church, I had a curacy in the middle of Salisbury Plain." He lived in a village consisting of a few scattered cottages: once a week a butcher's cart came over from Salisbury; then only could meat be obtained, and he often dined on a mess of potatoes sprinkled with ket chup. He was too poor to buy books, and he was thus forced to cultivate the society of the squire, Mr. Beach, who, according to the fashion of the time, invited the curate to dine with him every Sunday; after the acquaintance, Mr. Beach requested him to resign the curacy, and to accompany his eldest son to the University of Weimar, in Saxony. They set out for Germany, but that country being disturbed by war, "in stress of politics" they "put into Edinburgh," where they remained five years.

When Sydney Smith and his pupil entered Edinburgh, in the year 1797, it numbered amongst its inhabitants men whose names have since then become famous through the world.

He became intimate with all, and amongst the most remarkable of his associates were Horner, Playfair, Scott, Dugald Stewart, John Allen, Brown, Leyden, Lord Webb Seymour, Lord Woodhouselee, Alison, Sir James Hall, but, as he himself states-"Among the first persons with whom I became acquainted were, Lord Jeffrey, Lord Murray, and Lord Brougham; all of these maintaining opinions upon political subjects a little too liberal for the dynasty of Dundas, then exercising supreme power over the northern division of the island."

After residing two years in Edinburgh he returned to England, for the purpose of marrying Miss Pybus, a friend and schoolfellow of his sister Maria. The union was approved by the lady's mother, but was opposed by her brother, Mr. Charles Pybus, who was one of the Lords of the Admiralty under Pitt.

The lady had but a very small fortune, and a pearl necklace, which was sold for £500, to enable the young couple to buy linen and other necessary articles; Sydney's whole resources consisting of his intellect, "and six small silver tea spoons which, from much wear, had become the ghosts of their former selves." Mr. Beach presented him, upon his marriage, with £1000, as a token of his appreciation of the care bestowed upon his eldest son, and at the same time requested him to take charge of his second son, with whom was entrusted to his care, by his guardians, Mr. Gordon, of Ellon Castle. For the care of each of those young men he received £400, the highest sum which had then been given to any but Dugald Stewart the pupils are still living, and continued to retain for him, to his death, feelings of deep and warm affection.

During his residence in Edinburgh, he occasionally preached in the Episcopal Church, then served by Bishop Sandford; he attended the lectures on Moral Philosophy of Dugald Stewart and of his successor, Dr. Thomas Brown; he also attended, both in Edinburgh and in Oxford, the lectures on Medicine and Anatomy; indeed so attentive had he been to these latter studies in Oxford, that the professor, Sir Christopher Pegge, wished him to become a physician. Feeling the vast extent of usefulness which a knowledge of medicine throws open to a clergyman, he pursued the study so far in Edinburgh as to attend the Clinical Lectures of Dr. Gregory, and many instances are related of his skilfull application in after life of the information thus acquired.

It is unnecessary here to refer to the establishment of The Edinburgh Review; it has been told so graphically by Sydney Smith, in the preface to his works, that Lady Holland extracts it, and whatever he has not told, is fully detailed in Lord Cockburn's Jeffrey's Life and Correspondence.*

Having, in 1803, completed the education of his two pupils, he was induced by Mrs. Smith, who rated his ability highly, to remove to London, as affording a more extended sphere for the development of his genius. Accordingly, in the year 1804, he took up his residence in Doughty-street, Russellsquare, and there amidst the lawyers, he soon became intimate with Romilly, Scarlett, and Mackintosh; to those may be added, Dr. Marcet, Dumont, Whishaw, Lord Dudley and Ward, Sharp, Samuel Rogers, and Luttrell.

His first sermon preached in London, was that called, in the second volume of his Sermons, "On Invasion," and was delivered before a large body of Volunteers in the summer of 1804; and a year or two afterwards he preached in aid of the poor Swiss. About this period he obtained, through Sir Thomas Barnard, the preachership of the Foundling Hospital, and although worth but £50 a year, the office was gladly accepted. He endeavoured, at the same period,. to obtain other employment in his profession; for a time all his efforts

Lady Holland, at page 426 of the "Memoir," gives the following list of Sydney Smith's articles in "The Edinburgh Review":—