Save when the wren flits from her down-coved nest, That soon as loos'd booms with full twang away- The treacherous surface, while the quick-eyed trout Some feather'd dam, purveying 'mong the boughs, (Where safe and happily he might have lurk'd,) Tangled so thick with pleaching bramble shoots, That fans my throbbing temples! smiles the plain But, oh! more sweet the thought, heart-soothing thought, Of toil partake this day the common joy But hark! a plaintive sound floating along! Before their wicker door. Behold the man! PERSECUTION AND FAITH OF THE COVENANTERS. With them each day was holy, every hour Was laid," joyous arose; to die that day Was bliss. Long ere the dawn, by devious ways, O'er hills, through woods, o'er dreary wastes, they sought The upland muirs, where rivers, there but brooks, Dispart to different seas: Fast by such brooks A little glen is sometimes scoop'd, a plat With green sward gay, and flowers that strangers seem There, leaning on his spear, (one of the array, Whose gleam, in former days, hath scathed the rose Of night, save when the wintry-storm raved fierce, THE POOR MAN'S FUNERAL. Yon motley, sable-suited throng, that wait The younger's plaint-languid he raised his head, The coffin is borne out; the humble pomp As falls each spadeful of the bone-mix'd mould. A last farewell: all turn their several ways. Woes me! those tear-dimm'd eyes, that sobbing breast! That wont to lead thee home: no more that hand GRANVILLE SHARP, 1735-1813. "THE lives of some men may be contemplated in their opinions and private studies; of others, in their exertions and public concerns. It is rarely that the world beholds the union of unceasing action and unwearied study; still more rarely does it enjoy the sight of such united power devoting itself, at once meekly and resolutely, in the fear of God, to the best good of man. Yet such was the character of Granville Sharp." 1 See "Memoirs of Granville Sharp, Esq.," by Prince Hoare. London, 1820, 4to, pp. 554. Such are the remarks made by the biographer of Mr. Sharp in entering upon the consideration of his character-a character to which I feel, with depressing sensibility, no justice can be done in the short space allotted to these biographical notices. He was the son of the Rev. Thomas Sharp, Archdeacon of Northumberland, and was born in Durham, on the 10th of November, 1735. In 1750 he left Durham, having been apprenticed to a linen-draper of London. At the end of his apprenticeship, he engaged in a linen factory, and it was at this period he made his first advances in learning. Having a series of controversies with a scholar in London, whose name is not given, upon some disputed doctrines in the New Testament, his antagonist denied the correctness of our translation; whereupon Mr. Sharp, with that singleness of purpose which attended him through life, to spare no labors to ascertain the truth, immediately set upon the study of Greek, and with so much success, that he some years afterward published a small work upon the Greek Article. A controversy of a similar character with a learned Jew led him to the study of the Hebrew language. In June, 1758, he obtained a subordinate appointment in the Ordnance Office. From this time to 1765, little is known of him, except that he was pushing his studies in the ancient languages, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, with untiring industry. In this latter year, a circumstance happened which gave a new direction to his whole life, and which has caused him to be looked up to by a grateful posterity as the pioneer in the great and glorious reform, then commenced, of the abolition of slavery in England; then of the abolition of the slave trade; and finally, in 1834, of the abolition of slavery throughout the whole extent of the British empire. In 1765, a man by the name of Lisle had brought to England, from Barbadoes, an African, whom he claimed as his slave, by the name of Jonathan Strong. He treated him in a very cruel manner, and beat him so severely over the head as to cause his head to swell: from this, a serious disorder fell into his eyes, and he was abandoned by his master to the charities of the world. In this situation he applied to William Sharp, surgeon, the brother of Granville, and in process of time was cured. When cured, his so-called owner, who had in his sickness abandoned him, met him; and seeing him so well and strong, claimed him as his property. He fled to some friends for protection, and the knowledge of his case soon came to the ears of Granville Sharp, and enlisted all the energies of his soul. Suffice it to say that, by great exertions, he finally obtained the full release of the man.' But Mr. Sharp saw that the case of poor Strong was but one of many similar instances that existed in England, and he determined to devote his powers to effect the abolition of a system of oppression that was productive of such monstrous evils. Of his labors in this great enterprise, we will quote the account given in the "Edinburgh Review:"2 'Regardless of the dangers to which he exposed himself, both in his person and his fortune, Mr. Sharp stood forward in every case as the courageous friend of the poor Africans in England, in direct opposition to an opinion of Yorke and Read an interesting account of the case in the "Memoirs" before referred to, and also "Clarkson's History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade," pp. 66, 67. Edinburgh Review, xii. 362. Talbot, the attorney and solicitor-general for the time being. This opinion had been acted upon; and so high was its authority, that, after it had been made public, it was held as the settled law of the land, that a slave, neither by baptism nor arrival in Great Britain or Ireland, acquires freedom, but may be legally forced back to the plantations. Discouraged by Judge Blackstone and several other eminent lawyers, Mr. Sharp devoted three years of his life to the study of the English law, that he might render himself the more effectual advocate of these friendless strangers. In his work, entitled, 'A Representation of the Injustice and Dangerous Tendency of tolerating Slavery in England,' published in the year 1769, and afterward, in his learned and laborious Inquiry into the Principles of Villanage,' he refuted the opinion of Yorke and Talbot by unanswerable arguments, and neutralized their authority by the counter-opinion of the great Lord Chief Justice Holt, who many years before had decided that, as force could be used against no man in England without a legal process, every slave coming into England became free, inasmuch as the laws of England recognised the distinction between person and property as perpetual and sacred. Finally, in the great case of Somerset, which was argued at three different sittings, in January, in February, and in May of the year 1772, (the opinion of the judges having been taken upon the pleadings,) it was at last ascertained and declared to be the law of the land, that, as soon as ever any slave set his foot upon English territory, he became free. Among the heroes and sages of British story, we can think of few whom we should feel a greater glow of honest pride in claiming as an ancestor, than the man to whom we owe our power of repeating, with truth, 'Slaves cannot breathe in England: if their lungs. After this, Mr. Sharp interested himself very much in the cause of slavery in America, and corresponded with that great-hearted philanthropist, Anthony Benezet, with Dr. Franklin, Dr. Rush,1 and others. During all this time, he was merely a clerk in the Ordnance Office; but an incident soon occurred which prevented him from remaining in it any longer-an incident which showed a scrupulous integrity, a transparent beauty of character, as rare as it is delightful to behold. He had long witnessed with great solicitude the difficulties between England and her then American colonies, and sympathized entirely with the latter, justly holding the sentiment "Our country, right or wrong," to be an execrable one. Accordingly, in 1774, he published a work entitled, "A Declaration of the People's Natural Rights to a Share in the Legislature," the very thing for which WE so strenuously contended. When, therefore, hostilities actually occurred, and 'I must give a short extract from one of the letters of the venerable Dr. Rush to Mr. Sharp, dated Philadelphia, May 1, 1773, it does so much credit to the heart of the author:-"A spirit of humanity and religion begins to awaken, in several of the colonies, in favor of the poor negroes. The clergy begin to bear a public testimony against this violation of the laws of Nature and Christianity. Great events have been brought about by small beginnings. Anthony Benezet stood alone, a few years ago, in opposing negro slavery in Philadelphia, and now three-fourths of the province, as well as the city, cry out against it. I sometimes please myself with the hopes of living to see it abolished. With esteem for your virtues, and in particular for your zeal in behalf of the negro slaves in America. I am, with great respect, yours, "BENJAMIN RUSH." 2 The office for the supply of cannon for the army. |