I party severally to do him the favour to stay and help him with his post. In this way he secured the services of about a dozen white negroes, whom he overwhelmed with thanks and blottingpaper, seating them round the long table which was covered with writing implements, and at which he had already taken his seat. Now, then, are you ready?' (throwing a letter across to 'my dear Woodford')- Begin, "my dear Sir," and sign it "yours truly." Say, "I shall be glad to confirm at your Church on the day and at the hour you propose. I trust your wife is by this time restored to health." Thank you!'-Will you (turning to the man on his left and handing him a letter) 'explain to him that I cannot possibly sanction what would be a grave irregularity, but that,' &c. &c. Begin, "Dear Mr. Soand-so," and end "very faithfully yours." Thank you, my dear Pearson!'-Then, turning with another letter to the man on his right, Tell him, please, that I have an engagement for the 17th which will hinder me doing what he wishes. But would another afternoon after the 17th and before the 20th suit him? Thank you, dear Leighton! Begin, "My dear" (calling him by his surname), and sign it "yours affectionately."-To the next scribe,Begin, "My dear Mrs." (naming her), "Yes, we all grow older. Thank you much for your photograph. enclose you in return what you are so good as to ask for." To the next,- Begin, "Reverend Sir, I have read with surprise yours of the 13th, and can only refer you to the letter I sent you on the same subject a week ago."-To the next,— 'Dear Sir, the last sherry was excellent. I shall be glad if you will send me a further supply of precisely the same quality at the same price.' . . . . This went on till every pen at table was heard scratching; the Bishop dashing off the more important notes with his own hand; only pausing at short intervals to glance over the work of his scribes, to sign his name, and to furnish the letter-writer with another job: every envelope as soon as finished being thrown into a basket. In this way perhaps forty, fifty, sixty letters were achieved, and the clock had already struck seven. All yawned-but one. He turned an imploring look to my dear Randall.' The letters had not yet been registered in the log-book. O yes, I'll do it.' And now, the contents of the basket being transferred to the postbag, we were all again thanked and invited to dress for dinner, with the information that A B C D (gentry of the neighbourhood), with wives and daughters, were coming, and that they had been invited for eight o'clock. Wilberforce had been hard at work for nine hours, and had still a little thing which he must do before he could go to dress.' He looked thoroughly fagged. fagged. On reappearing in the drawing-room, however, a more entire contrast can hardly be imagined. He looked at least ten years younger. Every mark of thought and care had vanished from his brow. Then came the dinner-already referred to. Dinner ended, after a few civilities to his guests, when he had sufficiently set things going in the drawing-room, he was to be seen in a corner on a sofa which exactly held two persons. He beckoned to you,-his forefinger being first extended horizontally, then pointed vertically to the vacant part of the sofa. Seated by his side, you were drawn closer and heard,- All sorts of strange reports have reached me of the scrape which E. has got into. Pray insense me. You must know all about it.' When you had done insensing, he would consult you as to what course it would be best for himself to pursue, ending with a request that you would send F. to him. F. accordingly occupied the seat you had just vacated; and you knew very well that the Bishop was arranging with him about a meeting of clergy to be held next month at G. F. in turn was requested to pick out H., and send him to him. In this way not a little of the business of the diocese was helped forward a stage, while half the party were chatting about nothing in one drawing-room, the other half listening to music in the other. His powers of work were truly surprising, and he would get through what he had to do under conditions which by most men would have been deemed fatal to serious effort. An amusing instance of this belongs to the last year of his archidiaconate, when, having been commanded to preach next day before the Queen (the order did not reach him till after dinner), he was under the necessity of travelling, in November, through the Saturday night at the tail of a goods' train, crossing the Solent on the Sunday morning, in order to be in time to preach at Osborne, and of writing his sermon at intervals on the way : In after years Bishop Wilberforce was fond of telling the story of this Saturday night's journey, and of the inconvenience he experienced in writing his sermon for the morrow in a carriage attached to a train of trucks, which was continually stopping, and which had no buffers to break the shock of each stoppage. Far ahead at the other end of the train he could hear the bump of the first truck, and then of the next, and of the next, until, as it neared his own turn, the ink had to be secured from upsetting, and himself and his paraphernalia prepared for the constantly recurring jolt.'-p. 243. Yet he not only achieved his sermon, but wrote a long letter to his adopted sister besides, which he finished on board the steamer. The most singular part of the matter, however, was that Wilberforce's appetite for work was so extraordinary. Several instances instances of this present themselves, one of which may stand as a sample for the rest. A fortnight before the examination, it was his practice to direct candidates for priests' orders instantly to post and send him to Cuddesdon the last two sermons they had preached. The morning and afternoon homilies, delivered in an obscure Berkshire village on a certain Sunday in December 1849, were accordingly forwarded to headquarters by a nameless individual, not without trepidation. The first (on 'The Day of Judgment') contained a considerable extract from Pearson on the Creed. The second was unusually severe on the sin of stealing, the squiress, who was also the lady-bountiful of the village, having been just robbed of her ducks, a loss which sorely exercised her woman's nature. It was not the creatures she cared for; but to think of anyone having the heart to come and steal from me!' Accordingly, without exactly mentioning the ducks, the preacher had made it perfectly plain what he was alluding to. The examination over, he was sent for into the Bishop's library. 'We find your papers the best we have had this time.' The man began to breathe freely. I have read both your sermons.' (O good-gracious!—the ducks!) 'They are all very well; but I think a prolonged extract from Pearson is somewhat out of place, has a dry, formal sound,—in a village sermon and those remarks about stealing in the other sermon -I suppose they were occasioned by something which had recently occurred, eh?' It was but too plain that the Bishop had spelled out every word.-He showed the same powers of endurance in wading through the answers of his candidates, many of which he would discuss with them during the interview which followed, on the night previous to Ordination.-Every one who ever travelled with him will remember how he utilized a railway journey to write his letters. So overwhelmed was he with correspondence, that his favourite resource was on such occasions (it being well understood that the guard must always give him a carriage to himself) to get out his writing materials, and to scribble on a kind of swinging desk. These missives he dated from 'The Train,' and they were really almost as legible as his letters written under the most favourable conditions. In this way he would frequently dash off two or three dozen short letters in the course of a railway journey of a couple of hours; for he wrote wondrous rapidly, and his writing was unusually large. This practice of his is well known. But all are not aware that in crazy vehicles, and even when travelling on bad roads, he would still pursue his correspondence. It is related :— 'A propos of his practice of writing letters in railway-carriages, that, that, having dated a letter so written, "Rail, near Reading," the receiver, ignorant alike of his identity, and of his habit, directed the reply as follows:: S. Oxon, Esq., Nevertheless the letter was delivered within a post or two at the Bishop's London address, 61 Eaton Place. The envelope was preserved for many years as an example of the perception of the officials of the Post-Office.'-Introd, p. 31. This feature in Wilberforce's character may not be dismissed so briefly. It has been so excellently touched upon by his biographer, that some further details may reasonably be introduced here from his admirable Introduction' to the 'Life' :— 'Perhaps no man ever possessed a more remarkable power of working at all times, and of using up odds and ends of time-a faculty which of itself indicates a more than common vital force. He was passionately fond of North Wales, and frequently spent some time there in the autumn, taking the opportunity to speak and preach for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. The details of his return journey from one of these Welsh visits are too characteristic to be omitted. He had preached on the Sunday, and on the Monday morning, leaving his hosts at Coed Coch near Conway, he travelled viâ Chester and Shrewsbury to Plâs Machynlleth, the residence of Earl Vane, now the Marquis of Londonderry. He arrived at 4 P.M. Saddle-horses were awaiting him, and with the friend who accompanied him, he scoured the country-hill and valley-until 8 P.M., barely allowing himself ten minutes to dress for dinner, and this after a railway journey of full 180 miles. The next day he was driven to a spot well known to Welsh tourists, Minfford, at the base of Cader Idris, which he ascended and descended on foot, a serious climb for a man already nearly sixty. On Wednesday morning he attended, and spoke at, a meeting for the Propagation Society at Aberystwith, then walked some miles to a neighbouring house to luncheon, then travelled ninety miles by rail and ten more by road to Llangedwyn, the residence of Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn, arriving at 8.45; dinner at 9 and bed at 12.45. On the Thursday morning, after a 6-o'clock breakfast, he was off before 7, reached Crewe between 8 and 9, and London at 1.30. There he had a multitude of appointments occupying the time until 4.30, after which he left town for Salisbury, where by 8 he was ready to join a large party at the Bishop's, and then, after dinner, he entertained the whole company in the drawing-room, by a reading of "Enoch Arden," then just published. The traffic manager had given him a carriage to himself, so that during the journey to Salisbury, he had both written his day's letters and dressed for dinner.'-p. xxiv. It would be idle to try to conceal the plain fact that Bishop Wilberforce Wilberforce paid the inevitable penalty of a life of such continuous action, and found wondrous few opportunities for reading or for writing. In order to achieve his well-known article on 'Essays and Reviews' which appeared in the Quarterly,' he was obliged to shut himself up entirely at Cuddesdon for a fortnight. There are but twelve hours in the day. Into those twelve hours, he habitually forced the work of eighteen, if not of four-and-twenty; but reading, which is to bear fruit, will not submit to be so disposed of, and he was much too clear-sighted a man to make the attempt. His was, to an extraordinary extent, a life of action. Once, on hearing of a friend's promotion to the episcopate, Ah,' he exclaimed, and now he will degenerate into a mere administrator.' It must, in fact, be . plainly admitted that the nature and extent of episcopal work renders systematic reading next to impossible. And yet, to some extent, Wilberforce did read. On coming down one morning to breakfast, at a country-house, he admitted that he had risen at six, and had carefully mastered twenty pages of Pusey on Daniel. He was reading the book through; but could only find time for it by early rising. He read such books alone as he deemed indispensable; getting the substance of many others chiefly by conversing with those who had read them carefully, and on whose judgment he knew that he might rely. The wonder was how he ever found it possible to write-what he was so frequently called upon to preach-namely, a sermon. Never, certainly, could he have written those later sermons at all, had he not acquired extraordinary facility by constant exercise during the earlier years of his ministry-as many an entry in his diary proves. For months together,' says his biographer, 'the course of preparation of each sermon is specified, together with memoranda as to its efficacy when delivered' (p. 55). O that young preachers would lay such a discovery to heart! Even to the last he stuck to the practice of at least endeavouring to commit to paper what he proposed to deliver from the pulpit, at the Athenæum, probably, or in the train. The document, it must be confessed, bore abundant traces of the disadvantages under which it had been produced, and was never fit for printing until it had been carefully revised, in fact, it almost required to be re-written. Such a passing reference to Wilberforce's preaching awakens a multitude of slumbering recollections. There is no describing how exquisite was his oratory. Such a delightful voice and persuasive mode of address; such a happy admixture of argumentative power with rhetorical skill; such wealth of striking imagery and unrivalled beauty of diction; and all this recom mended |