Richard Lovell Edgeworth - Richard Lovell Edgeworth

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'My father could no longer consider Buonaparte as a great man,
abiding by his principles, and content with the true glory of being
the first citizen of a free people; but as one meditating
usurpation, and on the point of overturning, for the selfish love of
dominion, the liberty of France. With this impression, my father
declared that he would not go to the court of a usurper. He never
went to his levees, nor would he be presented to him.

'My father had not the presumption to imagine that in a cursory
view, during a slight tour, and a residence of four or five months
at Paris, he could become thoroughly acquainted with France.
Besides, his living chiefly with the select society which I have
described precluded the possibility of seeing much of what were
called les nouveaux riches.

'The few general observations he made on French society at this time
I shall mention. He observed that, among the families of the old
nobility, domestic happiness and virtue had much increased since the
Revolution, in consequence of the marriages which, after they lost
their wealth and rank, had been formed, not according to the usual
fashion of old French alliances, but from disinterested motives,
from the perception of the real suitability of tempers and
characters. The women of this class in general, withdrawn from
politics and political intrigue, were more domestic and
amiable. . . .

'With regard to literature^he observed that it had considerably
degenerated. For the good taste, wit, and polished style which had
characterised French literature before the Revolution there was no
longer any demand, and but few competent judges remained. The
talents of the nation had been forced by circumstances into
different directions. At one time, the hurry and necessity of the
passing moment had produced political pamphlets and slight works of
amusement, formed to catch the public revolutionary taste. At
another period, the contending parties, and the real want of freedom
in the country, had repressed literary efforts. Science, which
flourished independently of politics, and which was often useful and
essential to the rulers, had meanwhile been encouraged, and had
prospered. The discoveries and inventions of men of science showed
that the same positive quantity of talent existed in France as in
former times, though appearing in a new form.'

The charms of Paris and its society were rudely broken by Edgeworth
receiving one morning a visit from a police officer requiring him
immediately to attend at the Palais de Justice. Edgeworth was in bed
with a cold when this summons came. He writes to Miss Charlotte
Sneyd:--'My being ill was not a sufficient excuse; I got up and
dressed myself slowly, to gain time for thinking--drank one dish of
chocolate, ordered my carriage, and went with my exempt to the
Palais de Justice. There I was shown into a parlour, or rather a
guard-room, where a man like an under-officer was sitting at a desk.
In a few minutes I was desired to walk upstairs into a long narrow
room, in different parts of which ten or twelve clerks were sitting
at different tables. To one of these I was directed--he asked my
name, wrote it on a printed card, and demanding half a crown,
presented the card to me, telling me it was a passport. I told him I
did not want a passport; but he pressed it upon me, assuring me that
I had urgent necessity for it, as I must quit Paris immediately.
Then he pointed out to me another table, where another clerk was
pleased to place me in the most advantageous point of view for
taking my portrait, and he took my written portrait with great
solemnity, and this he copied into my passport. I begged to know who
was the principal person in the room, and to him I applied to learn
the cause of the whole proceeding. He coolly answered that if I
wanted to know I must apply to the Grand Juge. To the Grand Juge I
drove, and having waited till the number ninety-three was called,
the number of the ticket which had been given to me at the door, I
was admitted, and the Grand Juge most formally assured me that he
knew nothing of the affair, but that all I had to do was to obey. I
returned home, and, on examining my passport, found that I was
ordered to quit Paris in twenty-four hours. I went directly to our
Ambassador, Lord Whitworth, who lived at the extremity of the town:
he was ill--with difficulty I got at his secretary, Mr. Talbot, to
whom I pointed out that I applied to my Ambassador from a sense of
duty and politeness, before I would make any application to private
friends, though I believed that I had many in Paris who were willing
and able to assist me. The secretary went to the Ambassador, and in
half an hour wrote an official note to Talleyrand, to ask the why
and the wherefore. He advised me in the meantime to quit Paris, and
to go to some village near it--Passy or Versailles. Passy seemed
preferable, because it is the nearest to Paris--only a mile and a
half distant. Before I quitted Paris I made another attempt to
obtain some explanation from the Grand Juge. I could not see him, or
even his secretary, for a considerable time; and when at length the
secretary appeared, it was only to tell me that I could not see the
Grand Juge. "Cannot I write," said I, "to your Grand Juge?" He
answered hesitatingly, "Yes." A huissier took in my note, and
another excellent one from the friend who was with me, F. D. The
huissier returned presently, holding my papers out to me at arm's
length--"The Grand Juge knows nothing of this matter."

'I returned home, dined, ordered a carriage to be ready to take me
to Passy, wrote a letter to Buonaparte, stating my entire ignorance
of the cause of my deportation, and asserting that I was unconnected
with any political party. F. D. engaged that the letter should be
delivered; and Mrs. E. and Charlotte remaining to settle our affairs
at Paris, I set off for Passy with Maria, where my friend F. D. had
taken the best lodging he could find for me in the village. Madame
G. had offered me her country house at Passy; but though she pressed
that offer most kindly we would not accept of it, lest we should
compromise our friends. Another friend, Mons. de P, offered his
country house, but, for the same reason, this offer was declined. We
arrived at Passy about ten o'clock at night, and though a deporte, I
slept tolerably well. Before I was up, my friend Mons. de P. was
with me--breakfasted with us in our little oven of a parlour
--conversed two hours most agreeably. Our other friend, F. D, came
also before we had breakfasted, and just as I had mounted on a table
to paste some paper over certain deficiencies in the window, enter
M. P. and Le B h.

'"Mon ami, ce n'est pas la peine!" cried they both at once, their
faces rayonnant de joie. "You need not give yourself so much
trouble; you will not stay here long. We have seen the Grand Juge,
and your detention arises from a mistake. It was supposed that you
are brother to the Abbe Edgeworth--we are to deliver a petition from
you, stating what your relationship to the Abbe really is. This
shall be backed by an address signed by all your friends at Paris,
and you will be then at liberty to return."

'I objected to writing any petition, and at all events I determined
to consult my Ambassador, who had conducted himself well towards me.
I wrote to Lord Whitworth, stating the facts, and declaring that
nothing could ever make me deny the honour of being related to the
Abbe Edgeworth. Lord Whitworfh advised me, however, to state the
fact that I was not the Abbe's brother. . . .

'No direct answer was received from the First Consul; but perhaps
the revocation of the order of the Grand Juge came from him. We were
assured that my father's letter had been read by him, and that he
declared he knew nothing of the affair; and so far from objecting to
any man for being related to the Abbe Edgeworth, he declared that he
considered him as a most respectable, faithful subject, and that he
wished that he had many such.'

Before this unpleasant occurrence Edgeworth had thought of taking a
house in Paris for two years and sending for his other children; but
he now, in spite of the entreaties of his French friends, altered
his plans and resolved to return home. Maria writes:--'He was
prudent and decided--had he been otherwise, we might all have been
among the number of our countrymen who were, contrary to the law of
nations, and to justice and reason, made prisoners in France at the
breaking out of the war. We were fortunate in getting safe to free
and happy England a short time before war was declared, and before
the detention of the English took place.

'My eldest brother had the misfortune to be among those who were
detained. His exile was rendered as tolerable as circumstances would
permit by the indefatigable kindness of our friends the D' s. But it
was an exile of eleven years--from 1803 to 1814--six years of that
time spent at Verdun!'

CHAPTER 11

Instead of returning at once to Ireland, the Edgeworths went to
Edinburgh to visit Henry Edgeworth, whose declining health caused
his father much anxiety. Maria writes:--'He mended rapidly while we
were at Edinburgh; and this improvement in his health added to the
pleasure his father felt in seeing the interest his son had excited
among the friends he had made for himself in Edinburgh--men of the
first abilities and highest characters, both in literature and
science--whom we knew by their works, as did all the world; with
some of whom my father had had the honour of corresponding, but to
whom he was personally unknown. Imagine the pleasure he felt at
being introduced to them by his son, and in hearing Gregory, Alison,
Playfair, Dugald Stewart, speak of Henry as if he actually belonged
to themselves, and with the most affectionate regard. . . .

'On our journey homewards, in passing through Scotland, we met with
much hospitality and kindness, and much that was interesting in the
country and in its inhabitants But the circumstance that remains the
most fixed in my recollection, and that which afterwards influenced
my father's life the most, happened to be the books we read during
our last day's journey. These were the lives of Robertson the
historian, and of Reid, which had been just given to us by Mr.
Stewart. In the life of Reid there are some passages which struck my
father particularly. I recollect at the moment when I was reading to
him, his stretching eagerly across from his side of the carriage to
mine, and marking the book with his pencil with strong and
reiterated marks of approbation. The passages relate to the means
which Dr. Reid employed to prevent the decay of his faculties as he
advanced in years; to remedy the errors and deficiencies of one
failing sense by the increased activity of another, and by the
resources of reasoning and ingenuity to resist, as far as possible,
or to render supportable, the infirmities of age . . . My father
never forgot this passage, and acted on it years afterwards.'

It was not Henry who was taken first, but Charlotte, who was 'fresh
as a rose' on her first tour abroad. In April 1807 she died of the
same disease as her sisters, and about two years after her brother
Henry followed her to the grave.

It needed a brave heart to bear up under such sorrows, but
Edgeworth, though he felt them keenly, would not sink into the
lethargy of grief, but roused himself to work for the public good.
He was on the board appointed to inquire into the education of the
people of Ireland, and two of his papers on the subject were printed
in the reports of the Commissioners; he also drew up the plan of a
school for Edgeworth Town, which was afterwards carried into
execution by his son, Lovell; and at this time he was writing his
Memoirs, a task which was interrupted by a severe illness in 1809.
He had hardly recovered from this before he was engaged in the
Government survey of bogs, and Maria writes:--'It was late in the
year, and the weather unfavourable. In laying out and verifying the
work of the surveyors employed, he was usually out from daybreak to
sunset, often fifteen hours without food, traversing on foot, with
great bodily exertion, wastes and deserts of bog, so wet and
dangerous as to be scarcely passable at that season, even by the
common Irish best used to them. In these bogs there frequently occur
great holes, filled with water of the same colour as the bog, or
sometimes covered over with a slight surface of the peat heath or
grass, called by the common people a shakingscraw. 'In traversing
these bogs a man must pick his way carefully, sometimes wading,
sometimes leaping from one landing place to another, choosing these
cautiously, lest they should not sustain his weight: avoiding
certain treacherous green spots on which the unwary might be tempted
to set foot, and would sink, never to rise again.'

The work was fatiguing, but the open air life seemed to give him new
vigour, and his health was reestablished.

The work had interested him much, and he believed that an immense
tract of bog might be reclaimed. The obstacles he foresaw were want
of capital and the danger of litigation. As long as the bogs were
unprofitable there was no incitement to a strict definition of
boundaries, but if the land was reclaimed many lawsuits would
follow. Maria thus describes the difficulties encountered by her
father:--'He wished to undertake the improvement of a large tract of
bog in his neighbourhood, and for this purpose desired to purchase
it from the proprietor; but the proprietor had not the power or the
inclination to sell it. My father, anxious to try a decisive
experiment on a large scale, proposed to rent it from him, and
offered a rent, till then unheard of, for bogland. The proprietor
professed himself satisfied to accept the proposal, provided my
father would undertake to indemnify him for any expense to which he
might be put by future lawsuits concerning the property or
boundaries of this bog. He was aware that if he were to give a lease
for a long term, even for sixty years, this would raise the idea
that the bog would become profitable; and still further, if ever it
should be really improved and profitable, it would become an object
of contention and litigation to many who might fancy they had
claims, which, as long as the bog was nearly without value, they
found it not worth while to urge. It was impossible to enter into
the \ insurance proposed, and, consequently, he could not obtain
this tract of bog, or further prosecute his plan. The same sort of
difficulty must frequently recur. Parts of different estates pass
through extensive tracts of bog, of which the boundaries are
uncertain. The right to cut the turf is usually vested in the
occupiers of adjoining farms; but they are at constant war with each
other about boundaries, and these disputes, involving the original
grants of the lands, hundreds of years ago, with all subsequent
deeds and settlements, appear absolutely interminable. . . .

'It may not be at present a question of much interest to the British
public, because no such large decisive experiment as was proposed
has yet been tried as to the value and attainableness of the object;
but its magnitude and importance are incontestable, the whole extent
of peat soil in Ireland exceeding, as it is confidently pronounced,
2,830,000 acres, of which about half might be converted to the
general purposes of agriculture.'

It was in 1811 that Edgeworth constructed, 'upon a plan of his own
invention, a spire for the church of Edgeworth Town. This spire was
formed of a skeleton of iron, covered with slates, painted and
sanded to resemble Portland stone. It was put together on the ground
within the tower of the church, and when finished it was drawn up at
once, with the assistance of counterbalancing weights, to the top of
the tower, and there to be fixed in its place.

'The novelty of the construction of this spire, even in this its
first skeleton state, excited attention, and as it drew towards its
completion, and near the moment when, with its covering of slates,
altogether amounting to many tons weight, it was to move, or not to
move, fifty feet from the ground to the top of the tower, everybody
in the neighbourhood, forming different opinions of the probability
of its success or failure, became interested in the event.

'Several of my father's friends and acquaintances, in our own and
from adjoining counties, came to see it drawn up. Fortunately, it
happened to be a very fine autumn day, and the groups of spectators
of different ranks and ages, assembled and waging in silent
expectation, gave a picturesque effect to the whole. A bugle sounded
as the signal for ascent. The top of the spire appearing through the
tower of the church, began to move upwards; its gilt ball and arrow
glittered in the sun, while with motion that was scarcely
perceptible it rose majestically. Not one word or interjection was
uttered by any of the men who worked the windlasses at the top of
the tower.

'It reached its destined station in eighteen minutes, and then a
flag streamed from its summit and gave notice that all was safe. Not
the slightest accident or difficulty occurred.' Maria adds:--'The
conduct of the whole had been trusted to my brother William (the
civil engineer), and the first words my father said, when he was
congratulated upon the success of the work, were that his son's
steadiness in conducting business and commanding men gave him
infinitely more satisfaction than he could feel from the success of
any invention of his own.'

Towards the close of 1811 Edgeworth was requested, as he understood,
by a committee of the House of Commons on Broad Wheels, to look over
and report on a mass of evidence on the subject. This he did, but
then found that it was a private request of the chairman, Sir John
Sinclair, who begged that the report might be given to the Board of
Agriculture. This Edgeworth declined, but wrote instead and
presented An Essay on Springs applied to Carts; and in 1813 he
published an essay on Roads, and Wheel Carriages. His daughter
writes:--'In the course of the drudgery which he went through he
received a great counterbalancing pleasure from the following
passage, which he chanced to meet with in a letter to the committee,
written by a gentleman to whom he was personally a stranger:

'"Mr. Edgeworth was the first who pointed out the great benefit of
springs in aiding the draught of horses. The subject deserves more
attention than it has hitherto met with. No discovery relative to
carriages has been made in our time of equal importance; and the
ingenious author of it deserves highly of some mark of public
gratitude."'

Maria adds:--'Those ingenious ideas, which had been but the
amusement of youth, as he advanced in life, he turned to public
utility: for instance, the mode of conveying secret and swift
intelligence, which he had suggested at first only to decide a
trifling wager between him and some young nobleman, he afterwards
improved into a national telegraph, and through all difficulties and
disappointments persevered till it was established. In the same
manner, his juvenile amusements with the sailing chariot led to
experiments on the resistance of the air, which in more mature years
he pursued in the patient spirit of philosophical investigation, and
turned to good account for the real business of life, and for the
advancement of science.

'On this subject, in the year 1783, he published in the Transactions
of the Royal Society (vol. 73) "An Essay on the Resistance of the
Air," of which the object, as he states, is to determine the force
of the wind upon surfaces of different size and figure, or upon the
same surface, when placed in different directions, inclined at
different angles, or curved in different arches. . . . After trying
several experiments on surfaces of various shapes, he ascertained
the difference of resistance in different cases, suggested the
probable cause of these variations, and opened a large field for
future curious and useful speculation; useful it may be called, as
well as curious, because such knowledge applies immediately to the
wants and active business of life, to the construction of wind- and
water-mills, and to the extensive purposes of navigation. The theory
of philosophers and the practice of mechanics and seamen were, and
perhaps are still, at variance as to the manner in which sails of
wind-mills and of ships should be set. Dr. Hooke, in his day,
expressed "his surprise at the obstinacy of seamen in continuing,
after what appeared the clearest demonstration to the contrary, to
prefer what are called bellying or bunting sails, to such as are
hauled tight." The doctor said that he would, at some future time,
add the test of experiment to mathematical investigation in support
of his theory.

'It is remarkable that this test of experiment, when at length it
was applied, confirmed the truth of what the philosopher had
reprobated as an obstinate vulgar error. My father, in his Essay on
the Resistance of the Air, gives the result of his experiments on a
flat and curved surface of the same dimensions, and explains the
cause of the error into which Dr. Hooke, M. Parent, and other
mathematicians had fallen in their theoretic reasonings. . . .

'It is remarkable that a man of naturally lively imagination and of
inventive genius should not, in science, have ever followed any
fanciful theory of his own, but that all he did should have been
characterised by patient investigation and prudent experiment. . . .

'In science, it is not given to man to finish; to persevere, to
advance a step or two, is all that can be accomplished, and all that
will be expected by the real philosopher.

'"We will endeavour" is the humble and becoming motto of our
philosophical society.'

CHAPTER 12

In his seventy-first year Edgeworth had a dangerous illness, and
though he seemed to recover from it for a time, he never regained
his former strength. One great privation was that, from the failure
of his sight, he became dependent on others to read and write for
him. But his cheerful fortitude did not fail, though he felt that
his days were numbered. He had promised to try some private
experiments for the Dublin Society, and with the help of his son
William he carried out a set of experiments on wheel carriages in
April 1815 and in May 1816.

Almost his last literary effort was to dictate some pages which he
contributed to his daughter Maria's novel Ormond, and he delighted
in having the proofsheets read to him and in correcting them. Mrs.
Ritchie has given some touching details of his last days in her
Introduction to a new edition of Ormond.

Maria writes:--'The whole of Moriaty's history, and his escape from
prison, were dictated without any alteration, or hesitation of a
word, to Honora and me. This history Mr. Edgeworth heard from the
actual hero of it, Michael Dunne, whom he chanced to meet in the
town of Navan, where he was living respectably. He kept a shop where
Mr. Edgeworth went to purchase some boards, and observing something
very remarkable about the man's countenance, he questioned him as
they were looking at the lumber in his yard, and Dunne readily told
his tale almost in the very words used by Moriaty. . . . Mr.
Edgeworth also wrote the meeting between Moriaty and his wife when
he jumps out of the carriage the moment he hears her voice.'

Edgeworth kept his intellectual faculties to the last. 'To the last
they continued clear, vigorous, energetic; and to the last were
exerted in doing good, and in fulfilling every duty, public and
private. . . .

'In the closing hours of his life his bodily sufferings subsided,
and in the most serene and happy state, he said, before he sank to
that sleep from which he never wakened:

'"I die with the soft feeling of gratitude to my friends and
submission to the God who made me."'

He died the 13th of June 1817.

It may be thought to be an easy task to make an abridgment of a
biography, but in some ways it is almost as difficult as it is for
the sketcher to choose what he will put into his picture and yet
preserve a due proportion and give a faithful idea of the whole
scene before him. I have tried to give such portions of the Memoirs
as will present the many-sided character of R. L. Edgeworth in
relation to his scientific, literary, and educational work, and in
relation to his position as a landlord, a father, and a friend. He
was a singular instance of great mental activity with little
ambition; of a genial nature in his own family circle and among his
friends, he withdrew from the multitude, and refused to lower his
standard of cultivated intercourse in order to win favour with
coarser natures. He is chiefly remembered now as an educational
reformer and as the guide of Maria Edgeworth in the earlier stages
of her literary career. What she achieved was in great part due to
her father's judicious training and encouragement.

A little more ambition and the spur of poverty might have made
Edgeworth better known as an inventor of useful machines: it is
curious to remark how nearly he invented the bicycle. He saw the
advantage that light railways would be to Ireland, but the breath of
mechanical life, steam, as a power, he did not foresee.

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