This fine speech was delivered at a crucial moment of the speaker's personal fortunes. Whether he would or would not have made a good bishop, and whether the Whigs were or wore not justly chargeable with cowardice[103] in not having raised him to the Episcopal Bench, are disputable points. It seems certain, from his own declarations, that in later life he would have declined the honour; but there was a time when it might have been offered, and would probably have been accepted. When he feared that England might be dragged into war with France on behalf of Spain, he composed a skit purporting to be a Protest entered on the Journals of the Lords by the Bishop of Worcester, and signed it "Sydney Vigorn."[104] The Bishop of Worcester[105] died on the 5th of September 1831, and Lord Grey gave the vacant mitre to a Tory.[106] Sydney's emotions are not recorded; but on the 10th of September Lord Grey offered him a Residentiary Canonry of St. Paul's—"a snug thing, let me tell you, being worth full £2000 a year." It was not an overwhelming reward for such long and such brilliant service to the causes which Lord Grey represented, but it was a recognition—and it was enough. He was installed on the 27th of September, and on the day of his installation he wrote to a friend—"It puts me at my ease for life. I asked for nothing—never did anything shabby to procure preferment. These are pleasing recollections."
Soon afterwards, he was presented on his appointment, and met with a misadventure at the Palace.—
"I went to Court, and, horrible to relate, with strings to my shoes instead of buckles—not from Jacobinism, but ignorance. I saw two or three Tory lords looking at me with dismay, was informed by the Clerk of the Closet of my sin, and, gathering my sacerdotal petticoats about me (like a lady conscious of thick ankles) I escaped further observation."
[83] Francis Wrangham (1769-1842), Archdeacon of Cleveland.
[84] William Vernon-Harcourt {1789-1871}, father of Sir William
Vernon-Harcourt, M.P.
[85] Patrick Duigenan (1735-1816), LL.D., M.P. for the City of Armagh, and
Protestant agitator.
[86] The Yorkshire Gazette for April 12, 1823, contains a long letter from "A North Riding Clergyman," protesting against the language used by Sydney Smith. This clergyman states that the report of the meeting at Thirsk, given by the York Herald of March 29, was "unquestionably by the Minority themselves." It "professes to be a sketch of what was said and done at the meeting of the North Riding Clergy. Then the public is favoured with three considerable speeches, filling three close columns of a newspaper, on the one side; and not with three lines, nay, not with one, of anything said on the other side…. Surely the whole of the twenty-two clergyman who differed from the ten were not so astounded by the eloquence and display of their opponents as to remain absolutely speechless." It is further said that "on the present occasion, and after assuring his learned brethren that he was not going to inflict upon them a speech, and some other remarks of similar accuracy, Mr. Smith immediately harangues them in a vehement and long speech; during which, with firm resolve, it may seem, not to possess either 'overheated mind' or body, he nearly exhausted the 'Three Tuns' of water," For this quotation, and for the date of the meeting, which had been erroneously stated by previous writers, I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. J.S.R. Phillips, editor of the Yorkshire Post.
[87] (1808-1889): became 8th Earl of Carlisle in 1864 The Rev. Richard Wilton, Canon of York and Rector of Londesborough, wrote in 1895:—"My former venerable friend, the oldest inhabitant, gave me some graphic descriptions of Sydney Smith's visit to the parish once or twice a year, and the interest which was felt in the village when he drove over from Foston, his other living, to preach an occasional sermon at Londesborough. His reading, and manner in the pulpit, were described to me as having been 'bold and impressive.' As soon as the sermon was over, he would hasten out of the church along with his hearers, and chat with the farmers about their turnips, or cattle, or corn-crops, being anxious to utilize his scant opportunities of conversing with his parishioners…. There was until lately living in this parish an old man aged eighty, who was proud of telling how he was invited over to Foston to 'brew for Sydney,' as he affectionately called him."
[88] Mr. Stuart Reid gives to this curious name the more impressive form of Mayelstone.
[89] As Earl Marshal.