Elliott & Fry. Photo Walker & Cookerell Ph. So.
Eleanor A. Ormerod

ELEANOR ORMEROD, LL.D.,
ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGIST:
AUTOBIOGRAPHY AND CORRESPONDENCE

EDITED BY ROBERT WALLACE

PROFESSOR OF AGRICULTURE AND RURAL ECONOMY

IN THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH

WITH PORTRAIT AND ILLUSTRATIONS

NEW YORK

E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY

31 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET

1904

DEDICATED

TO ALL

MISS ORMEROD’S CORRESPONDENTS

IN

ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY.

PREFACE

The idea that Miss Ormerod should write her biography originated with the present writer during one of many visits paid to her at St. Albans. Miss Ormerod had unfolded in charming language and with admirable lucidity and fluency some interesting chapters of her personal experiences and reminiscences. The first working plan of the project involved the concealment of a shorthand writer behind a screen in the dining-room while dinner was proceeding, and while the examination of ethnological specimens or other attractive objects gave place for a time to general conversation on subjects grown interesting by age. Although the shorthand writer was selected and is several times referred to in letters written about this period (pp. [304]-[307]), Miss Ormerod, on due reflection, felt that the presence, though unseen, of a stranger at these meetings in camera would make the position unnatural, and dislocate the association of ideas to the detriment of the narrative.

She then bethought herself of the method of writing down at leisure moments, from time to time as a suitable subject occurred to her, rough notes (p. [318]) to be elaborated later, and when after a time a subject had been exhausted, the rough notes were re-written and welded into a narrative (pp. [304]-[321]). Some four or five of the early chapters were thus treated and then typewritten, but the remainder of the Autobiography was left in crude form, requiring much piecing together and editorial trimming. Had the book been produced on the original plan, it was proposed to name it “Recollections of Changing Times.”[^[1]] It would have dealt with a number of subjects of general interest, such as the history of the Post Office, early records of floods and earthquakes, as well as newspapers of early date. The introduction of Miss Ormerod’s letters to a few of her leading correspondents was made necessary by the lack of other suitable material. The present volume is still mainly the product of Miss Ormerod’s pen, but with few exceptions general subjects have been eliminated; and it forms much more a record of her works and ways than it would have done had she been spared to complete it. From the inception of the idea the present writer was appointed editor, but had Miss Ormerod lived to see the book in the hands of the public his share of work would have been light indeed. Armed with absolute authority from her (p. [318]) to use his discretion in the work, he has exercised his editorial license in making minor alterations without brackets or other evidences of the editorial pen, while at the same time the integrity of the substance has been jealously guarded.

As in Miss Ormerod’s correspondence with experts only scientific names for insects and other scientific objects were employed, it was found expedient to introduce the common names within ordinary or round brackets. Much thought and care have been given to the arrangement of the letters, and a sort of compromise was adopted of three different methods that came up for consideration, viz., (1) according to chronological order, (2) according to the subjects discussed, and (3) grouping under the names of the individuals to whom they were addressed. While the third is the predominant feature of the scheme the chronological order has been maintained within the personal groups, and precedence in the book was generally given to the letters of the oldest date. At the same time, to complete a subject in one group written mainly to one correspondent, letters dealing with the subject under discussion have been borrowed from their natural places under the heading of “Letters to Dr. ——” or “Letters to Mr. ——.” While Miss Ormerod’s practice of referring to matters of minor importance and of purely personal interest in correspondence dealing mainly with definite lines of scientific research, has not been interfered with in a few instances, in most of the other groups of letters on technical subjects editorial pruning was freely practised to prevent confusion and to concentrate the subject matter. The chief exceptions occur in the voluminous and interesting correspondence with Dr. Fletcher, in her specially confidential letters to Dr. Bethune, and in the very general correspondence with the editor. It was felt that to remove more of the friendly references and passing general remarks to her correspondents would have been to invalidate the letters and show the writer of them in a character alien to her own.

The figures of insects which have been introduced into the correspondence, to lighten it and increase its interest to the reader, have been chiefly borrowed from Miss Ormerod’s published works; and among them will be found a number of illustrations from Curtis’s “Farm Insects,” for the use of which her acknowledgments were fully given to Messrs. Blackie, the publishers.[^[2]] The contents of this volume will afford ample evidence of Miss Ormerod’s intense interest in her subject, of the infinite pains she took to investigate the causes of injury, and of the untiring and unceasing efforts she employed to accomplish her object; also that her determinations relative to the causes and nature of parasitic attacks upon crops, give proof of soundness of judgment, and her advice, chiefly connected with remedial and preventive treatment, was eminently sensible and practical. Mainly by correspondence of the most friendly kind she formed a unique connecting link between economic entomologists in all parts of the world; and she quoted their various opinions to one another very often in support of her own preconceived ideas.

The three biographical chapters, [III]., [XI]., and [XII]., were added to the autobiographical statements which she had left, with the object merely of supplying some missing personal incidents in an interesting life. Other deficiencies in the Autobiography are made up by Miss Ormerod’s correspondence, and the history of her work is permitted to evolve from her own letters.

A strong vein of humour runs through many parts of her writings, notably in the chapter on “Church and Parish.” The reader will not fail to notice the splendid courtesy and deference to scientific authority, as well as the fullest appreciation of and unselfish sympathy with the genuine scientific work of others, which pervades all she wrote. Prominent among these characteristics of Miss Ormerod should be placed her scrupulous honesty of purpose in acknowledging to the fullest extent the work of others.

The work of collecting material, sifting, and editing has been going on for nearly two years, and could never have been accomplished but for the kindly help rendered by so many of Miss Ormerod’s correspondents, all of whom I now cordially thank for invaluable sympathetic assistance. Special acknowledgments are due to Sir Wm. Henry Marling, Bart., the present owner of Sedbury Park, and to Miss Ormerod’s nephews and nieces, who have been delighted to render such assistance as could not have been found outside the family circle. Besides Mr. Grimshaw, Mr. Janson, Dr. Stewart MacDougall, Professor Hudson Beare, and Mr. T. P. Newman who read the proofs critically, last, but not least, do I thank Mr. John Murray, whose friendly reception of the first overtures made to him as the prospective publisher of this volume brightened some of the dark moments near the close of Miss Ormerod’s life. I have had as editor the much appreciated privilege of drawing, in all cases of difficulty, upon Mr. Murray’s great literary experience.

In making these pleasing acknowledgments I in no way wish to shift the responsibility as Editor from my own shoulders for defects which may be discovered or for the general scheme of the work, which was, with slight modifications, my own. If it be said in criticism that the Editor is too little in evidence, I shall be all the more satisfied, as that has been throughout one of his leading aims.

ROBERT WALLACE.

University of Edinburgh,

1904.

LIST OF ERRATA.

Page 70, line 31, for “Tenebroides” read “Tenebrioides”.

Page 130, line 11, for “Ceutorhyncus” read “Ceuthorhyncus”.

Page 130 in description of Fig. [14], for “Ceutorhyncus” read “Ceuthorhyncus”.

Page 144, line 7, for “importad” read “imported”.

Page 185, line 1, for “Lucania” read “Leucania”.

Transcriber’s note:

These errata have been applied to this Project Gutenberg text.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

CHAPTER XVII

CHAPTER XVIII

CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XX

CHAPTER XXI

CHAPTER XXII

CHAPTER XXIII

CHAPTER XXIV

CHAPTER XXV

CHAPTER XXVI

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT

LIST OF FULL-PAGE PLATES

CHAPTER I
BIRTH, CHILDHOOD AND EDUCATION

I was born at Sedbury Park, in West Gloucestershire, on a sunny Sunday morning (the 11th of May, 1828), being the youngest of the ten children of George and Sarah Ormerod, of Sedbury Park, Gloucestershire, and Tyldesley, Lancashire. As a long time had elapsed since the birth of the last of the other children (my two sisters and seven brothers), my arrival could hardly have been a family comfort. Nursery arrangements, which had been broken up, had to be re-established. I have been told that I started on what was to be my long life journey, with a face pale as a sheet, a quantity of black hair, and a constitution that refused anything tendered excepting a concoction of a kind of rusk made only at Monmouth. The very earliest event of which I have a clear remembrance was being knocked down on the nursery stairs when I was three years old by a cousin of my own age. The damage was small, but the indignity great, and, moreover, the young man stole the lump of sugar which was meant to console me, so the grievance made an impression. A year later a real shock happened to my small mind. Whilst my sister, Georgiana, five years my senior, was warming herself in the nursery, her frock caught fire. She flew down the room, threw herself on the sheepskin rug at the door, and rolled till the fire was put out. But she was so badly burnt that the injuries required dressing, and this event also made a great impression on me. Other reminiscences of pleasure and of pain come back, in thinking over those long past days, but none of such special and wonderful interest as that of being held up to see King William IV. Little as I was, I had been taken to one of the theatres, and my father carried me along one of the galleries, and raised me in his arms that I might look through the glass window at the back of one of the boxes and see His Majesty. I do not in the least believe that I saw the right man. However, it is something to remember that about the year 1835, if I had not been so frightened, I might have seen the King.

In regard to any special likings of my earliest years it seems to me, from what I can remember or have been told, that there were signs even then of the chief tastes which have accompanied me through life—an intense love of flowers; a fondness for insect investigation; and a fondness also for writing. In my babyhood, even before I could speak, the sight of a bunch of flowers was the signal for both arms being held out to beg for the coveted treasure, and the taste was utilised when I was a little older, in checking a somewhat incomprehensible failure of health during the spring visit of the family to London. Some one suggested trying the effect of a supply of flower roots and seeds for me to exercise my love of gardening on, and the experiment was successful. I can remember my delight at the sight of the boxes of common garden plants—pansies, daisies, and the like; and I suppose some feeling of the restored comfort has remained through all these years to give a charm (not peculiarly exciting in itself) to the smell of bast mats and other appurtenances of the outside of Covent Garden market.

My first insect observation I remember perfectly. It was typical of many others since. I was quite right, absolutely and demonstrably right, but I was above my audience and fared accordingly. One day while the family were engaged watching the letting out of a pond, or some similar matter, I was perched on a chair, and given to watch, to keep me quiet at home, a tumbler of water with about half a dozen great water grubs in it. One of them had been much injured and his companions proceeded quite to demolish him. I was exceedingly interested, and when the family came home gave them the results of my observations, which were entirely disbelieved. Arguing was not permitted, so I said nothing (as far as I remember); but I had made my first step in Entomology.

Writing was a great pleasure. A treat was to go into the library and to sit near, without disturbing, my father, and “write a letter” on a bit of paper granted for epistolary purposes. The letter was presently sealed with one of the great armorial seals which my father wore—as gentlemen did then—in a bunch at what was called the “fob.” The whole affair must have been of a very elementary sort, but it was no bad application of the schoolroom lessons, for thus, quite at my own free will, I was practising the spelling of easy words, and their combination into little sentences, and also how to bring pen, ink, and paper into connection without necessitating an inky deluge. In those days children were not “amused” as is the fashion now. We neither went to parties, nor were there children’s parties at home, but I fancy we were just as happy. As soon as possible a certain amount of lessons, given by my mother, formed the backbone of the day’s employment. In the higher branches requisite for preparation for Public School work, my mother was so successful as to have the pleasure of receiving a special message of appreciation of her work sent to my father by Dr. Arnold, Head master of Rugby. All my brothers were educated under Dr. Arnold, two as his private pupils, and the five younger as Rugby schoolboys, and he spoke with great appreciation of the sound foundation which had been laid by my mother for the school work, especially as regarded religious instruction. From the fact of my brothers being so much older than I, the latter point is the only one which remains in my memory; but I have a clear recollection of my mother’s mustering her family class on Sunday afternoons, i.e., all whose age afforded her any excuse to lay hands on them. Whether in the earlier foundation or more advanced work, my mother’s own great store of solid information, and her gift for imparting it, enabled her to keep us steadily progressing. Everything was thoroughly learned, and once learned never permitted to be forgotten. Nothing was attempted that could not be well understood, and this was expected to be mastered. In playtime we were allowed great liberty to follow our own pursuits, in which the elders of the family generally participated, and as we grew older we made collections (in which my sister Georgiana’s love of shells laid the foundation of what was afterwards a collection of 3,000 species), and carried on “experiments,” everlasting re-arrangement of our small libraries, and amateur book-binding. All imaginable ways of using our hands kept us very happily employed indoors. Out of doors there was great enjoyment in the pursuits which a country property gives room for, and I think I was a very happy child, although I fancy what is called a “very old-fashioned” one, from not having companions of my own age.

On looking back over the years of my early childhood, the period when instruction—commonly known as education—is imparted, it seems to me that this followed the distinction between education and the mere acquirement of knowledge (well brought out by one of the Coleridges), and embraced the former much more fully than is the case at the present day. There was no undue pressure on bodily or mental powers, but the work was steady and constant. The instruction, except in music, was given by my mother, who had, in an eminent degree, the gift of teaching. Although at the present time home education is frequently held up to contempt, still some recollections of my own home teaching may be of interest. The subjects studied were those included in what is called a “solid English education.” First in order was biblical knowledge and moral precepts, practical as well as expository, which seem to have glided into my head without my being aware how, excepting in the case of the enormity of any deviation from truth. In each of the six week-days’ work came a chapter of Scripture, read aloud, half in English, and half in French, by my sister and me. The “lessons,” i.e., recitation, inspection of exercises, &c., followed. The subjects at first were few—but they were thoroughly explained. Geography, for example, was taken at first in its broad bearings, viz., countries, provinces, chief towns, mountains, rivers, and so on (what comes back to my mind as corresponding to “large print”), and gradually the “small print” was added, with as minute information as was considered necessary. Use of the map was strictly enforced, and repetition to impress it on the memory. I seem to hear my mother inculcating briskness in giving names of county towns—“Northumberland? Now then! quick as lightning, answer.” “Newcastle, Morpeth and Alnwick, in Northumberland”; and to enforce attention a tap of my mother’s thimble on the table, or possibly, if stupidity required great rousing, with more gentle application on the top of my head. If things were bad beyond endurance, the book was sent with a skim across the room, which had an enlivening effect; but this rarely happened. My mother gave the morning hours to the work (unless there was some higher claim upon them, such as my father requiring her for some purpose or other) but she always declared that she would have nothing to do with the preparation of lessons in the afternoon. If all went fairly well, as usual, the passage for next day’s lesson was carefully read over at my mother’s side, and difficulties explained, and then I was expected to learn it by myself. What we knew as “doing lessons”—which now I believe passes under the more advanced name of “preparation”—was left to my own care, and if this proved next morning not to have been duly given I had reason to amend my ways. The preparation hour was from four to five o’clock, but if the lessons had not been learned by that time they were expected to be done somehow, though I think my mother was very lenient if any tolerably presentable reason were given for short measure. If the work were completed in less than the allotted time, I was allowed to amuse myself by reading poetry, of which I was excessively fond, from the great volume of “Extracts” from which my lesson had been learned. This plan seems to me to have had many advantages. For one thing, I carried the morning’s explanations in my head till called upon, and for another, I think it gave some degree of self-reliance, as well as a habit of useful, quiet self-employment for a definite time. This was, in all reason, expected to be carefully adhered to, and I can well remember when I had hurried home from a summer’s walk how the muscles in my legs would twitch whilst I endeavoured to learn a French verb.

One educational detail which, as far as my experience goes, appears to have been much better conducted in my young days than at present, was that reading aloud to the little people had not then come into vogue. I have no recollection of being allowed to lie about on the carpet, heels in the air, whilst some one read a book to me. There was also the peculiarity to which, if I remember rightly, Sir Benjamin Brodie attributes in his autobiography some of his success in life, viz., work was almost continuous. There was never an interval of some weeks’ holidays. A holiday was granted on some great occasion, such as the anniversary of my father and mother’s wedding-day and birthdays, and on the birthdays of other members of the family, but (if occurring on consecutive days) somewhat under protest; and half-holidays were not uncommon in summer. These consisted of my being excused the afternoon preparation of lessons, and as the pretext for asking was generally the weather’s being “so very fine,” I conjecture it was thought that an extra run in the fresh air was perhaps a healthy variety of occupation. Any way, the learning lost must have been small, for excepting the written part of the work the lessons were expected to appear next morning in perfect form, however miscellaneously acquired. One way or other there were occasional breaks by pleasant episodes such as picnics, on fine summer days, to one of the many old ruined castles, or disused little Monmouthshire churches, or Roman remains in the neighbourhood, where my father worked up the material for some forthcoming archæological essay and my mother executed some of her beautiful sketches (plate [VI].). The carriage-load of young ones enjoyed themselves exceedingly, and prevented the work from becoming monotonous or burdensome. And there were joyful days before and after going from home, and now and then, when it was impossible for my mother to give her morning up to the work, if she had not appointed one of the elder of the young fry her deputy for the occasion. I remember, too, that I took my book in play hours, when and where I wished; sometimes on a fine summer afternoon the “where” might be sitting on a horizontal bough of a large old Portugal laurel in the garden. And I fancy that the perch in the fresh air, with the green light shimmering round me, was as good for my bodily health (by no means robust) as my entertaining little book for my progress in reading.

It was remarkable the small quantity of food which it was at one time thought the right thing for ladies to take in public. I suppose from early habit, my mother, who was active both in body and mind, used to eat very little. At lunch she would divide a slice of meat with me. Although now the death, in her confinement, of the Princess Charlotte, “the people’s darling,” which plunged the nation in sorrow, is a thing only of history, yet it is on record how she almost implored for more food, the special desire being mutton chops. Though not in any way connected with the Royal Family, my mother held in memory the unhappy event from its consequences. Sir Richard Croft, whose medical attentions had been so inefficient to the Princess, was shortly after called to attend in a similar capacity on Mrs. Thackeray, wife of Dr. Thackeray, then or after Provost of King’s College, Cambridge. For some reason or other he left his patient for a while, and the story went that, finding pistols in the room where he was resting, he shot himself. Miss Cotton—Mrs. Thackeray’s sister—was a friend of my mother. Miss Thackeray, the infant who was ushered into the world by the death of both her mother and the doctor, survived, and in her young-lady days was particularly fond of dancing; and I have the remembrance of my first London ball being at her aunt’s house.

PLATE I.
Sedbury Park House and Grounds, distant view.

Mansion House, Sedbury Park; Miss Georgiana Ormerod on the left, Miss Eleanor Ormerod on the right.
(pp. [14], [48].)

CHAPTER II
PARENTAGE

The situation of Sedbury (plate I.), rising to an elevation of about 170 feet between the Severn and the Wye, opposite Chepstow, was very beautiful, and the vegetation rich and luxuriant. My father purchased the house and policy grounds from Sir Henry Cosby about 1826, and it was our home till his death in 1873. He retained Tyldesley, his other property in Lancashire, with its coal mines, but we did not reside there, as the climate was too cold for the health of my mother and for the young family.

[The original purchase was called Barnesville, and earlier still Kingston Park, and it consisted of a moderate-sized villa with the immediately adjoining grounds. The property was added to by purchases from the Duke of Beaufort, and it was renamed Sedbury Park after the nearest village. To the house the new owner added a handsome colonnade about 10 feet wide, and a spacious library. Sir Robert Smirke, the architect of all the improvements, was the man who designed the British Museum, the General Post Office, &c.[^[3]] Barnes Cottage on the property, at one time ‘Barons Cottage,’ was kept in habitable repair because it secured to the estate the privilege of a seat in church.]

About sixteen miles from Sedbury Park are still to be seen the interesting ruins of the Great Roman station of this part of the country, Caerwent or the white tower, the Venta Silurum of Antonine’s “Itinerary.”[^[4]] Its trade and military importance were transferred to Strigul, now known as Chepstow, after the Norman Conquest. Sedbury Park is believed to have been an outlying post of this chief military centre, and it was occupied by soldiers “guarding the beacon and the look-out over the passages” of the Severn. Considerable finds of Roman pottery (plate [XI].) were discovered about 1860, while drains about 4 feet deep were being cut near to the Severn cliffs. They consisted chiefly of fragments of rough earthenware—cooking dishes and cinerary urns, &c. There was also a small quantity of glazed, red Samian cups and one piece of Durobrivian ware and great quantities of animals’ teeth and bones, but no coins (p. [174]). After the death of my father it was found that much of the best ware had been stolen.

My father (plate [II].) is well known for the high place he takes amongst our English County historians, as the author of “The History of the County Palatine, and City of Chester,” published in 1818. He came of the old Lancashire family of Ormerod of Ormerod, a demesne in the township of Cliviger, a wild and mountainous district, situated along the boundaries of Lancashire and Yorkshire. The varied watershed (transmitting the streams to the eastern and western seas); the beauties of the rocks and waterfalls; the shaded glens, and the antique farmhouses (where fairy superstition still lingered till the beginning of the past century), have been written about by Whitaker in his “History of Whalley.”[^[5]] There, in the year 1810, in an elevated position, amongst aged pine and elm trees, and surrounded by high garden walls of dark stone, the mansion, (plate [XXVIII].)—since greatly enlarged by the family of the present proprietor—stood in a dingle at the side of a mountain stream, which rushed behind it at a considerable depth. Beyond the stream, the rise of the ground to the more elevated moors includes a view of the summit of Pendle Hill, of exceedingly evil repute for meetings of witches and warlocks, and congenerous unpleasantnesses, in the olden time.

PLATE II.
George Ormerod, Esq., D.C.L., LL.D., F.R.S., F.S.A.,
of Sedbury Park, Gloucestershire, and Tyldesley, Lancashire,
Father of Miss Ormerod.
From a painting after Jackson, date circa 1820.
(pp: [11], [14].)

The family of Ormerod was settled in the locality from which they took their name, as far back as the year 1311, the estates continuing in their possession until, in 1793 (by the marriage of Charlotte Ann Ormerod, sole daughter and heiress of Laurence Ormerod, the last of the generation of the parent stem in direct male descent), they passed to Colonel John Hargreaves; and by the marriage of his eldest daughter and co-heiress, Eleanor Mary, with the Rev. William Thursby, they became vested in the Thursby family,[^[6]] represented until recently by Sir John Hardy Thursby, Bart., of Ormerod House, Burnley, Lancashire, and Holmhurst, Christchurch, Hants. Sir John showed thoughtful, philanthropic feeling to his Lancashire district, by presenting the land for a public park to Burnley, and, in connection with his family, he also gave the site for the neighbouring “Victoria Hospital.” In 1887, he served as High Sheriff of Lancashire, and was created Baronet. Dying on March 16, 1901, he was succeeded by his eldest son, John Ormerod Scarlett Thursby, of Bankhall, Burnley, who, in his surname and baptismal names, keeps alive the connection with the old family stock and the families with which the last two co-heiresses of Ormerod were connected by marriage. With these matters of possessions, however, the collateral branch of Ormerod, of Bury in Lancashire (from the special founder of which my father was descended in direct male line), had nothing to do. From Oliver Ormerod, who became permanently resident at Bury shortly after the close of the seventeenth century, descended his only son, George Ormerod of Bury, merchant. From him descended George Ormerod (an only child), who died on October 7, 1785, a few days before the birth of his only child—my father—yet another George Ormerod. In a mere statement of the names of the representatives of successive generations, of whom no specially distinguishing points appear to have been recorded, there is, perhaps, little of general interest. But possibly some amount of interest attaches to the proofs of representatives of one family having lived quietly on from generation to generation in one locality since the early part of the fourteenth century. The connections and intermarrying of the Ormerods with many of the Lancashire families of former days give the subject a county interest to those who care to search out the genealogical, historical and heraldic details given at great length in my father’s volume of “Parentalia.” Here and there some member of the family appears to have come before the world, as in the case of Oliver Ormerod, M.A., noted as a profound scholar, theologian, and Puritan controversialist, and author of two polemical works—one entitled “The Picture of a Puritan,” published in 1605, and the other “The Picture of a Papist,” published in 1606. Oliver Ormerod was presented to the Rectory of Norton Fitzwarren, Co. Somerset, by William Bourchier, third Earl of Bath, and afterwards to the Rectory of Huntspill in the same county, where he died in the year 1625.

Something, however, occurred in 1784 of much interest to our own branch of the family, leading subsequently to great increase of property, and likewise in some degree, connecting us with the Jacobite troubles of 1745. This was the marriage of my grandfather with Elizabeth, second daughter of Thomas Johnson, of Tyldesley. Thomas Johnson (my great grandfather) having married, secondly, Susannah, daughter and co-heiress of Samuel Wareing, of Bury and Walmersley, got with her considerable estates, inherited from the Wareings, the Cromptons of Hacking, and Nuthalls of Golynrode. On the occasion of the march of Charles Stewart to Manchester in 1745, “Tyldesley”—to use the form of appellation often given from property in those days—suffered many hardships. As one of the five treasurers who had undertaken to receive Lancashire subscriptions in aid of the reigning monarch, King George the Second, and as an influential local friend of the cause, he was one of those who suffered the infliction of domiciliary military visitation, and also threat of torture by burning his hands to induce him to give up government papers and money in his possession. I have still in my house (1901) the large hanging lamp of what is now called “Old Manchester” glass, which lighted the dining-room when my great grandfather stood so steadily to his trust that although the straw had been brought for the purpose of torture (or to terrify him into submission) extremities were not proceeded to. He was ultimately left a prisoner on parole, in his house, until released in December, 1745, in consequence of the retreat of the rebel army. But disagreeable as this state of things must have been at the best, it was to some degree lightened by kindness (or at least absence of unnecessary annoyance) on the part of the Jacobite officers, of whom stories remained in the family to my own time. One especial point was their kindness to my eldest great aunt,[^[7]] then a little child, whom they used to take on their knees to show her what she described as their “little guns.” The drinking of the healths of the rival princes, which probably often led to a less peaceful ending, was mentioned by my father in his History of Cheshire, as a notable instance of consideration.

PLATE III.
Family Group—George Ormerod as a child; his Mother seated behind him; her brother, Thomas Johnson, Esq., of Tyldesley, Lancashire, standing; and their Mother seated on the right.
Composition from miniature, circa 1780.

“On one occasion when the Scotch officers who caroused in their prisoner’s house, had given their usual toast King James, and the host on request had followed with his, and undauntedly proposed King George, some rose, and touched their swords; but a senior officer exclaimed, ‘He has drunk our Prince, why should we not drink his? Here’s to the Elector of Hanover.’”[^[8]]

During the disturbed time, when any one bearing the appearance of a messenger would assuredly have been seized with the papers which he carried, the difficulty of transmitting information was met by the employment at night of two greyhounds trained for the service. The documents were fastened to the animals and thus carried safely to the adherent’s house, from which as opportunity offered they could be passed on. The greyhounds, having been well fed as a reward and encouragement to future good behaviour, were started off on their return journey. In the present day this plan of transmission would very soon be discovered, but in those times the nature of the country, the nocturnal hours chosen, and also the deeply-rooted superstitions of the district, all helped to make the four-footed messengers very trusty carriers.

In 1755 Thomas Johnson served as Sheriff of Lancashire. He died in 1763, leaving a widow (who survived him until 1798), one son, and three daughters—the only survivors of a family of eleven children, of whom seven died in infancy, three on the day of their birth. Of the four children who reached maturity, Elizabeth, the second daughter (plate III.) married my grandfather, George Ormerod of Bury, at the Collegiate Church, Manchester, on the 18th of October, 1784. He died in 1785, a fortnight before the birth of my father, who was the sole issue of this marriage.

My father, George Ormerod (plate [II].), heir to his grandfather, was born October 20, 1785. He was co-heir of, and successor to the estates of his maternal uncle in 1823, and sole heir to his surviving maternal aunt in 1839. He was D.C.L., LL.D., F.R.S., F.S.A., and a magistrate for the counties of Cheshire, Gloucester, and Monmouth. On August 2, 1808, he married my mother, Sarah, eldest daughter of John Latham, Bradwall Hall, Cheshire, Fellow and sometime President of the Royal College of Physicians, Harley Street, London.[^[9]]

My grandfather in the female line, John Latham, M.D., F.R.S. (plate [IV].), the eldest son of the Rev. John Latham, came of an old family stock, and was born in 1761 in the rectory house at Gawsworth, Cheshire. He was educated first at Manchester Grammar School, and thence proceeded (with the view of studying for orders) to Brasenose College, Oxford, but the strong bent of his own wishes towards the medical profession induced him to alter his plans, and he took his degree of M.D. on October 10, 1788. “His first professional years were passed at Manchester and Oxford, where he was physician to the respective infirmaries. In 1788 he removed to London, was admitted Fellow of the College of Physicians, and elected successively physician to the Middlesex, the Magdalen, and St. Bartholomew Hospitals. In 1795 he was appointed Physician Extraordinary to the Prince of Wales, and reappointed to the same office on the Prince’s accession to the throne as George IV. In 1813 Dr. Latham was elected President of the College of Physicians; in 1816, founded the Medical Benevolent Society; and in 1829 finally left London, retiring to his estate at Bradwall Hall, where he died on April 20, 1843, in the eighty-second year of his age.”

He indulged in the practical pleasures of country life, and maintained a home farm, on which he kept a dairy of sixty cows. He was a man of great force of character and of decisive action. On one occasion a man who had been told that if he returned he would be summarily ejected, came back to crave an audience. On being reminded of the fact he pleaded, “Oh! doctor, you do not really mean it.” “Yes, I do,” was the prompt reply as an order was given to the butler to turn the intruder out.

PLATE IV.
John Latham, Esq., M.D., F.R.S., Physician Extraordinary to George IV., maternal grandfather of Miss Ormerod, in his robes as President of the Royal College of Physicians, 1813 to 1819.

Dr. Latham married, in 1784, Mary, eldest daughter and co-heiress of the Rev. Peter Mayer, Vicar of Prestbury, Cheshire, by whom he had numerous children, of whom three sons and two daughters lived to maturity. My mother, his eldest daughter, survived him, as did also her brothers. Of these the second son, Peter Mere Latham, M.D., of Grosvenor-street, Westminster, one of Her Majesty’s Physicians Extraordinary, was long well known as an eminent consulting physician regarding diseases of the chest, until his own severe sufferings from asthma obliged him to retire to Torquay, where he died on July 20, 1875.

From our being related to John Latham and his wife, Mary Mayer (although in point of rank the difference was so enormous between the head from whom we could trace and ourselves), it is permissible to allude to our connection with the family of Arderne of Alvanley, and consequent descent from King Edward the First and his wife, Eleanor of Castile. This gave us our claim of “founder’s kin” in the election to the “Port Fellowship” of Brasenose College, to which distinction in my time my brother— Rev. John Arderne Ormerod—was elected. He was the last Port Fellow on the above foundation. The record of each generation will be found in the genealogical table of “Arderne” in my father’s “Parentalia,” and also on reference to the pedigrees of the many families of which members are named in the “History of Cheshire.”

CHAPTER III
REMINISCENCES OF SEDBURY BY MISS DIANA LATHAM[^[10]]

My cousin Eleanor Anne Ormerod was the youngest of a family of ten—seven brothers and three sisters—all clever, energetic creatures, and gifted with a strong sense of humour. A large family always creates a peculiar atmosphere for itself; it also breaks up into detachments of elder and younger growth, and the elder members are beginning to take places in the world before the younger are out of the schoolroom. Eleanor’s eldest brother was a Church dignitary while she was still a child, teased and petted by her young medical student brothers, and the darling of her elder sister Georgiana. The father and mother of this numerous flock were both remarkable people. Mr. Ormerod, historian and antiquary, always occupied with literary or topographical research, was an autocrat in his own family and intolerant of any shortcomings or failings that came under his notice. He could, however, on occasion, relax and tell humorous stories to children. The family discipline was strict; the younger members were expected to yield obedience to the elders, and it was said that the spaniel Guy (he came from Warwick), who ranked as one of the children, always obeyed the eldest of the family present. My aunt had a large share of the milk of human kindness added to much practical common sense and a touch of artistic genius in her composition; it was from her that her daughters inherited their eye for colour and dexterity of touch. Mr. Ormerod was a neat draughtsman of architectural subjects, but my aunt had taste and skill and a delight in her own branch of art—flower painting—that lasted all her life.

Sedbury Park (plate I.) was a beautiful home; the house, a handsome family mansion with comfortable old-fashioned furniture, good and interesting pictures, old china, and a splendid library, afforded also ample space for its inmates to follow their various hobbies, and many were the arts and crafts practised there at various times. The carpenter’s bench, the lathe, wood-carving, electro-typing, modelling and casting for models each had their turn, and in all this strenuous play Eleanor had her full share. Society played a very secondary part in life at Sedbury; calls were exchanged with county neighbours at due intervals, and there was some intimacy with Copleston, Bishop of Llandaff, the Bathursts of Lydney Park, and the Horts of Hardwicke. But though Mr. Ormerod attended to his duties as magistrate, and went duly to meetings of the bench at Chepstow, he was quite without sympathy for field sports and the pursuits of his brother magistrates. He was absorbed in his own studies, and something of a recluse by nature.

[Miss Ormerod has herself written of the elaborateness of the arrangements and the great formality which were associated with the regular county dinner party, the chief method of entertainment at Sedbury sixty years ago. She referred to the anxieties experienced lest the coach should not arrive in time with the indispensables including fish—“the distance of Sedbury from London involving twenty-four hours or more of transmission in weather favourable or otherwise.” Miss Ormerod continues:—

“One very important matter in the far gone past times in the arrangement of the dinner table, was the removal of the great cloth and of two cloths laid, one at each side, just wide enough to occupy the uncovered space before the guests, and long enough to reach from one end of the table to the other. The removal required a deal of care and dexterity, and I do not think it was practised at many other houses in our neighbourhood. When the table was to be cleared for dessert of course everything was removed, including the great tablecloth itself—one of the handsomest of the family possessions, and of considerable length when there were the usual number of about eighteen or twenty guests. The operation was performed as follows:—The butler placed himself at the end of each strip successively, and a few of the house servants or of those who came with guests along each side. The butler drew the slips in turn and the servants took care there should be no hitch in the passage of the cloths, and so each was nicely gathered up.

“But the removal of the great tablecloth which was the next operation was a more difficult matter. The great heavy central epergne of rosewood had to be lifted a little way up by a strong man-servant or two, whilst the tablecloth was slipped from beneath it and the cloth was started on its travels down the table till it came into the hands of the butler, who gathered it up. The beautifully polished table then appeared in full lustre. The shining surface sparkled excellently and presently reflected the bright silver and glass and the fruit and flowers with a brilliance which to my thinking was much more beautiful than the arrangement of later days.”]

The annual visit to London was a great delight to my aunt, who enjoyed meetings with her own family and friends, and visits to exhibitions, &c. Her husband had always occupation in the British Museum, and her daughters took painting and other lessons. Mary, the eldest, was a pupil of Copley Fielding; Georgiana (plate [XXVII].), and Eleanor later, had lessons from Hunt and learnt from him how to combine birds’ nests and objects of still life with fruits and flowers into very lovely pictures. Both were excellent artists with a slight difference in style: Georgiana’s pictures had great harmony of colour and composition; Eleanor’s had more chic. Hunt was a very touchy little man—almost a dwarf—and if by any chance my aunt did not see him and bow as she drove past he cherished resentment for days after. At Sedbury driving tours or picnic excursions to the ruined castles and other objects of interest (plates [V]., [XVI]., [XXV].), in the neighbourhood were frequent, and the sketches that resulted were often reproduced as zincographs. Now and then a tour abroad was achieved, but such tours were few and far between. The beautiful copy of Correggio’s “Marriage of St. Catherine” which ultimately became Eleanor’s property, was acquired on a visit to Paris and the Louvre.

This self-contained family life did not lead to the marriage of the daughters, and three only of the seven sons married—one very late in life. Mary, the Princess Royal of the family, was the centre of the first group—herself and four brothers; Georgiana that of the second, consisting of two brothers older than herself, one younger, and Eleanor. Georgiana was a most lovable person; she always believed in her younger sister’s capacity and in her projects, which were not approved of nor taken seriously by some of her elders, and could not have been carried out until after the break up of the home on the death of Mr. Ormerod. Meantime, the naturalist element in Eleanor was free to lay up knowledge for future use, and her country life gave leisure and opportunity for observation of bird, plant, and insect life, to say nothing of reptiles. Any snake killed on the estate was brought to Eleanor, and if it was remarkable for size or beauty she took a cast of it to be afterwards electrotyped, or had it buried in an ant-hill in order to set up its skeleton when the ants had cleaned the bones. The casts, which resembled bronze, were sometimes attached to slabs of green Devonshire marble, and made handsome paper weights. Wasps were at one time a subject of special study and interest to her brother Dr. Edward Ormerod, and she and Georgiana once conveyed a wasp’s nest to him at Brighton. I believe he did not allow the wasps to exceed a certain number, out of consideration for the neighbouring fruiterers.

The premature deaths of Edward and William, physician and surgeon, were heartfelt sorrows to the two sisters nearest in age. If Eleanor’s lot had been cast in later days she might have become a lady doctor of renown; she had many qualifications for the medical profession and a liking for domestic surgery; she had strong nerves and inspired confidence and used to say that she never went a journey without some fellow-passenger going into a detailed account of all her ailments. Besides strong nerves she had strong eye-sight and a delicate but firm touch. Her brothers did not encourage anatomical studies, but she could prepare sections of teeth and other objects for the microscope as beautifully as any professional microscopist. Some of my cousins were strong sighted and very short-sighted, and much inclined to be sceptical as to my long-sighted vision.

My last visit to Sedbury was in the autumn of 1853 in company with my step-sister Margaret Roberts, then just beginning to try her powers as an authoress. Eleanor must then have been twenty-five or twenty-six, but was considered to be quite young by her family, and in some respects was really so. She no longer played such pranks as embarking in a tub to navigate the horse pond, but her fine dark eyes would shine with mischief, and she was the licensed jester to the family circle.

PLATE V.
Ruins of Tintern Abbey, Monmouthshire.
Frith photo.

The routine of life at Sedbury usually began, on the part of the younger members of the family, with a walk after breakfast prefaced by a visit to the poultry yard and greenhouses. Georgiana was chief hen-wife, and kept an account of the eggs and chickens. The park, lying on high ground between the Severn and the Wye, had beautiful points of view and fine timber, and there were lovely views beyond its precincts. “Offa’s Dyke” ran through a corner of the estate, and the discovery of some Roman pottery in its neighbourhood had given my cousins much occupation in sticking broken fragments together and re-building them into vases (plate [XI].). Our most beautiful walk, rather too long for the morning strolls, was to the “double view,” a projecting promontory above the Wye where the river curves and from whence a lovely view is visible both up and down the stream. From the morning walk we always brought back something from hedge or field for my aunt to draw as she lay on her sofa with her drawing table across it. She was then in failing health, but still able to draw, and she used to make studies of flowers in pencil on grey paper, touching in the high light with Chinese white. Each drawing when finished was shut up in a large book, and there kept until some gathering of the family took place, when the drawings were produced and a lottery ensued, each person choosing a drawing in turn according to the number on the ticket they had drawn. I have a book of these beautiful drawings (plate [VI].) which I greatly prize. In her youthful days she had painted in oils, and there were some fine copies of Dutch flower pictures in the drawing-room made by her. In later life the care of her large family left scant time for Art, but she cherished it in her daughters, and it was again a resource in her advanced age. The great sculptor Flaxman was a friend of her father and had encouraged her youthful efforts in Art. She had amazing industry and had copied many of his designs on wood as furniture decorations.

PLATE VI.
Portion of Norman Work from Chepstow Parish Church.
From a drawing by Mrs. Ormerod, 1844.
(p. [6].)

Georgiana and Eleanor usually had some painting or other industry on hand, or copying to do for their father. In the afternoon we often took a drive and were taken to see Tintern or the Wynd Cliff or some other point of interest. After dinner we sat in the library, a fine room with a splendid collection of books shut up in wire bookcases. Each member of the family had a key to the imprisoned books, but a visitor felt that to get one extracted for personal use was rather a ceremony. The beautiful illustrated books were brought out for the evening’s entertainment and then safely housed again. On Sundays we walked or drove to Tidenham Church, a “little grey church on a windy hill” (plate [VII].). We took a walk in the afternoon, and in the evening Mr. Ormerod read a sermon in the library to us and the servants. Such was the routine of life that autumn at Sedbury. At the time of our visit, the Gloucester Musical Festival was going on, but there was no thought of going to hear it. In later years Eleanor possessed a good piano and studied the theory of music, but I think that was prompted by her general cleverness and activity of intellect rather than by any special gift for music. She was teaching herself Latin during our visit, and as time went on she acquired other languages. She made beautiful models of fruits by a process of her own invention. A collection of these was sent to an International Exhibition at St. Petersburg and she acquired sufficient knowledge of Russian to correspond with the department of the Exhibition receiving them.

After the break-up of the Sedbury home, consequent on the death of Mr. Ormerod, who survived his wife[^[11]] for many years, Mary bought the lease of a house in Exeter and settled there for the rest of her life; the two younger sisters took a house for three years in Torquay, where we were then living as well as their, and our, old and beloved uncle, Dr. Mere Latham. Wishing to be nearer London, they removed to Isleworth and some years later to Torrington House, St. Alban’s, where they spent the remaining years of their lives.

DIANA LATHAM.

CHAPTER IV
CHURCH AND PARISH

Our Parish Church (plate [VII].), that is to say, the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Tidenham, Gloucestershire, in which parish my father’s Sedbury property was situated, was of considerable antiquarian interest, as, although the hamlet of Churchend in which it stands is not mentioned in the Saxon survey of 956, the original church was in existence in the year 1071. The fabric of the church when I knew it was of later date, and, as shown by the accompanying sketch, chiefly in the architecture of the fourteenth century, excepting the south doorways of the nave and chancel and the tall narrow trefoil-headed windows in the north aisle. The chief point of archæological interest, however, lies in its possession of a leaden font (plate [VII].) in perfect repair, referable from its style to the transition period of Saxon and Anglo-Norman architecture, and considered not likely to be more recent in date than the eleventh century. The subject derives additional interest from the circumstance of the precise correspondence of this font in Tidenham Church with the leaden font in the church of the adjoining small parish of Llancaut, making it demonstrably certain that both the fonts were cast from the same mould.[^[12]] The decorations on the fonts are in mezzo relievo. These consist of figures and foliage ranged alternately, in twelve compartments, under ornamental, semi-circular arches resting on pillars; the design—two arches containing figures alternating with two arches containing foliage—being thrice repeated. The details will be better understood from the accompanying plate than from verbal description, but may be stated as representing respectively under each of the two thrice-repeated arches a venerable figure seated on a throne, the first of the two holding a sealed book, the second raising his hand as in the act of benediction, after removal of the seal from a similar book which is grasped in his hand. Each of these figures was considered to represent the Second Person of the Trinity.[^[13]] On this point I am not qualified to offer an opinion, but whatever may be the case as to ecclesiastical adaptation in the representation in the second of the two figures, the first of the throned figures appears to coincide with the description of the vision of the Deity, given in the “Revelation” of St. John, chap. V. verse 1,[^[14]] rather than with any representation of “The Lamb” that “stood,” as it had been slain, and “came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat upon the throne” (verses 6 and 7 of the chapter quoted).

PLATE VII.
Leaden Font in Tidenham Church.

Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Tidenham, Gloucestershire.
The vault on S.E. side of the Church, about 15 ft. square,
is the grave of Miss Ormerod’s Father and Mother.
From a sketch by Miss Georgiana E. Ormerod.

The illustration is taken from very careful “rubbings” of the Tidenham Font. The Llancaut font has suffered considerable damage, and likewise the loss of two of the original twelve compartments. These had presumably been removed to make the font more suitable to the exceedingly small size of the little Norman chapel (plate [VIII].). This church, which in my time was almost disused, measured only about 40 feet in length by 12 in breadth, and possessed nothing of an architectural character, excepting one small round-headed window at the east end, with plain cylindrical side shafts without capitals, and a small cinquefoil piscina. The situation, on one of the crooks of the Wye, and just above the river, is romantic in the extreme. The ground rapidly slopes down to it from above, clothed with woodland from the level of the top of the precipitous cliffs which rise almost immediately beside it to a great height above the river. Access on that side is thus only possible by boat, or by a rough way, known as the Fisherman’s Path, along the front of the cliffs. Nevertheless, because of the exceeding picturesqueness of the spot, it was a favourite resort on the twelve Sundays in the year on which (I believe under some legal necessity) service was there, in my time, performed. The scene, on the only occasion I was ever present (when our parish church was closed), might have furnished an excellent subject for a painting, as the congregation (far too many for the little church to hold), in their bright Sunday dress, emerged from the sloping glades or woodland, to the open space close by the church. Comfort was a matter of minor importance. Those who disposed themselves on the grass, where they had full enjoyment of the fresh summer air, and heard, through the open door, as much of the service as they chose to listen to, doubtless enjoyed themselves, but within it was not so agreeable. The squire’s family were of course installed in the pew, and there we were packed as tightly as could be managed, so that we all had to get up and sit down together. We had a “strange clergyman,” reported to be of vast learning; and my juvenile terror, along with my physical condition from squeezing, has imprinted the morning’s performance on my recollection as something truly wretched.

There being no resident population the chapel has since fallen into ruin, and the font and bell have been removed to the mother parish of Woolastone, the bell now doing duty at the day-school there. In 1890 Sir William H. Marling, Bart. (patron of the living) carefully restored the font and placed within it a brass plate bearing the following inscription:—

“Perantiquum hunc fontem baptismalem e ruinis sacelli scī Jacobi Lancaut in comū Gloucē servatum refecit Guls̄ Hes̄ Marling Bars̄ A.D, 1890.”

The venerable relic stands in the hall at Sedbury Park.

PLATE VIII.
Norman Chapel, Llancaut, Wye Cliffs.

The history of the “Church” in our parish of Tidenham, whether interpreted as the body of believers or the building in which they worshipped, might be well taken, during about the fifty middle years of the past century, as an illustration of “changing times.” In the year 1826—or thereabouts—when my father purchased the property, Tidenham Church was no exception to many other churches in rural districts. The interior comes back to my remembrance as dark, dingy, and very decidedly damp, as shown by the green mould on pillars and walls. One of the first improvements was the placing of two good stoves in the church,—one presented by my father, and the other (rather, I believe, against local wishes) by the Parish. I well remember the presence of the stoves, as it was considered by the churchwardens, or whoever arranged these matters, that the time which was most decorous for stirring the fires was during the singing as “it drowned the noise.” What our local choir consisted of I do not remember, but I rather think it was simply vocal, and started by a “pitchpipe.” But at least there was nothing ridiculous about it. We did not, as in a church at no great distance, have the violinist and his instrument carried in on a man’s shoulders because the unfortunate musician was without legs!

The sittings for the congregation were (I suppose as a matter of course in those days) all in closed pews with doors—the pews of a size, form, and respectability of appearance, likewise of comfort and fittings, according to the social position of their holders. It could not, however, be said that the chief parishioners had the best places, for our two large, roomy, square seats were mounted up, side by side, a few steps above the others at the end of the north aisle, with a good wall between us and the chancel, effectually preventing our seeing what was going on in that direction. Within our special pew, which had curtains more or less drawn, we sat round with our feet at proper times on good high hassocks. When we knelt we all turned round and faced the sides of the pew, and my juvenile sorrows were sometimes great towards the end of the Litany. The fatigue from kneeling on the top of my unsteady perch produced faintness, and I well remember my anxieties increasing with the “odd” feeling till I mustered courage to announce to my eldest sister, whom I held in considerable awe, that I did not feel very well; and measures were taken accordingly. The pew was said to be just over where the soldiers were buried who were killed during the Parliamentarian war at the Battle of Buttington, a locality in the same parish; but on an occasion of some repairs being made, the flooring was discovered to be laid on, or close above the live rock, which rendered this view inaccurate. The surface of the ground was immediately below the floor, and as the family pew had on its east side one of the great east windows of the church, and on the north side a smaller one, both with small panes ill-leaded, and one with a very insufficiently fastened small window, our Sunday devotions in winter were anything but comfortable.

I believe the rural congregation behaved with great propriety, though certainly on one occasion it struck me that a reverence during the creed at the name of Pontius Pilate on the part of the wife of my father’s farm-bailiff, was somewhat out of place. But we were free from such lapses in decency of arrangement as occurred elsewhere. The pigeons did not roost in the tower, neither did a turkey sit on her eggs in the pulpit, which, considering that the time of incubation for the turkey hen is four weeks, must have interfered considerably with the due performance of service. Neither were we, so far as I remember, scandalised by attendance of dogs in church, whether avowedly accompanying their masters or making a voyage of discovery as to where their clerical owner might have vanished. And certainly we did not have the disgraceful circumstance which occurred in another church with which I was acquainted, of two ladies of good social position in the parish walking up to the rails of the communion table to receive the sacrament, followed by their great Newfoundland dog!

One practice—certainly objectionable, but perhaps not unusual in country parishes where the church was also used as the week-day schoolroom—was putting the bags holding the provisions which the children brought with them for their dinners on the communion table. I do not think that this was so very shocking, for no irreverence was intended. A table was a table in those days, and not an “Altar,” and looking back on the matter it does not appear clear where else the food could have been safely placed. I fancy there was no regular vestry and, excepting the floor, or the seats of the pews, there does not seem to me to have been any other place of moderately safe deposit. However, by and by a room was hired as a schoolroom, and the church was freed from the presence of the children and their dinners. I well remember our going over in form to hold some sort of an examination, which was wound up by my father (who was certainly better fitted to examine witnesses from the magistrate’s bench than to probe for what information our little uncivilised urchins possessed) electrifying the audience by desiring to know whether his examinee knew the use of a pocket-handkerchief. My mother was a more efficient aid by paying the schooling of all our own cottagers’ children, and also in allaying strife. On one occasion, when a woman wished to remove her children from the parish school because they were better taught at a recently established Unitarian school, she dexterously overcame the difficulty by stating she meddled with nobody’s conscience, but if the children went to the parish school she paid, and if they did not go she didn’t. We heard no more on the subject.

Some of our customs were very pretty. On Palm Sunday, that is the Sunday before Easter Sunday, sometimes known in our part and the district as “Flowering Sunday,” it was the custom to dress the graves with flowers. Friends of the family came from a long distance. A son of our head-gardener would come down from Scotland for the occasion, and the wealth of yellow daffodils and white narcissus, which grew by the Wye, close to the little church of Llancaut, helped greatly towards the decoration. Two Crown Imperials were a greatly admired addition which, season permitting, appeared to ornament one special grave. The “flowering” was a touching and pleasing remembrance of the friends whose bodies rested below, until in after years the custom gradually arose of placing artificial flowers along with the fresh blossoms, and then followed the much to be deprecated practice of putting little cases of flowers of tinsel, or anything that was approved of, which might remain on the grave. At Christmas time we had the real old-fashioned church decorations of good large boughs of holly, with plenty of red berries, mistletoe, laurel, and anything evergreen of a solid sort. The squire (i.e., my father) contributed a cartload of evergreen branches, and as a matter of course, they were applied largely to ornamenting our corner pew with more regard to appearance than comfort.

The service was performed simply, as was customary in those days, without any music excepting the singing of the hymns, but as nothing was omitted, and there was, I believe, no curate, it must have been rather fatiguing to the vicar, and it certainly was a terribly long business especially for those not always in good health, if they stayed for the Communion Service on the rare occasions on which it was administered. The drive from the Park to the bottom of the hill on which the Church stood, was upwards of two miles. Then came a wearying walk up the hill until this became so steep that in the Churchyard there were successive little arrangements of steps to help us up the ascent. Within, it seems to me, that the clergyman neither excused himself, nor us, anything that might have lightened the strain, bodily and mental, to the younger attendants. The creed of St. Athanasius was duly gone through as well as the Litany, and addresses, which nowadays are cut very short, came at full length. When, after the return drive, we got safely home, I will not say but that our spiritual state might have been better had our bodily condition been less open to the unsettling influence of a desire for a much-needed meal.

One pleasure of the high days was having the fine old hymns for Easter or Christmas, which no bad singing can spoil, as a variety on Sternhold and Hopkins, but I still bear in mind the absolute depression caused by that doleful production, the hymn called “The Lamentation of a Sinner.” To this day it seems to me that it would be better for such a composition to be omitted from our service.

Although it appears to be the correct thing for those who have been before the public in later life to have reminiscences (or for their biographer to invent them), of their precocious piety, I cannot remember that I was ever much given that way. I think that I was as a child kept in steady paths of proper behaviour, and amongst the items taught was certainly scrupulous observance of the fifth commandment in all its branches. Any deviation from truth was another point, the wickedness of which was most sedulously inculcated; and I should say that from my earliest days I was thoroughly well grounded in as much simple and necessary religious information as my small head could carry.

But I did not indulge in fine sentiments, felt or expressed, and I think that my first absolute feeling on religious matters was roused when in one of our spring visits to London, I went regularly on Sunday morning with the family to attend the service at the Vere Street Chapel, where Mr. Scobell was then vicar, and some clergyman of high standing occasionally preached. One thing that was very charming to a girl who had not heard anything of the kind before, was the hymn singing. The splendid hymn “Thou art the way,” imprinted itself on my mind, as likewise a part of a sermon by Mr. Scobell, on the basis of our trust in God. He enumerated various of the high characteristics of the Deity; His boundless power, His holiness and other characteristics of His majesty. With the mention of each characteristic he put the question, “Does this give you a claim for acceptance?” until he came to the climax, “His love,” with the words “but His love, that you may trust.” Perhaps if the good man had known how these words would abide to old age as a comfort to one who was then amongst the youngest of his congregation, it would have given him pleasure.

The Archbishop of Dublin, the celebrated Dr. Whately, also preached at this Chapel, and I heard him deliver his grand sermon on “the doubts leading to the assured belief of St. Thomas.” I suppose this time was what in some circles would have been called my “awakening,” but we in our family neither thought nor spoke of these things; and any allusion to such matters would have brought on me (possibly very rightly) an awakening of another kind, which would have entirely disinclined me to favour the family with any religious views, beyond what might be shown in behaving with propriety and above all doing as I was bid to the best of my ability.

Reverting to early recollections of ecclesiastical matters, or things in which the clergy might have been expected, ex-officio, to interfere, there certainly was room for improvement, but this was not peculiar to the olden time. Some of the curious circumstances of which accounts reached my young ears are better forgotten. One thing that I remember was the very different position relating to sporting, and also to the divergence in dress from the great precision now in vogue. A clergyman of somewhat high position, being, I suppose, pressed for time on one occasion, performed the funeral service in his “pink” visible beneath his surplice. Another, subsequently a favourite with all his poorer parishioners for his kindness, when a candidate for orders, was encouraged by his father to the necessary mental labour by the promise that if he passed his examination he should have a double-barrelled gun! In a locality not far from the edge of Monmouthshire, I myself saw the incumbent of one of the small livings with his coat off loading a manure cart! He comes back to my memory as doing the work quietly and gravely, and with no more appearance of derogation than if he had been budding the roses in his garden; still the work must have taken a considerable amount of time from the purposes of his ordination.

The “Oxford” or “Tractarian Movement” of 1833-45[^[15]] made an enormous commotion, and perhaps for a retired locality nowhere more than in our own parish.

After the death of the old vicar, amongst a succession of clergy the most noted was Dr. Armstrong (presented 1846).[^[16]] With him came the full tide of the Oxford Movement, and as he was a highly accomplished man, eloquent in the pulpit, of charming society manner in the drawing-room, and with his heart fixed on driving his own views of reform and restoration forward, the holders of differing ecclesiastical views in the parish were soon very thoroughly by the ears. My father as “squire” and chief resident landowner had always tried (much to his own discomfort at times) to uphold the cause of decency and order. But with the new arrangements came all sorts of trouble from an excess of ceremonial, and peace seemed to have vanished. The attempted setting up of confession caused much trouble, and difference of lay and clerical opinion in the restoration of the Church was a fertile cause of ill-feeling. One special point was the right claimed by the vicar to prevent any of the general congregation entering the church by the chancel door. We had always gone in that way, and it was not convenient to reach the family pew by going round two sides of the church, so my father stuck to his legal rights, and the door was not visibly fastened. But one unlucky day when we, the ladies of the family, arrived as usual and tried to go in, to our consternation it appeared impossible to turn the latch. It was a remarkably pretty handle—I suppose an imitation of mediæval ironwork—but it required more than common woman’s strength to make this unlucky invention act in admitting us to the church. However, we were not to be kept out by this ingenious device. Muscularly I was remarkably strong from working in wood and stone, and I was perfectly happy to forward my father’s wishes, so thenceforward for many a week I went to church with a round ruler in my pocket, and slipping this into the hanging bit of ironwork, I easily raised the latch and gave my mother and sisters entrance to church. I did not object to my part of the ceremony in the least—rather liked it, in fact—but looking back from graver age it seems to me that it would have been better if the vicar had not driven the squire to defend the rights of the congregation by such forcible measures. After a while the latch (or the vicar’s view on the subject) was loosened, and we obtained entrance without, like the violent, being obliged to take it by force.

The real troubles of the times were endless. It was even possible for a sincerely religious man to absent himself from the reception of communion on the ground that he was not able to participate with Christian comfort and in a charitable frame of mind. Within the church building itself the condition of things was not satisfactory. The openings beneath the very “open” seats, whereby was secured free circulation for dogs and draughts, were unpleasant in various ways.

The appointment of our skilled and accomplished vicar, Dr. Armstrong, to the Bishopric of Grahamstown in South Africa, for which he was eminently fitted, was hailed by many of us with heartfelt gratitude. In later years, under the kindly care of the Rev. Percy Burd (successor in 1862 of the Rev. Alan Cowburn) who, without thinking it necessary to push everything to extremities, attended with the utmost care to proprieties of detail of worship in church, to social friendliness, and to care of the poor, we passed along in paths of comfort and peace, for which some of us were deeply grateful.

Amongst various parish or local matters, of which the bodily presence has, to a great degree, passed away, and the remembrance that at one time such things were has probably faded from most of the minds in which they ever held a place, are turnpike gates, with their adjoining toll-houses; also the parish stocks and the parish pound.

In parochial arrangements in my day two great improvements arose, one of which has now long been a regular part of parish work, but was new at least to us. This was a women’s clothing club. The other was the commencement of the plan of lending books to those who otherwise would rarely have seen them. It was introduced by my sister, Georgiana E. Ormerod, when little more than a girl, quite at her own expense. It was continued by her without any pecuniary assistance (unless may be sometimes some small co-operation from myself) to the end of her long life.

The clothing club was set on foot under some difficulties by the wife of one of the clergy resident in our parish, for the goods procurable at Chepstow, the nearest town, were by no means remarkable for their quality, and Mrs. Morgan thought herself bound to do the best in her power for her poor subscribers. So the matter was accommodated (not without a good deal of grumbling from Chepstow shopkeepers about money being taken out of their pockets) by part of the goods brought from Bristol (where excellent material was to be had) for the women to choose from, being sent previous to “club day” to Mr. Morgan’s large and commodious house. In those days, so far as I know, the plan of sending the women with tickets to the shops had not been adopted, and our method, though exceedingly laborious to the lady manager of the club, was good for the women, for it ensured that their choice was confined to the very best materials, all of a useful kind, and at the lowest possible prices.

When a growing up girl, perhaps about sixteen, my sister Georgiana thought it would be a pleasure to the children of our own cottagers to have some entertaining books, and she began by lending them from the small store which had gradually come down from the elders of our generation. She chose carefully what she thought would be of interest, and very soon the elder children took to reading, or sometimes the fathers would read aloud to their families. My sister always either read the books herself or knew the nature of the contents before lending them, and when done with they were brought back and exchanged. The borrowing rapidly spread beyond our own cottagers till it included our farmers and their friends at Gloucester and Bristol. The books were almost invariably treated with all reasonable care, and scarcely ever was one a-missing. Besides the entertainment, they acted as an antidote to the attractions of the public-house. It was a great delight to my sister when she had a request for a book, because Jack or Dick was home from his ship or on a holiday, and they wanted a book that would keep him from the “public.” I attribute much of my sister’s success to the care with which, even after her book-lending had extended to far-distant localities, she chose the books. On one occasion when she had made a donation of books of her own choosing to the Lending Library, Bethnal Green, London, she was greatly pleased to hear that the boys and girls had passed the word round amongst the factories of the entertaining books that had arrived. Those we found suited best (for I was in some degree her assistant) were accounts of real incidents made into narratives. Ballantyne’s earlier books with accounts of the fire brigade, post office, lighthouse and the like were great favourites, perhaps none the less for the conversations being at times a trifle vulgar; but when a writer took up some special view, as of teetotalism, high-churchism, or any other specialism, we dropped him. Stories of olden times, such as the Plague in London, or the Great Fire; risings in Henry the Eighth’s time; wars of the time of Charles the First and Cromwell; forest troubles of the time of William Rufus, and the like—told as stories, with the facts correct although the thread on which they were strung was imaginary—were always favourites. We seldom lent absolutely religious books unless they were asked for, and then we took care that they should be of a solid and interesting sort; but whether sacred or secular the number of books lent or given for lending in the course of the year was very great.

My sister was a highly accomplished woman, a good linguist and historian, and a careful scriptural student. As a scientific entomologist and a Fellow of the Entomological Society of London, she was a co-operator with me in my work. She devoted her artistic talent for many years to the execution of excellent diagrams, serviceable for agricultural purposes, of insects injurious to farm and orchard produce, some of which she made over to the Royal Agricultural Society, but the greater number she presented to friends interested in lessening the amount of loss through insect injury, and to Agricultural Colleges. From girlhood to old age she unceasingly carried on her chosen work of distribution of useful healthy literature. She asked no aid, nor made the considerable sums she expended, and the careful cordial thought she gave to this work, matter of public notoriety, but in her last moments it brought a smile to her face when I told her that I purposed to continue her work.

My father when living near Chester had the first news on a Sunday morning before church time, of the Duke of Wellington’s success, and that the battle of Waterloo had been fought and won. After service he mounted on a tombstone and announced the glorious news to the assembled congregation. In my early days in Gloucestershire, a neighbour, Captain Fenton, was at times thought to be tedious in his recurrence to the charge of the Scots Greys in which he had served, but it was a grand memory all the same.

In a much humbler sphere and at a different stage of the same great struggle an interesting part was played by a very decent woman—afterwards a servant in our family—at the burial of Sir John Moore at Corunna. She was proud to remember that she was one of those who held a lanthorn at the ceremony alluded to in Wolfe’s poem:—

“We buried him darkly at dead of night

* * * * * *

By the struggling moonbeams’ misty light

And the lanthorn dimly burning.”

PLATE IX.
Map of the Banks of the Wye.
Sedbury Park Property, the darkly shaded area between
Severn and Wye.
(pp. [33] and [38].)

CHAPTER V
SEVERN AND WYE

The locality round which most of the recollections of nearly half my life centre is in the district of Gloucestershire, between the Severn and the Wye (opposite Chepstow in Monmouthshire, plate IX.), almost at the extremity of the peninsula, sometimes not inaptly called the “Forest Peninsula,” as some of the “Hundreds” comprised in the more widely extended area stretching on to the Forest of Dean near Newnham, are technically called the “Forest Hundreds,” although what is commonly thought of (at the present day) as the Forest of Dean, has long since ceased to be connected, popularly speaking, with the lower extremity of the peninsula. This is bounded on the two sides by the Severn and the Wye respectively; and at intervals it presents to the Wye considerable frontage of high cliffs of mountain limestone, and to the Severn red marl, capped more or less with lias. It terminates at the junction of the two rivers in a small area, which is an island at high water, but accessibly connected with the mainland at low water. Here, that is on the rocky ground at the point of confluence of the Wye with the Severn, were still existing in my time (that is up to 1873) the few but massive remains of the Hermitage and Chapels, popularly known collectively as the Chapel of St. Tecla or Treacle Island (plate [X].). The name as given by William of Worcester in full form is “Capella Sancti Teriaci Anachoretæ.” He describes the locality likewise as “The Rok Seynt Tryacle,” but not having now the opportunity of consulting his observations, I am not able to say whether the ancient chronicler gives any reason for the building of this little but massive knot of buildings, or for its overthrow, which must have been a somewhat laborious task, and from the thickness and the solidly built nature of the walls, one that required co-operation. In the short account given by my father in “Strigulensia” from which I borrow some part of these notes, he says, “It would be vain to attempt identification of the Hermit whose name is associated with the ruins, and who does not appear in the calendar of saints, but he occurs as follows in the “Valor Ecclesiasticus” of Hen. VIII., vol. ii. p. 501,” “Capella Sancti Triaci valet nihil, quâ stat in mare et nulla proficua inde proveniunt.” Whether modern skilled archæologists may have thrown light on the early history of the anchorite and his Severn and seaweed-girt chapel I do not know, but few places could be found less attractive for the archæeological picnic-excursions which have become fashionable of late years. Even to my brothers and myself, accustomed as we were to Severn mud, and to picking our way fairly safely over and amongst the coarse brown slippery seaweed fronds (chiefly, if I remember rightly, the Fucus serratus), the passage over such parts as were not then submerged was an exceedingly muddy progress, needing a deal of care lest we should take a sudden slide into one of the little rock basins concealed by the “kelp” or other coarse brown seaweed. But once arrived, it was very pleasant to sit in the sunshine and enjoy the glorious view down the Estuary of the Severn, the fresh salt air blowing round us, or otherwise employ ourselves to our fancy. From careful measurements we found the length of the chapel to have been 31 feet 6 inches, the width 14 feet 6 inches, and the thickness of the walls, wherever sufficient remained for observation, approximately 3 feet.[^[17]] We had to be quick in our operations and our return had to be kept in mind, or we should have had to be fetched off in a boat, and under all circumstances it was probably best for the sake of appearances that our walk home should be as far as possible by the fields or under the cliffs where minutiæ as to condition of boots, &c., were unimportant.

The characteristics of the scenery of each of the rivers are wholly different. The Severn above Beachley and Aust (in former days the land-points of the much-used “Old Passage”) spreads into a wide area of water, perhaps about a mile wide at the narrowest, and at high tide forming a noble lake-like expanse. The Wye, on the contrary, as shown in the map (plate [IX].), takes its sinuous and narrow course between successive promontories, projecting alternately from the Gloucestershire and Monmouthshire banks.

Ruined Anchorite’s Chapel of St. Tecla, on the Chapel Rock
where Severn and Wye meet.
From a sketch by Miss E.A. Ormerod.
(p. [33].)

Severn Cliffs, Sedbury Park.
(p. [40].)

Across some considerable portion of the river a quarter of a mile or so above Beachley, on the Gloucestershire side, a rocky ledge of limestone called “The Lyde” projects at low tide, causing a backwater of which the steady roar can be heard at a long distance.[^[18]] Cormorants on the rock, and conger-eels below it, were regular inhabitants or visitors—the former presumably attracted by the latter, which served to some degree also as food to the fishermen, although pronounced to be “slobbery-like.”

The muddy colour of the Severn was not in itself picturesque—at least I have never heard the point mentioned with admiration; but to me, born as I was by this noblest of our rivers, it seemed to convey a comfortable idea of homeliness and strength. Sometimes, however, in the early morning or in certain conditions of light, the deep rosy colouring was almost as if the whole width of water had been changed to blood; then the effect was very splendid, and as wonderful still as it must have been in days long gone by to Queen Boadicea:—

“Still rolls thy crimson flood in glory on

As when of old its deep ensanguined dye

Told to the warrior Queen her falling throne,

Her people’s death, the foemen’s victory.”

But, independently of other considerations, a bend in the river was of great local service. It formed a bay of about perhaps three-quarters of a mile across, bounded to the west by our own and the Beachley cliffs, and further protected, or endangered, on the southern side by a low range of rocks running out into the river. With the rising tide the import shipping to Gloucester, which in those days was extensive, put in here to be searched by the Custom House officials. At that time (excepting tugs) it was entirely composed of sailing vessels mostly laden with corn, wine, and timber, and the mixed fleet moving about in the bay with colours flying was a very lively sight. In due time they passed on—the three-masters, ships, and barques, or the graceful chasse-marées, taking the lead; brigs and schooners following, and sloops and—if weather permitted—Severn trows bringing up the rear. These, however, as they differed very little in formation from canal barges, required tolerably fair or at least quiet weather to allow them to proceed in safety. The procession of shipping came along almost beneath our cliffs, the deep channel being on that side, and perhaps it was as well that they were no nearer, or the nautical remarks might have been more often audible to the young people than was desirable!

A special convenience to ourselves was a little creek under the cliffs, called in those parts a “pill” (presumably from the Welsh pwll or pool), which allowed of coals being run in a sloop across from Bristol and carted up to the house by a shorter road than that from Chepstow.

FIG. (A).—PUTCHER FOR CATCHING SALMON.

Salmon fishing was carried on partly by nets from fishing boats, partly by rows of baskets known as “putts” or “putchers.” The boats during the boat fishing lay above the edge of the water on the sloping and slippery frontage of the shore. When the tide served for fishing, the men went down from the village above the cliffs to their boats across the flat and precipitously-edged grass, between the base of the low cliffs and the sloping shore. Each man wriggled with might and main at his boat till he loosened its adhesion to the tenacious mud and started it on its slide with its bows foremost towards the water. Once off, of course the pace accelerated; its owner, running behind, held on and clambered in as best he could, and the two arrived safely and with a great jolt on the water. The boats then formed in line, secured by being tied stern to stern at about a boat’s length from each other, and presumably anchored also, but this I do not remember. The net of each boat was lowered, and nothing further occurred till a fish was captured; then the net was lifted, the fish, shining in all the beauty of its silvery scales, taken out, and the net lowered again. These were the best fish; those that were caught in the putts were “drowned” fish, and unless the fishermen were fairly on the alert to secure them before the falling tide had left the baskets long uncovered, there was a very good chance of the eyes being pecked out or the fish otherwise disfigured by birds.

The putcher or basket fishing was carried on by means of very open extinguisher-shaped baskets each long enough to hold, it can hardly be said accommodate, a good-sized salmon. The frame or stand on which these baskets were fixed was formed of two rows of strong poles or upright pieces of wood, running down the shore, across the narrow of the river, for many yards, firmly fixed between high and low tide level, at such a distance as would allow the baskets to reach from one side to the other. Horizontal poles or pieces of wood connected the upright poles, and to these horizontal supports the baskets were attached, so as to form rows with the open ends of the extinguishers facing up stream and all ranged one storey above the other. The fish were drifted into the basket trap, and of course, though they might injure themselves in their struggles, and to some degree their market value, they were powerless to effect their escape and withdraw backward against the set of the tide.[^[19]]

The much larger form of basket described by Mr. Buckland as “putts,” and as being used for catching flat fish, was of a slightly different make—formed only of two instead of three pieces; one large piece, so wide at the opening that I, as a girl, had no difficulty in standing within it, and a very much smaller piece, forming a kind of nose. This little adjunct was, I believe, taken off and searched by the fishermen for what it contained. To my sister Georgiana and myself it was a great pleasure to go down to where the two great eel-putts stood on clean shore at very low tide below the longest row of salmon-putchers, and search for anything that was to be found. My sister was a good conchologist. We searched for seaweed, &c., &c., and thereby got a deal of pleasant amusement. The fishermen, who knew us well, made no objection to our investigations, though, as one of the men remarked on one occasion, “It was not everybody they liked to see near the putts.”

In our immediate neighbourhood the fishermen were quiet—at least I never heard of their getting into very objectionable difficulties—but about eight miles higher up the river, near Lydney, things in this respect were by no means all that could be wished. On one occasion they captured the Fishery Inspector himself—whose duty it was to ascertain that the meshes were not below a certain measurement—and secured him in the nets. Another time somebody (who, unluckily for him, bore some resemblance to the obnoxious inspector) got nearly sloughed up in one of the great marsh ditches, and would have been left to live or die as might chance—probably the latter—but for the arrival of timely help. My father being one of the acting magistrates of the district, we used to hear from time to time of these and other “mauvaises plaisanteries” in the neighbourhood of the Forest of Dean.

On reference to the portion of the Ordnance Map (plate [IX].) it will be seen that there is a broad band marked “mud,” of about a sixth of a mile in width at the widest part and extending for about a mile and a half by the side of the deep channel of the Severn, between it and the cliffs of the Beachley and Sedbury Bay.

The most remarkable capture of which I have any recollection as taking place in the waters, or rather in the mud of the Severn, was said to be a “Bottle-nosed whale,” or Dolphin, Delphinus tursio, Fabr., but it was so many decades of years ago, that I have no means now of turning to any record for verification of the species. The capture itself excited a deal of local interest. It was on a summer morning that one of my brothers, enlivening his vacation studies, as was his custom, by watching through his telescope anything of interest that might be going on amongst the shipping or elsewhere, saw something like an enormous fish struggling and “flopping” on the Beachley pier of the old Passage Ferry. As a matter of course, we young folks set off after luncheon to have our share of the sight, and found the creature had been captured when lying helpless, or half dead, in the mud at the Aust side of the Ferry, and had been towed across behind a boat. At this distance of time I only remember the whale- or dolphin-like shape of the animal, its great size, and that it was apparently of a greyish colour; but this item might very likely be from its being coated with Severn mud. In Bell’s “British Quadrupeds” the greatest length recorded of various specimens found in England is 12 feet. The colour of the back is black, with a purplish tinge, becoming dusky on the sides, and dirty white on the belly. This species is considered rare in England and it is of some interest, in referring to the locality of what may be called our own capture, that “The first account which we have of its appearance on our own shores is that of John Hunter,” and it was taken with its young one “on the sea coast near Berkeley”; that is about two or three miles higher up the left bank of the Severn than the Aust Cliffs. Another specimen was found in the river Dart in Devonshire, and, it was stated, “was killed with difficulty, the poor animal having suffered for four hours the attacks of eight men armed with spears and two guns, and assisted by dogs. When wounded it made a noise like the bellowing of a bull.”[^[20]] In the case of the Old Passage specimen the poor creature was also most barbarously treated, chiefly by being attacked by the running of hay forks, pitch forks, and the like, into its body, and I remember a good deal of chopping with hatchets or axes, but it was quite quiet and, it was to be hoped, was past feeling pain. Immense popular interest, of course, was excited as to the precise nature of the unusual “take,” as to whether it was a Leviathan, or possibly the kind of fish that swallowed Jonah—but the affair ended by the creature being shipped off to Bristol to be turned into a little money for the boatmen who secured it, and no other cetacean was taken during the remainder of the years in which Sedbury was my home.

The most observable of the seaweeds, which grew on the rocks or large stones, more or less in the muddy salt water between tide levels at the mouth of the Severn, were of the genus Fucus, which at one time was much used in the making of kelp. The ornamental kinds always appeared to me to be unaccountably absent. They were not to be expected to make this place their habitat, but, still, their almost total absence in the masses of drift matter left by the retiring tide struck me as curious. In my most successful searches I do not remember ever being fortunate enough to secure even a fragment of the lovely Oak-leaf, Delesseria, with its bright, rosy-veined leaves from as much as 4 inches to 8 inches in length placed along their cylindrical stem, or the Peacock seaweed, Padina pavonea, with its concentric markings. Of Iceland Moss there might be a battered morsel. The general composition of the driftage was composed of little except what might be grown in the neighbourhood, mixed with sugar cane or packing material thrown from the vessels. This, however, seemed to me of some interest in connection with the set of the currents. Here, however, I am out of my element, but as my brother Dr. Ormerod employed me as a collector, I am not personally responsible.

The distinct varieties of soil, and also the geographical and the geological surroundings of Sedbury, were unusually favourable to natural history investigations, whether of fauna and flora of the present day, or of fossil remains of saurians and shells. These were easily accessible as they fell from the frontage of lias, or the narrow horizontal strip in the cliffs (plate [IX].) facing the Severn, well known to the geologists as the “bone bed.” At the highest part the cliffs were about 140 feet, calculating from medium tide level. There the face had been quarried back for a supply of lias limestone, used in enlarging the offices of the house, and in so doing had laid bare a fine bed of so-called “Venus” shells. We used to find beautiful specimens of those shells, irrespective of this extra fine deposit, and also of “patens,” oysters of some kind, which we sought for unweariedly, hammer in hand. The greatest matters of interest, however, were the saurian, or the fish remains, of which we sometimes found a plentiful supply of specimens of little value, and now and then some of considerable interest.

PLATE XI.
Roman Pottery, found in Sedbury Park.
From a drawing by Miss E. A. Ormerod.
(p. [18].)

Saurian from the Lias, Sedbury Cliffs.
(p. [41].)

The Sedbury cliffs lie nearly north of the Aust cliff, and contain the Aust bone bed, from which the Severn, about a mile wide, or somewhat more, there divides them. Geologically, in all important characteristics, I believe the two cliffs correspond. Of this bone bed it is noted by Sir Charles Lyell[^[21]]: “In England the Lias is succeeded by conformable strata of red and green marl or clay. There intervenes, however, both in the neighbourhood of Exmouth, in Devonshire, and in the cliffs of Westbury and Aust, in Gloucestershire, on the banks of the Severn, a dark-coloured stratum, well known by the name of the ‘bone bed.’ It abounds in the remains of saurians and fish, and was formerly classed as the lowest bed of Lias; but Sir P. Egerton has shown that it should be referred to as the Upper New Red Sandstone.” The reasons given are not of interest to the general reader. From the fallen débris of this we collected vertebræ, single, or sometimes a few in connection, also bones of the paddles, and any amount of teeth, also coprolites, the excrementitious matter of the living owners of the bones. These were in great quantity, but I never remember that they were other than irregular lumps, and though some of us were much given to grinding and polishing stones that afforded hope of an ornamental result, it never occurred to us to exercise our talents on these lumps, which might have indicated in their undigested contents some evidence of the diet of their consumers.

The only valuable or interesting specimen of Saurian remains (that is of an animal in moderate degree of entirety) fell from the cliffs after I had ceased to reside there. This was a slab of Lias about 3 feet long by 2 feet broad, and about 7 to 9 inches thick (plate [XI].) The history of its fall, as given to me in a letter from Dr. John Yeats, F.R.G.S., then residing at Chepstow, dated September, 1882, was, that “From one of the ledges, or from the top of a slip or subsidence, a fir tree was blown down during the autumn of 1882.... The fossil was found beneath the roots,” and “the fossil remains were laid bare by a conchoidal fracture.” A few detached vertebræ were collected, but unfortunately no part of the head was secured. Of this specimen Professor Richard Owen was good enough to report to Dr. Yeats on the 24th of May, 1883, as follows: “From the concavity of the articular surfaces of the vertebræ, I infer it to be part of an ichthyosaurus, and the number and character of the ribs agree with that deduction. If any part of the jaws or teeth should be found near the locality it would decide the matter.”

This fossil is now in the possession of Sir William H. Marling, at Sedbury.

The surface of the cliffs was of a very mixed nature, with ledges of stone projecting slightly in places, and from the effect of weathering, landslips, leading at times to inconvenience, were not infrequent. As we knew the nature of the ground we were careful about going near the edge of the top of the cliff, where a precipice or a crack showed danger, but it happened more than once that a bullock or calf, attracted by food to be found amongst the trees or bushes which in some places clothed the slanting upper part, was tempted beyond safe footing, and toppled down to the bottom to its own destruction. On one occasion, on returning from a walk, my sister Georgiana and I, not having noticed a fall from the cliffs, were cut off by one of these slips from any comfortable advance. It was not a case of danger, but a choice between much wet and dirt from Severn mud, or very considerable discomfort of another sort, as the slip had brought down with it brambles, &c., &c., most unpleasant to brave for the sake of dryness. We preferred the wet passage, feeling our way with our feet through the muddy water from one good-sized stone to another, and presently arrived safely above the high-tide level, but to those who did not know that beneath the muddy surface there was a sound footing if sought for, the little episode might have been unpleasant.

PLATE XII.
Royal Mail starting from Old General Post Office, London.
Original lent by Arthur Ackermann & Son, 191, Regent Street, W.

CHAPTER VI
TRAVELLING BY COACH, FERRY, AND RAILWAY

In my early days much of the passenger transit of South Wales and the south-westerly part of England passed over the old Passage Ferry across the Severn from Beachley to Aust, and consequently the coaches all passed our park gates. It was said there were fourteen coaches a day. On this I am unable to offer an opinion, but there were a great number, and amongst them were two mails. The road to the head of the old Passage Pier, from Chepstow, was about three and a half miles in length, and very hilly (going up one ascent, long or short as the case might be, to go down another), with the exception of two lengths of flat “galloping ground.” These well deserved their name, and I can still remember the swing of violent speed at which the high, piled-up vehicle tore past us, causing children and accompanying dogs to allow it a very free passage. The journey was not without risk of disaster, for on one occasion in turning a sharp angle, on the incline of a steep shore-hill, without due care, the coach lurched to the outward side of the curve and made a distribution of its outside passengers on the greensward by our park gates. It certainly would have been a great help in those days if the wish (though not exactly as he expressed it) of the driver of one of the more old-fashioned of the coaches could have been carried out, and “a little akyduct” made to convey the road from the top of one hill to the next, thus avoiding the dangerous descent.

The view from the tops of the coaches as they galloped along the flat road at the summit of the Severn cliffs down to the Ferry pier was very beautiful. On one side was the Severn, a mile wide at the narrowest, with the red Aust cliffs opposite, the Sedbury cliffs above; and, in the distance, about thirty miles away up the river, the hills, near or beyond Gloucester, could be faintly seen. On the other side, about a field or two from the road, was the lowest part of the Wye at its point of juncture with the Severn, and the noble estuary itself opening out from about four miles width till it was lost to view in the distance of the Severn Sea.

TIME-TABLE ILLUSTRATING THE METHOD OF TRAVELLING 200 YEARS AGO.

The Old Passage, though probably as well managed as was reasonably possible, was, in many respects, a most inconvenient necessity. On one occasion, while fourteen passengers were crossing in a sailing boat, every living thing, except one dog, perished in mid-transit. It was on a stormy Sunday in September, 1838, and the boat was heavily laden with horses as well as the passengers. How the accident happened was never known. One of my brothers had been watching the boat from our cliffs, and on looking again, after a minute or so, she was gone. The conjectural cause of the disaster was that one of the horses had become unruly. The assignment of the disaster to a judgment for travelling on Sunday, may be looked on as a state of feeling very desirable to be removed by changing times, which have brought a larger charitableness and greater common sense.

PLATE XIII.
Old Chepstow Bridge, rebuilt in 1816, with Post-chaise crossing it.
From an old picture signed W. Williams, 1783.

A novel custom was associated with the Old Passage. A man suspected of possible infection of hydrophobia, was put into the salt water, and towed about in the Severn at the stern of a boat. In the event of a man having been bitten by a stray dog, this operation made his village acquaintances much easier in their minds about him. They had also the fun, and in any case the patient would not be the worse for a thorough good washing!

The appliances of the ferry were a steam boat and various sailing boats, including one known as the Mail-boat, as well as on the Beachley side, an apparatus acting as a telegraph. This consisted of an arrangement of board which, when at rest, resembled a wooden window shutter about a couple of yards square, fastened to one of the buildings; and, by some code of signals of an exceedingly simple sort, requisite directions were conveyed across the river as to the boat service.

On our side there was one solidly built pier, serviceable for shipment of passengers or goods at all states of the tide, and accessible for all kinds of carriage use from the good road which terminated at the top in front of a small kind of hotel; it likewise had the desirable security, for the greater part of its length, of strong posts with chains between them. On the Aust side there was a high- and also a low-water pier, not far apart, a little way below the inn, and if the tide served for boats to reach these all went fairly well after disembarking, but it was a different matter at half-tide. The half-tide pier was a considerable distance from the others—a quarter or half a mile away beneath the cliffs, and mud and stones and the roughest imaginable affairs in the guise of road had to be got through or over on the way to the inn. The effect of this on the springs, paint, &c., of a good Long Acre-built barouche, when by some unhappy necessity it had to be committed to such a method of transit, may be easily imagined. The passage for a carriage was, at the best, not well arranged. A muster of fishermen or boatmen was made, and the carriage was turned on the pier and dragged more or less rapidly on board, and there, I presume, secured from movement, but, certainly, by no means from danger, for part of the freight might consist of half a dozen or a dozen bullocks, which shifted to one side or the other as the vessel lurched. On the whole the transit by the Old Passage Ferry, so well known in former days, was one link in a chain of necessities which left much room for changing times to improve.

The great change in the method of travelling may be said to have been publicly inaugurated in the spring of 1830[^[22]] by the opening of the Canterbury and Whitstable line of railway.

In the same year the Bill for the Warrington railway was passed by both Houses of Parliament, and permission was also granted to construct a line from Leicester to Swannington, Robert Stephenson being appointed chief engineer to both lines. But the great railway event of that year was the opening, with an imposing ceremonial, on September 15th, of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. This left nothing to be desired in showing high appreciation of the importance of advance in methods of locomotion. Although a complete success, from the point of view of capabilities of safe and also of rapid travelling, the day was one of great trouble and anxiety. As the train neared Manchester the mob crowded on the lines, and while to have gone forward at any moderate pace would have been death to hundreds, on the other hand, the slow movement allowed the populace to swarm on the carriages and display their political aversion to “the Duke” (Wellington) by throwing brickbats, and by other objectional irregularities. The riot was not so much remembered as the accident which resulted in the death of Huskisson. I can recollect the unsophisticated story of something being seen going along the line at such a speed that it was hardly discernible; and also that a horn was used for train signalling in place of the steam whistle. Carelessness of life through ignorance of the danger was everywhere conspicuous; discipline was much needed. My father while waiting at a station took pleasure in walking along the line to while away the time. Tying horse-carriages on open trucks was not an unusual practice with carriage-people who could afford to pay for the luxury. My father long travelled in his own carriage thus attached, and stepped from the truck on which it stood to the next, but of course at considerable danger to his person.

PLATE XIV.
A West of England Royal Mail en route.
Original lent by Arthur Ackermann & Son, 191, Regent Street, W.

CHAPTER VII
CHARTIST RISING IN MONMOUTHSHIRE IN 1839

The remembrance of the Chartist[^[23]] rising in Monmouthshire of November, 1839, must have long faded away, except from the minds of the few survivors who were concerned in its suppression, and those of the younger generation who remember it from the anxiety it caused throughout the district. I came among the latter number. My father was an acting magistrate, and at the time alterations were going on in his house at Sedbury Park. I can well remember the surly, disobedient, and generally insubordinate behaviour of the local workmen in the week preceding Sunday, the 3rd of November. With the return of the workmen, in the course of the following week, the face of affairs had however changed. The rising had taken place, and had been thoroughly crushed. Receiving a reverse, they were there and then seized with panic, and fled. Their chief leaders—by name John Frost, Zephaniah Williams, and William Jones, and others not so deeply implicated—were captured, and to us the result was exceedingly satisfactory. The men when they returned were patterns of obedience and as meek as mice. They did not in the least desire the distinction of being known, in a magistrate’s house, to have taken part in an outbreak which had totally failed. They had thought that by Monday or Tuesday the house would be in their hands and our relative positions reversed, and, indeed, it would have been hard to find a house more indefensible against a disciplined mob than ours. Along two sides of the house (plate [I].), ran a broad colonnade of Bath stone, supported by pillars so wide and so placed that in many cases men ascending by ladders put against them, would have been greatly or entirely protected from the discharge of fire-arms from the windows; and the broad flat surface of the top of the colonnade, 10 feet in width, by about 120 feet in length, would have made an admirable mustering ground for scores of men, from which to carry on their unpleasant attacks in conjunction with their allies below. This however we were spared.

The trial of Frost and the other leaders followed speedily by special Commission at Monmouth. It began in the following December and ended in January (1840), with a verdict of guilty of High Treason; and sentence of death according to the treason penalties of the time was pronounced by Lord Chief Justice Tindal as follows:—“That you, John Frost, and you, Zephaniah Williams, and you, William Jones, be taken hence to the place from which you came, and be thence drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution, and that each of you be there hanged by the neck until you be dead, and that afterwards the head of each of you shall be severed from his body, and the body of each, divided into four quarters, shall be disposed of as Her Majesty shall think fit, and may Almighty God have mercy on your souls.” A recommendation to mercy, which was mercifully attended to, was added on behalf of the five least guilty men. The possibility of the horrors of the details of the treason penalties (though much mitigated from those of former days on account of their being carried out on the dead body of the offender) created consternation through the district, and the remembrance has remained with me to this day. However, the capital sentence on Frost and his two special associates was commuted to transportation for life, an act of grace coincident with those extended on the marriage of our late Queen of glorious memory.

Only the above disjointed reminiscences of trouble have remained in my mind through the sixty years which have since elapsed, but the rising was so planned that, if it had succeeded, it would have proved a match to light the smouldering Chartism of the Midlands and the North of England, and even under the circumstances the case was described in the Attorney-General’s address to the Jury at the commencement of the Monmouth trial as follows:

“There has recently been in this County an armed insurrection, the law has been set at defiance; there has been an attempt to take forcible possession of the town of Newport, there has been a conflict between the insurgents and the Queen’s troops; there has been bloodshed, and the loss of many lives. The intelligence of these outrages has caused alarm and dismay throughout the kingdom.”[^[24]]

When divested of the repetitions and technicalities of the reports of the sworn witnesses, and also of the addresses of the Lord Chief Justice and legal authorities, the story of the rising possesses much interest as an account in many of its details of what could not happen in the present day. The mountainous nature of the insurgent locality, the extraordinarily stormy weather which threw the undisciplined thousands out in their calculations, and the short, but (for the time occupied) bloody climax would have formed under such a pen as Sir Walter Scott’s, a narrative of interest almost equal to some of those of the Covenanting troubles.

The part of the County in which the disturbances took place—was what is called the “hill district” of Monmouthshire (plate [XV].), which has been described as an area of triangular form, having for its apex to the south, Risca, a town five miles W.N.W of Newport. The base of the triangle was at a distance of from fifteen to twenty miles in a northerly direction, with the great Beaufort and Nant-y-glo iron works to the west, on the edge of Brecknockshire, and to the east Blaenavon on the Usk in its hilly, or it might be said mountainous, neighbourhood. The area of this hill district is varied with hill and dale, intersected in parts by deep glens, and also by mountain streams, of no inconsiderable force after heavy rains. Picturesquely considered the country is of great beauty, but beneath the surface are rich supplies of coal and iron. For some years before 1839, the mines had been much worked, and the country, instead of being merely inhabited by a small and scattered population, was at the time of the outbreak estimated to contain above 40,000 inhabitants, often, as it was stated, displaying “an extent of ignorance very much to be deplored” and consequently easily led away by the agents of seditious societies and formed into affiliated bodies ready for outbreak when called on.

PLATE XV.
Map showing the District of the Chartist Rising in Monmouth.
Newport near the low right-hand corner above the bend
of the River Usk.

The matured plan of the rising was arranged on the 1st of November at a meeting at a place called Blackwood, where there was a Lodge or Society of Chartists. At this meeting deputies attended, and orders were formulated, that the men should assemble armed on the evening of the 3rd, the following Sunday. There were to be three principal divisions, one under the command of Frost (then living at Blackwood), the other two to be respectively formed of men from the up-country, and men more from the east and north. These divisions were to meet at Risca at a convenient distance from Newport, their destination, which they purposed to reach about two in the morning. They hoped to find the inhabitants asleep, and to carry out their plans at their own convenience; attack the “intended-to-be-surprised” troops at Newport, break down the bridge over the Usk, and stop the mail. The Newport mails in those days were forwarded over the Old Passage of the Severn to Bristol, from which place at a given time they were sent North. The non-arrival of the mails at Birmingham was to have been a sign of success of the Monmouthshire outbreak, and of a general rising in Lancashire, and other parts of the kingdom. Affairs, however, turned out very differently to what they expected. The night between the Sunday and Monday was the darkest and most tempestuous that had been known for years, and consequently though Frost arrived near Risca early in the night, the other divisions were long behind time. Meanwhile Mr. Phillips, the Mayor of Newport, afterwards Sir Thomas Phillips, a firm and intelligent man, well informed of what was going on, had been quietly making preparations, in view of the intelligence received during Sunday. He had given orders to the Superintendent of Police to have a number of Special Constables ready on that evening. A detachment was stationed at the Westgate Hotel, where the Mayor and another magistrate also located themselves about 9 p.m., and remained watching throughout the night. When day dawned on Monday, November 4th, intelligence was received that the insurgents were approaching, and the Mayor sent a request to the barracks for military assistance. There was only one company of soldiers (of Her Majesty’s 45th Regiment of foot) stationed at Newport at the time. Of these thirty men, under command of Lieut. Basil Gray, were sent to the assistance of the Mayor. They arrived at the Westgate Hotel about 8 a.m. The soldiers were placed in a room on the ground floor of the hotel with three windows (a bow window with three divisions) coming down within a few inches of the ground, and it should be observed that they did not load their muskets until, after being fired upon, they were ordered to do so. Shortly after the rioters were seen advancing, the numbers being technically stated in the indictment for High Treason as “a great multitude ... to the number of two thousand and more,” probably more accurately computed at 5,000, armed with guns, pistols, pikes, swords, daggers, clubs, bludgeons, and other weapons. Amongst the miscellaneous “weapons of offence” were scythes fixed on poles, and an instrument (of which a specimen was produced in court) called a “mandrel,” used for working out coal in the mines, and somewhat resembling a pick-axe in shape. A portion of the rioters formed in front of the hotel, and at once began the attack by firing a volley of small arms at the windows of the room where the soldiers were placed, of which the lower shutters were closed. They gained entrance to a passage, or corridor, communicating with it by a door. The word was immediately given to load with ball cartridge, but whilst the lower window shutters remained closed, the men could not reply. Therefore, with the certainty that they would be fired on, the Mayor and Lieutenant Gray threw back the shutters, and stood unmasked facing the insurgents, who immediately discharged a volley of small arms, whereby the Mayor was wounded in the groin, and seriously in one arm near the shoulder, and Sergeant Daily was badly hit in the head. The order to fire was at once given, and several of the insurgents were wounded, and fell. For the short time that the conflict lasted the rioters in the house continued to try to force the position by rushing up to the doorway; but when they encountered their own dead and received the return fire of the soldiers they faltered, and in less than ten minutes the affray was over. The passage was cleared of all excepting the dead and wounded, and the vast mob of rioters was dispersing with all speed. In the words of one witness, they “ran to all quarters.” Another deposed that he met numbers of them near Newport “running back in all directions,” and though here and there some men remained, they were without arms, and from the quantity of weapons of offence collected afterwards, it was demonstrable that in many cases the men must have flung them away as they fled. But though short, the affair had been bloody. The rioters lost seven men killed besides a number of wounded, and the casualties to their opponents were in some cases serious, although not fatal. Hundreds hurried from the scene of their repulse with such speed that by ten o’clock a.m. they were passing the Lodge Gate of Tredegar Park, about two miles from Newport. Amongst this crowd was John Frost, ex-draper of Newport and would-be conductor of the outbreak, a man who had proved himself as deficient in courage as he had been inefficient in leadership. He was endeavouring to conceal his identity by holding a handkerchief to his face as if he were crying. But on being spoken to and recognised, he left the road and going through an archway leading to a coppice wood, was lost sight of. A warrant was granted in the afternoon of the same day, and in the evening, on the door being forced open of the house of a man named Partridge (about a quarter of a mile from the Westgate Hotel in Newport), Frost was found and was immediately taken into custody. On being searched, three pistols all loaded, a powder flask, and some balls were found in his pocket.

PLATE XVI.
Chepstow Castle, Monmouthshire.
(p. [16].)

CHAPTER VIII
BEGINNING THE STUDY OF ENTOMOLOGY, COLLECTIONS OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGICAL SPECIMENS, AND FAMILY DISPERSAL.

So far as a date can be given to what has been the absorbing interest of the work of my life, the 12th of March, 1852, would be about the beginning of my real study of Entomology. I fancy I attended to it more than I knew myself, for little things come back to memory connected with specimens being brought to me to name or look at, one in particular regarding a rare locust. The date was some time before coaches were discontinued, and the usual gathering of people in those days had collected at the door of the George Hotel in Chepstow to see the coach change horses, when, to the astonishment of all, a fine rose-underwinged locust appeared amongst them. Chepstow is on a steep hill, and the “George” about half a mile from the bridge (plate [XVII].). Down the hill set off the locust, pursued by a party from the George, until it was captured at the bridge, and our family doctor conveyed it alive and uninjured to me. On my father sending it up to Oxford to Professor Daubeney as a probable curiosity, he identified it as being the first of the kind which had been taken so far west. If he gave us the name, I have forgotten it. In March I began my studies by buying my first entomological book, and I chose beetles for the subject, and Stephens’s “Manual of British Beetles”[^[25]] for my teacher. Those who know the book will understand my difficulties. It has no illustrations, glossary, nor convenient abstracts to help beginners, and, if such things existed in those days, they were not accessible to me. But I made up my mind that I was going to learn, and as palpi, maxillæ, and names of all the smaller parts of the insects were wholly unknown to me, I struck out a plan of my own. From time to time I got one of the very largest beetles that I could find, something that I was quite sure of, and turned it into my teacher. I carefully dissected it and matched the parts to the details of the description given by Stephens. The process was very tedious and required great care, but I got a sound foundation, and by making a kind of synopsis of the chief points of classification I got a start. To this day (1891) I have my old Stephens’s Manual with my own pencil markings, that started me on my unaided course. Identification was very difficult for a long time, but I “looked out” my beetles laboriously till I thought I was sure of the name, and then, to make quite certain, I took the subject the other way forward—worked back systematically from the species till I found that there was no other kind that it could be. Killing my specimens was another difficulty. I had been told that if beetles were dropped into hot water death was instantaneous. I was not aware that it should be boiling. So into the kitchen I went with a water beetle, which in after years I found must have been Dytiscus marginalis—a large water beetle which has great powers of rapid swimming—got a tumbler of hot water, and dropped my specimen in. But to my perfect horror, instead of being killed instantaneously, it skimmed round and round on the water for perhaps a minute as if in the greatest agony. This was my second lesson; thenceforward I supplied myself with chloroform.

My first experience in the use of the microscope was gained by helping my brother William to prepare botanical specimens for examination under his microscope. I thus had useful practice early in life, 1849 (?), in the management of a good instrument. I bought my own about 1864, after my brother John’s death—one of Pillischer’s—a good working instrument with excellent 1-inch and ¼-inch lenses on a nose-piece. I first studied with it the hairs of different animals. I also worked preparations of teeth, showing the fluid contents when in a fresh state.

PLATE XVII.
Chepstow with the Road Bridge over the Wye (opened in 1816), Chepstow Castle on the River-bank, and rising ground behind.
Frith photo.

In the number of the “Gardeners’ Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette” for August 1, 1868, the announcement was made that “Throughout the month of August there will be open in the Palace of Industry, in the Champs Élysées, Paris, an Exhibition which we conceive cannot fail to be of great service in extending a knowledge of the destructive or beneficial habits of various species of insects.... The Exhibition is organised by the ‘Société d’Insectologie Agricole’ under the Presidency of Dr. Boisduval, one of the Vice-Presidents of the Horticultural Society of Paris, and under the auspices of the Minister of Agriculture, Commerce, and Public Works. The object of this Society (and consequently of the Exhibition itself) is twofold: firstly, to investigate the economy and to extend the benefits resulting from insects serviceable to mankind; and secondly, to study the habits of those species which affect our gardens, orchards, farms or forests, in order to arrest their ravages or destroy them individually.”

Details were given at some length of the classes of subjects to be represented, in the hope that it might attract the attention of the Council of our own Horticultural Society to the desirability of arranging some similar exhibition, and, on the 22nd of August following, the public were informed (again in the “Gardeners’ Chronicle,” p. 893) that “the desideratum lately pointed out as falling within the province of the Royal Horticultural Society to supply, viz., a Collection of Insects (and their products), is now in a fair way to be made good.” A short sketch was given of the plan on which it was proposed to deal with the subject, in which the “insect friends” of the horticulturist were the division to be placed first. Following these were to be “gardeners’ enemies,” and the plants on which they feed; next to these again, “insects beneficial or injurious to man.” Negotiations on the part of the Council of the Royal Horticultural Society with the Science and Art Department resulted in the agreement that, if the Society would form the Collection, the Department would house, care for, and display it. The eminently qualified Fellows of the Society, Mr. Wilson Saunders, Mr. Andrew Murray (pp. [75] and [87]), and Mr. M. J. Berkeley, agreed to lend their best assistance in the matter, and Mr. Murray, at the request of the Council, undertook the most laborious part of the task—that of receiving, arranging, and putting in order the various specimens that might be sent from time to time. All collectors and observers who might be willing to help were requested to communicate with Mr. Murray, and without delay I availed myself of the opportunity, in pleasant anticipation of the entomological co-operation giving a use to what had been previously somewhat desultory observation.

I was singularly well situated for the collection of ordinary kinds of injurious insects, and for the observation of their workings, as I then resided on my father’s Gloucestershire property. The extent was not very great, only about 800 acres, but the nature of both the land and the cultivation afforded wonderful variety of material for commencing a collection. The wood- and park-land included old timber trees in some instances dating back to the time of the Edwards, and also plenty of ordinary deciduous woodland and coppice. The fir plantations supplied conifer-loving forest pests; the ordinary insects of crop and garden were of course plentiful; the woodland and field pools added their quota; and the diversity in exposure from the salt pasturage by the Severn to the various growths up the face of the cliffs to about 140 feet probably had something to do also with the great variety of insect life. I had willing helpers in the agricultural labourers—when they had made up their minds whether they would assist or not. They had always helped, for we were on very friendly terms, and some of them or their children, like myself, had been born on the estate. But, though I did not know it at the time, I heard afterwards that when I asked for such special help they held a sort of informal meeting to consult whether it should be granted. Happily they settled that I was to be helped because the rural counsel stated I made use of what I got. The verdict was satisfactory in practical results, but I had my own private opinion that what were sometimes called “Miss Eleanor’s shillings” helped the cause of collection. From the commencement of work until my father’s death, when I ceased to have command of the large area of ground, I collected and sent the results to the charge of Mr. Murray. Communication was entirely carried on by letter.

[N.B.—Miss Ormerod’s work was gracefully acknowledged by the Royal Horticultural Society awarding her the Floral Medal (plate [XXII].).]

Family Dispersal.

My father’s last days were happy and painless, and were passed in comfort under the attendance of my sisters and myself, whom, in the failing condition of his powers of exertion he preferred to all other society. We deeply felt the happiness of ministering to his welfare, for he would not hear of our leaving him for even twenty-four hours, and he objected to visits from my brothers excepting occasionally for a short time. They, not being used to the gentle ways necessary for an aged invalid, worried him. His last illness, however, was short. On the Monday preceding his decease he was able to come downstairs to his nine o’clock breakfast as usual, and the Thursday following—the 9th of October, 1873—he passed gently away, at the mature age of eighty-seven years.

He was succeeded in the property by his eldest son, the Venerable Thos. Johnson Ormerod, Archdeacon of Suffolk, and Rector of Redenhall-cum-Harleston, Norfolk, who had held the post of Examining Chaplain to two bishops of Norwich, Dr. Stanley and Dr. Hinds, and had been requested to hold it once again by their successor, Dr. Pelham. This however, he declined, not feeling disposed in his own advancing age to continue in the laborious though honourable office. On my father’s death, my brother resigned his living,[^[26]] and moved with his two unmarried daughters to Sedbury. From his standing as a clergyman of high position, who had long mixed in literary society, and also as a country gentleman, it had been hoped that he would make Sedbury a literary and county centre, as it had been in my father’s time. But his life was unexpectedly closed at the age of sixty-five by a sudden illness. He died on 2nd December, 1874, and the property passed to his eldest son, the Rev. G. T. B. Ormerod, then, or shortly before, curate of Stroud.

[A short account of Miss Ormerod’s brothers other than the eldest above referred to—all men of ability and diligent workers—will complete this chapter of family history.

“Two entered the Church; the third brother, John, was the holder of the Port Fellowship of Brasenose and bursar of that college; and the youngest, Arthur, spent his life in parish work as Vicar of Halvergate, in Norfolk.

“The fifth brother, William, and the sixth, Edward, became students at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, to which institution their uncle, Dr. Peter Mere Latham and his father, Dr. John Latham, had been physicians. William’s health failing, he left London, and after a few years’ practice at Oxford, where he was surgeon to the Radcliffe Infirmary, he retired to Canterbury, and there died at a comparatively early age. Edward distinguished himself as a physician and as a naturalist. He too was debarred by bad health from practising in London, but in Brighton he became physician to the Sussex County Hospital, and was for many years the leading consultant of the town. He wrote several excellent papers on medical subjects, and his monograph on “British Social Wasps” brought him the fellowship of the Royal Society.

“The second brother, Wareing, and the fourth, Henry, started as solicitors in Manchester. Wareing left Manchester for Devonshire, living first at Chagford, on the borders of Dartmoor, and afterwards at Teignmouth. Geology was his favourite study. He compiled the Index for the publications of the Geological Society, of which he was a fellow, and he made many contributions to its journal.

“Henry Mere Ormerod continued to practise as a solicitor in Manchester till his death in 1898. He also managed his father’s Lancashire estates, and to him the other members of his family turned for legal and for practical advice. He was a churchwarden of the Collegiate Church, now the Cathedral, trustee of various important charities, active in all good movements, proud to be of Lancashire origin and a Manchester man. He possessed extensive knowledge and most varied interests. His collections of books, china, and prints were remarkable; and in such subjects as archæology, genealogy, architecture, geology, and certain branches of natural history he was an expert. It was he who presented to the Bodleian Library, Oxford, in accordance with the wishes of his father, the author’s copy of the ‘History of Cheshire.’”]

Extract from Ormerod’s “History of Cheshire,” vol. iii. page 450 (1st edition), relative to the Original of Pl. [xviii].

“P. 238, Nantwich Hospital. The author has in his possession a singularly curious oak chest which he purchased at Erdswick Hall. It had been bought by the tenant at a sale at Hulgreve Hall (an estate of the Astons, who participated in the division of the religious spoil at the Reformation), and it was traditionally said to have come from this hospital. It appears to have been one of the chests used to keep vestments and chalices, &c., in, and is about two feet broad, by five in length, and two feet nine inches in height; at each end are two compartments, and in front five, all of which except the central one are sumptuously carved in imitation of rich Gothic windows with canopies, crockets, finials, buttresses, and shrine work. The centre represents the coronation of Henry VI., and the single rose occurs over the fleur-de-lis in the ornaments. The chest is figured in Plate 44 of ‘Specimens of Gothic Architecture in England,’ by Augustus Pugin, 1822; and a description is given at page 27.

“A chest, of a description precisely corresponding with it, was recently offered for sale at Liverpool, with the Brereton painted glass, and described as having been formerly the church chest at Ashton-under-Lyne.”

PLATE XVIII.
Antique Carved Chest, an Heirloom of the Ormerod Family.