name, the marriage would take place. This
propensity on the part of parents to live their children's lives is very
common. Few be the parents and very great are they who can give liberty
and realize that their children are only loaned to them. I fear we
parents are prone to be perverse and selfish.

Josiah and Sarah reviewed their status from all sides. They could have
thrown the old gentleman overboard entirely and cut for Gretna Green,
but that would have cost them an even ten thousand pounds. It would
also have secured the Squire's enmity, and might have caused him a fit
of apoplexy. And surely, as it was, the lovers were not lost to each
other. To wed is often fatal to romance; but it is expecting too much to
suppose that lovers will reason that too much propinquity is often worse
than obstacle. The road between them was a good one--the letter-carrier
made three trips a week, and an irascible parent could not stop dreams,
nor veto telepathy, even if he did pass a law that one short visit a
month was the limit.

Lovers not only laugh at locksmiths, but at most everything else. Josiah
and Sarah kept the line warm with a stream of books, papers, manuscripts
and letters. By meeting the mail-carrier a mile out of the village, the
vigilant Squire's censorship was curtailed by Sarah to reasonable
proportions.

And so the worthy Richard had added the joys of smuggling to the natural
sweets of a grand passion. In thus giving zest to the chase, no thanks,
however, should be sent his way. Even stout and stubborn old gentlemen
with side-whiskers have their uses.

And it was about this time that John Wesley came to Burslem and was
surprised to find a flower-garden in a community of potters. He looked
at the flowers, had a casual interview with the owner and wrote, "His
soul is near to God."

* * * * *

Wedgwood knew every part of his business. He modeled, made designs,
mixed clay, built kilns, and at times sat up all night and fed fuel into
a refractory furnace. Nothing was quite good enough--it must be better.
And to make better pottery, he said, we must produce better people. He
even came very close to plagiarizing Walt Whitman by saying, "Produce
great people--the rest follows!"

Wedgwood instituted a class in designing and brought a young man from
London to teach his people the rudiments of art.

Orders were coming in from nobility for dinner-sets, and the English
middle class, inste