led, who in a few hours will be no more. The Bread and the Wine are
his immense hope! they seem to stand between him and infinite danger,
to soothe pain, to calm perturbation, and to inspire immortal
courage."

What is the conclusion of the whole matter? It is, in my judgment, that
Sydney Smith was a patriot of the noblest and purest type; a genuinely
religious man according to his light and opportunity; and the happy
possessor of a rich and singular talent which he employed through a long
life in the willing service of the helpless, the persecuted, and the poor.
To use his own fine phrase, the interests of humanity "got into his heart
and circulated with his blood."[181] He wrote and spoke and acted in prompt
and uncalculating obedience to an imperious conviction.--

"If," he said, "you ask me who excites me, I answer you, it is that
Judge Who stirs good thoughts in honest hearts--under Whose warrant I
impeach the wrong, and by Whose help I hope to chastise it."

Here was both the source and the consecration of that glorious mirth by
which he still holds his place in the hearts and on the lips of men. His
playful speech was the vehicle of a passionate purpose. From his earliest
manhood, he was ready to sacrifice all that the sordid world thinks
precious for Religious Equality and Rational Freedom.

[145] Eden Upton Eddis (1812-1901).

[146] Miss Holland writes--"His hair, when I know him, was beautifully
fine, silvery, and abundant; rather _taille en brosse_, like a
Frenchman's."

[147] Lord Houghton.

[148] A hostile reviewer of his Sermons quotes from them such phrases
as--"Lays hid," "Has sprang," "Has drank," "Rarely or ever."

[149] See p. 90.

[150] I have not attempted to make a catalogue of these jokes. Such
catalogues will be found in the previous Memoirs of Sydney Smith, and
in Sir Wemyss Reid's Life of Lord Houghton.

[151] Hugo Charles Meynell-Ingram (1784-1869), of Hoar Cross and Temple
Newsam.

[152] (1808-1891), became 7th Duke of Devonshire in 1858.

[153] This insinuation was quite unfounded.

[154] It is pleasant to cite the testimony of Lord Houghton, who assured
Mr. Stuart Reid that he "never knew, except once, Sydney Smith to make
a jest on any _religious_ subject; and then he immediately withdrew
his words and seemed ashamed that he had uttered them."

[155] Spencer Perceval.

[156] Lord Hawkesbury.

[157] See Append