o allow certain portions of a weekly
newspaper to be read to the boys on a Saturday evening. This case was
read to us, I think from the _Leeds Mercury_; and though Mr. Fawcett's
name was not mentioned, we were all aware who the minister was."

Thus we have no _direct_ evidence of the amount of Mr. Fawcett's
communications with George III. How much of the story as it is now told was
read to the boys, we do not know; but that it came to them first through a
weekly paper, is rather against than for it.

We all know the tendency of good stories to pick up additions as they go. I
have read that the first edition of the _Life of Loyola_ was without
miracles. This anecdote seems to have reached its full growth in 1823, in
Pearson's _Life of W. Hey, Esq._, and probably in the two lives of George
III., published after his death, and mentioned by WHUNSIDE. Pearson, as
cited in "N. & Q.," Vol. vi., p. 276., says, that by some means the _Essay
on Anger_ had been recommended to the notice of George III., who would have
made the author a bishop had he not been a dissenter; that he signified his
wish to serve Mr. Fawcett, &c. That on the conviction of H----, Mr. Fawcett
wrote to the king; and a letter soon arrived, conveying the welcome
intelligence, "You may rest assured that his life is safe," &c.

It is not stated that this was "private and confidential:" if it was, Mr.
Fawcett had no right to mention it; if it was not, he had no reason for
concealing what was so much to his honour, and so extraordinary as the
king's personal interference in a matter invariably left to the Secretary
of State for the Home Department. If, however, Mr. Fawcett was silent from
modesty, his biographers had no inducement to be so; yet, let us see how
they state the case. The _Account of the Life, Writings, and Ministry of
the late Rev. John Fawcett_: London, 1818, cited in "N. & Q.," Vol. vi., p.
229., says:

"He was induced, _in conjunction with others_, to solicit the exercise
of royal clemency in mitigating the severity of that punishment which
the law denounces: and it gladdened the sympathetic feelings of his
heart to know that these petitions were not unavailing; but the modesty
of his character made him regret the publicity which had been given to
this subject."

The fifth edition of the _Essay on Anger, printed for the Book Society for
Promoting Religious Knowledge_, London, no date, has a memoir of the
aut