I have seen it; and though I
never saw the original I felt that it must be like, as indeed every one
who knew her said it was. I do not, as I said before, know anything more
remarkable in the history of human sorrow and resolve.

I remember well that Dr. Belfrage was the first man I ever heard speak
of Free-trade in religion and in education. It was during the first
election after the Reform Bill, when Sir John Dalrymple, afterwards Lord
Stair, was canvassing the county of Mid-Lothian. They were walking in
the doctor's garden, Sir John anxious and gracious. Dr. Belfrage, like,
I believe, every other minister in his body, was a thorough-going
Liberal, what was then called a Whig; but partly from his natural sense
of humor and relish of power, and partly, I believe, for my benefit, he
was putting the Baronet through his facings with some strictness,
opening upon him startling views, and ending by asking him, "Are you,
Sir John, for free-trade in corn, free-trade in education, free-trade in
religion? I am." Sir John said, "Well, doctor, I have heard of
free-trade in corn, but never in the other two." "You'll hear of them
before ten years are gone, Sir John, or I'm mistaken."

I have said thus much of this to me memorable man, not only because he
was my father's closest and most powerful personal friend, but because
by his word he probably changed the whole future course of his life.
Devotion to his friends was one of the chief ends of his life, not
caring much for, and having in the affection of his heart a warning
against the perils and excitement of distinction and energetic public
work, he set himself far more strenuously than for any selfish object,
to promote the triumphs of those whom his acquired instinct--for he knew
a man as a shepherd knows a sheep, or "_Caveat Emptor_" a horse--picked
out as deserving them. He rests in Colinton churchyard,

"Where all that mighty heart is lying still,"--

his only child William Henry buried beside him. I the more readily pay
this tribute to Dr. Belfrage, that I owe to him the best blessing of my
professional and one of the best of my personal life--the being
apprenticed to Mr. Syme. This was his doing. With that sense of the
capacities and capabilities of other men, which was one of his gifts, he
predicted the career of this remarkable man. He used to say, "Give him
life, let him live, and I know what and where he will be thirty years
hence;" and this long before our greate