nment, which hangs by a thread, shall be broken up, the
parting will be painful, and their subsequent relations will not
be without embarrassment to themselves, nor fail to be the cause
of jealousy in others. It is a great proof of the discretion and
purity of his conduct and behaviour, that he is admired,
respected, and liked by all the Court.

Yesterday I went to Battersea and dined with Robert Eden, the
Rector,[1] and he took me before dinner to see his lions, and
introduced me to scenes very different from those which I am used
to see. We went to different manufactories, a saw-mill, a
pottery, to the lunatic asylum, to the workhouse, and we visited
several poor people at their cottages, when he enquired into the
circumstances of the sick or the indigent; but what struck me
most forcibly was the school (upon Bell's system) and the
extraordinary acquirements of the boys. Eden examined them, and
invited me to do so, in arithmetic, geography, English history,
and the Bible, and their readiness and correctness were really
surprising. I doubt whether many of the children of the rich, who
are educated at a vast expense at private or public schools,
could pass such an examination as these young paupers who are
instructed at the cost of about one guinea a year. The greatest
punishment that can be inflicted on one of these boys is to
banish him from school, such delight do they take in acquiring
knowledge. He gave me a curious account of the state of his
parish: there is no middle class of tradesmen in good
circumstances; they are divided between the extremes of wealth
and of poverty, masters and operatives; but amongst the latter
there is a considerable amount of knowledge, though their minds
are ill-regulated and their principles perverted. When first he
came there the place abounded in disciples of Carlile, pure
atheists, and when Carlile was in prison he was supported by
their contributions; but though totally without religion they
were not immoral, and among these men were some of the best
husbands and fathers in the place, so much so that when Carlile
told them that men might indulge in polygamy and take two wives,
they were scandalised and disgusted, and began immediately to
abandon him. Some were reclaimed and came to church, but the
greater part, who required some powerful excitement, sought it in
politics, and became deeply imbued with the most pernicious
principles of hatred against all institutions, against the