Book Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XXVI (1869-1879) THE LAST YEARS OF JOHN LAWRENCE Home Life--The London School Board--Tributes to Missionary Work--Miss Gaster's Reminiscences--The Forward Policy--He condemns the Government's Afghan Policy--His Death. Lord Lawrence's official connection with India was over, and his ideal of domestic happiness at last seemed possible of attainment. And in a measure it was attained, though the realisation of the day-dreams of the stifling kutcheri was only partial, for the children whom he had loved to gather round him, in whose romps he had joined with a zest hardly less than their own, had grown up and were dispersed.1 During the parents' last absence from England they had lived at Southgate with their aunt Letitia and their cousin Honoria, the daughter of Sir Henry Lawrence. On the death of Mrs. Hayes, Sir Herbert and Lady Edwardes had generously taken charge of the Southgate house so that Lady Lawrence might remain another year with her husband. The family now removed to Queen's Gate, Kensington, and in 1871 Brockett Hall, Hertfordshire, became their country home. Though fairly regular in his attendance at the House of Lords, Lord Lawrence took little part in debate. He was 1 Nine children were living at this date--four sons, John, Henry, Charles Napier, and Bertie, and five daughters, Kate, Emily, Alice Margaret, Mary, and Maude. A son and daughter had died in infancy. The eldest, Kate (married in 1868 to Colonel Randall), was born in 1843, the youngest, Maude, in 1864. no orator, and, in common with most men of prompt and decisive action and of administrative ability, he distrusted overmuch fluency of language, though he listened with admiration, and some envy, to genuine eloquence. Mr. Gladstone, writing to express the...