SYDNEY SMITH




CHAPTER I


EDUCATION--SALISBURY PLAIN--EDINBURGH

A worthy tradesman, who had accumulated a large fortune, married a lady of
gentle birth and manners. In later years one of his daughters said to a
friend of the family, "I dare say you notice a great difference between
papa's behaviour and mamma's. It is easily accounted for. Papa, immensely
to his credit, raised himself to his present position from the shop; but
mamma was extremely well born. She was a Miss Smith--one of _the old
Smiths, of Essex_."

It might appear that Sydney Smith was a growth of the same majestic but
mysterious tree, for he was born at Woodford; but further research traces
his ancestry to Devonshire. "We are all one family," he used to say, "all
the Smiths who dwell on the face of the earth. You may try to disguise it
in any way you like--Smyth, or Smythe, or Smijth[1]--but you always get
back to Smith after all--the most numerous and most respectable family in
England." When a compiler of pedigrees asked permission to insert Sydney's
arms in a County History, he replied, "I regret, sir, not to be able to
contribute to so valuable a work; but the Smiths never had any arms. They
invariably sealed their letters with their thumbs." In later life he
adopted the excellent and characteristic motto--_Faber meæ fortunæ_; and,