Sydney Smith | Page 9

away, whenever I shrink from the
contempt and misrepresentation to which my duty shall call me to
submit."
The year 1800 was marked, for Sydney Smith, by an event even more

momentous than the publication of his first book. It was the year of his
marriage. His sister Maria had a friend and schoolfellow called
Catharine Amelia Pybus. He had known her as a child; and while still
quite young had become engaged to marry her, whenever
circumstances should make it possible. The young lady's father was
John Pybus, who had gone to India in the service of the Company,
attained official distinction and made money. Returning to England, he
settled at Cheam in Surrey, where he died in 1789. In 1800 his daughter
Catharine was twenty-two years old. Her brother, a Tory Member of
Parliament and a placeman under Pitt, strongly objected to an alliance
with a penniless and unknown clergyman of Liberal principles; but
Miss Pybus happily knew her own mind, and she was married to
Sydney Smith in the parish church of Cheam on the 2nd of July 1800.
The bride had a small fortune of her own, and this was just as well, for
her husband's total wealth consisted of "six small silver teaspoons,"
which he flung into her lap, saying, "There, Kate, you lucky girl, I give
you all my fortune!"
In the autumn of 1800, Mr. and Mrs. Sydney Smith established
themselves at No. 46 George Street, Edinburgh. Mrs. Smith sold her
pearl necklace for £500, and bought plate and linen with the proceeds.
Michael Beach had now quitted Edinburgh for Oxford, but his younger
brother William took his place in the Smiths' house, and was joined by
the eldest son of Mr. Gordon of Ellon. Lady Holland states that with
each of these young gentlemen her father received £400 a year; and Mr.
Hicks-Beach, grateful for his good influence on Michael, made a
considerable addition to the covenanted payment.
In 1802 the Smiths' eldest child was born and was christened Saba. The
name was taken out of the Psalms for the Fourteenth Day of the Month,
and was bestowed on her in obedience to her father's conviction that,
where parents were constrained to give their child so indistinctive a
surname as Smith, they ought to counterbalance it with a Christian
name more original and vivacious. Saba Smith became the wife of the
eminent physician, Sir Henry Holland, and died in 1866. The other
children were--a boy, who was born and died in 1803; Douglas, born in
1805, died in 1829; Emily, wife of Nathaniel Hibbert, born in 1807,

died in 1874; Wyndham, born in 1813, died in 1871.
[1] For this remarkable variant, see Burke's Peerage, _Bowyer- Smijth_,
_Bart._
[2] (1739-1827.)
[3] William Howley (1766-1848).
[4] In 1819 Sydney Smith violated his own canon, thus: "But, after all,
I believe we shall all go--
"_ad veteris Nicolai tristia regna, Pitt ubi combustum Dundasque
videbimus omnes_."
[5] He became M.A. in 1796.
[6] (1765-1822.) Lees' Reader in Anatomy 1790, Regius Professor of
Medicine 1801.
[7] It is curious that the date and place of Sydney Smith's ordination as
Deacon cannot be traced. He would naturally have been ordained at
Salisbury by John Douglas, Bishop of Sarum; but there is a gap in that
prelate's Register of Ordinations between 1791 and 1796. He may have
been ordained on Letters Dimissory in some other diocese. He was
raised to the Priesthood in Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, on the
22nd of May 1796 by Edward Smallwell, Bishop of Oxford; being
described as Fellow of New College, and B.A.
For the foregoing facts I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. A.R.
Malden, Registrar of the Diocese of Salisbury, and Mr. J.A. Davenport,
Registrar of the Diocese of Oxford.
[8] Quoted by Mr. Stuart Reid.
[9] (1735-1811).
[10] (1745-1833.)

[11] (1734-1826.)
[12] "At the commencement of the nineteenth century, the
Sunday-school had become a part of the regular organization of almost
every well-worked parish. It was then a far more serious affair than it is
now, for, where there was no week-day school, it supplied secular as
well as religious instruction to the children. In fact, the Sunday-school
took up a considerable part of the day,"--J.H. OVERTON, The English
Church in the Nineteenth Century.
[13] Grandfather of Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, M.P.
[14] James Gregory (1753-1821), Professor of Medicine.
[15] Joseph Black (1728-1799), Professor of Chemistry.
[16] (1757-1839.)
[17] (1777-1819). Son of the 10th Duke of Somerset.
[18] Henry Dundas (1742-1811), Lord Advocate, created Viscount
Melville in 1802.

CHAPTER II
_THE EDINBURGH REVIEW_--LONDON--"MORAL
PHILOSOPHY"--PREFERMENT
We now approach what was perhaps the most important event in
Sydney Smith's life, and this was the foundation of the Edinburgh
Review. Writing in 1839, and looking back upon the struggles of his
early manhood, he