AN EYEWITNESS OF HISTORY.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1031, 21 January 1911, Page 9

AN EYEWITNESS OF HISTORY.

v LIVED 'UNDER SIX MONARCHS.. ' . HARD WORKING AT 92.. ■ A young fellow of 70, you'd think—not 92. fet lie lias lived in the reigns .of fix monarchs, for Georgo 111 died when he was two years old. Ho writes in a firm hand, reads small print without glasses, works hard, as secretary to tho South Australian - Geological _ Society, finds pleasure now and again ill a good cigar, and travels long Journeys, says tile Sydney "Daily Telegraph." This time lie has come over from Adelaide the Science Congress, a delegate from South Australia. "Work?" he says.. "My work, is an amusement to me." In his spare time ho - is an enthusiastic fishsnnaii,' and it is only lately that. 110 lias given up horse-riding. Wonderful old man! Mr. T. S.-Reed is wbll known in South Australia. Besides his secretaryship, ho lectures' often- on scientific subjects at the Adelaide University, .'and ho is-, an, interesting and' frequent contributor to the local, newspapers. Born in ' ISIS, threo years after- the battlo cf Waterloo —think of the'events and people ho. must have known arid socn! He has, too, and remembers them. ■ He has 110 cut-and-dried directions to those who would livo long; lie thinks longevity may bo, at least ill his case, hereditary. His grandfather was born in 1730, three y ; Ears after the death-of George I, and lived to a great age. His father, who.died in IE6I, six years before tho Franco-Prussian war, wa.V thon in his 90th year. . ■• . Tho . little grey figure at .tho hotel table, a pen in 0110 hand, leaned back, remembering. Clean-shaven, shrunken a little, and with rather a stoop, yet L-y no/ means' aged-looking; thoughtful, remembering past-history. ■ •Riots and Body-Snatching. • "I saw the first sword-cuts, in the., first cavalry charge in the Bristol riots," .said lie. r'Tsaiv the whole.thing; I was a boy. then.. ■ Tho'.first cut sliced off the-top of. a woman's -bonnet, that shot'through tlio. air like an oyster-shell 011' edge.' The second cut a man's nose clean oft';. I' can ■"see 'the sword : flash, and ■ his frightened, bleeding face, even now. And I can see a waiter carrying up a bottle of wine in tho hotel there, and tasting-it, and not liking the taste!" Mr. Heed renumbers iho: refection-'o£ the Reform Bill,, the' great .event/ of his boyhood. .He saw. .gfopherison's- first engine;- the.Rocket, and: 'the 'first, experiments /in He remenibers the Burke, and Hare (errors, tho 'days' wluri medical students ■ and young doctors could not get bodies for dissection; .'when-, grav.es were broken open and the bodies dug up and -sold. "In that time,", said'he, "a mail abso-j lutely worthless, ill his lifo was worth after-his cl-tnth two guineas a limb. The relations of the. dead had then to watch their graves, with lanterns and pistols, for at least.a fortnight; that had to be_ done when my eldest sister died." "I still remeuibsr," he went on, 1 "tho elections in Queen's. Square, that lasted a fortnight, and many, a fight between .tho Blues (tho Tories) and the Reds. You would see, not uncommonly, a party of gentlemen, 20 or . so,-, start out. waving their-bludgeons-as a challenge.. to r the Reds,, and there were broken heads , to: follow. A. couple cf guineas were often poid for a' vote in those days, and sometimes idoubtful voters! were .made drunk, and carried away into the country, and kept there till the. declaration of thq .poll. There were - no. police then; only the parish constable and night watchman, and sometimes the watchman would wake you at midnight; with a cry ,of fire, or robberv, or because some gang of young bloods had found him fast, asleep ill his!' box, and turned it upside down. I remember , the mob fair, a sort of hiring auction night, when men women stood up in the market place in rows, waiting for some master or mistress /to hire them." In 1837, at; Bristol, Mr. Reed attended tho second or third meeting of the British Association l'or- the Advancement of Science; lie had become a member.at 19 years, old. At a'conversazione there lie. heard -Tom Moore speak," not long before, his death.- Ho saw there-- lriariy. of-..the. most eminent men of the ..time.'. "He heard addresses by Whewell 'and Browster; the opposing theorists on the plurality of worlds; 116 heard Wheatstone read a paper on electric light, and Herapath, who was making his first' experiments with.nitrous ether gas, and Lardner and Jlurcliison, and Conybenre and Professor' Carpenter; and he Was. intimate withl'rofessor Pre.stwich, of London. . ' _ , A Consumptive Cured., . , A consumptive, Mr. Heed came out to South Australia in 18GG. "But when 1 felt the north windi" ho said, "laden with the-fragrance of eucalyptus shoots, and the resinous piny breezes, I knew I should be well and healthy again." in 184-i he had married a sister of Sir liichard'Hanson, who afterwards became Chief Justice of' South Australia. And in 1818 he had becomo a member of a silk trading firm in Derby. At tho 1851 exhibition ho was one -of 173 who. won medals for a. shuttleloss fringe loom. While at Derby lie was a' great collector of rub-, biugs from the .monumental brasses .in churches "all'over England., He was a recognised authority 011 the subject, lectured upon it, and read several papers before' the Archaeological Society. He attended the authors' levee ill Derby, l held on behalf of the Guild of Literature and Art. Charles Dickens was there, and Wilkie 'Collins, Douglas Jerrold,' Tenniel, Charles Knight, and others. "And, Nathaniel Hawthorne visited us," he said. He knew Mrs. Olipbant and Annie Sliipton well, Isambard Brunei, the world-famous engineer, and the wellknown lawyer, Sergeant Bompas, the original of Dickens's "Sergeant Buzfuz." He heard sermons by the, great RobertHall, and saw how some of the hearers, overcome by the man's solemn eloquence, roso,to ■ their, feet and remained standing until tho discourse ended." -Frank Newman, the brother of the Cardinal, was there, and Erskino and Brougham travelled down from London, a 20-hours' journey, to hear one of these lectures. All "the lectures of great men of the time Sir. Reed" attended. lii 1833 'l'hclwnll, 011 education, immensely interested him—Theljvall,' who in 1791 was tried with Hardy and Home Tooke for high treason. '"At,the trial," said Mr. lieed, "Tlielwall was annoyed at something. that his counsel, Erskino, did. 'I'll bo hanged if I don't defend myself,' saiVl lie. 'You'll undoubtedly' bo hanged if you do,' answered Erskino." At 20 years old. Mr. Heed was introduced to Frank Buckland, the great naturalist, who visited him at Cheltenham. Ho "knew' Dr. Thwnites, of Colombo, as a young Bristol entomologist. Ho remembered the Pattis, Grisi, Christine Nillsson„ Jennv Li.nd, Norman Neruda, Sims Reeves arid Joachim. He 'met and Charles Lamb, and Addington Syliionds was his family doctor. He or.co consulted Dr. Prout, a gentleman of the old school, even in those days, who wore knee breeches and silk stockings, and gold-bueklcd shoes. What a life of interest and energy! And it looks a pretty sound one, oven yet,