A MILLIONAIRE’S LIFE

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1523, 28 February 1901, Page 58

A MILLIONAIRE’S LIFE

A MILLION LEFT FOR MISSIONS. A recent cable message announced the death of Robert Arthington, of Leeds, and the fact that deceased had left nearly a million sterling to two London Missionary societies. From latest home files it appears that the circumstances connected with the bequest are remarkable . A “Lloyd’s” representative has interviewed one of the executors of the dead millionaire’s estate, and has gathered from him some interesting particulars of his career, which was chiefly noteworthy for a- rigid, almost desperate, self-denial’ in the interests of foreign missions. Mr Robert Arthington, who was 77 when he died, was the son of Quaker parents, who- were very well off and extremely pious people. His father was for many years a brewer in Leeds, and owned extensive premises, including a roomy brick house attached to the mattings. His religious views undergoing a change, Air Arthington, senior, from purely '-conscientious motives, relinquished- his business in the brewery trade, and th© property and buildings there were allowed to run almost into decay, until, for a good round sum, they were eventually bought up by the Midland Railway company, who pulled down the maltings and erected good warehouses. Partly from this sale Air Arthington was able to leave his son Robert, when he died, about £200,009. Then began the strange self-sacrifices of Robert Arthington. After the death of bis parents he continued to live, for the most part, quite alone in the old family house in Kunslet, and subsequently in a house he ha-dl built in Headingley ; but always in the strictest economy, his central object being to save money, which might afterwards go towards spreading the Gospel in foreign lands. Though brought up in affluence he denied himself nearly everything, and it is said that he would often buy a chop andi make it last- three days, grilling it th© first day, eating the remainder cold l the .second day, and converting the bone into soup for the third. During all this time he was making very safe investments, from which he amassed his fortune, and which he has now bequeathed, all hut a tenth —which goes to cousins—to the Baptist and London Alis sionary societies. In 1876 be- gave a steamer to the former society for use on the Great. Congo, river, and also made large gifts to other missionary organisations for penetrating unknown fields in Africa. He conceived the idea of throwing a chain of. missions right across the Dark Continent. Mr Arthington spent the last three years of his life at Teignmouth, where, at the hands of his attendants, he consented in his old age to receive som e of the comforts which he had long denied himself. Surrounded by his missionary literature he still kept his mind fixed upon the one object, and in his last days •though very feeble, his mental faculties remained clear enough for him to intimate which passages in the Bible he wished: read out. In his will, which has been proved at £930,000., he makes various suggestions to the missionary societies as t-o how the money shall be spent. He directs, for instance, that “to every tribe of mankind which has them not, and which speaks a language apart from all others, accurate copies of at least the Gospels of St. John and St. Luke, and! the Book" of th© Acts of the Apostles printed in the tribe’s language shall b e given, for teaching a.t least ten or a dozen persons of such tribe to read.” Wherever practicable, these suggestions will be carried out.