EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY.

35

philosophic training. Darwin had himself been a student in its University; and his son Charles, who died there in 1778, had given promise of the highest talent. When Josiah Wedgwood the younger first attended the High School in 1782, Dugald Stewart occupied the chair of Mathematics in the University, changing it for that of Moral Philosophy in 1785. The three latter years of the young man's residence in Edinburgh thus embraced an early portion of that brilliant period throughout which numberless students flocked from various parts of Britain and Ireland, and even foreign countries, to listen to the great follower of Reid, who, in a manner most attractive, and with learning deep as it was comprehensive, sought to repress the materialism of the followers of Locke, and to point out some ultimate principles or laws of thought which exist in the mind altogether distinct from its connexion with the material world. Nevertheless, he rather made ready for a philosophy than educed one; and the reaction since his day, in favour of a more sensational form of metaphysical philosophy, points out still more forcibly the impossibility of separating the intellectual from the organic.

Whilst in Edinburgh the young Wedgwoods lodged in Buccleugh Place, and appear to have seen a good deal of the society around them. But they do not seem to have liked either the country or its people. 'I do not know if you were ever in Scotland,' wrote Josiah the younger to his cousin, Thomas Byerley, 'but I think I know that you never would wish to come again; for the people are most abominably dirty, and the country is very near being one great moor, and very high, piercing winds almost continually blow, which fill our house with smoke, and make us as dirty

30

LETTER FROM DR. BLACK.

as the inhabitants. We have plays, concerts, and assemblies, but I am told that the last are disagreeable, on account of the very great form and ceremony which are kept."

Their father's fame led to their receiving considerable attention from various men of note. Lord Dundonald presented them with specimens from a pottery he had established, and they visited Dr. Black, Dugald Stewart, and other of the University professors. The elder Wedgwood had probably consulted Black in relation to minerals and fossils which might prove useful in his experiments for new porcellaneous bodies; and the illustrious chemist seems to have been, like Whitehurst, Keir, Darwin, and others, on the look-out for substances of this nature. I send,' wrote Black to the younger Josiah, on the eve of the youth's return to Etruria, the small parcel, which I beg you to present with my respectful compliments to your Father. It contains a piece of petrified wood from the north of Ireland, which is penetrated with siliceous matter, but is still inflammable, and some specimens of a stone from Bengal, remarkable for the following particulars : It is not described in any system of mineralogy hitherto published. I found it in the possession of a Seal Cutter to whom it was sent by a friend in India, as a stone much used there, for cutting and grinding the hard stones and gems. By examining his parcel of it I found it had been taken out of a sort of granite, which is made up much more of quartz than feltspar, and that it is dispersed through the granite in small masses of very different sizes, all of them having a sparry structure. I heartily wish you an agreeable journey and happy meeting with your friends."

1 Mayer MSS. March 5, 1786.

2 Wedgwood MSS. April 10, 1786.

LESLIE'S LIFE OF WEDGWOOD.

37

John Leslie, whose acquaintance the young Wedgwoods probably made during their residence in Edinburgh, and who, as we have just seen, became for a period1 their tutor at Etruria, was an excellent chemist and mathematician, a follower of Reid in metaphysics, and a Whig in politics. But if the memoir of their father, which these young men, unfortunately, at a later day, employed him to write, be taken as proof, he possessed little intellectual ability. His faculty of observation and expression was meagre; he had no idea of arranging material. He probably wrote under restraint, and the facts supplied may have been dry and few; but he had seen the man, lived for months under his roof, and was contemporary with those who could have supplied him with vivid particulars of all the varied phases of Wedgwood's career. The consequence was, that the memoir was not even tolerable to his sons, who, undoubtedly, cared less than others for those graphic details which constitute the chief merit of biographical records. It remains still in MS.; and though corrected by the pens of Josiah Wedgwood, Coleridge, and even Carlyle, it is still what it originally was-a biographical sketch, without the facts or interest which constitute true biography.

With Leslie's philosophic tutorship the nonage of Wedgwood's sons was brought to a close. He returned to Edinburgh, and, resuming his chemical and other · studies, produced a Treatise on Heat which placed him high in science. When the promotion in 1805 of Playfair to the chair of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh made a vacancy in that of Mathematics, he was considered the only well-qualified

1 Cottle says three years; but this is doubtful.

38

LESLIE'S CELEBRATED CONTEST.

candidate. He was supported by Stewart, Playfair, and many others who regarded only the superiority of fitness; but the moderate clergy, who had a candidate of their own in view, failing on the question of the College Test, which Leslie at once took, sought out a passage in his Treatise on Heat' in which the name of Hume was mentioned in relation to Philosophical Causation. This supplied them with what they required—a personal exception to the candidate whose science was unassailable. But the Town Council, jealous of this attempt to supersede their authority, and encouraged by the support of many eminent and liberal men, stood firm, and elected Leslie to the vacant chair. After a long contest in both the civil and ecclesiastical courts, their election was confirmed, and Leslie retained his Professorship some years, and not without distinction. His manner, however, was not attractive to all alike, and he seems to have indulged in one, at least, of the coarse habits of his time. 'Henry does not seem to like Leslie,' wrote Peter Holland, the Knutsford surgeon; too much of a bon vivant.'1

1 1 P. Holland to Josiah Wedgwood, January 17, 1807. Mayer MSS.

Importation of French Earthenware-Its Defects-Improved Skill of English Potters reverses Balance of Trade-Rapid Increase of Exports— Evasion of Restrictive Duties-Trade with France-Pitt's Treaty of Commerce-Daguerre and Sykes-Daguerre's Incapacity as a Man of Business-His Ruin of the splendid Consignments made to him-His Contest with Wedgwood-Arbitration-Daguerre in London-Probably at Etruria-Young Wedgwood at this date employed in Experiments on Light, Heat, and Colour-His Love of Philosophical Speculation-Corresponds with Priestley-Papers appear in the Philosophical Transactions-Edgeworth and Thomas Wedgwood confer as to Improvements in the Ventilation of Prisons-Staffordshire BowmenMarriage of Josiah Wedgwood the Younger-- Dr. Beddoes-Researches in Pneumatic Chemistry-Pneumatic Institution at Clifton — The Elder Wedgwood's Contribution to its Establishment-Watt invents an admirable Apparatus for the Administration of Medicated Air— His Correspondence with Beddoes-Death of Josiah Wedgwood the Elder-Etruria becomes a Place of the Past.

FROM the reign of Charles II. till nearly the close of the first half of the eighteenth century a considerable quantity of earthenware was imported into England from the French coast. It was less heavy and more porcellaneous than Delft ware, its glaze was thin and white, and the result being a sort of China, brought it into favour for the breakfast and tea table, and for the dinner table so far as sauce-boats and small dishes of various forms went, the rest of the service being invariably of pewter. The exceptions to this rule lay with those who, from wealth or the incidents of trade and foreign intercourse, possessed services of Oriental porcelain or costly Delft earthenware. The white ware thus favoured was made principally in and near Paris and Boulogne; in fact, on