“ Colston, who was in the habit of bestowing large sums yearly for the release of poor debtors and the relief of indigent age and sickness, and who gave (1711) no less than £6000 to increase Queen Anne’s Bounty Fund for the augmentation of small livings, was always keenly interested in the organization and management of his foundations ”

“ In 1708; at a cost of £41,200, he built and endowed his great foundation on Saint Augustine’s Back, for the instruction, clothing, maintaining and apprenticing of 100 boys; and in time of scarcity, during this and next year, he transmitted “by a private hand” some £20,000 to the London committee. In 1710, after a poll of four days, he was sent to parliament, to represent, on strictest Tory principles, his native city of Bristol; and in 1713, after three years of silent political life, he resigned this charge. He died at Mortlake in 1721, having nearly completed his eighty-fifth year ”