Thomas Thompson

“ And Tommy was one of Thompson's business Experiments.
“I'll show them!” he said aloud. And in his determination there was quite as much loyalty to Thompson as resolve to demonstrate the worth of Thomas F. Leigh.
Having definitely made up his mind to succeed, he began once more at the beginning. He must get RIvington and his other friends to arrange for Meetings with their fathers. The speeches would say themselves when the time came. It all depended upon what manner of men the fathers were. And then he began to think of his own father.
The human mind works curiously. ”

“ Thompson.
Once, when Peace struck her, Rosie sprang at him and bit him severely.
Rosie has disappeared. Every morning Mrs. Thompson cut down a big loaf for Peace’s pets, which he always saw fed himself. He was very careful, too, about their being cleaned, making it his rule to get down on his knees and scrub the stable flagstones himself.
Thomas once said to him jestingly while the stable was being built that “it was a good amusement for him—​it kept him out of the public-house.” “The public-house,” said Peace, “is the ruin of all. I never go there. ”

“ Long before Field learned the value of his time and writing, he began to appreciate the value of printer's ink and showed much shrewdness in courting its favor. He did not wait for chance to bring his wares into notice, but early joined the circle of busy paragraphers who formed a wider, if less distinguished, mutual admiration society than that free-masonry of authorship which at one time almost limited literary fame in the United States to Henry James, William Dean Howells, Charles Dudley Warner, and Thomas Bailey Aldrich. ”

“ A man, of the name of Thompson, of the Success, is missing; has not been seen since three, P.M., yesterday."
"Sunday, July 22d.—A party, under the command of Lieutenant Belcher, of the Success, are gone out in search of Thompson; fears are entertained that he has strayed from the settlement, and fallen in with the natives. Uninterrupted by natives last night." ”

“ He devised his copyhold lands in Grantchester to his son Thomas, to whom he bequeathed ‘the team ware that he now goeth with, that is to say, the cart and eight horses, and all the harness and other things thereunto belonging, with the nag.’ After his father's death Thomas conducted the business with extraordinary success, and amassed a handsome fortune. ”

“ Having dealt with free trade, catholic emancipation, the House of Lords, the theory of rent, and the currency, Thompson in 1855 published his ‘Fallacies against the Ballot,’ which he afterwards (in 1864) republished in his favourite guise of a catechism. Even after his retirement from parliament (at the age of seventy-eight) he continued to write as ‘An old Reformer’ and ‘A Quondam M.P.’ on public matters, particularly concerning himself in defence of the threatened Irish church, which, however, he lived just long enough to see disestablished. ”

“ On October 8, 1915, this noted old pioneer was eighty-eight years old and still vigorous, mentally. His power of thinking is not much diminished, and he is still a reader and student. Constant reading and thinking, we are told, is conducive to longevity and Mr. Thompson has always been a great reader and student of history and philosophy. He is a man, self-made and self-taught, and is blessed with a keenness of intellect far above the average. ”

“ Thompson felt and evinced in his every word and act. Few home-born lovers of our country have done a tithe as much as he did to save her from the ruin she was bringing upon herself by her recreancy to the fundamental principles, upon which she professed to stand. Not a dozen names, of those who have lived within the last forty years, deserve to stand higher on the list of our public benefactors than the name of George Thompson. ”

“ But the evidence seems to be against probabilities. Thompson succumbed completely to the influence of the great genius whose temper and circumstances of life were singularly like his own. Experiments in laudanum were made and habits contracted which accentuated a natural unfitness to wrestle with the practical problems of getting on and rendered family intercourse drearier than ever.
In 1885, when he was twenty-six years old, Francis decided to leave home. After a week in Manchester he requested and received from his father the price of a railway ticket for London. ”

“ He early gave evidence of great skill in debate. In 1859 he entered the office of Henry Pryor, attorney, and, learning shorthand, was employed as a reporter in the House of Assembly of Nova Scotia. He was called to the bar in January 1865. He soon acquired a good practice, but still kept his work as a reporter in the assembly, becoming in 1867 reporter in chief. This experience proved valuable to him. Having become an alderman of Halifax and chairman of the school commissioners, Thompson in December 1877 entered the House of Assembly of Nova Scotia as member for Antigonish. ”

“ Thompson forgot himself in a most unusual way, forgot that he was an old family servant, that the apron-string met round his middle with difficulty, that the Authorities were away and his responsibilities increased thereby; forgot too, that for twenty years he had been answering bells, over-hearing conversations without pretending to do so, and that visitors wanted hot water and early tea at "7:30 sharp." He remembered suddenly that he was a man—and that he was very fond of some one. The birds were singing, the sun was shining, the flowers were out upon the lawn, and it was Spring. ”

“ Another short poem sees the newsboys in Fleet Street shouting the news of the end of the world, and the awful return of God. The writers seem unconsciously to have sought to make a poem as large as a revelation, while it was nearly as short as a riddle. And though Francis Thompson himself was rather in the Elizabethan tradition of amplitude and ingenuity, he could write separate lines that were separate poems in themselves:—
"And thou, what needest with thy tribe's black tents,
Who hast the red pavilion of my heart?" ”

“ In his later years Thompson devoted himself chiefly to landscape subjects with figures, the themes of which were for the most part drawn from the mountains and lakes of Cumberland and Westmoreland, but occasionally from Scotland. His range, however, was limited, and his work was lacking in poetic sympathy. His attempts at classical and scriptural subjects, such as ‘Acis and Galatea,’ exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1849, and ‘Proserpine,’ were not a success. ”

“ His mode of procedure along the ambulacrum was quite his own, and you might know at the furthest point from him that [16] you had 'Tommy' in perspective. He sidled along the wall, and every now and then he would hitch up the collar of his coat as though it were slipping off his none too thickly covered shoulder-blades. He early evinced a love for books, and many an hour, when his schoolfellows were far afield, would he spend in the well-stocked juvenile library. His tastes were not as ours. Of history he was very fond, and particularly of wars and battles. ”

“ The meetings of the London societies, the conversaziones where the devotees of science, of literature, and of art mingle so happily together, had peculiar attractions to a refined and cultivated mind such as Thompson possessed, and which was not narrowed by a too exclusive attention to one pursuit. He took pleasure in every ennobling eff'ort of the intellect, in the fair creations of the artist — the bright imaginings of the poet, in every discovery within the wide domain of physical science, and in the applications of its laws to lessen the labour or minister to the happiness of man. ”

“ He was a rebel to be loved, we are told by Watson R.409 Sperry, later managing editor. “A lot of tall, straggling Virginia gentlemen, ex-soldiers, I fancy, all of them, began to visit the office. Mr. Thompson had a big man’s beard, a delicate body, and a sensitive, feminine nature. He was a bit punctilious, but kindness itself.” His careful attention to dress, verging on foppishness, was less out of place in Bryant’s office than it would have been in Greeley’s or Dana’s. J. Ranken Towse speaks of his personal charm, a reflection of his experience in the best Richmond and London circles. ”

“ Being appointed captain's coxswain and valet suited Thompson to a nicety, and it was amusing to see how he adapted himself to his new position, as from a merry wag he suddenly quieted down into a solemn-looking fellow. We hardly need say this was all assumption on his part, but "quiet dignity tinged with a slight shade of melancholy" he considered the correct sort of thing for the role, and no one who saw him recognized the gay and festive youth of old times.
"Promotion's ruined Thompson," said the boatswain to Price. "He ain't hisself. I shouldn't wonder if he goes into a consumption." ”

“ One of Thompson's sayings, ‘We are none of us infallible, not even the youngest among us,’ has become proverbial. It was a reply made incidentally at one of the college meetings held for the alteration of statutes in 1877 or 1878, to a junior fellow who had proposed to throw upon the senior members of the society a new and somewhat onerous responsibility. To the young, the diffident, the little known, the poor, Thompson was uniformly kind, helpful, and generous ”

“ In 1824, then being forty years of age, Thompson commenced a literary career by contributing an article on the ‘Instrument of Exchange’ to the first number of the ‘Review.’ Being prompted by his sympathy with the Greeks, then struggling for independence, Thompson published in 1825 two pamphlets in modern Greek and French on ‘Outposts’ and on a system of telegraphing for service in the field. ”

“ Thompson, in surprise.
“Yes,” cried our hero. “I don’t like the look of Tommy—​he’s very queer.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” observed Mrs. Peace; “but he’ll be better in a day or two, I suppose?”
“I’m not so sure about that. He’s very bad, poor little fellow—​refuses his food.”
“May I go with you?” said Willie.
“Aye, if you like. Come along.”
“Oh, that’s what’s put him out,” said Mrs. Thompson.
“I knew there was something the matter. It’s the pony. Well, that’s a bad job.”
“He cares a deal more for Tommy than he does for either of us—​you may rest assured of that. ”

“ Three were first proposed, but Andrew Thompson was finally selected; for, though he was known not to have so much practical experience as several of the others, his firmness, sagacity, and high moral character were acknowledged by all.
“And now, my lads,” he said, when he had modestly accepted the office, “the first thing we must do is to build a snow-wall, to shelter us from the wind; and as soon as the wind moderates, we’ll have up a flagstaff on the top of the highest hummock, to show our friends where to look for us.” ”

“ His family was of intensely Orange and anti-nationalist sympathies. After education at a private school, Thompson was for a time clerk in the office of James Hayden, solicitor. At the age of sixteen he contributed verses to the 'Derry Journal' and developed an aptitude for journalism. He found employment on the 'Belfast Morning News,' and then in 1877, at the age of twenty, through the influence of Sir Charles Lewis, baronet, M.P. for Derry, he joined the staff of the conservative 'Standard' in London, writing chiefly on non-political themes. ”

“ Thompson felt that he must certainly have been killed. After many days’ quest, and many uncertainties, he found the spot where his house had stood; it was a heap of rubbish. His servant and merchandise lay beneath it. He had money enough, or credit enough, to set to work men to clear away some of the fallen materials, and to explore whether any amount of property were recoverable. What’s that sound? A subterranean, or subruinan, voice? The workmen stop, and are ready to fly with fear. Thompson exhorts them, and they work on. But again that voice! No human creature can be living there. ”

“ Thompson said. "There is nothing here that is harmful to a human." There was comfort in the thought.
Kurkil brightened perceptibly. "But, what happened to the race that built this city?"
"I don't know," Thompson answered. A tinge of gruffness crept into his voice as he forced out of his mind the memories of what they had seen in this building they had entered and had climbed. This had once been an office building, a place where the unknown people who had worked here had handled their business transactions and had kept their records. ”

“ Looking from his office-window on 21 Oct., 1835, he saw the crowd of “gentlemen of property and standing” gathered in Washington and State streets to break up a meeting of anti-slavery ladies and “snake out that infamous foreign scoundrel, Thompson,” and “bring him to the tar-kettle before dark” — the same Thompson of whom Lord Brougham said in the house of lords at the time of the passage of the British emancipation act: “I rise to take the crown of this most glorious victory from every other head and place it upon his. He has done more than any other man to achieve it” ”

“ No matter how often Field played his antics before or on his wife, they always seemed to take her by surprise and evoked a remonstrance in which pride over his mirthfulness mollified all displeasure.
By the time Field returned to St. Louis his ready funds were exhausted and he had to appeal to Mr. Gray to raise more by mortgaging the balance of his interest in his father's property. This is as good a place as any to take leave of the patrimony that came to Field at the death of his father, for he was never to see any more dividends from that source. ”