1825-1826] lt)5 



CHAPTER XIII 



18251826 



Fanny and Emma Allen return to Cresselly The death of Caroline 

 Wedgwood The Grand Tour of the Josiah Wedgwoods Frank 

 Wedgwood at Maer Their return home Allen Wedgwood Vicar 

 of Maer The anti-slavery agitation. 



IN 1825 a great change took place in the lives of Emma and 

 Fanny Allen. Their brother John's wife died after a 

 long illness, and they returned to live at Cresselly to take 

 care of his four children Seymour Phillips (called Bob), 

 Harry, Johnny, and Isabella. Fanny's pet was Johnny, 

 6 years old; Emma devoted herself to the little Isabella. 

 After regretting that her sister Jessie had no children, 

 Emma wrote: "It is very consoling to live among the 

 springing things when you are yourself declining, and with- 

 out children I sometimes think it is almost impossible to 

 grow old with grace. . . . Isabella is become, perhaps from 

 imitation of Johnny, nearly as fond of me as he is of Fanny. 

 Her favourite place is now on my lap. She is so volatile that 

 I daresay this taste of hers will not last, but it appears so 

 strange to me to have anything so fond of me that I feel it 

 is creating in me a feeling that will not pass away." Emma 

 Allen's attitude was striking in her dignified and open accep- 

 tance of the fact that everywhere her sisters were more 

 popular than herself. She said of her brother in 1818, 

 ' John I am sure shews me more affection than he ever did 

 before, and if you could but know how I have always loved 

 him you may guess how delightful his tender manners are 

 to me." Bessy, however, wrote of this sister a few years 

 later : " We shall miss her very much. If I did not love and 

 value her as I do, I should feel the benign influence of her 

 contented spirit and tranquil soul." 



Caroline, the second daughter of the John Wedgwoods, 

 died early in 1825. This death affected her family deeply 

 They had before been inclined to belong to the Evangelical 



