WILLIAM COBBETT. 



fILLIAM COBBETT was a native of Farnham, in 



Surrey. He was born about 1762, the third son 



of a small farmer. After he had risen to 



eminence and distinction, it was his delight and his pride 



to refer to the honourable, if humble circumstances of his 



early life — to a father whom, he says, ' I ardently loved, and 



to whose every word I listened with admiration,' and to a 



'gentle, and tender-hearted, and affectionate mother.' In one 



of his Rural Rides, in which he was accompanied by one 



of his sons, then a mere boy, he says : ' In coming from Moor 



Park to Farnham town, I stopped opposite the door of a 



little old house, where there appeared to be many children. 



"There, Dick," said I, "when I was just such a little creature 



as that, whom you see in the doorway, I lived in this very 



house with my grandmother Cobbett."' He was a bold, 



adventurous, hardy little chap, fond of all manner of rural 



EngUsh sports, and the very ' father to the man ' he afterwards 



became. Cobbett, whatever were his faults, had a genial 



temperament and great warmth of feeling. In one of his 



Rural Rides, in which he was accompanied by an elder son, 



he wTites : — 



n 



