Recollections of George John Cayley 



We followed him upstairs to the drawing-room, where 

 the tree was beginning to shine with its candles, the two 

 other children were excitedly running to and fro, little Artie 

 was lying back on his pillows between his mother and his 

 nurse ; and then George Cayley, with the tears streaming 

 down his cheeks, went on steadily lighting the candles and 

 looking to it all. Little Artie was smiling faintly, the 

 children still running round and round the little tree, 

 when we left. I remember the sad look of the lighted 

 windows as we drove away and looked back at the house. 



It is now thirty years since George Cayley himself died 

 after a long illness courageously endured. The Times 

 obituary for October 15, 1878, ran thus : — 



"On the nth October, at Munton Rectory, Kent, 

 George John Cayley, second son of the late Edward 

 Stillingfleet Cayley, Esq., M.P.,of Wydale, York, aged 52." 



ANNE THACKERAY RITCHIE. 



II 



George Cayley's personality was brilliant, original, and 

 many-sided. To seek his society was to court surprise, for 

 he was eccentric and conventional, steadfast and capricious, 

 made up of contradictions. He was a wayward philosopher. 

 Those whom he admitted to intimacy found themselves in 

 the wittiest, the most resourceful, the finest company. It 

 is true that, like most persons of strong individuality, if he 

 could attract he could also repel : otherwise, how should 

 Nature protect her favourites against besieging hordes of 

 curious mediocrity ? 



One after another those who knew George Cayley are 



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