ROBERT POCOCK. 13 



ff This being the first compilation of ' The History of 

 Gravesend ' that ever appeared in print, and the 

 compiler of the same not having that leisure time 

 requisite for its critical inspection, by other business 

 interfering, it is hoped that the candid reader will 

 excuse any errors that he sees in the performance of 

 it." 



It is clear that even in 1790 he had virtually com- 

 piled his History, which only saw the light in 1797. 

 It is nevertheless more than doubtful if his finances 

 would have, even at this later date, enabled him to 

 have launched the volume if it had not been facilitated 

 by the fortunate incident that he happened to be 

 present at a sale of the stock of a paper-mill, and was 

 thus enabled to purchase at quite a presumably nominal 

 price a quantity of unsized paper, cut into sheets too 

 small for profitable or general use in the trade. By this 

 acquisition he came to be able to utilize the accumu- 

 lations, both antiquarian, natural, and local, which his 

 untiring energy and industry had secured. 



In those of the fragmentary diaries of Pocock which 

 have been collected, traits of his general character will 

 sufficiently appear, and in the most natural way ; but 

 candour does not allow us to say that his domestic re- 

 lations, arising out of his second marriage, always 

 exhibited the completest harmony. It was with 

 him as with many who similarly give their days to 

 public rather than private objects, they to a propor- 

 tionate extent withdraw time and energies which would 

 otherwise have been more completely focussed upon the 

 domestic hearth. In how many cases of literary men do 

 we not naturally find the same causes productive of the 

 like results. And if on the part of his conjugal help- 



