my father Joseph. My father had a small factory at Coventry, which he enlarged

at the time of the invention of bicycling. He was a patentee of the Openshaw

unbreakable tire, and his business met with such success that he was able to

sell it and to retire upon a handsome competence.


“My uncle Elias emigrated to America when he was a young man and became a

planter in Florida, where he was reported to have done very well. At the time

of the war he fought in Jackson’s army, and afterwards under Hood, where

he rose to be a colonel. When Lee laid down his arms my uncle returned to his

plantation, where he remained for three or four years. About 1869 or 1870 he

came back to Europe and took a small estate in Sussex, near Horsham. He had

made a very considerable fortune in the States, and his reason for leaving them

was his aversion to the negroes, and his dislike of the Republican policy in

extending the franchise to them. He was a singular man, fierce and

quick-tempered, very foul-mouthed when he was angry, and of a most retiring

disposition. During all the years that he lived at Horsham, I doubt if ever he

set foot in the town. He had a garden and two or three fields round his house,

and there he would take his exercise, though very often for weeks on end he

would never leave his room. He drank a great deal of brandy and smoked very

heavily, but he would see no society and did not want any friends, not even his

own brother.


“He didn’t mind me; in fact, he took a fancy to me, for at the time

when he saw me first I was a youngster of twelve or so. This would be in the

year 1878, after he had been eight or nine years in England. He begged my

father to let me live with him and he was very kind to me in his way. When he

was sober he used to be fond of playing backgammon and draughts with me, and he

would make me his representative both with the servants and with the