Page:Notes by the Way.djvu/293

 NOTES BY THE WAY.

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��Mrs. Smyth has made in 1907 a valuable addition to the history of postal reform by writing a new memoir of her father, Sir Rowland Hill, and the volume of three hundred pages forms a succinct account of the entire movement. There are eighteen illustrations, including four portraits of Rowland Hill, a view of Bruce Castle, the Mulready envelope, and a charming portrait of Lady Hill. She was a devoted wife and a true helpmate, and Lady Hill Mrs. Smyth states :

" During the long postal-reform agitation, her buoyant hopeful- ness and abiding faith in her husband's plan never failed to cheer and encourage him to persevere. Years after, when their children were old enough to understand their position, their father would tell them how much he owed to her, and bade them never to forget the debt."

She died on the 27th of May, 1881, at the age of eighty-four.

In ' N. & Q.' for the 22nd of September, 1906, Mr. John T. Page, referring to her grave in Highgate Cemetery, states that it is on the left-hand side of the centre path, near the Catacombs, No. 17,725, and is marked by a plain Latin cross of white marble, containing on its base an inscription to Lady Hill. On the white marble wall in front of the grave, close beside the path, is the following inscription :

Sacred to the memory of

Sir Rowland Hill, K.C.B., D.C.L., F.R.S.,

Born at Kidderminster, 3rd December, 1795,

Died at Hampstead 27th August, 1879,

Buried in Westminster Abbey. To his creative mind and untiring energy the world owes

THE UNIFORM PENNY POSTAGE SYSTEM,

Established 1840.

While the originator of the Penny Post is buried in the temple of silence and reconciliation, just in a straight line across the river may be seen the tower of Christchurch, Westminster Bridge Road, under which rest the remains of another Rowland Hill, the Rowland Hill great preacher, who was at first buried under the pulpit of Surrey Chapel, but when that building was sold, the body was removed to its present resting-place. The tower is known as the Lincoln Tower, after President Lincoln, and was built with money raised by Americans in gratitude to Newman Hall (who succeeded the Rev. James Sherman as pastor of the church) for his persistent advocacy of the cause of the North during the war with the Southern States. '

��Chapel.

��Newman Hall.

��The Report of the Postmaster-General dated the 8th of September, 1908, contains the welcome announcement that " upon the 1st of October next the rate for letters for the United States of America will be reduced to Id. per ounce." The former charge would have been 5d. In October, 1907, a great boon had also

��Penny

postage to

United

States.

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