Page:Protestant Exiles from France Agnew vol 2.djvu/486

 rewarded with the office of Cursitor Baron of the Exchequer, and returned to England to enter upon its duties.

His behaviour in the colony had obtained for him the confidence of the inhabitants, and at their request he acted at home as agent of the Protestant settlers in Quebec. In their interest he published, “An Account of the proceedings of the British and other Protestant Inhabitants of Quebec, in order to obtain a House of Assembly,” 1775, 8vo, and “The Canadian Freeholder, consisting of dialogues between an Englishman and a Frenchman settled in Canada,” 1779, 3 vols. 8vo.

The Baron also took an active interest in the welfare of people at home.

Mindful of the steadfastness of his ancestors, he published some works relative to the spirit and persecuting career of popery. Also in 1791 he wrote against “pluralities,” or the holding of more than one ecclesiastical office by a clergyman, and against “temporary incumbencies” in parish churches, the incumbent retiring on a patron’s protegé coming of age or becoming eligible for the living. These were the principal topics of his book entitled, “The Moderate Reformer, or a proposal to correct some abuses in the Present Establishment of the Church of England,” 1791. His strong Protestant convictions were unalloyed with hostility to the persons of Romanists — so much so, that at the period of the French Revolution, his house was open to the refugees from France; and French Archbishops, and bishops, and numerous priests, might be seen at his hospitable table.

He was a diligent student of the books and pamphlets of the days of the Stuarts, and the cavaliers and parliamentarians, and printed at least three volumes of reprints and extracts bearing upon the constitution of England upon civil and religious liberty.

He was a great patron of poor authors, whose meritorious works he was often at the expense of printing. Watt and Haag give a list of his publications. He was thought worthy of admission among the Fellows both of the Royal Society of London, and of the Society of Antiquaries. He lived unmarried, and in his last days he was affectionately tended by his nearest relative, Mr. Whitaker. He died on May 19, 1824, in his ninety-third year. (His relationship to the Whitakers is explained in Chap, xv.)

The Gentleman’s Magazine exhibits his habits linked with the olden time. “French,” says the writer, “was the language of the paternal roof, and he spoke it with the utmost fluency and propriety. But it was the French of the age of Louis XIV., not of modern times, and it was amusing to contrast his pronunciation with that of the new refugees. He himself used to mimic with great success the Parisian dialect.” But the writer, who volunteers to give the world the most information concerning Baron Masères, is William Cobbett (in his Rural Rides). “I knew the Baron very well,” says this writer, “he was a most conscientious man. He was, when I first knew him, still a very clever man; he retained all his faculties to a very great age. . . . He had always been a very sensible, just, and humane man, and a man too who always cared for the public good; and he was the only man that I ever heard of, who refused to have his salary augmented.” When Cobbett was imprisoned for writing a newspaper article, the Baron frequently visited him in Newgate; and “he always came in his wig and gown, to show his abhorrence of the sentence.” As to Baron Masères’ money matters, Cobbett is partly mistaken. The following is the correct statement. He had a pretty house and grounds at Reigate, a house in Rathbone Place, London, and also chambers, No. 5 King’s Bench Walk, Inner Temple. In his Will he bequeathed £10,000 to “my near relation, Mr. Whitaker, a farmer at Pembury, in the county of Kent,” £10,000 to Elizabeth Whitaker, and £10,000 to Charlotte Whitaker. He left £800 and some books to “Mr. Anselm Donisemount, a French gentleman of note, formerly Counsellor of the Parliament of Paris before the French Revolution in 1789;” £500 to Mr. Richard Pooler of Reigate, formerly a seller of Mathematical Instruments in London; £200 to Mrs [Miss] Webster of Reigate, “who is constantly employed in doing good offices to her neighbours;” £200 to Francis Polhill, “my godson, second son of the late Charles Polhill, Esq., of Chipstead, Kent;” £300 to Mr. Ambrose Glover, the attorney at Reigate, for his own use, and £200 for a foot pavement in the High Street; £200 to Mr. Martin, the apothecary at Reigate. There are several legacies to servants, and the whole remainder is left to Rev. Robert Fellowes, of Cumberland Place, Marylebone, who proved the Will, as sole executor, on 19th June 1824. The effects were sworn under £100,000. The Baron also left books to the Inner Temple Library, and his unsold publications in sheets to Mr. William Frend, of Bridge Street, Blackfriars.

The following epitaph is on his monument in the churchyard of Reigate:— 