published an autobiography entitled "Life and Adventures of Peter Porcupine." Sometime afterwards when Lord Castlereagh spoke of his writings as twopenny trash, he very characteristically accepted that name also, as the title of his publications. In 1796 he opened a shop at Philadelphia for the sale of his own works. His friends feared for his safety, since the feeling on behalf of France was very strong. "I saw," says Cobbett, "that I must at once set all danger at defiance, or live in everlasting subjection to the prejudices and caprices of the democratical mob. I resolved on the former . . . I put up in my windows, which were very large, all the portraits that I had in my possession of kings, queens, princes, and nobles. I had all the English ministry, several of the bishops and judges, the most famous admirals, and, in short, every picture that I thought likely to excite rage in the enemies of Great Britain. Early on the Monday I took down my shutters. Such a sight had not been seen in Philadelphia for twenty years." In spite of his sympathies, however, the English government found him too independent to become their tool. He heard himself called by the English consul "a wild fellow," and remarked, "When the king bestows upon me £500 a year perhaps I may become a tame fellow and hear my master, my friends, and my parents belied and execrated, without saying a single word in their defence." Cobbet ultimately was involved in several prosecutions for libel, and returned to England in 1800. He was introduced to Pitt, and opened a bookseller's shop in Pall Mall; but disputing the policy of the peace of Amiens, he quarrelled with the government; broke off from many proffered friendships; and in 1802 commenced the Political Register, which grew into a weekly essay on politics. His opinions became more and more democratic, but they were always sincere and his own, and he was influenced in their formation neither by threats nor bribes. Cobbett's political writings amount to one hundred octavo volumes. For nearly forty years he gave his thoughts to the public upon political and social questions, at least once a week. Of a vehement and open disposition, he expressed every passion and every wish, every personal prejudice and every patriotic prayer. Bold and sometimes coarse, he was also fearless and free. His hatred and his affections were equally intense. His maxim—professed to be borrowed from Swift—was "If a flea bite me, I will kill it if I can." The greater the odds against him, the higher his courage rose. Inconsistent, he always owned his change, and gave his reason, following the rule laid down by Chatham, "It is the duty and ought to be the honour of every man to own his mistake, whenever he discovers it, and to warn others against those frauds which have been too successfully practised upon himself." He eagerly espoused the cause of reform; but, at the same time, wrote to the journeymen and labourers of England to respect the constitutional history of their country; for, said he, "there is no principle, no precedent, no regulations (except as to mere matter of detail) favourable to freedom, which is not to be found in the laws of England, or the example of our ancestors." In fact, many of the opinions for uttering which Cobbett was called "fool," "incendiary," "vulgar," "libeller," would to-day be regarded alike by whig and tory as plain common sense. With clear insight into the course of history in a free country, in 1816 Cobbett wrote to "the Labourers" of England, that "a reformed parliament would soon do away all religious distinctions and disabilities. In their eyes a catholic and a protestant would both appear in the same light." Upon practical questions, Cobbett's clear-headed advice was of infinite service to the agricultural population, among whom his chief influence was exerted. He pointed out that thrashing machines were no causes of misery to the poor; and endeavoured to persuade the working people not to enter upon a crusade for their destruction. To this day, Cobbett's "Cottage Economy" and "Advice to Young Men" constitute standard books in the cottages of the southern counties, and many a Sussex and Surrey countryman finds that his "Grammar" gives him the most intelligible account of his native tongue. Cobbett was repeatedly tried for libel, and on one occasion was sentenced to a fine of £1000 and imprisonment for two years, on account of some strictures he made on a case of flogging in the army. In 1817 he revisited America, but returned in 1819, bringing with him the bones of Paine. He was returned to parliament for the borough of Oldham in 1832, but having been previously accustomed to retire to rest at nine, and rise at four in the morning, his health could not accommodate itself to the change of habit; and after a brief illness he died June 18th, 1835. His personalities were forgotten in his power, his inconsistencies in his honesty, his vehement impulses in his common sense, and his thousand battles were remembered only for his fearless daring; while the chief organ of his opponents bestowed upon the peasant politician whose voice had echoed through the mine and the coal-pit, and who, to use the expression of Coleridge, had lifted the latch of every cottage door and thundered with no runaway knock at the palace gate, the not unfitting title of—the Last of the Saxons. Cobbett's political works consist of—"Porcupine's Works," 12 vols. 8vo, Philadelphia, 1794 to 1800; and "The Weekly Political Register," 88 vols. 8vo, London, 1802 to 1835. An abridgment of the 100 volumes has been published by his sons in 6 vols., 8vo, London, 1835. In addition to his political works, Cobbett wrote French and English grammars, "Cottage Economy," "Advice to Young Men," "Legacy to Parsons," &c. &c.—L. L. P.
COBDEN, Richard, in his day the chief apostle of free trade, was born at the farmhouse of Dunford, near Midhurst, Sussex, on the 3rd of June, 1804. He was thus, by seven years, the senior of his friend and fellow-worker, Mr. Bright. The family of Mr. Cobden had long been resident in the locality where he first saw the light. His grandfather is still remembered at Midhurst, in the immediate vicinity of his birthplace, as "Maltster Cobden;" and such designations as "Cobden's Lane" still survive there, memorials of Mr. Cobden's progenitors rather than of himself. His father was a substantial yeoman, but some degree of obscurity rests over his earlier years and career. Certain it is that, unlike Mr. Bright, Mr. Cobden was the architect of his own worldly fortunes. It is understood that at an early age he was placed in a London warehouse, from which he emerged as traveller for a Manchester firm extensively engaged in the cotton trade. In 1830 we find him a master calico-printer, in partnership with Messrs. Sherreff and Foster, at Sabden, in a romantic district of hill-country, near Blackburn, in Lancashire, where every valley has its stream of pure water, that indispensable element in the finer departments of calico-printing. Subsequently, with an elder brother, he engaged in the same business at Chorley in Lancashire; the name of the new firm being Richard Cobden & Brothers. Mr. Cobden retired from commerce after the great free trade triumph of 1846.
Up to 1835 Mr. Cobden was little known in Lancashire or Manchester, where he had a counting-house, save as a calico-printer of good taste and business ability, beginning to produce articles of a superior quality, which competed with the best London products, and which grew to be celebrated as the "Cobden-prints." From this period onwards, his local and general activity expanded in scope, until it reached its acme in the repeal of the corn laws. Mr. Archibald Prentice, formerly editor of the Manchester Times, has described in his Annals of the League, the surprise and delight with which he perused in 1835 some singularly lucid and logical letters addressed to him anonymously on political and politico-economical topics, intended for publication in his journal. Soon afterwards he received a copy of a pamphlet, published in 1835, "England, Ireland, and America, by a Manchester manufacturer;" and in the inscription on the fly-leaf, "From the author," he recognized the hand-writing of the anonymous correspondent, of whom he had predicted that he would one day be a man of note. It was the first literary work of Richard Cobden. All Mr. Cobden's political, economic, and social philosophy, is to be found in this his earliest publication. Mr. Urquhart was beginning his denunciations of Russia; Mr. Cobden maintained that the absorption of Turkey by Russia would be the best possible solution of the Eastern question. Peace, nonintervention, retrenchment, and free trade, were the watchwords of the "Manchester manufacturer." The germ of the Anticorn-law League lurked in his suggestion, that as we had a Linnæan Society, so we ought to have a "Smithian," to diffuse a knowledge of the principles of the Wealth of Nations, and that prizes might advantageously be offered for the best essays on the corn question, and lecturers be usefully sent into the rural districts to enlighten the protectionist ignorance of the agriculturists. Mr. Cobden's views of foreign policy, whether sound or not, were not those of a mere student of books and newspapers. In 1835 he made the continental tour already referred to in the memoir of Mr. Bright, and again in 1837, he traversed some of the chief countries of Europe; on both occasions partly with a view to
