Clay Lane

Throughout his careerTHROUGHOUT his career, Victorian mill-owner and statesman Richard Cobden laboured to persuade his fellow MPs to throw off the jealousy that led them to wars, blockades, and sanctions, and let peace and prosperity grow through mutual respect and open trade. In our cover story, American journalist and fellow peace campaigner Elbert Green Hubbard tells us a little about how Cobden’s early life shaped him, and why his motto came to be Character Counts!

Welshman George Herbert turned down a promising career at Court to become a country clergyman in Bemerton, near Salisbury, where he served with gentle conscientiousness until his death from consumption in March 1633, just a month shy of his fortieth birthday. In A Well-Tuned Heart, Herbert’s contemporary Izaak Walton recalls an occasion when the mild-mannered clergyman got his hands (and much else besides) dirty helping a tradesman who had been dumped unceremoniously in the mud by his overloaded horse.

Two centuries later, Sydney Smith, another well-connected man of letters, also turned his back on what some might think to be greater things to serve as a rural clergyman; but the twinkle in his eye was much more noticeable. Find out what his definition of a successful marriage was, in Shear Love.

And finally, we read a touching tale of a Victorian commuter, who was quite literally Left Holding the Baby.

As always, each story is accompanied by some little brainteasers, playing with English words and the logic of sentences.