Notes On Literature, Science And Art.

year . He was the son of a poor clockmaker , a man of unusual intelligence for his position in life , Avho Avas said to be a distant relative of the aristocratical family of the same name . The rudiments of learning he picked up at the Sunday

School , and afterwards at the Mechanics ' Institute ; for his parents Avere too poor to pay for his schooling , and he had , at an early age , to win his own bread in the Potteries , many of tbe workshops in Avhich , as he tells us . in his prize essay on Public and

Popular Amusements , were " of the worst possible description , being badly lighted , and Avithout even an attempt at ventilation . " And he adds , Avriting in 1858 , " Little regard is paid to the health or comfort of the inmates ; year after year they

are deprived of air and light , ancl compelled to breathe a poisoned atmosphere , Avhose fearful ravages are seen in the Aveak , attenuated forms of its victims . " I never looked upon " the attenuated form " of Bro . GordonAvithout thinking that he himself

, Avas a living proof of this sentence ; and I have no hesitation in saying , that to his slavery in childhood , more than to the hard literary labours of his manhood , do Ave owe

his premature death . In 1859 , he entered on his professional career as a reporter , on the Staffordshire Sentinel , at Hanley . In November , 1861 , he bscarne sub-editor ancl reporter of the Stockton Gazette and Middlesborough Times , which two papers had then become amalgamated . The duties of this

position he discharged for nearl y five years , with great industry and fidelity . I became personally acquainted Avith him on his first going to Middlesborough , and had unusual opportunities of ivitnessing his unceasing industry during his residence there .

He was afterwards connected with various other local papers , up to the time of his death . Bro . Gordon had published several small books , tbe most interesting of which was , Rambles along the Cliffs—Sa-ltbum to Whitb y , giving an account of a pedestrian

tour along the Cleveland coast , made in August , 1864 , in company with the Avriter of these Notes . In 1869 , he published bis Watering Places of Cleveland , on a new edition of which lie was engaged at the time of bis death Though b

. y no means a man of great genius , Bro . Gordon Avas one of those useful and praise-worth y '" en , who , remembering the fable of the hare and the tortoise , make up by patient

perseverance in cultivating the talents God has given them , for the want of greater gifts . At the time of his death he was D . G . M . of tbe Free Gardeners , as well as a Brother of the Craft . He has left a AvidoAV and five children , I fear , inadequately provided for . Bro . Gordon

was a credit to the Avorking classes from Avhom he sprung , only to change hard bodily labour for that Avhich is equally a strain on the brain ; for as FLORENCE CLEVELAND sings :- — " A vast o' fooaks can't understand

That sum's hard at Avork AVIV ther heeads , Whahle udders is Avorking Avi' t' hand . " It Avas but proper that the biographer of James Montgomery , Chautrey and others , should have his own life fully ancl lovingly writtenand this has been ably done by

, the Rev . William Hudson , in his Life of John Holland , a neatlyj . rinted , Avell-bound octavo volume of 576 pages , Avhich deserves , ancl indeed must have , a fuller notice at my hands than present space permits . His thirty-six years of friendship Avith

Montgomery , his long connection Avith the Sheffield papers , his many books and fugitive pieces on almost every conceivable subject , in both prose and poetry , his fine sympathies Avith humanity , and his strong love of nature , joined to the purest practice of piety , made John Holland really a great man , though never over-burdened with Avealth , rank , or title ; and for those who

like myself , only knew him through a comparatively small portion of his writings , this Life by Mr . Hudson is of great value ; whilst those Avho , like my dear literary friend , Eta Mawr , had the pleasure of his personal acquaintance , AV ' III value Mr . Hudsons ' s graphic representation of the

man , body and mind , as almost reproducing him again livingly before them . Many of the short poems quoted by Mr . Hudson are new to me , and give me a higher conception of Mr . Holland than I had before , for several of them are gems in their Avay ,

and are likely to be often epioted by me , in the " Masonic Magazine" and elsewhere . Not the least interesting part of the book to me , is the poet ' s correspondence Avith our mutual friend Miss E . Colling , whose hospitality Itoohave repeatedly enjoyed

, , at Hurworth ; whose literary correspondence I , too , have benefited by ; and whose beautiful poems , like those of her L