from your old acquaintance, and the former has made me an elegant present. I am now very much taken up with study; am to speak Antony's speech in Shakespeare's Julius Cæfar (which play I will read to you when I come to town), and am this week to make a declamation. I add no more than the fincere well-wishes of your faithful friend,

And affectionate brother,

WILLIAM JONES.

If I am not deceived by my partiality for the memory of Sir William Jones, this letter will be perused with interest by the public. The topics felected for the confolation of his fifter, are not indeed of the most novel nature, nor the best adapted to afford it; and we may smile at the gravity of the young moralift, contrafted with the familiarity of the circumstances detailed in the latter part of the epistle, which I found no difpofition to reject: but the letter, as it ftands, will furnish no contemptible proof of his talents and frater

1

nal affection, and may ferve as a standard of comparison to parents, for estimating the abilities of their own children.

The period of tuition under Dr. Sumner paffed rapidly, to the mutual fatisfaction of the mafter and scholar, until Jones had reached his seventeenth year; when it was determined to remove him to one of the Univerfities. This determination was not adopted without much hesitation; for it had been ftrongly recommended to his mother, by Sergeant Prime, and other Lawyers, to place him, at the age of fixteen, in the office of fome eminent special pleader: and they supported their recommendation by an observa tion, equally flattering to him and tempting to his mother, that his talents, united with fuch indefatigable industry, must ensure the moft brilliant fuccefs, and confequently the acquifition of wealth and reputation. It is a fingular proof of his curiofity to explore unufual tracks of learning, that, at this early age, he had perused the Abridgement of Coke's Inftitutes, by Ireland, with fo much.

His

attention, that he frequently amufed the legal friends of his mother, by reasoning with them on old cafes, which were supposed to be confined to the learned in the profeffion. The law, however, at that time, had little attraction for him; and he felt no inclination to renounce his Demofthenes and Cicero for the pleadings in Westminster-Hall. disgust to the study of the law had also been particularly excited, by the perufal of fome old and inaccurate abridgement of law-cafes in barbarous Latin. This difinclination on his part, the folicitude of Dr. Sumner, that he should devote fome years to the comple tion of his studies at the University, and the objections of his mother, founded on reafons of economy, to a profeffion which could not be pursued without confiderable expense, fixed her decifion against the advice of her legal friends. The choice of an University was also the occafion of fome difcuffion. Cambridge was recommended by Dr. Sumner, who had received his education there: but Dr. Glaffe, who had private pupils at

Harrow, and had always distinguished Jones by the kindest attention, recommended Oxford. His choice was adopted by Mrs. Jones, who, in compliance with the wishes of her fon, had determined to refide at the Univerfity with him, and greatly preferred the fituation of Oxford.

In the Spring of 1764, he went to the Univerfity for the purpose of being matriculated and entered at College *: but he returned to Harrow for a few months, that he might finish a courfe of lectures, which he had just begun, and in which he had been highly interested by the learning, eloquence, tafte, and fagacity of his excellent inftructor. They separated foon after with mutual regret, and in the following term he fixed himfelf at Oxford.

The name of Jones was long remembered at Harrow, with the refpect due to his fupe

* The following is the form of his admission into University College, copied from his own writing:- Ego Gulielmus Jones, filius unicus Gulielmi Jones, Armigeri, de civitate Lond. lubens subscribo sub tutamine Magistri Betts, et Magistri Coulson, annos natus septéndecim.

rior talents and unrivalled erudition; and he was frequently quoted by Dr. Sumner, as the ornament of his fchool, and as an example for imitation. He had not only distinguished himself by the extent of his claffical attainments, and his poetical compofitions, but by the eloquence of his declamations, and the masterly manner in which they were delivered. In the varied talents which conftitute an orator, Dr. Sumner himself excelled; and his pupil had equally benefited by his example and inftruction. In the behaviour of Jones towards his school-fellows, he never exhibited that tyranny, which in the larger feminaries of learning is fometimes practifed by the senior, over the younger ftudents. His difpofition equally revolted at the exercife or fufferance of oppreffion; and he early exhibited a mind, strongly impreffed with those moral diftinctions which he ever retained. Of the friendships which he contracted at school, many were afterwards cultivated with reciprocal affection; and among the friends of his early years, fome ftill furvive, who re