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CHAPTER VII
CHARACTERISTICS--HUMOUR--POLITICS--CULTURE--THEORIES OF LIFE--RELIGION
What Sydney Smith was to the outward eye we know from an admirable portrait
by Eddis[145] belonging to his grand-daughter, Miss Caroline Holland. He
had a long and slightly aquiline nose, of the type which gives a peculiar
trenchancy to the countenance; a strongly developed chin, thick white
hair,[146] and black eyebrows. His complexion was fresh, inclining to be
florid. In figure he was, to use his own phrase, "of the family of
Falstaff." Ticknor described him as "corpulent but not gross." Macaulay
spoke of his "rector-like amplitude and rubicundity." He was of middle
height, rather above it than below, and sturdily built. He used to quote a
saying from one of his contemporaries at Oxford--"Sydney, your sense, wit,
and clumsiness, always give me the idea of an _Athenian carter_." Except on
ceremonious occasions, he was careless about his dress. His daughter
says:--"His neckcloth always looked like a pudding tied round his throat,
and the arrangement of his garments seemed more the result of accident than
design."
His manner in society was cordial, unrestrained, and even boisterous. "I
live," he said in an admirable figure, "with open doors and windows." His
poor parishioners regarded him with "a curious mixture of reverence and
grin."[147] His daughter says that, "on entering the pulpit, the calm
dignity of his eye, mien, and voice, made one feel that he was indeed, and
felt himself to be, 'the pastor standing between our God and His people,'
to teach His laws, to declare His judgments, and proclaim His mercies.
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