The Rev. W. Walford, for some years minister of a Congregational Church at Yarmouth, then classical tutor at Homerton College, and finally pastor of the old Meeting House, Uxbridge, was one of the most remarkable men I ever knew. I see him now, with his handsome face, bald head, well-knit form, keen eyes, compressed lips, rather tottering in gait, and brusque in manner. What walks and talks we had! In conversation he expressed himself with singular accuracy on theological and metaphysical subjects. He had Butler and Jonathan Edwards at his fingers’ ends, and could pack into a few words some of their most abstruse definitions and arguments. He had a habit of turning round when you walked with him, and standing face to face, when he would, in a most luminous style, state his propositions and adduce his proofs. He read Sir William Hamilton with immense admiration, though he did not in all respects adopt his views; and, at a period when looseness of religious thought was becoming prevalent, it was a treat to see him make a stand, figuratively as well as literally, for a distinct utterance of what people believe. From no man’s conversation have I derived more instruction and advantage. I can never forget his reading to me, with tears in his eyes, a translation he had made of Plato’s “Phaedo.” One day an old gentleman called to say he was about to reside at Old Windsor, and intended joining our worship at William Street Chapel. He had a cheerful, lively expression of countenance, with a few short grey locks on each side of his bald head, and showed in his gait signs of paralytic seizure. Full of humour and kindness, he made a pleasant impression. Thus began my friendship with Mr. Samuel Bagster of famous Polyglot memory. Notwithstanding his lameness, he could at that time walk from Old Windsor to our house with the aid of a stick, only asking a helping hand at the commencement of his pedestrian attempts. Thus started off he would steadily pursue his journey dressed in a short cloak and wearing a very broad-brimmed hat. He was one of the chattiest, most amusing friends I ever had. He possessed a large fund of anecdotes, which he knew I liked; and from time to time, as I visited his house, he doled them out with no niggard hand. He had lived on books, and books were his delight. Many choice editions in handsome bindings lined the walls in his rambling, quaint sort of residence, where also flowers, gathered in his little garden, formed conspicuous ornaments. There he would sit nursing his foot, complaining of pain in his great toe, and would launch out for a pleasant sail over the lake of memory, and take me from one point to another. The old books he had bought and sold, the circumstances connected with the origin of his Polyglot and Hexapla, the fire which occurred on his premises in Paternoster Row—these he would narrate in a characteristic way.