Outside his own circle, Death, while it so long passed him by, was very busy. Old friends, men eminent in science or in public life, he saw pass away before him. He once spoke to me with deep feeling of certain old men who, whenever they met him, had always received him with the greatest warmth. Of his friend Colonel Torrens, whom he had known years before as the chairman of the South Australian Commission, he has left the following brief record:--"He was eminent as a writer on political economy, and was one of the founders of the Political Economy Club. He was many years in Parliament, and was chairman of the South Australian Commission when I was secretary. I had known him previously, but this made our acquaintance intimate, and led to a friendship which continued till his death. When on his death-bed, at the age of eighty-four, he wrote me a most affectionate letter, expressing his desire that a connection even then contemplated between his family and mine should be realised; and a year or two later this was done, to the great satisfaction of my wife and myself, by the marriage of my son with one of the Colonel's granddaughters." Colonel Torrens, I may add, had early in the century distinguished himself as a brave soldier. His descendants show with pride a sword of honour which was presented to him for his gallant defence of the Island of Anholt. With all its losses, its seclusion, and its deprivations, the old man's life was far from being unhappy. He had resources in himself, and he had the never-failing past on which to dwell. His strength failed, and his mind began to lose somewhat of its old vigour. "Yet hath my night of life some memory," he might well have said. He had, moreover, a hearty love of fame, and he was doubly happy in this, that honours followed him even into his retirement. He passed away from the sight of men, but he was never made to feel that he was forgotten. Now in one grateful acknowledgment, now in another, he was shown that the world was not indifferent to the man who had conferred on it so signal a benefit. In some newspaper, or in some book, would appear from time to time a kindly and generous mention of his services which would warm up his heart even in the chill of age. I am reminded how Johnson, one day in the last summer of his life, "called out with a sudden air of exultation, as the thought started into his mind, 'O! Gentlemen, I must tell you a very great thing. The Empress of Russia has ordered the 'Rambler' to be translated into the Russian language; so I shall be read on the banks of the Wolga.' Boswell,--'You must certainly be pleased with this, Sir.' Johnson--'I am pleased, Sir, to be sure. A man is pleased to find he has succeeded in that which he has endeavoured to do.'" In like manner Sir Rowland Hill often exulted at the news that his great plan had won yet another triumph on some distant shore.