ABSTRACT
In the year 1810, that is to say, as soon as Place’s acquaintance had any pecuniary value, Mr. William Godwin sought Wallas' acquaintance and readily formed a friendship. Place gives a pathetic little picture of another man whom Godwin helped to disillusionise. Mr. Godwin’s affairs brought Place acquainted with Mr. Elton Hammond, whose father had been a wholesale tea-dealer in the City of London, and had at his decease left a considerable property to his two sons and two daughters. Mr. Hammond started in life with enthusiastic notions of the capacity and desires of mankind to become virtuous and happy. To their rapid improvement he hoped to devote himself. He persuaded himself that he should be able to correct their vices and prevent them committing crimes.
