for the munificence of his private hospitality as for his public spirit. There are few whose death will be heard of with more regret by the public and none could be more deeply lamented by those who knew his fine social qualities and personal accomplishments. The Baltimore American said: Died at Annapolis on Monday morning in the 55th year of his age the Hon. Edward Lloyd. The various important responsible situations to which the deceased has from time to time been called by his fellow citizens, and which from an early age till within a short period he has filled with distinguished ability, has made his name familiar with his countrymen, and every one sensible of the estimation in which he was held as a public man. He served first as a delegate to the General Assembly from Talbot county, and in succession a member of Congress, Governor of the State, State Senator, presiding officer of that body, and Senator of the United States. Declining health induced him ultimately to relinquish public honors that he might enjoy the endearments of his affectionate family. Alas! how brief and unstable is the tenure of all that earth can give to mortals. In the various private and domestic relations of life Col. Lloyd so discharged the duties of his station as to gather around him and to bind in the bonds of social affection a large circle of friends and admirers, and in public, the estimation placed by the people upon his services is best evinced by the frequent calls made upon him to fill the most elevated dignities. From his sound and discriminating mind and from his long acquaintance with public affairs, he has possessed a great and leading influence in the councils of the State. EDWARD LLOYD (VI) THE FARMER 1798-1861 When Edward Lloyd the fifth of the name, who was commonly called Governor, arrived at his majority, the happy event was suitably celebrated at Wye House by a convivial assemblage of relatives and friends, who in the midst of their hilarity, after dinner, called for the infant heir to the name and estate, Edward Lloyd (VI) Jr., who was brought to the table and made to go through the form of drinking his father's health. He was then more than one year old, having been born at Annapolis, Dec. 27th, 1798. He was the eldest son of a large family of children, all of whom at this date (Oct. 1885) are dead with a single exception, the widow of Admiral Buchanan, who, in a serene and beautiful old age, still represents the high born graces of the family and the sterling virtues of her distinguished father. Young Lloyd grew up in the seclusion of his home, with no other companions than his own brothers and sisters, or, as unsophisticated youth knows few distinctions, the young negroes upon the plantation. His early education was at the hand of Mr. Joel Page a private tutor in the family, who long continued to be an honored and beloved inmate of Wye House, and who, there ending his days under painful circumstances, being distracted in mind, was interred in the ancestral burial ground where a stone is erected to his memory, consecrated by the affection of more than one generation of the Lloyds. As all his ancestors had been farmers or planters, young Lloyd seems to have been predestined to the avocation of a tiller of the soil. Under the erroneous impression that the agriculturist is not benefited by higher education, or rather condemning, as he justly might do, the sciolism or pedantry of the college bred men of his day, his father neglected to give him the advantages of even that poor training and culture which could be obtained in the superior schools of the time. Young Lloyd did, however, feel some inclination to prepare himself for a professional life, and actually began his studies in the city of Philadelphia; but these, being interrupted by a severe attack of illness, were never renewed. It would have been no waste of time, money and labor, if he had taken courses of instruction in law, medicine and divinity, as preparatory to the avocation to which hereditary custom had destined him; for the learning of each of these would have been of value to the great planter who was required by the circumstances of his position as slave holder to perform the functions of jurist, doctor and priest upon his domain and among his dependents. While Mr. Lloyd missed those refined and delightful pleasures which flow from the cultivation of polite letters and the pursuits of science, he was not without compensation in his escape from their enervating influences, for while acquiring the elements of a good sound education in English letters and the principles of such knowledge as can be made applicable to the common practical affairs of life, the most masculine forces of his mind and traits of character were free to develop in all their healthy vigor and natural nobility. In short his education, falling in with his inclinations or aptitudes and circumstances, made him not the scholar weighed down with "wise saws and modern instances" dreamy, speculative, hesitating, timid from very excess of knowledge-but the thoroughly equipped man of affairs, courageous, ready, full of resources, capable of reading life's lessons of wisdom written in its most obscure dialect, of solving life's problems involved to the last degree of intricacy, unraveling life's syllogisms in her most entangled "logic of events," and reducing in the crucible and alembic of experience the most refractory of life's materials. There is other learning than that taught in the schools, however high, and this Ed. Lloyd acquired in the school of experience. Arriving earlier than usual at a period in life, when the vacant pleasures of youth cease to satify the mind and occupy the hours, be became desirous of serious and profitable employment and so, at his request, he was placed in charge of a large plantation of his father's. Marrying soon after, his father built for him the beautiful house at Wye Heights now occupied by David C. Trimble, Esq., and there he settled down to the serious work of life which was never pretermitted until life's close. There he continued to reside until the death of Gov. Lloyd, when he removed to Wye House, and Wye Heights became the home of Danied Lloyd, Esq., his brother. There, too, he may be said to have served his apprenticeship under that most able master in geoponics,his father. In the conduct of this and other large tracts he displayed those qualities, and later acquired those habits which characterized him as the greatest farmer of the State of Maryland. Reared in affluence he became frugal; growing up in ease and idleness he became laborious and industrious; accustomed to every pleasure which wealth could purchase or parental partiality bestow he became abstinent from or moderate in the indulgence of the customary enjoyments of youthful life, and to the greatest freedom of action, he became circumspect, selfrestrained as regards his own conduct, and masterful of the conduct of those subject to his control-that is to say, as he was able to govern himself so he was able to govern others. In this apprenticeship at Wye Heights he acquired that training which qualified him to manage in after life, with wonderful skill the larger estate of both land and slaves that fell under his care at the death of his father or that he acquired by his own economy, prudence or acuteness. Without being too precise in its definition, it may be well enough to note that the period embraced within the experience of Col. Edward Lloyd (VI) the typical farmer of this section of Maryland, was pretty distinctly marked off in the industrial history of Talbot county. It extended from the time when the agricultural revolution from tobacco culture to grain growing from planting properly so called to farminghad been fully completed; through the years of a rude and wasteful husbandry when the rearing of the cereals received the almost exclusive attention of our farmers; down to the beginning of that great epoch, which is marked in our industrial history by the introduction of improved machinery, the use of artificial fertilizers, but more distinctly still by the change of our system of labor. When Edward Lloyd, Jr., commenced his farming operations the rearing for market of tobacco, once the great staple and indeed currency of the province and State, after a gradual decline of more than fifty years, had wholly ceased. It had merely a survival to use the phraseology of the sociologists of this day, in the small patches of the negroes, who planted a little for their own uses. The adaptation of the soil of Talbot to the growth of grain, its presumed want of adaptation to the rearing of cattle, the proximity of the county to the first flour market of America or perhaps in the world coupled with the facilities of each farmer for the shipment of his products from his own door, probably a growing perception of the impoverishment of his lands, had expelled the "sot werd" (its "factors" had long since gone) from the fields and barns, caused the warehouses for its storage to go to decay, and deprived the inspectors of their vocation. Edward Lloyd, Junior, long so called, became a great grain grower, and labored successfully, when so many failed, through the long and weary years of agricultural depression, extending from about 1820 to his death in 1861 years when the rewards of farm industry were so small and the wants of a growing civilization were so disproportionately great-years when poverty seemed to be the lot of the small farmer, and debt that of the large-years, too, when, in the midst of social and political unrest all seemed to be so dazed and blinded as to be incapable of seeing the cause why their fertile fields yielded but the crops of sterility and their labor and economy were paid with the wages of sloth and wastefulness. During this period the value of lands in Talbot County declined, and population diminished or was stationary.67 It is much to the credit of Edward Lloyd the farmer, that under these depressing circumstances, -for it must be borne in mind that he was affected as sensibly by them as others were, if not more seriously-he was able to maintain the ancient repute of the family for wealth, when it seemed upon the verge of destruction, to disburden his estate of a heavy debt left charged upon it by his father, to aid his brothers when involved in pecuniary difficulties, and even to add largely to his wealth both in land and slaves. The farming of Col. Lloyd was conducted on a great scale, for he cul 67 From 1820 to 1860, according to the United States census, the population of Talbot increased in 40 years but 406 persons. From 1820 to 1840, in 20 years, it diminished 1,299 persons. From 1860 to 1880, in 20 years, it increased 3,630 persons. tivated thousands of acres, and with a method which was as admirable as it was necessary for success. The system of tenantry, the occupant paying a proportion of the products, called by the French agrinomists, the systeme metayer, which prevailed in this county, had not his approval as being entirely too favorable to the land renters, and often disastrous to the land owners; but while his estate was divided into many separate farms, each independent of the other, he kept the whole under his mediate or immediate direction and supervision. Each farm had its overseer, a white man, with its own gang of slaves, while the whole of them was under a bailiff or steward, who reported to him as master and chief. But he was not content with this, for he was unremitting in his personal attention, visiting each daily, if possible, giving general directions as to its tillage and management, looking after the welfare of his slaves, administering to their wants, or ordering punishment for offences against discipline. This involved much personal labor, for the accomplishment of which he was early in his saddle. Whether guests were in his house or not he made his rounds in company with his steward and returned to dine with his family in the afternoon. The remainder of the day was given to social enjoyment, or attention to such business as should be discharged in his office. He was of the class of gentlemen farmers a class which it has been and still is the privilege and profit of this county to possess, giving dignity to an avocation too commonly thought to be suggestive of rudeness and rusticity only, refining the manners of our people prone to become agrestic, and maintaining a standard of honor in our social as well as business life-but he was a gentleman farmer, not in the sense of being one who amused himself with rural occupations as a pastime, and evaded the labors, responsibilities and annoyances of the husbandman, but in the sense of being one, who, not laboring with his hands upon his estate, was nevertheless assiduous in his attention to his business, careful in directing its greater or more important operations, giving personal attention to the condition of his dependents, looking closely after his own personal interests, yet finding time or taking it, for the cultivation of those amenities and graces which give to life its greatest charm, and for indulgence in those pleasures, without which "weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, seem all the uses of this world." He was eminently a practical farmer, not given to trying experiments, yet not following old methods for the sake of consistency; having no agronomic theories to establish, but observing close that he might form rules for his own guidance. Not contemning the laws of good husbandry which the experience of others or of himself had shown |