The Baroness Burdett.Coutts, who died last Sunday at the age
of ninety-two, was born more than a year before the battle of Waterloo. Inheriting a great fortune from her maternal grandfather, Thomas Coutts, the founder of the famous bank, she devoted her wealth throughout her long life to the service of humanity. Her benefactions were countless, and ranged over the whole field of philanthropic effort. Nor was her generosity dominated by sentiment, her great aim being to help others to support themselves ; witness her interest in emigration schemes, the training of East End boys to be sea- men, and her munificence in reviving the Irish fishing industries. Her schemes were not invariably successful, and so far as South-Eastern Europe was concerned, to quote Lord Salisbury's phrase, she "put her money on the wrong horse." It is only right to add, however, that she resolutely abstained from political intervention, and never appeared on a political platform. The Baroness, on whom Queen Victoria conferred a peerage in 1871, was the first woman to receive the freedom of the City of London. The decision to accord her burial in Westminster Abbey is a fitting tribute to one who realised the responsibilities of great wealth more wisely than any woman of her generation.
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