PREFACE Ir should surely be a maxim of Biography that the written Life should be, so far as possible, of the same quality as the life lived. Following this canon, I have not desired to produce a biography of my Father which should lay bare minute details of domestic life, or personal trifles, and I have no doubt that the volume I offer will be counted dull by many readers of biography. I have desired to produce a record not discordant with a life at once austere and tender. After my Father's retirement from the Bench a firm of publishers suggested that he should write an autobiography for them to publish. Such an idea was not congenial to his mind, but when it was suggested to him that he should write an autobiography for his family he agreed to consider the matter, and before long began to put the earlier materials together; and as the later episodes of his life followed, a little prompting induced him to keep the manuscript pretty well up to date. The latest entries were made about three years before his death. The pages were certainly not written for publication, but for perusal by his children after his death, but the manuscript having been left to me and to my discretion I have felt at liberty to draw upon it largely in preparing this Memoir,which could not have been produced without this foundation. I have occasionally altered or omitted a few words without notice: I have also made use of his words in many passages without special indication that they are his. In the great length of his life my Father left most of his contemporaries behind, and his biographer has been greatly handicapped by the want of assistance from those who knew him intimately in middle life, and especially on the Bench. This has been made good, so far as is now possible, by the kindness of Sir Alfred Hopkinson, K.C., who has contributed a résumé of Sir Edward Fry's legal and judicial career, for which I tender him my most sincere thanks. These are due also to Mr. Justice Eve, and to Lord Haldane and the Rt. Hon. Henry Hobhouse, as well as to the friends whose names appear in the book as helpful contributors; and to unnamed members of my family. For suggestions and hints I wish to thank Prof. G. H. Leonard of Bristol University, and for much valuable advice, his cousin Mr. R. M. Leonard. FAILAND, Jan. 1921. A. F. NOTE. Sir Edward Fry's own words, whether taken from his autobiography or elsewhere, are distinguishable from those of the biographer by appearing in spaced type. |