DEATH OF AN OLD INHABITANT — On Sunday morning one of Rushden's oldest and best-known figures passed away in the person of Samuel Knight, sen., at the advanced age of 94 years. The deceased gentleman was, at the time of his death, and had been for many years, senior deacon at the Old Baptist Church, and in connection with this cause he has always been a most active worker. For many years he was superintendent, of the large Sunday School, and endeared himself alike to both teachers and scholars by his whole-hearted service in this direction. Although he has long been debarred from active service through the infirmities of age, he still retained a lively interest, in the welfare of the church generally, but the school in particular, and it was one of his greatest delights to get one of the teachers to sit with him and relate the experiences of the past Sunday. Owing to failing eyesight and weakness, Mr. Knight has not been seen much of late years but he will be missed by a great number of friends. Mr. Knight had lived in the same house nearly the whole of his life, having been taken there when quite an infant.

One of the oldest inhabitants of the county passed from this life to a higher on Easter morning. We are so accustomed to regard Rushden as a busy, thriving, shoe-manufacturing community, that we are apt to overlook the fact that there is still much rural rusticity in the town. In one of the quaintest of thatch and plaster cottages, with low ceilings and its upper windows displacing the roof eaves, dwelt for more than 94 years Mr. Samuel Knight, Rushden's oldest townsman. He escaped being born in the house, but was carried into it a nursling, and there he lived until his death last Sunday. When a young man he became associated with the Baptists of the Old Meeting, which body he joined in full Church membership 68 years ago. He was appointed deacon more than 50 years since, and he was superintendent of the Sunday School for 33 years. The following delightful, though pathetic picture of the old man, penned twelve months ago by the Rev. W. F. Harris, pastor of the Old  Baptist Church, deserves wider publicity than it has yet received:- "Bright in intellect, and young of heart, he takes the keenest interest in all the affairs of the church. His father was 34 years a deacon of the same church, and his grandfather was also connected with it. He is one of the finest types of village Nonconformity I have ever met with. His devotion to his church is quite pathetic. Never does a collection take place without his contribution being included. Almost too blind to see, and too deaf to hear, he sits, hour after hour, in his old-fashioned chimney corner, meditating on the past, and deeply as he loves it, praying for his church a better future. Often he will break out into a repetition of favourite hymns, which for so many years he gave out, two lines at a time, in the Old Sanctuary. He has a rare knowledge of the Bible, and can tell chapter and verse for any passage quoted, while he can remember the texts he heard preached seventy and even eighty years ago."