Declined With Thanks
When Mr. Wilberforce, the great anti-slavery advocate (the father of the late Bishop of Winchester), was once a candidate for parliamentary honors, his sister, an amiable and witty young lady, offered the compliment of a new gown to each of the wives of those freemen who voted for her brother, on which she was saluted with the cry of “Miss Wilberforce forever!” when she pleasantly observed, “I thank you, gentlemen; but I cannot agree with you, for I really do not wish to be ‘Miss Wilberforce’ forever.”