was ever frightened, though
he used sometimes to be very ill.

"And so I went on, learned all I could from my father, and the
Vicar, and old Burt, till I was sixteen. By that time I had begun
to think for myself; and I had made up my mind that it was time I
should do something. No boy ever wanted to leave home less, I
believe; but I saw that I must make a move if I was ever to be
what my father wished me to be. So I spoke to the Vicar, and he
quite agreed with me, and made inquiries amongst his
acquaintance; and so, before I was seventeen, I was offered the
place of under-master in a commercial school, about twenty miles
from home. The Vicar brought the offer, and my father was very
angry at first; but we talked him over, and so I took the
situation.

"And I am very glad I did, although there were many drawbacks.
The salary was 35L a year, and for that I had to drill all the
boys in English, and arithmetic, and Latin, and to teach the
Greek grammar to the five or six who paid extra to learn it. Out
of the school I had always to be with them, and was responsible
for the discipline. It was weary work very often, and what seemed
the worst part of it to me, at the time, was the trade spirit
which leavened the whole of the establishment. The master and
owner of the school, who was a keen vulgar man, but always civil
enough to me, thought of nothing but what would pay. And this
seemed to be what filled the school. Fathers sent their boys,
because the place was so practical, and nothing was taught
(except as extras) which was not to be of so-called real use to
the boys in the world. We had our work quite clearly laid down
for us; and it was, not to put the boys in the way of getting
real knowledge or understanding, or any of the things Solomon
talks about, but to put them in the way of getting on.

"I spent three years at that school, and in that time I rounded
myself pretty well in Latin and Greek--better, I believe, than I
should have done if I had been at a first-rate school myself; and
I hope I did the boys some good, and taught some of them that
cunning was not the best quality to start in life with. And I was
not often very unhappy, for I could always look forward to my
holidays with my father.

"However, I own that I never was better pleased than one
Christmas when the Vicar came over to our cottage, and brought
with him a letter from the Principal of St. Ambrose College,
Oxford, appointing me to a servitorship.