Admiral." In other respects
also the man who was to be showed himself in the boy. He had a beautiful
way with children. He loved animals of every kind and had over them such
influence that they would follow him and come to his call. Still at
Ardara, in shelter of the hedge, you may see his nine hives of bees,
among which he used to spend many happy hours, and to which in later
times he devoted much of his hard-won leisure: once, his mother will
tell you, spending a whole winter's day--and a hunting day too!--carrying
his half-famished workers to and fro between hive and kitchen in his
cap. For horses he had a passion, and particularly for the Shetland pony
given to him one birthday. The fiercest brute yielded to his quiet
mastery; he never used whip or spur; and in time he was known as one of
the straightest and most fearless riders to hounds in County Down.

Until the age of eleven he was educated privately by a tutor, but in
September, 1884, he became a student at the Royal Academical
Institution, Belfast--the same institution through which, some years
previously, his father and his uncle, then Mr. Pirrie, had passed. There
he showed no special aptitudes, being fonder apparently of games than of
study, and not yet having developed those powers of industry for which,
soon, he became notable. In the Institution, however, was no more
popular boy, both with masters and schoolfellows. He excelled at
cricket, one is glad to know, and at all manly sports. Even then, we are
told, generosity and a fine sympathy were prominent traits in his
character. "He was always happy," writes a playmate, "even-tempered, and
showed a developing power of impressing everyone with his honesty and
simplicity of purpose." Wherever he went Tom carried his own sunshine.
All were fond of him. One can see him returning with his brother from
school, big, strong, well-favored, and perhaps with some premonition of
what the future had in store, lingering sometimes near the station
doorway to watch the great ships rising above the Island Yard close by
and to listen for a minute to the hammers beating some great vessel into
shape: and whilst he stands there, grave and thoughtful for a minute,
one may write here the judgment of his parents upon him, "He never
caused us a moment's anxiety in his life."

II.

When he was sixteen, on the 1st May, 1889, Tom left school, and as a
premium apprentice entered the shipyard of Messrs. Harland & Wolff. In