om Windsor in a coach
and six, two post-horses and their own four; of the house full of
visitors, the great roasts at the fire, the tables in the servants' hall
laid for thirty or forty for a month together: of the daily press of
neighbours, many of whom, Frewens, Lords, Bishops, Batchellors, and
Dynes, were also kinsfolk: and the parties "under the great spreading
chestnuts of the old fore court," where the young people danced and made
merry to the music of the village band. Or perhaps, in the depth of
winter, the father would bid young Charles saddle his pony; they would
ride the thirty miles from Northiam to Stowting, with the snow to the
pony's saddle-girths, and be received by the tenants like princes.

This life of delights, with the continual visible comings and goings of
the golden aunt, was well qualified to relax the fibre of the lads. John
the heir, a yeoman and a fox-hunter, "loud and notorious with his whip
and spurs," settled down into a kind of Tony Lumpkin, waiting for the
shoes of his father and his aunt. Thomas Frewen, the youngest, is
briefly dismissed as "a handsome beau"; but he had the merit or the good
fortune to become a doctor of medicine, so that when the crash came he
was not empty-handed for the war of life. Charles, at the day-school of
Northiam, grew so well acquainted with the rod that his floggings became
matter of pleasantry and reached the ears of Admiral Buckner. Hereupon
that tall, rough-voiced formidable uncle entered with the lad into a
covenant; every time that Charles was thrashed he was to pay the Admiral
a penny; every day that he escaped, the process was to be reversed. "I
recollect," writes Charles, "going crying to my mother to be taken to
the Admiral to pay my debt." It would seem by these terms the
speculation was a losing one; yet it is probable it paid indirectly by
bringing the boy under remark. The Admiral was no enemy to dunces; he
loved courage, and Charles, while yet little more than a baby, would
ride the great horse into the pond. Presently it was decided that here
was the stuff of a fine sailor; and at an early period the name of
Charles Jenkin was entered on a ship's books.

From Northiam he was sent to another school at Boonshill, near Rye,
where the master took "infinite delight" in strapping him. "It keeps me
warm and makes you grow," he used to say. And the stripes were not
altogether wasted, for the dunce, though still very "raw," made progress
with his stu