as the custom
then at this very excellent foundation to give mainly a classical
education, and doubtless I attained a very fair proficiency in my
studies. Had I cultivated them, however, with the same assiduity as
I did many of my pursuits in after-life, I might have attained some
eminence as a professor of the dead languages, and arrived at the
dignity of one of the masters of Bedford.

However, if I had any ambition at that time, it was not to become a
professor of dead languages, but to see what I could make of my own.
It is of no interest to any one that I had great numbers of peg-tops
and marbles, or learnt to be a pretty good swimmer in the Ouse. There
was a greater swim prepared for me in after-life, and that is the only
reason for my referring to it.

In the year 1830 Bedford Schoolhouse occupied the whole of one side of
St. Paul's Square, which faced the High Street. From that part of the
building you commanded a view of the square and the beautiful country
around. The sleepy old bridge spanned the still more sleepy river,
over which lay the quiet road leading to the little village of
Willshampstead, and it came along through the old square where the
schoolhouse was.

It was market day in Bedford, and there was the usual concourse of
buyers and sellers, tramps and country people in their Sunday gear;
farmers and their wives, with itinerant venders of every saleable and
unsaleable article from far and near.

I was in the upper schoolroom with another boy, and, looking out of
the window, had an opportunity of watching all that took place for a
considerable space. There was a good deal of merriment to divert our
attention, for there were clowns and merry-andrews passing along the
highroad, with singlestick players, Punch and Judy shows, and other
public amusers. Every one knows that the smallest event in the country
will cause a good deal of excitement, even if it be so small an
occurrence as a runaway horse.

There was, however, no runaway horse to-day; but suddenly a great
silence came over the people, and a sullen gloom that made a great
despondency in my mind without my knowing why. Public solemnity
affects even the youngest of us. At all events, it affected me.

Presently--and deeply is the event impressed on my mind after seventy
years of a busy life, full of almost every conceivable event--I saw,
emerging from a bystreet that led from Bedford Jail, and coming along
through the square and near the wi