amuse them, and to
minister to their rather selfish whims. Some accidental remark led his
class to express a wish to visit the Zoo. Gordon at once seized the
idea, and said they should do so. He made all the arrangements as
carefully as if he were organising a campaign. His duties prevented
his going himself, but he saw them off at the station, under the
charge of his assistant, and well provided with baskets of food for
their dinner and refreshment on their journey. Of course he defrayed
the whole expense, and on their return he gave them a treat of tea and
strawberries. He also thought of their future, being most energetic in
procuring them employment, and anxious in watching their after-career.

For some reason that is not clear he called these boys his "kings." He
probably used it in the sense that they were his lieutenants, and he
borrowed his imagery from the "Wangs," or kings of the Taeping ruler.
I am told, however, that he really used the word in a spiritual sense,
testifying that these boys were as kings in the sight of God. He
followed the course of the first voyage of those who went to sea,
sticking pins in a map to show the whereabouts of their respective
vessels. It is not astonishing that his pupils should have felt for
him a special admiration and affection. He not merely supplied all
their wants, but he endeavoured to make them self-reliant, and to
raise them above the sordid and narrow conditions of the life to which
they were either born or reduced by the improvidence or misfortune of
their parents. Of course Gordon was often deceived, and his confidence
and charity abused; but these cases were, after all, the smaller
proportion of the great number that passed through his hands. He
sometimes met with gross ingratitude, like that of the boy whom he
found starving, in rags, and ill with disease, and whom he restored to
health, and perhaps to self-respect, and then sent back to his parents
in Norfolk. But neither from him nor from them did he ever receive
the briefest line of acknowledgment. Such experiences would have
disheartened or deterred other philanthropists, but they failed to
ruffle Gordon's serenity, or to discourage him in his work.

Perhaps the following incident is as characteristic as anything that
took place between Gordon and his "kings." A boy whom he had twice
fitted out for the world, but who always came to grief after a few
months' trial, returned for a third time in the evening. Go