Howard was silent for some minutes, and then said, "I will speak to your governor, for I think it is a great pity for a young fellow like you to waste his time in the country till he is too old to do anything; and as our governors were cronies, I may, perhaps, take the liberty of talking to him."

It must have been on that evening, after I had gone to bed, that Howard broached the subject to my father; for on the following morning my father took me into the library, and, shutting the door carefully, as though what he was going to say was a great secret, said, "Howard tells me you are very anxious to be an engineer officer, and have talked to him about it. Now I have no wish to part with you, but if you think you would like such a profession, I will do what I can for you. It is a most gentlemanly profession, admits you to good society, enables you to see the world, and you may make your name known as a clever man. Young Howard is a good example for you. He carried off several prizes at Woolwich, and has always been considered a most promising young man, and he thinks you could not do better than go into the Engineers. You will have to work hard for a year or two, but with what you know already you will soon pick up all that is required, and your knowledge of natural history will no doubt help you on and bring you into notice. So if you think it will suit you I will apply for an appointment to the Academy."

On the day following this conversation, Howard left us for a farm-house some eight miles distant, and on the day after his departure my father sent a letter to the Master-General of the Ordnance, asking for an appointment for me to the Academy, and stating that I was clever, and a good naturalist.

By return of post a letter was received, the opening of which I awaited with intense anxiety. It was a long rectangular doc.u.ment, with "O.H.M.

Service" on the outside; the contents were brief but most decisive. In answer to the application, the Master-General regretted that there was no prospect of a vacancy at the Royal Military Academy before I had pa.s.sed the age for admission.

A shade of disappointment only pa.s.sed across my father's face as he read this letter, but to me it was a shock that seemed to render my future a blank. I had so set my heart on being an engineer officer, like Howard, that I had thought of nothing else for the past four or five days and nights. My usual amus.e.m.e.nts had become distasteful, and been neglected; the fire of ambition had entered my mind, and repose was no longer attainable. Castles in the air had been built, and seemed to me substantial edifices; and now to find all my hopes thus cruelly crushed was a blow I could not support. I tried my best to bear up, but I felt broken-hearted. I instantly thought of Howard; might he not help me?

He was so clever, and so acquainted with everything, that perhaps he might tell my father what to do. I must find Howard and let him know what had happened; so, soon after breakfast, I started for a long walk to that part of the forest where I hoped to find him. I was in luck that day, for I came on Howard as he was going to his work, told him of the disappointment I had just experienced, and asked him if there was no remedy. He smiled at my eagerness, and said, "Never despair, I will see what can be done. I have a relative in the Cabinet, and he may manage the affair for you; but, really now, it takes as much interest to get a nomination for Woolwich as it does to make a curate a bishop; but I will write about it, and if I get you a nomination you must do me credit, and pa.s.s all your examinations well."

A week pa.s.sed after this interview, and I saw nothing of Howard; each day as the post came in I looked anxiously for a letter, but none came, and I at length lost all hope. I had told my father what Howard had said, but he smiled at my sanguine hopes, and told me it was unfortunate, and could not be helped; but there really was no chance of success, as he had ascertained that nearly every nomination for Woolwich was given either through parliamentary interest, or to the sons of distinguished military officers.

On the eighth day, however, an official letter was left by the postman at our lodge. My father opened it with eagerness, and scanned its contents before reading it to us. He then said, "Bob, I congratulate you; listen to this:--

"'I have the honour to inform you that the Master-General of the Ordnance has granted a nomination to the Royal Military Academy to your son, Robert Shepard, and I am directed to state that he may present himself at the Academy at the next examination in February. I enclose papers, etc.'"

I jumped from my chair, gave my father a hug, exchanged kisses with my two sisters and aunt, and performed various extraordinary capers about the room. In imagination I was already an officer, a traveller, a lion-slayer, and very much what Howard appeared to me. Of the th.o.r.n.y path between me and the position I aspired to I knew nothing. I saw the prize only, and little knew what I had to pa.s.s through ere I reached it.

If I could have seen the life I should lead during the next three years I doubt whether my ambition would not instantly have been extinguished; and I should have remained a dreamy forest boy, and grown up to the position of a country gentleman of moderate means and somewhat limited abilities.

On that morning there was joy in our house; my father was pleased at the success of what he supposed was his application, and because he saw I was pleased. My sisters were pleased at the prospect of having a brother a soldier; and my aunt was, I think, gratified because of late she had lost much of the control over me, which she had wielded when I was a mere child, and did not now care to have me in the house.

When the first excitement of the intelligence was over, my father took me into the library to talk over the papers he had read, relative to the examination.

"There is Euclid," he said; "three books you will have to take up. That you'll soon learn, because your mind is fresh and has not been crammed like other boys at your age. Then there is arithmetic,--that of course you know; and algebra up to quadratic equations; this you will soon pick up. I remember at Cambridge I soon learnt all these things. History and geography you were always fond of, and, of course, there is nothing to learn there. French and German, too, you can pick up a smattering of--enough to pa.s.s an examination--and I fancy your knowledge of natural history will help to make you stand well at an examination. To February is five months, so there is no hurry, and if you go steadily on you ought to pa.s.s well. Perhaps, if I get a tutor to come over from Southampton twice a week, we might manage it well."

I knew nothing about examinations, or the difficulty of the subjects I was expected to learn, and so could offer no remarks, and could only acquiesce in my father's suggestion, and should probably have dreamed on a few months longer had not Howard that afternoon called at our lodge, to congratulate us on the receipt of the nomination which, he said, he had heard of that morning. He took but little credit to himself for what he had done; but I felt certain then, and I ascertained afterwards, that it was entirely due to his interest that I obtained my nomination.

Upon hearing what was proposed to be done in preparing me for the examination, he a.s.sured us that it would be impossible for me to qualify by February, even if I went to the best cram-school at Woolwich; but to have a tutor twice a week would be useless. He impressed on my father the necessity for getting my examination postponed till February twelvemonth--the last date that my age would admit of--and recommended that I should at once be sent to Mr Hostler, the best cram-school at Woolwich, who would prepare me if any one could.

The high opinion which my father entertained of Howard caused him not only to listen to, but to act on, this advice; and it was decided that on the Monday week following my father was to start with me for Woolwich, and leave me in charge of Mr Hostler, to be prepared for the Royal Engineers, and for the examination on the February twelvemonth from that date.

CHAPTER THREE.

A CRAM-SCHOOL AT WOOLWICH FORTY YEARS AGO.

In the days to which this tale refers, railways did not exist; it was therefore by the Salisbury coach that I travelled with my father to London. I will pa.s.s over my wonder and surprise at the size and crowds of London, and of the scenes that presented themselves to me as I for the first time drove through the metropolis. Steam-vessels were then novelties, and it was by a steam-vessel that we journeyed from London Bridge to Woolwich, and were deposited in the lower part of that dirty town, from whence a cab conveyed us to the school-house of Mr Hostler at the early hour of eleven a.m. As, from what I was able to gather at the time, Mr Hostler's was a fair specimen of the Woolwich cram-schools forty years ago, this establishment and the life I led there will be somewhat fully described. After long years of roughing it in various parts of the world, the early impressions of that school are fresh in my memory. Coming as I did to that school, fresh from a quiet country home, where I had led the quietest of lives--where a slap from my aunt was the greatest evil that ever happened to me--where politeness and consideration for others was instilled into me by my father as the essential attribute of a gentleman--I was ill-prepared for Mr Hostler's school, where a somewhat different tone prevailed.

On arriving at Mr Hostler's, we were shown into a comfortably-furnished but small room, and were informed that Mr Hostler would come very soon.

After about five minutes the door opened, and a short, broad, dark man entered. His eyes were dark and piercing, and his aquiline nose gave him, to my mind, the appearance of a hawk. Without a moment's hesitation he said, "How do you do, Mr Shepard? Lucky to get a nomination for your boy, and lucky I've got room for him. Another day and you'd have been too late." Mr Hostler turned his hawk-like eyes on me and said, "You don't look well: are you ill?"

"No, thank you; I'm a little tired--that's all."

"He's for the Academy?" said Mr Hostler to my father.

"Yes, for the Royal Engineers."

"Ah! you must work hard, and we'll make something of you here, you may depend. I think, Mr Shepard, I'd better take him at once, and show him in the school. 'Go to harness at once' is my motto."

Before I had quite realised my position, I had bid my father good-bye, had cast a longing look after him, and felt a choking feeling in my throat, and a sensation of utter loneliness came over me as I knew I was alone, without a friend near.

Mr Hostler took a long look at me, and then, in quite a different tone to that in which he had spoken to my father, said,--

"Come along, youngster. You are like a young bear, I see; all your trouble's to come. You've a lot before you, I can tell you."

I followed Mr Hostler out of the room, down about half-a-dozen steps, and into a courtyard, where I heard a noise of voices making so great a din that it was impossible to distinguish the words. These sounds came from a long building on the left, to which Mr Hostler led me. He opened a door and pushed me in before him, when I saw one of the most extraordinary sights that I had ever witnessed.

In the room were a number of tables, at which were sitting about fifty boys in about five rows. The majority of these boys were swinging backwards and forwards, like pendulums the wrong end uppermost; others had their hands pressed over their ears, and their heads bent down over a book; the whole of them were repeating words or sentences, portions of which only were audible amidst the deafening din.

In after years, when I have stood at night near a tropical swamp, and have listened to the deafening noise of a thousand bull-frogs, I have always had recalled to me my first visit to the schoolroom of Mr Hostler's cram-school at Woolwich.

Upon our entering the schoolroom several boys looked up from their books, and the noise for an instant decreased; then, from the far end of the room, a shrill voice exclaimed, "Because the triangle ABC is similar to the triangle DEF, therefore the side AB is to the side DE." Then a chorus of voices drowned the first voice, and again the uproar proceeded.

"Stop a minute, boys!" said Mr Hostler in a loud voice. "Here's a new boy--Shepard's his name. He's going into the Royal Engineers. I say, Beck, you look out, or he'll beat you!"

As this speech was made to the whole school, I made a bow--such a one as my father had taught me to make to a lady. A t.i.tter ran round the various tables as I did so, and I distinctly saw one boy make a grimace at me.

"Here, Monk," said Mr Hostler; "you take Shepard; set him his Euclid, and see what he knows in Swat."

The person addressed was a hard-featured man, with a surly look about him, who, handing me a book, said,--

"What do you know?"

"No Euclid," I replied.

"Don't know any Euclid? Why, how old are you?"

"Nearly fifteen," I replied.

"Oh I nearly fifteen and don't know any Euclid! and you're going to be an engineer?"

"Yes," I replied; "I'm going to be an engineer."

"Don't you wish you may get it?" said Mr Monk. "Now learn these definitions," he continued, "and let's see what you can do."

The book now placed before me was the mysterious Euclid, my first acquaintance with which I was now to make. I looked at the first sentence under the definitions, and thought I had never seen a more extraordinary statement than that there made,--

"A point is that which has no parts and no magnitude."

I read this over two or three times, but each time I read it and thought over it the statement seemed more and more curious. On looking further down the page, I saw that "a line was length without breadth," which seemed to me quite a mistake; for, however thin a line might appear to the naked eye, yet I knew, from my experience with the microscope in connexion with natural history, that the thinnest spider's web always showed some breadth when it was looked at through a microscope. It occurred to me that, amidst the noise and confusion that went on in this school, it was possible that the fact of looking at a line through a microscope had never been thought of by any one; and as I felt quite certain that it was impossible that a line could exist without breadth, I determined to point this out to Mr Monk.

Watching for an opportunity to catch his eye, I half rose from my seat as I saw him looking at me. He immediately came to where I was sitting, and said,--

"What's the matter? You've only your definitions to learn; can't you understand them?"

"Not quite," I said; "but I think this about a line having no breadth is wrong; for, however thin a line may appear, it looks thick if you bring a microscope to see it through."

As soon as I commenced speaking to Mr Monk, the boys at the table ceased their sing-song noise and listened to what I was saying. There was a look of astonishment in their faces as I spoke, which quickly changed to a broad grin when they heard what I said; and when Mr Monk said in a sarcastic tone, "Oh, you've found that Euclid's wrong, eh? and that we are all a pack of fools? Now, you just learn three more definitions for your cheek, you young puppy?" the boys actually roared with laughter.