would exhibit a pleasing image to picture the delicate stripling strolling through the Green with the friends of his after life, and shadowing forth a dim outline of his ideal Cato, as the page of Lucan had warmed into a Roman glow that innate love of liberty, which never deserted him to the last. The future statesman and bard without doubt drew his first principles of policy and poetry from the torn and bethumbed copies of Cicero and Thucydides, of Homer and Virgil, which, the lesson over, were scattered to the chance of a school-room riot." "But the essayist and the critic," suggested the Preacher, "derived all his light from within; it was no false glare from the pompous diction of Longinus, the pedantry of Dionysius, or the twaddle of Aulus Gellius that lit up the electric spark over a new region of literature, perhaps more interesting and inexhaustible than any of the fresh-discovered fairy lands of modern times. His critiques upon Milton and Chevy Chase, and his papers on the Imagination, are not only valuable beyond price in themselves, but will be ever hailed by the literary patriot as the first emancipation from the thraldom of the pomp of system and severity of science' in criticism, which it was reserved for the present age to appreciate in its full and perfect liberty.' "And what dark day," exclaimed the Guest, "shall obliterate the memory of Sir Roger de Coverly?” "To us then especially," concluded the Schoolmaster, "it belongs, giving its own glory to each school, to claim as Carthusians the honour of giving birth to the English Essayists. If with the Tatler, Spectator, and Guardian, the name of Addison and, though longo proximus intervallo, that of Steele are inseparably joined, some portion of their glory must at least redound to the honour of that school which ranks them among her worthiest sons." "Nor have we wanted," said the Registrar, "great men in the severer studies of life, who not only hence derived their education, but gladly returned to testify their gratitude when their names were high enough in the world to give weight and consequence to their predilections. To instance the law only. I well remember when a boy at school, that Oration never passed without the presence of Blackstone: and we all know that Ellenborough not only returned to us as a Governor, but so lovingly did he hold the memory of Thomas Sutton, that even 'in death they were not divided.'” "And we may hope," said the Preacher, "that the spirits of those good men departed still hover over our domain, to kindle up in her present sons an honourable rivalry of the glories of by-gone days. You know the words of a Carthusian poet, Haply in Chartreuse's consecrated shades With hallow'd influence, her cloistered cell." As the voice of the last speaker dropped at the closing words, his hearers, surprised into sensibility by a quotation so little expected, allowed themselves to be carried away by the train of thought which the lines just uttered suggested. There was a pause of several minutes. Each seemed to be carrying back his thoughts within himself to the same period of his early years; and the change of expression which passed over the features of each, as the smile which ever and anon played upon the lips waned into a more sorrowful expression, or, brightening up for an instant into a vivid illumination of the whole countenance, ended in the all-but outpoured tear, seemed to show the chequered nature of the scenes round which their recollections were straying. It was a tacit understanding of the affections which no one seemed inclined to disturb. They paused.The silence became painful; till the same sympathy which had hushed their voices at once awoke them all, and the idea, varied in expression but conceived the same, broke forth from all in common, and almost at the same moment. "How many a curious history would Tales of the Charterhouse embrace!" 66 If every one," suggested the Guest, (developing the thought which had shadowed itself in the mind of each,) "selecting from his store some record of his schoolfellows which he best remembered, or the most striking circumstance which has fallen under his notice as an officer of this House, would repeat the plain and unvarnished tale, you might beguile the evening fireside with many a story, which, though perhaps not stirring enough for the world, would carry a domestic interest at least to the bosom of every Carthusian." The proposal obtained at once general approval, and each eagerly pressed upon the Stranger the duty of following up his advice by his example. "Another day, when further acquaintance shall have better established my claim to your attention, I shall be happy if I can show you that the East still furnishes its moving incidents, which, if less wonderful, are yet not wholly unworthy of the Thousand and One, and the ear of the great Caliph Haroun Al Rashid; but in your own house I must look to one of you to begin." Many were the compliments, and great the modesty of the assembled party; at length precedence, which is generally accompanied with its onus as well as honour, devolved the task of commencing on the Preacher. "As you have taken me by surprise you must not expect much plot in my narration, but such particulars as I can remember of two of the most talented among my schoolfellows, in some measure also connected with my calling, I will gladly impart. Let us fill our glasses to Domus,' and then shall commence "Hawkhurst and 'old' Townshend used to sit next to one another in Raine's sixth form, and they were known as the Damon and Pythias of the Upper School. The first day that I showed my face in the Green as an under boy, I well remember seeing them together on the Terrace-now, alas! no more-that ran along the east side of the Green, and never shall I forget the impression that their two handsome faces and princely bearing made upon me. (And who more a prince in his own and his fellows' estimation than the sixth-form boy of a public school on the eve of launching into his college life?) Never afterwards in the school were there any boys half as good-looking, as tall, as strong, as well dressed, as commanding as they; and years after the thread of my story begins was Hawkhurst's name handed down, magnified doubtlessly by the lenses of tradition, as something infinitely beyond the imitation of the degenerate races that followed. If some adventurous youth had ' tibbed out,' and come back with his head and tongue full of Miss Melon's attractions, Hawkhurst had been three nights running behind the scenes, and gone upon the stage at the banquet of Macbeth on Mrs. Siddons's benefit. If Ashley had 'chevied' a cat over the wall, and cut it over on the other side, yet Hawkhurst had kept a kennel of foxes, and a cry of hounds to hunt in the Wilderness. If Hawkins had had a blow up with a jarvey, Hawkhurst had thrashed three, and a waterman to boot, the same evening. Whatever indeed the most daring of after times could achieve or relate, there was sure to be some story of Hawkhurst which utterly extinguished all the aspiring hopes of the modern hero. In truth he was a fellow bold and intelligent beyond his years; and though he could not have been eighteen when I first knew him, he might have passed from his looks and manner for full two years older. 'Old' Townshend, — Frank Townshend I must call him here,-was next above Hawkhurst in the school; he had more 'spirit,' Hawkhurst more 'pluck.' Townshend would defend a weak upper boy, Hawkhurst would thrash a fellow twice his size in the form above him; the one was more loved, the other more popular. Townshend was the best cricketer of his day, bowler, bat, and field. Hawkhurst played seldom, and then he only 'swiped;' and either was out because he knocked down his wickets, or knocked down his wickets because he was out. Townshend had more talent, Hawkhurst more genius; Townshend did the best verses, Hawkhurst the quickest; the one helped his fag in his verses, the other did them for him. "But Hawkhurst had suffered disadvantages in education which his schoolfellow had not. He was the second son of an old Kentish baronet, whose extravagance and other less creditable excesses had driven him, when his boy was hardly ten years old, to an unsettled life on the Continent; he lost his wife at Venice |