fresh springiness into our tired legs by his graphic stories, or vigorous recitations. And so, instead of dropping on the road, we accomplished our 40 miles' walk, and reached home quite lively. He was very fond of architecture and could sketch quickly, with a light and effective touch; and as he always read up the history and antiquities of the places or churches we visited, he was an admirable guide and companion. It was while still at School that he laid the foundation of his remarkable knowledge of Liturgies and Church Ritual; studies that he pursued con amore; for with a spirit of devotion and reverence, he united a love of order and dignity in Ceremonial: and it was a thoroughly characteristic answer that he gave to a friend who asked him "What he would like to be." "I should like to be a Canon, and recite the daily offices in my Cathedral." His entire freedom from affectation or self-consciousness, his modesty and courtesy and consideration for others, with his constant high standard of thought and conduct, and his winning smile and sympathetic manner, secured him great influence and esteem amongst all his schoolfellows. As an illustration of the effect produced on others by the simple dignity and graciousness of his manner, a leading Physician of the Midland Counties who had invited Benson with other schoolfellows to keep his son's birthday, ventured a prophecy as he pointed at Benson-" that boy is a born courtier, and he will prove it later on." But it was not this feature that impressed his companions, though they never had a doubt that a brilliant future awaited him; it was the feeling that there was in him something higher, purer, more spiritual than they could realise elsewhere, which made us all feel while with him that we could live a better life, frame fairer ideals, and feel more able to carry them into practice than at other times. A schoolfellow met us one morning on our way down to First Lesson,-"And how is the Bensonian Etheriality?" he said. The euphuistic affectation was absurd: but I have often since thought it conveyed a striking truth: for indeed he seemed to live in a refined pellucid atmosphere. "Whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely," were the objects that he set before him, and exemplified by thought and word and deed. The Rev. R. M. Moorsom, another schoolfellow, writes: He did not play at cricket or football or racquets or fives or even hockey, nor at rounders and cloisters-cricket, except very rarely; and as he had pluck and enthusiasm we often wondered why he did not join in our games. But gradually a vague unexpressed idea arose in our minds that he had to begin the struggle of life earlier than the rest of us, that his father being dead he had to prepare early to work for the support of his mother and sisters and crippled brother, and that he was even then putting away the pleasures of life and at its outset choosing its duties rather than its enjoyments. So we honoured him, though he could not throw away halfcrowns on amusements, or spend his afternoons in games with us; he had to fill his father's works again with machinery and workmen; that was his youthful ambition, and we thought him a nobler fellow than ourselves for turning away from what delighted us and choosing what would aid his family; and we respected him greatly. Even when at school he was a keen Churchman; he astonished us by the energy with which he spoke of the crime of plundering the Church in the sixteenth century, of the cruelties inflicted on the monks, and of the just vengeance of God in punishing those families who still held to their sacrilege and their booty. He would glory in the thought that he was being educated in a Church school founded with Church money, by wise Churchmen who had rescued Church property from the greedy hands of the King. I subjoin one of my father's early letters, written when he was nearly fifteen. To his Mother: on a visit to Mrs William Sidgwick, MY DEAR MAMA, his great-aunt. SKIPTON CASTLE. I arrived in Manchester on Tuesday morning without any very serious accident; the utmost damage I sustained was breaking the egg in my coat pocket, and getting my fingers well bedaubed. There were many things that struck me as I passed them, but I have forgotten them all, for railway travelling is to me just like dreaming. The only things I remember are Stafford Station, and Stafford Castle "Bosom'd high 'mid tufted trees." B. I. 3 When I got to Manchester I waited some time for my uncle, but as he did not come, I got a ticket porter and went to his office. When I came there he was not in, so I walked into his sittingroom, took a book, sat me down and looked at the pictures,-as for reading it was impossible to attempt it, for all the letters ran over the edge of the book like the milestones on the railroad. About 12 o'clock my uncle' came in and said I had told him the wrong time for the arrival of the train, and that I had kept him waiting above an hour! Then he took me to see the town, we went pretty near all over it, and he took me to the Athenaeum and set my name down. Then we went home again and had dinner. I do not like Manchester; the buildings are nasty, though handsome, and the streets are too clean to be comfortable. A Mr Lodge dined with us, "a youngish man, rather handsome -tall-good business-several thousands"-so said my uncle. After dinner Mr Lodge and my uncle wanted to have some talk, and I went to the Athenaeum, and read Martin Chuzzlewit, last number. I then went back to the office, and went with my uncle to tea with Mr John Wilson, a calico printer. He has a beautiful house about four miles out of town. We had a very good tea in cups about as big as a milk basin, almost put my head in them— not quite though--he showed us a most beautiful collection of Italian pictures, all except one or two on disagreeable subjectsfor instance, Apollo flaying Marsyas, he is stripping the skin from his arm, and thrusting his fist in to make it come off more easily -nice idea that! We left Mr Wilson's at about 10 o'clock, went home, went to bed, went to sleep, but awoke with a start, thinking that the bed ran against Stafford Castle and made my nose bleed. My uncle wanted me very much to stay another day, to see the flower show, but I was afraid my aunt might not like it, so I did not. I went by the mail at seven o'clock next morning,—I never enjoyed a ride more in my life. I must tell you about it some time. By the bye, I almost forgot to tell you, but all the way in the railroad, I could not help thinking of a text in Isaiah, "Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain shall be brought low, and the crooked shall be made straight, etc." When I came to Skipton I gave the guard and coachman a shilling between them, at which they grumbled very much, and assured me it was not enough. The footman met me there and 1 Mr, afterwards Sir Thomas Baker. carried my bag for me. The Castle was about a quarter of the size I expected, "I looked, I stared, etc." "So narrow seemed the towers, the court so small." Wordsworth-Hem!-My cousins were none of them at home, but my Aunt was walking in the Castle Yard. She was very glad to see me. I am so tired with pleasure, I don't know what to do. My Aunt is not at all strict, except that I am obliged to eat bread and butter with a knife and fork. Mr Robert Sidgwick is come home, he is just like my papa in manners, voice and everything. I remain, my dear Mama, Your affectionate son, E. W. BENSON. CHAPTER II. SCHOOL LIFE. "Tela manu jam tum tenera puerilia torsit." VIRGIL. THE influences under which my father's life were moulded were, I have shown, very various, and singularly favourable to the production of an independent and affectionate disposition. There was first the piety of his father's character, a piety broadened by intimate acquaintance with matters scientific. Then he had a very affectionate and cultivated home circle, full of interest in books and art; but at the same time there was no kind of luxury, indeed, the bracing discipline of poverty-not the poverty which degrades, but the poverty which condemns the unnecessary and is strict with itself. On the other hand he had plenty of genial social influences in his numerous visits to the friendly country houses of his various cousins and relations at Skipton and the neighbourhood. Lastly he was under the influence of a profoundly stimulating teacher, who exercised a personal fascination on his pupils both in the direction of literary taste and religious feeling. From Lee he caught the sacred fire, the desire of knowledge; the belief that while it is the imperative duty of every man to do, it is no less imperative, in order to make doing effective, to know. Then too he was surrounded by an equally |