2 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



means ; either he undertakes to revise the " biography " 

 or he does not. In the former case, he makes himself 

 responsible; in the latter, he allows the publication of 

 a mass of more or less fulsome inaccuracies for which 

 he will be held responsible by those who are familiar 

 with the prevalent art of self-advertisement. On the 

 whole, it may be better to get over the " burlesque of 

 being employed in this manner " and do the thing him- 

 self. 



It was by reflections of this kind that, some years 

 ago, I was led to write and permit the publication of 

 the subjoined sketch. 



I was born about eight o'clock in the morning on 

 the 4th of May, 1825, at Baling, which was, at that 

 time, as quiet a little country village as could be found 

 within a half-a-dozen miles of Hyde Park Corner. 

 Now it is a suburb of London with, I believe, 30,000 

 inhabitants. My father was one of the masters in a 

 large semi-public school which at one time had a high 

 reputation. I am not aware that any portents preceded 

 my arrival in this world, but, in my childhood, I re- 

 member hearing a traditional account of the manner 

 in which I lost the chance of an endowment of great 

 practical value. The windows of my mother's room 

 were open, in consequence of the unusual warmth of 

 the weather. For the same reason, probably, a neigh- 

 bouring beehive had swarmed, and the new colony, 

 pitching on the window-sill, was making its way into 

 the room when the horrified nurse shut down the sash. 

 If that well-meaning woman had only abstained from 

 her ill-timed interference, the swarm might have settled 

 on my lips, and I should have been endowed with that 

 mellifluous eloquence which, in this country, leads far 



