PARENTAGE AND EARLY LIFE n 



impetus. Originally it was intended that he should 

 be sent to Winchester School, but his father seeing 

 something there of which he greatly disapproved 

 when he went to inspect the school, it was determined 

 that he should be sent elsewhere. Accordingly, this 

 same year he was entered as a pupil at Bromsgrove 

 School in Worcestershire, which at that time was 

 under the head-mastership of the Rev. John Topham, 

 a most estimable clergyman of the old school. 

 Bromsgrove was one of the so-called grammar 

 schools of King Edward the Sixth. A boy edu- 

 cated there, and gifted with good abilities, had a 

 pretty certain prospect of gaining one of the scholar- 

 ships attached to the foundation, which led after- 

 wards to a fellowship at Worcester College, Oxford. 

 It was with this object in view that he entered the 

 school. Under ordinary circumstances he would 

 in all probability have obtained a scholarship 

 without difficulty, for he rose rapidly in the school, 

 winning several prizes, and ultimately gaining the 

 silver medal as being second in the school. His 

 ambition, however, was doomed to disappointment ; 

 for, as it happened, there was no vacancy in the 

 year that he left the school, nor in the two years 

 that intervened before he went to Oxford a most 

 unusual occurrence while on the very next occa- 

 sion, when it was just too late for him to compete, 

 there were no fewer than four scholars elected. 

 This was naturally a trial to him, though, being of 

 a sanguine and hopeful temperament, and always 

 looking on the bright side of things, he in nowise 



