MARLBOROUGH COLLEGE. 9 



means to say, " that man's greatest enemy is man," or, in other 

 words, that the proverb, " Hawks don't pick out hawks' eyes," 

 cannot be appUed to boys. 



It is all very well for the poet to exclaim : — 



" How I love the festive boy 

 With his tripping dance of joy." 



but the ordinary small schoolboy is not regarded with much favour 

 by outside mortals bigger than himself. The old Hanuman monkeys 

 of India, are said to kill the youthful males, whenever they can 

 catch them ; and I have little doubt the lads of the Lower School 

 would soon have shared a similar fate, had they not been protected 

 by the law. This opinion was subsequently confirmed by a poem, 

 composed in Greek, by a forward boy of the Upper School, and which 

 was shouted out amid uproarious mirth by all who were sufficiently 

 advanced in learning. It was known as " The Doctor's war-song 

 over the Lower School bugs," and although I knew very well its 

 import, I could only catch the refrain, which sounded like — "Zeus, 

 Zeus, katakteine astrapo!" Which seems to mean, that as the big 

 fellows dare not polish us off themselves, an urgent appeal was 

 made to Jupiter, to " do the needful," and exterminate us, bag and 

 baggage, with his thunder-bolts. 



Two lads who were present in the wilderness attracted my 

 particular attention. Indeed, they formed the cynosure of all. One 

 was the only boy in the school who possessed those fearful appen- 

 dages to the human face, called whiskers, which in those days 

 excited general admiration, and were supposed to make the wearer 

 irresistible to the other sex. In my Liliputian eyes, he appeared 

 tall as the tree which stands before my window now, but as I find 

 its height is more than thirteen feet, he could hardly have been so 

 tall as that. This lad, on referring to the College register, I find 

 has long since been dead ; but the other, a graceful lad, also of 

 monstrous height, is now Ambassador at Washington. I never 

 heard his name mentioned except in praise, so there seems no harm 



