FATHEE AND SONS 367 



to his own sons, here teaching, there supervising their 

 school-work ; now turning discussion on scientific and 

 serious subjects, now trying to evoke the scientific spirit by 

 encouraging collections of plants or insects. But the over- 

 mastering impulse towards science, which alone makes the 

 scientific man, was not theirs. The nearest approach to the 

 desired consummation was in the case of the elder son of 

 his second marriage (b. Dec. 14, 1877), who, as a boy, grow- 

 ing up in close touch with the father now free from official 

 ties, was moved by a sympathetic ambition to follow in his foot- 

 steps and become a botanist. His early education was shaped 

 with this end in view ; however, his ambition gradually faded 

 as he realised that it was rooted in sympathy rather than the 

 inborn scientific impulse ; and at eighteen he definitely aban- 

 doned this in favour of the idea of electrical engineering, and 

 finally; after reading Science at Cambridge, the Army. 



All the letters written to this son from his schooldays on 

 have fortunately been preserved, bound carefully into two 

 volumes under the title of ' The Lion Letters.' For in one 

 of the nursery games he used to play with the child, Hooker, 

 his beard representing a shaggy mane, enacted the part of a 

 Hon, whence their pet names for one another, the Old Lion 

 and the Little Lion, regularly used in the letters. But the 

 ' little ' lion speedily shot up to a most inappropriate height, 

 and ' Little Lion ' had to be abandoned for * young lion ' 

 or * Cub,' the latter finally winning the day. Last touch, 

 and a charming one — when the ' young Hon ' married, his 

 wife was adopted as ' lioness.' 



The note of the letters is their sane simplicity, full of the 

 affection that would keep complete touch between home and 

 school, while guiding the boy's mental growth by dwelling 

 on the things which involve observation, co-ordination of 

 thought, and accurate, attentive concentration — that ' intend- 

 ing of the mind,' as Newton called his own chief faculty — . 

 without which the quickest intelligence is ineffective. 



They record the home details which enshrine boyish interests, 

 but sttadily add something that opens a wider vista. The 

 dog and the pony are not forgotten ; but the historical associa- 



