8 AUTOBIOGBAPHT. [Ch. n. 



I remember clearly only one other incident during this year 

 whilst at Mr. Case's daily school, — namely, the burial of a 

 dragoon soldier ; and it is surprising how clearly I can still 

 see the horse with the man's empty boots and carbine sus- 

 pended to the saddle, and the firing over the grave. This 

 scene deeply stirred whatever poetic fancy there was in me.* 



In the summer of 1818 I went to Dr. Butler's great school in 

 Shrewsbury, and remained there for seven years till Mid- 

 summer 1825, when I was sixteen years old. I boarded at this 

 school, so that I had the great advantage of living the life of a 

 true schoolboy ; but as the distance was hardly more than a 

 mile to my home, I very often ran there in the longer intervals 

 between the callings over and before locking up at night. 

 This, I think, was in many ways advantageous to me by 

 keeping up home affections and interests. I remember in the 

 early part of my school life that I often had to run very quickly 

 to be in time, and from being a fleet runner was generally 

 successful ; but when in doubt I prayed earnestly to God to 

 help me, and I well remember that I attributed my success to 

 the prayers and not to my quick running, and marvelled how 

 generally I was aided. 



I have heard my father and elder sister say that I had, as a 

 very young boy, a strong taste for long solitary walks ; but 

 what I thought about I know not. I often became quite 

 absorbed, and once, whilst returning to school on the summit 

 of the old fortifications round Shrewsbury, which had been 

 converted into a public foot-path with no parapet on one side, 

 I walked off and fell to the ground, but the height was only 

 seven or eight feet. Nevertheless, the number of thoughts 

 which passed through my mind during this very short, but 

 sudden and wholly unexpected fall, was astonishing, and seem 

 hardly compatible with what physiologists have, I believe, 

 proved about each thought requiring quite an appreciable 

 amount of time. 



Nothing could have been worse for the development of my 

 mind than Dr. 'Butler's school, as it was strictly classical, 

 nothing else being taught, except a little ancient geography 

 and history. The school as a means of education to me was 



* It is curious that another Shrewsbury boy should have been impressed 

 by this military funeral ; Mr. Gretton, in his Memory's Harhback, says that 

 the scene is so strongly impressed on his mind that he could " walk 

 straight to the spot in St. Chad's churchyard where the poor fellow was 

 buried." The soldier was an Inniskilling Dragoon, and. the officer in 

 command had been recently wounded at Waterloo, where his corps did 

 good service against the French Cuirassiers. 



