88 Life and Letters of Francis Galton 



for ascertaining whether a man has real insight and sympathy with 

 boyish growth — any other test than a brilliant degree in classical or 

 other studies— before we appoint him to be headmaster of a school, 

 where quite unconsciously he may make one boy after another miserable ? 



1 very gravely doubt it, and because I doubt it I have quoted much 

 from Francis Galton's diary, and must now give a letter written a few 

 months later (February 22, 1837). In the interval, i.e. since the letter 

 to Adele, the Doctor had been apparently trying to treat his boys more 

 as men, but the general scope of his method remained clearly the same : 



My dear Papa, 



Thank you very irmch for your kind letter and allowing me to take 

 mathematical lessons from Mr Mason. I have come over to your opinion that Classics 

 are of the greatest use in training the mind, but I feel certain that I do rwt get on as I 

 ought to do here. But even not counting that ; there is a thing which you must own is 

 of almost equal importance witli classics, and that is extensive reading in English, both 

 History and Poets'. Now although the Dr says he approves of that kind of reading, 

 yet when he comes in in the evening and sees us reading any book besides a classical 

 one, he always says to us " Have you done your lessons 1 " Then, if we sjiy Yes, he 

 makes us say them ; then if we do know them perfectly he tells us to look over what we 

 have done before, etc. In fact although nominally he approves of it, yet really he tries 

 to put a stop to it. 



Also on thinking it over, it seems to me that 6 books of Euclid are very little for 



2 years'". Now there was one thing which I forgot to say about English reading, that 

 my time of life is the one to make the most use of hereafter, and can anj' person 

 get on anywhere without having read certainly a great deal of English 1 When I i-ead 

 now I am obliged to read undei" the table at meals, or pick up time as I can which 

 amounts to very little in the end. As for my Classics T certainly am not getting on. 

 If at Easter we are made part of the Doctor's class we shall be put back and the old 

 round of impositions and hai-d work will come again as the Dr himself has assured us 

 more than once. If we remain on the other hand in Gedge's class, I .shall keep where I 

 am. I ask you in this lettei' to i-emove [me] not because I am unhappy here, for 

 certainly we have much more liberty and are treated moi-e as men but because I feel I 

 am really not getting on. I am not going down in my class, but then my class is 



' On Dec. 14, 1836 his diary tells us that he "bought Lord Chestei-field and some 

 pomegranates." In Oct. 1837 he thanks his mother for sending him money to buy 

 Southey, but Southey being unprocurable, he had purchased Crabbe. 



- I think Francis had learnt in mathematics a good deal more than this — perhaps 

 partly with Mr Mason. Thus there are from the year 1837 fragments of algebraic 

 notes on homogeneous products and limiting ratios. On a slip of paper recording work 

 done, we have not only the 6ti) and part of the 11th books of Euclid, but Algebra 

 Part I and Part II, except cubics, biquadratics and theory of equations ; Statics and 

 velocities of bodies. Dynamics, oscillations, projectiles, etc. ; Hydrostatics and Hydraulics, 

 and a "very little Differentials." 



