LITE AT OXFORD. 39 



possess ; it was there I entered upon the first pursuits of study 

 that I could fully understand or enjoy ; it was there I formed the 

 first binding and eternal friendships ; in short, it was there I passed 

 the happiest days of my life. 



" I may even there have met with things to disturb me, but that 

 was seldom ; and I would, without hesitation, enter into an agree- 

 ment with Providence, that my future life should be as happy as 

 those days. I dare say I left Glasgow at the time I should have 

 left it ; my dearest companions had either gone before me, or were 

 preparing to follow me; and had I stayed another year, perhaps my 

 last best friends, Miss W. and Miss M., would not have been in 

 College buildings ; in that case I might as well have been at Japan." 



In this honest and unaffected language may be traced that power 

 of local attachment, that clothed every home he found with a sacred 

 interest, interweaving into all the dreams of his memory associa- 

 tions that recalled either some day of unalloyed joy, or some mo- 

 ments of sorrow, hallowed in memory with the " tender grace of a 

 day that is dead." 



Of his studies and manner of life at Oxford I have no very mi- 

 nute or extensive memorials. That he was a hard student is suffi- 

 ciently proved, both by the relics of his industry and by the manner 

 in which he passed his final examination. That he also tasted of 

 the pleasures and diversions open to a lively young Oxonian, pos- 

 sessed of abundant resources,* is only to say that he was a young 

 man, and lived at Oxford for three years and a half. But the gen- 

 eral impression that he led what is called a " fast life," and was not 

 a reading man, is by no means correct. His wonderful physical 

 powers gave him indeed great advantages, enabling him to overtake 

 a larger amount of work in a short time than weaker frames could 

 attempt, and to recover with rapidity the loss of hours spent in de- 

 pressing gloom or hilarious enjoyment. But with all his unaffected 

 relish for the delights of sense, his was a soul that could never 

 linger long among them, without making them " stepping-stones to 



* His father had left him an unencumbered fortune of £50,000. I find the following calculation 

 in one of his memorandum-books, apparently made soon after his coming to Oxford :— " Expenses 

 necessary for an Oxford life for five months amount to about £170 ; that doubled, to £.340; and 

 for the other two months, £50, makes £400 the very least possible." I am afraid the " neces- 

 sary" expenses turned out to be very far short of the actual. The book contains an account 

 of expenditure somewhere up to the month of October 1803, amounting to about £150, which 

 may be considered moderate. But not long after there occurs this significant note :— "I find that 1 

 cannot balance my accounts, therefore will henceforth keep only general ones." 



