68 JAMES CLERK MAXWELL. [CHAP. IV. 



when saying it, looked steadily at the actual window, 

 where, as he averred, the arrangement of the panes 

 then helped to recall the order of the words. The 

 only fear was that by changing his place in the class 

 he might be obliged to stand sideways to the window. 

 Our mathematical teacher, Mr. Gloag, was a man 

 who combined a real gift for teaching with certain 

 humorous peculiarities of tone and mariner. He was 

 sometimes impatient, but had a kind heart, and we 

 liked him all the better because we mimicked him. 1 

 Old academicians still delight in talking of him. He 

 never allowed us to miss a step in any proof, and 

 made us do many " deductions," which we puzzled 

 out entirely without help. It must have been the 

 companionship of Maxwell that made those hours so 

 delightful to me. We always walked home together, 

 and the talk was incessant, chiefly on Maxwell's side. 

 Some new train of ideas would generally begin just 

 when we reached my mother's door. He would stand 

 there holding the door handle, half in, half out, while, 



" Much like a press of people at a door 

 Thronged his inventions, which should go before," 



till voices from within complained of the cold 

 draught, and warned us that we must part. 



From some mathematical principle he would start 

 off to a joke of Martinus Scriblerus, or to a quotation 

 from Dryden, intersperping puns and other outrages 

 on language of the wildest kind, " humming and haw- 



1 He once said to a nervous boy who had crossed his legs and was 

 sitting uneasily, " Ha, booy ! are ye making baskets wi 3 your legs ?" 



