OF ROBERT LESLIE ELLIS. xiii 



exerted his mind upon the subjects to which it was directed 

 in a manner by no means usual. 



He was never at school, but had the advantage of two 

 tutors at Bath, one in classics, the other in mathematics 1 . He 

 worked for them with great earnestness, and I find from his 

 own memoranda, that in the year 1827, when he was about ten 

 years old, he was doing equations, and reading Xenophon and 

 Virgil, besides giving some attention to French and drawing. 

 These same memoranda shew that at this time, in addition to 

 his ordinary work with his tutors, he was reading books not 

 usually read by boys at such an age, Cuvier's Theory of the Earth, 

 The Edinburgh Journal of Science, The Edinburgh Review, &c. 



One remark which is suggested by the boyish records left 

 behind him is, that it is clear that from an early age Ellis had 

 an extreme delight in knowledge for its own sake : he had not 

 the ordinary stimulus of school emulation, indeed he was singu- 

 larly free from the influence of competition until his college 

 days : but it is manifest, from his own account, that his pro- 

 gress in knowledge, and perhaps especially in mathematical 

 knowledge, was a source of very keen delight. 



In 1829, that is, when twelve years old, he began to read 

 Mechanics. In the early part of 1830 he commenced the Dif- 

 ferential Calculus; from which he rapidly proceeded to the 

 Integral Calculus; and towards the middle of the year he 

 speaks of being engaged with his tutor in finding the lengths 

 and areas of curves. 



Meanwhile his general reading, for which he was dependent 

 upon his father's library and upon that of the Bath Institution, 

 was most multifarious; but each particular subject seems to 

 have been carefully studied, and an opinion formed upon it. 



Thus his education proceeded quietly and also rapidly under 

 his father and private tutors for several years. 



1 His mathematical tutor was Mr T. S. Davies, afterwards of Woolwich ; his 

 classical, Mr H. A. S. Johnstone. 



b 



