xx MEMOIR 



carrs, over which he often shot while on these York- 

 shire visits, and his appreciation of the canny sense 

 and dry humour of the Yorkshire people, are shown 

 in "Wild England" and the "Nights with an Old 

 Gunner." These, too, give some hint of his knowledge 

 of the West Riding dialect, one of the many local 

 " tongues " for which he possessed an extraordinary 

 aptitude. He could faultlessly render or interpret 

 the local intonations of Norfolk, Suffolk, Berkshire, 

 Yorkshire, Devonshire, and Cumberland ; and his 

 unusual abilities in this direction may partly have 

 accounted for his power of quickly gaining the con- 

 fidence and liking of all sorts and conditions of men ; 

 whereby he acquired many odds and ends of local 

 knowledge which would never have reached a man 

 of less flexible and sympathetic temperament. 



He remained with his first pupil for four and a half 

 years, when the latter went to Eton and he himself 

 to Oxford. There he took a scholarship at Hert- 

 ford College, and subsequently his tutor recom- 

 mended him for an exhibition that was in the gift 

 of the Principal. With this help, together with his 

 savings and the remuneration for extra teaching under- 

 taken during the vacations and in his " grace terms," 

 he was able to complete his University course entirely 

 at his own expense. He had, of course, gone up a few 

 years later than most of his contemporaries, and the 

 work which he undertook during the vacations left 

 him little time for extra reading, but he neverthe- 

 less took a good second in Greats. He also had 

 charge of the college library, and won his Blue at 



