1838 EARLY PURSUITS 9 



himself. Among these may especially be noted his 

 medical brother-in-law, Dr. Cooke of Coventry, who 

 had married his sister Ellen in 1839, and through 

 whom he early became interested in human anatomy ; 

 and George Anderson May, at that time in business 

 at Hinckley (a small weaving centre some dozen 

 miles distant from Coventry), whom his friends who 

 knew him afterwards in the home which he made 

 for himself on the farm at Elford, near Tarn worth, 

 will remember for his genial spirit and native love of 

 letters. There was a real friendship between the 

 two. The boy of fifteen notes down with pleasure 

 his visits to the man of six-and-twenty, with whom 

 he could talk freely of the books he read, and the 

 ideas he gathered about philosophy. 



Afterwards, however, their ways lay far apart, 

 and I believe they did not meet again until the 

 seventies, when Mr. May sent his children to be edu- 

 cated in London, and his youngest son was at school 

 with me ; his younger daughter studied art at the 

 Slade School with my sisters, and both found a warm 

 welcome in the home circle at Marlborough Place. 



One of his boyish speculations was as to what 

 would become of things if their qualities were taken 

 away; and lighting upon Sir William Hamilton's 

 Logic, he devoured it to such good effect that when, 

 years afterwards, he came to tackle the greater 

 philosophers, especially the English and the German, 

 he found he had already a clear notion of where the 

 key of metaphysic lay. 



