IO 



BOYHOOD. 



[Chap. I. 



In the year 1833 his uncle Philip died, who a few years 

 before had removed from Birmingham, where he was a manu- 

 facturing optician, to 24, Regent Street, London. He was a 

 man of scientific attainments, and had done much to popularize 

 science by his improvements in what used to be little better 

 than a toy — the magic lantern, and by his exhibition of the 

 solar microscope. He was unmarried; and his sister Mary, 

 who was carrying on the business, invited her young nephew, 

 then nearly fourteen, to come and learn it. It seemed a con- 

 genial opening for him. Dr. Jerrard, in parting with him from 

 the Bristol College, wrote of him with cordial commendation, 

 and specified that he was "of considerable talents, especially 

 for scientific pursuits;" but, in 1847, Philip wrote to Brooke 

 Herford, who was thinking of exchanging trade for the 

 ministry : — 



" My father never said a word to Russell or me urging us 

 to the ministry : and as Russell from his boyhood decided for 

 it, I supposed there could not be two in one family, and gave 

 up all idea of it : * and my constructiveness, etc., were well 

 pleased with the optician's business ; so after being at college 

 six months, I was taken away, to my great inward regret, and 

 sent to London. There I stayed behind the counter, properly 

 aproned, etc., for six months, when something led to my 

 brother's finding out my real wishes, who stated them to my 

 father, and he at once consented, sent me back to college, and 

 here I am." 



Before he returned home, he was very busy preparing a 

 stock of slides — enough for a gross of microscopes ! His 

 occupation was, no doubt, of practical benefit to him, and his 

 experience of life was enlarged. While at Regent Street he 

 became acquainted with Dr. J. E. Gray, of the British Museum, 



* Like other ministers' children, he was fond of playing at preaching 

 when a little child. His mother, with the little ones around her, writes 

 (October, 1823, when he was nearly four) : " Philly is now preaching, and 

 M. is his audience ; but I perceive he is a sad heretic already, for, so far 

 from preaching the doctrine of original sin, he says, * Mankind is very 

 good ; so nobody would speak to Cain : and he was obliged to go away 

 and live by himself.' " 



