painful part of a public teacher's office, is the constant effort required, to cheat his pupils into attention and he who will not introduce considerable variety of topics, who is too pompous to be entertaining, and too full of his own dignity to throw an occasional air of vivacity over subjects grave in their general tenor, will be heard with obtuse ears, charm he never so wisely.

It has been the fashion of late years, especially with that class of persons who compliment themselves with the epithet of serious-minded, and endow their own confined party with the title of the religious public, to insinuate that the habits of large schools are somewhat whimsical in point of morality. Now it is unavoidable that where considerable numbers are congregated, and a certain portion of liberty is allowed, irregularities and abuses should occasionally arise: but it does not therefore follow, that the accumulation of numbers, or that certain extent of liberty, must on the average be an evil. To argue the point, would lead me too far: but I am a decided enemy to keeping boys in perpetual leading-strings. At the same time, where there is option, there will sometimes be a wrong choice. The painful part to a master's feelings is the necessity of setting up scarecrows : a necessity which falls with more severity on the grieved and disappointed parent, than on the worthless son. But I have never known an instance within my own experience, in which the scarecrow has failed to perform his office. On whatever occasion any question of discipline or morals has

arisen here, a very large majority has always taken the right side; has always acted rightly, and what is even of more importance, has thought and felt rightly. As a set-off against the superior vigilance, or rather the more unrelenting superintendence, of private or domestic education, I allege the system of moral discipline, and the habit of moral feeling, always subsisting among you independently of me: a system and habits which put a stern negative on every thing like meanness or shuffling; which hold the character of a gentleman to be of the very first necessity. In no instance have I ever known ungentlemanly or immoral conduct cheered by any individual not personally implicated. I have the pleasure to find that you, my friends, support in after life the character you have borne during your residence under my roof; nor need I, when I hear how respectfully you are spoken of in the University of Cambridge, where you are so numerous, entertain any fears for you, on a comparison with that description of young persons, nursed in supposed innocence and security, among the pet animals of a lady's drawing-room: a hat-box containing kittens on one side of the fireplace; a large band-box containing the heir apparent on the other.

On looking back to what I have written, I conceive it not impossible that some persons may consider it as the quip modest in favour of my own individual establishment: but this would not be a candid construction of my feelings or inten

tions. If the Cambridge triposes warrant me in considering myself as in any degree a successful teacher, I unfeignedly attribute that success, not to my talents, but to my breeding. That, as most of you know, took place at Harrow: there I learned my art, and on the model there furnished have I practised it. The late Dr. Benjamin Heath was the master of that school during all my earlier time. That excellent person was held in the highest veneration by his pupils, and was not only as good a master, but as good a man as ever lived. In him, firmness, which was neither shaken by difficulties nor exasperated by opposition, unquestioned impartiality, and a system of discipline founded on moral propriety and practical good sense, were the features of his public ministry. An opinion then very generally prevailing, that young persons were to be kept in a state of awe, gave an appearance of sternness to his outward deportment; but it went no deeper than the features and the wig. All the rest was candour, benevolence, and zeal for the interests of his pupils.

Like the general run of immaculate men, he judged the frailties of others with a lenity which sinners never exercise; and smiled in private at those venial errors which shook down a tempest of powder with the thunders of official denunciation.

My school education was finished under his successor, Dr. Drury; to whose strenuous encouragement and friendly advice I feel deeply indebted of him I should say more, were it not that the praise of the living is too often considered

as flattery. He has long since retired; but the name still flourishes. For myself, I cannot but hope that the labours of sixteen years have given me some ground of my own to stand upon; but I have no doubt that the circumstance of my bearing the name of my venerable relative occasioned my earlier services to be received with partiality. On the nearly identified regulations of Harrow and Eton I formed my system, not as a servile copyist, but as a free and faithful follower. But while I adopted their course of study and modes of management, I have from time to time introduced such deviations, as difference of local circumstances, and the facilities of a less extensive concern induced me in the exercise of an independent judgment to approve. But in my changes and additions, as well as in my adoptions, I have endeavoured to adhere to the spirit when departing from the letter.

The list of Harrow worthies, in all departments, ecclesiastical, civil, and military, did my limits allow of its transcription, would furnish a triumphant evidence of practical utility. Among the earlier names are those of Baxter the philologist and antiquary, and the critic Dennis, more celebrated than well esteemed.

Bruce the Abyssinian traveller, Orme the historian of Hindostan, and Hamilton the author of Ægyptiaca, form no mean triumvirate in an interesting department of literature. Sir William Jones was the Crichton of his age. In the naval and military department, we have the names of Lord Rodney, Lord Hastings, and Colonel Ponsonby,

whose noble career was prematurely terminated in the field of Waterloo. Of official statesmen our harvest is abundant: Lord Wellesley began at Harrow, and finished at Eton; to whom add, the late Spencer Percival, Mr. Robinson the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Peel the present Secretary of State for the Home Department, the Duke of Manchester, Lord Westmoreland, Lord Palmerston, and Lord Harrowby.* The labourers in the unproductive field of opposition are also not a few independently of names which shall be reserved to grace other than the political department, there are those of the Duke of Grafton, Lord Euston, Lord Althorpe, the Duke of Hamilton, the Marquis of Douglas, Lord Archibald Hamilton, Lord Duncannon, Lord Grosvenor, and many others others of later standing. To Richard Brinsley Sheridan that happened which never happened to any other man: on the same evening he was in three places at once; he was entertaining crowded audiences with his School for Scandal, and Duenna, at the two theatres, and making one of his most brilliant displays of eloquence in the House of Commons. Among those of the nobility honourably distinguished for classical pursuits and acquirements, may be mentioned the late Earl of Denbigh, the present Earl Spencer, and the Earl of Hardwicke who edited the collection called ،، Athenian Letters." In another department of literary pursuit we have the Earl of Aberdeen, the

* All but Lord Wellesley are exclusively Harrovians.