One of the first things that Mrs. Byron did on her removal to Newstead was to intrust her son to the care of a quack in Nottingham, in order to cure him of his lameness.  As the doctor was not successful, the boy was removed to London with the double purpose of effecting a cure under an eminent surgeon, and of educating him according to his rank; for his education thus far had been sadly neglected, although it would appear that he was an omnivorous reader in a desultory kind of way.  The lameness was never cured, and through life was a subject of bitter sensitiveness on his part.  Dr. Glennie of Dulwich, to whose instruction he was now confided, found him hard to manage, because of his own undisciplined nature and the perpetual interference of his mother.  His progress was so slow in Latin and Greek that at the end of two years, in 1801, he was removed to Harrow,—­one of the great public schools of England, of which Dr. Drury was head-master.  For a year or two, owing to that constitutional shyness which is so often mistaken for pride, young Byron made but few friendships, although he had for school-fellows many who were afterwards distinguished, including Sir Robert Peel.  Before he left this school for Cambridge, however, he had made many friends whom he never forgot, being of a very generous and loving disposition.  I think that those years at Harrow were the happiest he ever knew, for he was under a strict discipline, and was too young to indulge in those dissipations which were the bane of his subsequent life.  But he was not distinguished as a scholar, in the ordinary sense, although in his school-boy days he wrote some poetry remarkable for his years, and read a great many books.  He read in bed, read when no one else read, read while eating, read all sorts of books, and was capable of great sudden exertions, but not of continuous drudgeries, which he always abhorred.  In the year 1803, when a youth of fifteen, he formed a strong attachment for a Miss Chaworth, two years his senior, who, looking upon him as a mere schoolboy, treated him cavalierly, and made some slighting allusion to “that lame boy.”  This treatment both saddened and embittered him.  When he left school for college he had the reputation of being an idle and a wilful boy, with a very imperfect knowledge of Latin and Greek.

Young Byron entered Trinity College in 1805, poorly prepared, and was never distinguished there for those attainments which win the respect of tutors and professors.  He wasted his time, and gave himself up to pleasures,—­riding, boating, bathing, and social hilarities,—­yet reading more than anybody imagined, and writing poetry, for which he had an extraordinary facility, yet not contending for college prizes.  His intimate friends were few, but to his chosen circle he was faithful and affectionate.  No one at this time would have predicted his future eminence.  A more unpromising youth did not exist within the walls of his college.  He had a most unfortunate temper, which would have