for arguing the matter before taking either side.  One question, when very young, he would again and again recur to, as a matter on which the truth should be elicited.  This was a saying of our old servant, above named, when she broke either glass or earthenware:  that “it was good for trade.”  His ideas of political economy would not permit him to allow that this axiom was a sound one for the benefit of the state; and on this point, I think, Adam Smith and Malthus would scarcely disagree.

The pleasure I enjoyed in my son’s society when a boy, was greater than that which intercourse with many grown men contributed; for I may strictly repeat, as I have already said, that he was never a child in intellect although juvenile enough in habits and manners.  He never made foolish remarks, although not in the slightest degree uncomfortably precocious or pragmatical.  I had no fear of trusting him with anything, and was often reproved for allowing so young a child to handle a gun, which he was accustomed to do as early as eleven years of age.  His first practice was on some young rooks which he brought down with unerring aim, from a rookery on the grounds at our country residence.  He was so particular in his general demeanour that I designated him Gentleman John, and my Royal Boy.  His brothers, all younger than himself, styled him, Old Jack, and Gentleman Jack.  He had a wonderful power of attaching animals of all kinds.  Nothing moved him to anger so readily as seeing one ill-used.  Beating a horse savagely would excite his disgust, as well as his dislike to the person who did it.  Not having a dog, he used to take a fine cat we had, which would accompany him to any distance in the fields, and hunt the hedges and hedgerows for him.  Never feeling that I could have too much of his company, I frequently made him my companion in long country walks, during which he incessantly asked for information.  For the science of astronomy he evinced an early taste.  When a very little boy, I began to teach him the names and positions of the principal constellations, the revolutions of the earth on its axis, and the fixity of the polar star.  I believe we were the first to notice a comet in 1845, which was only a short time visible here, having a south declination, and which we afterwards knew to have been a fine object in the Southern hemisphere.

At the age of eleven he went to school at Ashburton.  Although the distance was not more than six miles from the cottage of Ipplepen, my then general place of residence, it was with much reluctance that I consented to the separation.  Several friends urged on me that I was not doing him justice by keeping him at home; that a public seminary where he could mix with other boys was an advantage, even though he might not learn more.  It also happened that, at this time, a gentleman with whom I had been long acquainted, and of whose talents I held a high opinion, was elected to the head-mastership of that school, which held its