PART II.
CHAPTER I.
When I had reached the age of twelve, I had got to the head of the
preparatory school to which I had been sent. And having thus exhausted
all the oxygen of learning in that little receiver, my parents looked
out for a wider range for my inspirations. During the last two years in
which I had been at school, my love for study had returned; but it was a
vigorous, wakeful, undreamy love, stimulated by competition, and
animated by the practical desire to excel.
My father no longer sought to curb my intellectual aspirings. He had
too great a reverence for scholarship not to wish me to become a scholar
if possible; though he more than once said to me somewhat sadly, "Master
books, but do not let them master you. Read to live, not live to read.
One slave of the lamp is enough for a household; my servitude must not
be a hereditary bondage."
My father looked round for a suitable academy; and the fame of Dr.
Herman's "Philhellenic Institute" came to his ears.
Now, this Dr. Herman was the son of a German music-master who had
settled in England. He had completed his own education at the
University of Bonn; but finding learning too common a drug in that
market to bring the high price at which he valued his own, and having
some theories as to political freedom which attached him to England, he
resolved upon setting up a school, which he designed as an "Era in the
History of the Human Mind." Dr. Herman was one of the earliest of those
new-fashioned authorities in education who have, more lately, spread
pretty numerously amongst us, and would have given, perhaps, a dangerous
shake to the foundations of our great classical seminaries, if those
last had not very wisely, though very cautiously, borrowed some of the
more sensible principles which lay mixed and adulterated amongst the
crotchets and chimeras of their innovating rivals and assailants.
Dr. Herman had written a great many learned works against every pre-
existing method of instruction; that which had made the greatest noise
was upon the infamous fiction of Spelling-Books: "A more lying,
roundabout, puzzle-headed delusion than that by which we Confuse the
clear instincts of truth in our accursed systems of spelling, was never
concocted by the father of falsehood." Such was the exordium of this
famous treatise. "For instance, take the monosyllable Cat. What a
brazen forehead you must have when you say to an infant, c, a, t,--spell
Cat: that is, three sounds, forming a totally opposite compound,--
opposite in every detail, opposite in the whole,--compose a poor little
monosyllable which, if you would but say the simple truth, the child
will learn to spell merely by looking at it! How can three sounds,
which run thus to the ear, see-eh-tee, compose the sound cat? Don't
they rather compose the sound see-eh-te, or ceaty? How can a system of
education flourish that begins by so monstrous a falsehood, which the
sense of hearing suffices to contradict? No wonder that the horn-book
is the despair of mothers! "From this instance the reader will perceive
that Dr. Herman, in his theory of education, began at the beginning,--he
took the bull fairly by the horns. As for the rest, upon a broad
principle of eclecticism, he had combined together every new patent
invention for youthful idea-shooting. He had taken his trigger from
Hofwyl; he had bought his wadding from Hamilton; he had got his copper-
caps from Bell and Lancaster. The youthful idea,--he had rammed it
tight! he had rammed it loose! he had rammed it with pictorial
illustrations! he had rammed it with the monitorial system! he had
rammed it in every conceivable way, and with every imaginable ramrod!
but I have mournful doubts whether he shot the youthful idea an inch
farther than it did under the old mechanism of flint and steel!
Nevertheless, as Dr. Herman really did teach a great many things too
much neglected at schools; as, besides Latin and Greek, he taught a vast
variety in that vague infinite nowadays called "useful knowledge;" as he
engaged lecturers on chemistry, engineering, and natural history; as
arithmetic and the elements of physical science were enforced with zeal
and care; as all sorts of gymnastics were intermingled with the sports
of the playground,--so the youthful idea, if it did not go farther,
spread its shots in a wider direction, and a boy could not stay there
five years without learning something: which is more than can be said of
all schools! He learned at least to use his eyes and his ears and his
limbs; order, cleanliness, exercise, grew into habits; and the school
pleased the ladies and satisfied the gentlemen,--in a word, it thrived;
and Dr. Herman, at the time I speak of, numbered more than one hundred
pupils. Now, when the worthy man first commenced the task of tuition,
he had proclaimed the humanest abhorrence to the barbarous system of
corporal punishment. But alas! as his school increased in numbers, he
had proportionately recanted these honorable and anti-birchen ideas. He
had--reluctantly, perhaps, honestly, no doubt; but with full
determination--come to the conclusion that there are secret springs
which can only be detected by the twigs of the divining-rod; and having
discovered with what comparative ease the whole mechanism of his little
government could be carried on by the admission of the birch-regulator,
so, as he grew richer and lazier and fatter, the Philhellenic Institute
spun along as glibly as a top kept in vivacious movement by the
perpetual application of the lash.
I believe that the school did not suffer in reputation from this sad
apostasy on the part of the head-master; on the contrary, it seemed more
natural and English,--less outlandish and heretical. And it was at the
zenith of its renown when, one bright morning, with all my clothes
nicely mended, and a large plum-cake in my box, I was deposited at its
hospitable gates.
Amongst Dr. Herman's various whimsicalities there was one to which he
had adhered with more fidelity than to the anti-corporal punishment
articles of his creed; and, in fact, it was upon this that he had caused
those imposing words, "Philhellenic Institute," to blaze in gilt
capitals in front of his academy. He belonged to that illustrious class
of scholars who are now waging war on our popular mythologies, and
upsetting all the associations which the Etonians and Harrovians connect
with the household names of ancient history. In a word, he sought to
restore to scholastic purity the mutilated orthography of Greek
appellatives. He was extremely indignant that little boys should be
brought up to confound Zeus with Jupiter, Ares with Mars, Artemis with
Diana,--the Greek deities with the Roman; and so rigidly did he
inculcate the doctrine that these two sets of personages were to be kept
constantly contradistinguished from each other, that his cross-
examinations kept us in eternal confusion.
"Vat," he would exclaim to some new boy fresh from some grammar-school
on the Etonian system--"Vat do you mean by dranslating Zeus Jupiter? Is
dat amatory, irascible, cloud-compelling god of Olympus, vid his eagle
and his aegis, in the smallest degree resembling de grave, formal, moral
Jupiter Optimus Maximus of the Roman Capitol?--a god, Master Simpkins,
who would have been perfectly shocked at the idea of running after
innocent Fraulein dressed up as a swan or a bull! I put dat question to
you vonce for all, Master Simpkins." Master Simpkins took care to agree
with the Doctor. "And how could you," resumed Dr. Herman majestically,
turning to some other criminal alumnus,--"how could you presume to
dranslate de Ares of Homer, sir, by the audacious vulgarism Mars?---
Ares, Master Jones, who roared as loud as ten thousand men when he was
hurt; or as you vill roar if I catch you calling him Mars again?---Ares,
who covered seven plectra of ground? Confound Ares, the manslayer, with
the Mars or Mavors whom de Romans stole from de Sabines!--Mars, de
solemn and calm protector of Rome! Master Jones, Master Jones, you
ought to be ashamed of yourself!" And then waxing enthusiastic, and
warming more and more into German gutturals and pronunciation, the good
Doctor would lift up his hands, with two great rings on his thumbs, and
exclaim: "Und Du! and dou, Aphrodite,--dou, whose bert de seasons vel-
coined! dou, who didst put Atonis into a coffer, and den tid durn him
into an anemone! dou to be called Venus by dat snivel-nosed little
Master Budderfield!--Venus, who presided over Baumgartens and funerals
and nasty tinking sewers!---Venus Cloacina, O mein Gott! Come here,
Master Budderfield: I must flog you for dat; I must indeed, liddle boy!"
As our Philhellenic preceptor carried his archaeological purism into all
Greek proper names, it was not likely that my unhappy baptismal would
escape. The first time I signed my exercise I wrote "Pisistratus
Caxton" in my best round-hand. "And dey call your baba a scholar!" said
the Doctor, contemptuously. "Your name, sir, is Greek; and, as Greek,
you vill be dood enough to write it, vith vat you call an e and an o,--
P,e,i,s,i,s,t,r,a,t,o,s. Vat can you expect for to come to, Master
Caxton, if you don't pay de care dat is proper to your own dood name,--
de e, and de o? Ach? let me see no more of your vile corruptions! Mein
Gott! Pi! ven de name is Pei!"
The next time I wrote home to my father, modestly implying that I was
short of cash, that a trap-bat would be acceptable, and that the
favorite goddess amongst the boys (whether Greek or Roman was very
immaterial) was Diva Moneta, I felt a glow of classical pride in signing
myself "your affectionate Peisistratos." The next post brought a sad
damper to my scholastic exultation. The letter ran thus:--
My Dear Son,--I prefer my old acquaintances Thucydides and
Pisistratus to Thoukudides and Peisistratos. Horace is familiar to
me, but Horatius is only known to me as Cocles. Pisistratus can
play at trap-ball; but I find no authority in pure Greek to allow
me to suppose that that game was known to Peisistratos. I should
be too happy to send you a drachma or so, but I have no coins in my
possession current at Athens at the time when Pisistratus was spelt
Peisistratos.--Your affectionate father,
A. CAXTON.
Verily, here indeed was the first practical embarrassment produced by
that melancholy anachronism which my father had so prophetically
deplored. However, nothing like experience to prove the value of
compromise in this world. Peisistratos continued to write exercises,
and a second letter from Pisistratus was followed by the trap-bat.
