The Gentleman Cadet

Chapter Four

Experiences at School – My First Fight

On entering the playground I saw about forty boys amusing themselves in various ways. Some were jumping with a pole, others were leaping over a tape, whilst several were talking in groups. As I approached the ground, I heard several boys call out, “Here he is!”

“Now where’s Fraser?” whilst eight or ten boys came round me, and seemed looking at me as a curiosity.

“You’re going to be an engineer, aren’t you?” said one boy.

“Yes,” I replied.

A shout of laughter was the result of this remark of mine, the reason for which I could not comprehend.

“You’re very clever, I suppose,” said the same boy; “an awful hand at Swat.”

“I can do rule-of-three,” I replied.

“Lor! what a clever fellow!” replied the boy. “I say,” he shouted, “Ansell, James, come here! We have a Sir Isaac Newton here!”

As he called, four or five boys came up and joined the others near me.

“He’s going to be an engineer,” said the same boy; “and he knows rule-of-three! Isn’t he likely to get them?”

“Where have you come from?” asked another boy.

“From the New Forest, Hampshire,” I replied.

“Then you’d better go back to the New Forest, Hampshire, and feed the pigs there.”

“You are very rude,” I said, “to speak like that.”

A shout of laughter greeted this speech, whilst the same boy intimated that I was “a confounded young prig!”

“Oh, here you are!” said Fraser, who suddenly appeared on the scene. “I’ve been looking for you. What do you mean by shying a book at me?”

“Why, you kicked me for no reason at all,” I replied. “It is I who have cause to complain of you.”

“Oh, you have, have you? then take that?”

Before I knew what was going to be done, Fraser suddenly struck me full in the face. The blow was so severe that for a second or two I scarcely knew what had happened. Then, however, I realised the fact, and, rushing at Fraser, I struck wildly at him. Without seeming to disturb himself much, Fraser either guarded off my blows or quickly dodged so as to avoid them; and when he saw an opportunity, as he soon did, he punished me severely.

Fraser was smaller than I was, but was certainly stouter, and he possessed what I did not, viz, skill in the use of his fists. This was the first fight I had ever been in, whilst he was an old hand at pugilistic encounters. The result, consequently, was what might be expected, viz, in ten minutes I was entirely beaten, all my strength seemed gone, and I was unable to raise a hand in my defence.

“Don’t you shy a book at me again,” said Fraser as he left me leaning against the wall, trying to recover myself.

“Bravo, Fraser! well done!” said one or two boys who had formed a ring round us as we fought. Not a boy seemed to pity me, or to be disposed to help me, and I felt as utterly miserable as a boy could feel.

As I leant against the wall, with my handkerchief to my nose, a boy named Strong came up and said, —

“You’d better wash the blood off your face, Shepard, or there’ll be a row.”

“I don’t care,” I replied, “whether there’s a row or not.”

“Come along,” said Strong; “don’t be downhearted. Fraser is an awful mill and a great bully, and always bullies a new boy just to show off his fighting. Come and wash your face.”

I went with Strong, and removed as much as possible the evidence of my late combat – Strong all the time trying his best to cheer me up.

“You’ve never been at a boarding-school before?” said Strong inquiringly.

“No; and I don’t think I shall stop here long,” I replied.

“Oh, there will be another new boy soon, and then you’ll lead an easy life.”

“But is every new boy treated as I am?”

“Well, very nearly the same. Then they are down upon you because you boasted you were going to get the Engineers’.”

“Boasted? I didn’t mean to boast. I came here to prepare for the Engineers.”

“But don’t you know that it’s only about one in twenty who go to the Academy who are clever enough for the Engineers? and when you say you are going to be an engineer it looks like boasting. You may be very clever, and a first-rate hand at Euclid and Swat; but it doesn’t do to boast.”

This speech opened my eyes at once. In my ignorance I knew no difference between being an engineer or anything else; but I now saw why it was that all the boys seemed to make such game of me when I said I was intended for the Engineers, as it was like asserting that I was very clever, and claiming to have it in my power to beat nineteen out of twenty boys who might compete with me. I now began to realise it as a fact that I was utterly ignorant on nearly every subject that was likely to be of use to me at Mr Hostler’s. I knew nothing either of schoolboys or school-life. To me it seemed most ungenerous that I should be laughed at because I made a mistake, not knowing that schoolboys as a rule are disposed to make butts of those who are not as well acquainted as themselves with the few facts on which they pride themselves.

In the afternoon of this my first day at Mr Hostler’s, my pride again received a severe blow. The subject studied in the afternoon was arithmetic and algebra; and on coming into the schoolroom Mr Monk asked me where I had left off in arithmetic.

In order not to make any mistake, I replied that rule-of-three was what I had last done.

I remember well that Aunt Emma, who used to teach me arithmetic, had a book out of which she used to copy a sum of a very simple nature, but which she as well as I thought at the time rather difficult. She then used to show me an example to point out how it was done; and, when I had finished it, used to compare my answer with that given in the book. She was rather hazy about the problem as a rule, and never ventured to give me any explanation as to where I was wrong in case my answer did not correspond with that in the book; but still I was supposed to have learnt rule-of-three, though I soon found out my mistake. The style of questions that I used to solve at home were such as the following: —

“If a bushel of coals costs two shillings and sixpence, what would be the price of fifty bushels?”

These I could fairly accomplish without much probability of making a mistake; and so I hoped I might succeed in passing Mr Monk’s examination of my rule-of-three.

“Just write down this question,” said Mr Monk; “we shall soon see if you know anything about rule-of-three.”

The following question was then dictated to me: —

“If 10 men and 6 boys dig a trench 100 feet long, 8 feet wide, and 5 feet deep, in 12 days, how many boys ought to be employed to dig a trench 200 feet long, 3 feet deep, and 6 feet wide, in 8 days, if only 5 men were employed, 2 boys being supposed equal to 1 man?”

As I read over this question I felt my heart sink within me. I knew I could not do it properly, and that I should again expose myself to ridicule in having said I could accomplish rule-of-three, when, if this were rule-of-three, I knew nothing of it. I sat for several minutes looking at the question, and trying to discover some means for its solution. Boys were mixed in my mind with ditches, men with days, and deep holes with width. At least a quarter of an hour passed without my making the slightest advance in the way of solution; at the end of this time Mr Monk looked at my slate and said, —

“So you don’t seem to know much about rule-of-three?”

“I never saw a sum like this before,” I replied.

“Then why did you tell me that you could do rule-of-three? Do you know your multiplication table?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“What’s 12 times 11?” he inquired.

Now, of all the multiplication table, 11 times anything was to me the easiest, because I remembered that two similar figures, such as 66, was 6 times 11, 77 was seven times 11, and so on; but 12 times 11 was a number I was always rather shaky about. I hesitated a moment and then made a wild rush at it, and said, “One hundred and twenty-one?”

Mr Monk looked at me with a mingled expression of pity and contempt, and said, “You’re nearly fifteen, and you don’t know your multiplication table, and yet you think you’re going to be an engineer! Why there’s not a boy at the charity-school who at twelve does not know more than you!”

I listened attentively to this remark, for I felt that Mr Monk was a prophet. It was quite true that I was a dunce. I had learnt it, and realised it in half a day. It had been forcibly impressed on me as I tried to learn Euclid, as I was ignominiously defeated by Fraser in a pugilistic encounter in something like ten minutes, and now when it was proved to me! did not know my multiplication table.

“You’d better commence at simple addition,” said Monk, “and work your way up. You can’t join any class; there’s no one so backward as you are. Your nursemaid ought to have taught you these things. At Mr Hostler’s we don’t expect to have to teach even arithmetic. It will take you three years to get up to quadratics!”

“Well, Mr Monk,” said Hostler, bustling into the room, “I hope Shepard is well up in his algebra?”

“He doesn’t even know his multiplication table?” said Monk.

Hostler stared at me much as he would at a dog with only two legs or a bird with one wing. Having given me a long searching look, under which I blushed and felt inclined to shrink under the form, he said, —

“Poor fellow! your friends have got a lot to answer for! What a pity it is, Mr Monk, that in civilised England people who are gentlefolks are not compelled by law to educate their children! Look at this boy, now. I dare say, at home and in the country, he was thought to be fit to run alone; and yet there he is, a regular dunce! Now, Shepard,” he said, “you must begin to learn; you must work hard; and if there’s no chance of your getting into the Academy, why, what you learn here will always be of use to you; so don’t be idle.”

Having made this remark, Mr Hostler went about the school, looking at the slates of the various boys, talking to several, and explaining their problems to them. As for me, I was soon busily engaged in adding up a long row of pounds, shillings, and pence, which I did not accomplish without three times failing to obtain the right total. At length, however, I was successful, just as it was time to turn out for our afternoon walk.

On going to bed that night I seemed to have passed through more, and to have gained more experience in that one day that I had in years before. I had learnt that I knew nothing – that my supposed knowledge was not real – that I was, in fact, a dunce, far behind all other boys of my own age – that I was weak in physical strength – and though my sisters used to think me awfully strong, yet this, too, was a mistake. Mixed with the depressing effect of this knowledge there was, however, a slight feeling of satisfaction in knowing that now at least I was among realities, whilst before I was among dreams. I had, too, a kind of presentiment that I had within me a capacity for doing work, if I could only get in the way of it. When I used to help my father in his microscope work, and sketched some of the wonderful details of the wings, legs, or bodies of the insects I saw, he always prophesied that I should do great things some day. Now, however, I realised the fact that I was a dunce – that I was so far behind other boys that it was improbable I could ever catch them up, and so to expect to excel was out of the question; if I could only attain to mediocrity I should be satisfied.

Such thoughts passed through my mind as I dozed off to sleep, and dreamed I was untangling a skein of wire, that as fast as I undid one part another portion gathered itself in a knot.

Suddenly I felt a choking sensation, and started up in bed with a strange bewildered feeling over me. The room was quite dark, and I could not see one of the ten beds occupied by the other boys in the room. I, however, heard a slight noise as of some one getting into bed, and then a smothered laugh. As I fully awoke I found I was drenched with water and my bed and pillow were wet – a fact I was much puzzled at.

As I sat up, wondering what had happened, a boy called out, “Shepard! what are you about?”

“I am wet through, somehow,” I said.

“Ah! some one has given you a ‘cold pig,’ I suppose, because you snored so. Don’t you make such a row again.”

When I was at home it was instilled into me that it was almost certain death to sleep in a damp bed, and numerous instances were quoted to me of persons who had either died of consumption, or been cripples for life in consequence of sleeping in wet sheets. In the present instance, however, there was no help for it. I must either sit up all night, or sleep in the bed, wet as it was. I was so completely tired, so utterly worn out, bodily and mentally, that I did not care who it was had thrown the water on me. My head ached, from over-thought as much as from the blows I had received in my fight, and I again laid down in the wet bed, and slept as well as though in my own room at home.

I had not half completed what would have been a fair night’s rest under ordinary conditions when I was awoke by the shrill voice of a boy shouting “Quarter!” I at first imagined this cry might mean something connected with a battle, and that the enemy were calling out for quarter; but on fully awaking I found each boy jumping up, and rushing to a basin of water and washing in the greatest haste. I followed the example set me by the other boys, from whom I learnt that we all had to be in the schoolroom by six o’clock, and any boy who was not in the room when the clock struck got no breakfast. We all rushed from our room about a minute before the clock struck, and entered the school where I had been on the previous day; and I then found that between six and seven a proposition in Euclid had to be learnt on nearly every morning. So I was at once started at my definitions.

In the hour allotted I managed to learn my definitions, and said them to the satisfaction of Mr Monk, and was able, therefore, to go out with the other boys for the half-hour preceding breakfast.

During the next two days our routine was very similar to that of the first day. I soon fully realised the fact that I was more backward, if not more stupid, than any boy in the school; and I also learnt that no one believed it possible I could ever be prepared to pass the examination for entrance to the Academy. There were boys at the school of only twelve years of age, who were far beyond me, who were not to be sent up for examination until they were fifteen years of age. In those days a boy was allowed only one trial for entrance, and if he then failed he never had another given him; and he consequently lost all chance of becoming a cadet. So it was, at least, a prudent precaution to keep a boy at school until he was well qualified to pass his examination. There was also then, as now, considerable rivalry amongst the schoolmasters who prepared for Woolwich Academy, and it was considered a feather in the cap of the individual who had prepared the first boy on the list. To send up any boy, therefore, badly prepared was imprudent, and also not likely to reflect any credit on the establishment from which he had been sent.

I used my best endeavours to get on, but found that my brain would not work as would that of other boys: it seemed like a limb that has not been used for many weeks and is suddenly called upon for some hard work; it becomes stiff and unable to work in a very short time. I also noticed that none of the masters seemed to take much trouble about me. It appeared as though they had agreed that I was not in the race for the Academy, and therefore it was unnecessary for them to trouble themselves much about me.

In three days an entire change had come over me. I had lost all pride in myself, and felt that I must merely drag on an existence at this school for a time. I had not the courage to write to my father and tell him it was impossible I could pass my examination, as I was such a dunce; for I knew such an announcement would not be believed by him, or, if believed, it would be most unpleasant news. I hoped, too, that it was possible I might by practice get accustomed to the noise at the school, and might, like other boys, be able to learn like a parrot the problems in Euclid. My life was certainly a most miserable one. I was still the last new boy, and as such had various tricks played upon me; but it seemed that my nature was somehow changed, and that I did not feel as sensitively as I did on first joining Mr Hostler’s.

One day per week at Mr Hostler’s was devoted to drawing of various kinds, and languages; and this day was a great relaxation after the perpetual Euclid, arithmetic, or algebra. I rather looked forward, also, to seeing Mr Walkwell, the drawing-master, who, I was told, was very amusing and quite a character, and who was very fond of boys. On going into school after breakfast, I saw Mr Walkwell. He was a short, spare man, with a flexible face, which he had the power of altering in a marvellous manner. His arms and legs also he could swing about in a wild kind of way that seemed quite dangerous. As we all entered the school, Mr Walkwell called out in a deep, loud voice that one would scarcely believe possible could emanate from so small a man, —

“Every boy to his seat instantly?”

Each boy jumped into a place except myself, and, not knowing where to go, I stood looking at Mr Walkwell.

“New boy,” said Mr Walkwell, pointing his finger at me threateningly. “New boy! See. Ought to be an artist. Large perceptives, comparison well developed, ideality large, temperament nervous. New boy, you can draw?”

“No, sir,” I said, “I can’t draw.”

“What’s your name, new boy?”

“Shepard, sir.”

“Gentle Shepard – not of Salisbury Plains – come and sit here. That’s always to be your place. Now, boys, listen to the three great rules of drawing.”

Mr Walkwell here took a piece of chalk and sketched on a black board in about half a dozen lines a small landscape. As he drew these lines, he said, —

“Listen, boys! There are three rules in drawing to be attended to. There is the distant, or delicate – see here the distant hills; the middle ground, or spirited; and the foreground, or bold.”

As he completed his remarks, he lowered his voice from the high falsetto at which he had commenced to the deepest base, whilst at the same time he ran his chalk about in a most skilful manner over the lines he had drawn, and filled in a very effective landscape.

“Now, Shepard,” he said, “you, as new boy, always remember these golden rules, and you must draw. Take a pencil now and copy this gate.”

I was here given a copy, a piece of drawing-paper, and a spare piece of paper to try my pencil on. I very soon copied the gate, and then amused myself in sketching a yacht, such as I had seen in the Solent, and making the Isle of Wight the distant, or delicate, and some posts the foreground, or bold. It was a scene I could call to mind, and I seemed to be again in Hampshire, enjoying my liberty. So engrossed was I with this fancy sketch, that at first I did not notice all the boys’ eyes turned on me with curiosity. I soon saw, however, that I was the object of general attention; and on looking round I saw Mr Walkwell leaning over me, watching what I was doing.

“New boy, give me that,” said Mr Walkwell; “you are idling.”

I gave up the paper, feeling certain that either three cuts on the hand or some other punishment would be given to me. Mr Walkwell looked at the drawing, and then at me, and then said, —

“Shepard, I must report you to Mr Hostler.”

“Please, sir, don’t!” I said; “I’ll never idle again.”

At that instant Mr Hostler came into the room and said, —

“Well, Mr Walkwell, how are you? Are the boys doing well?”

“Very fairly, sir, very fairly; but I have to report the new boy to you.”

“What, Shepard? Ah, I’m afraid he is a failure. Come here, Shepard!”

I got up from my seat and walked up to where Hostler and Walkwell were standing, feeling ready to faint from nervousness.

“New boy Shepard, Mr Hostler, has told me a story. I asked him if he could draw, and he said ‘No,’ and I have now seen him out of his own head draw this sketch, sir. Look at the curve of that yacht’s sails; see the way he has fore-shortened her; look how she rests on the water. Why, for a man that’s a work of art. That boy is an artist, sir, and he told me he couldn’t draw.”

It is very difficult to describe my feelings during this conversation. I had twice been surprised at discovering my ignorance during the past few days, and now I had a surprise in discovering that I was possessed of a skill in drawing which was above the average. I used to amuse myself when at home in drawing on a slate vessels and boats that I had seen when I had gone down to Lymington or Beaulieu, but that there was any great difficulty in drawing such things I had never imagined, or had I the slightest idea that other boys could not do so well – if not better than I did.

I was certainly pleased to find that there was something in which I was not a dunce; and although I was a laughing-stock of the school on account of my ignorance of mathematics and Euclid, I was held up as something unusually clever in drawing.

“Shepard,” said Mr Hostler, “I am glad to find you can do something well, but it’s a pity you have wasted your time in learning only drawing, to the neglect of mathematics. Drawing never passed a boy into the Academy, and it doesn’t count much afterwards. Very well, Mr Walkwell, make a good artist of him, and he’ll then have a profession always ready for him in case he wants it; but I wish, for his sake, he’d some knowledge of Euclid, and less of drawing.”

From that day Mr Walkwell paid great attention to my instruction, and I improved rapidly under his tuition, and after some dozen lessons I was considered the best in the drawing-class.

Chapter Five

Mr Hostler’s Cram-School

It was the practice for our school to be taken out for a walk on Sunday mornings, and to go on to the barrack-field at Woolwich, to see the march past previous to the troops going to church. At this march past the splendid band of the Royal Artillery used to play at the head of the regiment, whilst immediately following the band, and heading the regiment, were two companies of gentlemen cadets.

At the church-parade on Sundays the cadets turned out in full-dress, which consisted of white trowsers, a blue tailed coat with red facings, a shako and plume. Such a dress now would look old-fashioned, but to my boyish eyes it seemed in those days the pattern of neatness, and of a soldierlike appearance.

To me everything military possessed the charm of novelty, but I must own that nothing I had ever imagined previously came up, in my ideas, to the magnificent sight that I for the first time now witnessed. I had never before heard a military band, and I gazed with wonder at the immense display of musicians, headed by a splendid-looking man, arrayed in gold lace, and swinging a huge gold-headed stick, as tall as himself, which he dexterously manipulated in time with the music. There is always something spirit-stirring in the sound of martial music, and I stood entranced as the band marched past me, turned sharp to the left as though worked by machinery, and, wheeling about, faced me, as they continued the slow march they were playing.