the door carefully, as though what he was going to say was a great secret, said, “Howard tells me you are very anxious to be an engineer officer, and have talked to him about it. Now I have no wish to part with you, but if you think you would like such a profession, I will do what I can for you. It is a most gentlemanly profession, admits you to good society, enables you to see the world, and you may make your name known as a clever man. Young Howard is a good example for you. He carried off several prizes at Woolwich, and has always been considered a most promising young man, and he thinks you could not do better than go into the Engineers. You will have to work hard for a year or two, but with what you know already you will soon pick up all that is required, and your knowledge of natural history will no doubt help you on and bring you into notice. So if you think it will suit you I will apply for an appointment to the Academy.”
On the day following this conversation, Howard left us for a farm-house some eight miles distant, and on the day after his departure my father sent a letter to the Master-General of the Ordnance, asking for an appointment for me to the Academy, and stating that I was clever, and a good naturalist.
By return of post a letter was received, the opening of which I awaited with intense anxiety. It was a long rectangular document, with “O.H.M. Service” on the outside; the contents were brief but most decisive. In answer to the application, the Master-General regretted that there was no prospect of a vacancy at the Royal Military Academy before I had passed the age for admission.
A shade of disappointment only passed across my father’s face as he read this letter, but to me it was a shock that seemed to render my future a blank. I had so set my heart on being an engineer officer, like Howard, that I had thought of nothing else for the past four or five days and nights. My usual amusements had become distasteful, and been neglected; the fire of ambition had entered my mind, and repose was no longer attainable. Castles in the air had been built, and seemed to me substantial edifices; and now to find all my hopes thus cruelly crushed was a blow I could not support. I tried my best to bear up, but I felt broken-hearted. I instantly thought of Howard; might he not help me? He was so clever, and so acquainted with everything, that perhaps he might tell my father what to do. I must find Howard and let him know what had happened; so, soon after breakfast, I started for a long walk to that part of the forest where I hoped to find him. I was in luck that day, for I came on Howard as he was going to his work, told him of the disappointment I had just experienced, and asked him if there was no remedy. He smiled at my eagerness, and said, “Never despair, I will see what can be done. I have a relative in the Cabinet, and he may manage the affair for you; but, really now, it takes as much interest to get a nomination for Woolwich as it does to make a curate a bishop; but I will write about it, and if I get you a nomination you must do me credit, and pass all your examinations well.”
A week passed after this interview, and I saw nothing of Howard; each day as the post came in I looked anxiously for a letter, but none came, and I at length lost all hope. I had told my father what Howard had said, but he smiled at my sanguine hopes, and told me it was unfortunate, and could not be helped; but there really was no chance of success, as he had ascertained that nearly every nomination for Woolwich was given either through parliamentary interest, or to the sons of distinguished military officers.
On the eighth day, however, an official letter was left by the postman at our lodge. My father opened it with eagerness, and scanned its contents before reading it to us. He then said, “Bob, I congratulate you; listen to this: —
“‘I have the honour to inform you that the Master-General of the Ordnance has granted a nomination to the Royal Military Academy to your son, Robert Shepard, and I am directed to state that he may present himself at the Academy at the next examination in February. I enclose papers, etc.’”
I jumped from my chair, gave my father a hug, exchanged kisses with my two sisters and aunt, and performed various extraordinary capers about the room. In imagination I was already an officer, a traveller, a lion-slayer, and very much what Howard appeared to me. Of the thorny path between me and the position I aspired to I knew nothing. I saw the prize only, and little knew what I had to pass through ere I reached it. If I could have seen the life I should lead during the next three years I doubt whether my ambition would not instantly have been extinguished; and I should have remained a dreamy forest boy, and grown up to the position of a country gentleman of moderate means and somewhat limited abilities.
On that morning there was joy in our house; my father was pleased at the success of what he supposed was his application, and because he saw I was pleased. My sisters were pleased at the prospect of having a brother a soldier; and my aunt was, I think, gratified because of late she had lost much of the control over me, which she had wielded when I was a mere child, and did not now care to have me in the house.
When the first excitement of the intelligence was over, my father took me into the library to talk over the papers he had read, relative to the examination.
“There is Euclid,” he said; “three books you will have to take up. That you’ll soon learn, because your mind is fresh and has not been crammed like other boys at your age. Then there is arithmetic, – that of course you know; and algebra up to quadratic equations; this you will soon pick up. I remember at Cambridge I soon learnt all these things. History and geography you were always fond of, and, of course, there is nothing to learn there. French and German, too, you can pick up a smattering of – enough to pass an examination – and I fancy your knowledge of natural history will help to make you stand well at an examination. To February is five months, so there is no hurry, and if you go steadily on you ought to pass well. Perhaps, if I get a tutor to come over from Southampton twice a week, we might manage it well.”
I knew nothing about examinations, or the difficulty of the subjects I was expected to learn, and so could offer no remarks, and could only acquiesce in my father’s suggestion, and should probably have dreamed on a few months longer had not Howard that afternoon called at our lodge, to congratulate us on the receipt of the nomination which, he said, he had heard of that morning. He took but little credit to himself for what he had done; but I felt certain then, and I ascertained afterwards, that it was entirely due to his interest that I obtained my nomination.
Upon hearing what was proposed to be done in preparing me for the examination, he assured us that it would be impossible for me to qualify by February, even if I went to the best cram-school at Woolwich; but to have a tutor twice a week would be useless. He impressed on my father the necessity for getting my examination postponed till February twelvemonth – the last date that my age would admit of – and recommended that I should at once be sent to Mr Hostler, the best cram-school at Woolwich, who would prepare me if any one could.
The high opinion which my father entertained of Howard caused him not only to listen to, but to act on, this advice; and it was decided that on the Monday week following my father was to start with me for Woolwich, and leave me in charge of Mr Hostler, to be prepared for the Royal Engineers, and for the examination on the February twelvemonth from that date.
Chapter Three
A Cram-School at Woolwich Forty Years Ago
In the days to which this tale refers, railways did not exist; it was therefore by the Salisbury coach that I travelled with my father to London. I will pass over my wonder and surprise at the size and crowds of London, and of the scenes that presented themselves to me as I for the first time drove through the metropolis. Steam-vessels were then novelties, and it was by a steam-vessel that we journeyed from London Bridge to Woolwich, and were deposited in the lower part of that dirty town, from whence a cab conveyed us to the school-house of Mr Hostler at the early hour of eleven a.m. As, from what I was able to gather at the time, Mr Hostler’s was a fair specimen of the Woolwich cram-schools forty years ago, this establishment and the life I led there will be somewhat fully described. After long years of roughing it in various parts of the world, the early impressions of that school are fresh in my memory. Coming as I did to that school, fresh from a quiet country home,
