Page:Literary Landmarks of Oxford.djvu/108

78 and he used to wander, he always amiable and full of queer conceits of speech and of imagination.

What Sidney was at Christ Church in his own days was William E. Gladstone two centuries and a half afterwards. The later man made great and brilliant progress in learning. His talk, as an undergraduate, was of knowledge, and he, too, enriched his mind even in his hours of play. His distinguishing traits, we are told, were diligence, good conduct, studious habits and classical attainments. He went to Oxford in 1829, and he left, with a Double First, in 1831.

There is not much about which to gossip in the existence of the undergraduate of studious habits and of classical attainments, unfortunately; and almost the only picture of Gladstone at Christ Church which has come down to us is a very slight sketch from the pen of Lord Houghton, who says: "At that time [1829] we at Cambridge were full of Mr. Shelley; and a friend of ours suggested that as Shelley had been expelled from Oxford, and had been very badly treated at that University, it would be a good thing for us to defend him there. . . . We accordingly went to Oxford, then a long, dreary, post-chaise journey of ten hours; and were hospitably entertained by a young student of the name of Gladstone."