Page:Passages from the Life of a Philosopher.djvu/35

Rh remonstrance was vain, and we were accordingly fined. I never forgot that injustice.

The school-room adjoined the house, but was not directly connected with it. It contained a library of about three hundred volumes on various subjects, generally very well selected; it also contained one or two works on subjects which do not usually attract at that period of life. I derived much advantage from this library; and I now mention it because I think it of great importance that a library should exist in every school-room.

Amongst the books was a treatise on Algebra, called "Ward's Young Mathematician's Guide." I was always partial to my arithmetical lessons, but this book attracted my particular attention. After I had been at this school for about a twelvemonth, I proposed to one of my school-fellows, who was of a studious habit, that we should get up every morning at three o'clock, light a fire in the school-room, and work until five or half-past five. We acccomplished [sic] this pretty regularly for several months. Our plan had, however, become partially known to a few of our companions. One of these, a tall boy, bigger than ourselves, having heard of it, asked me to allow him to get up with us, urging that his sole object was to study, and that it would be of great importance to him in after-life. I had the cruelty to refuse this very reasonable request. The subject has often recurred to my memory, but never without regret.

Another of my young companions, Frederick Marryat, made the same request, but not with the same motive. I told him we got up in order to work; that he would only play, and that we should then be found out. After some time, having exhausted all his arguments, Marryat told me he was C 2