THE LATE MASTER OF TRINITY.—A REMINISCENC'a
NEARLY fifty-five years ago I was taken down to Harrow by shy father, there to be entered as a new boy. Dr. Vaughan. who had revived the fortunes of the famous school after the disastrous reign of the late Bishop Christopher Wordsworth, had retired three years previously, and been succeeded by a young Trinity Fellow of almost incredible achievements, whose appointment was regarded as a somewhat bold experiment, as it placed him in command of a set of masters to most of whom he had owed allegiance when in statu pupillari. Dr. Vaughan, it is true, was no older when he entered upon his head-mastership, but he had not been a Harrow boy, and was, consequently, unaffected by the disadvantage that confronted young Mr. Butler when he took up his post. But thanks to tact and dignity, with a faculty of unobtrusively holding his own, he soon established a supremacy which was loyally recog- nized even by subordinates who were members of the teaching staff for many years before he saw the light. My first interview with him was when, after calling on my tutor, my father proceeded with me to the Head-Master's house for the purpose of entering my name in the school-books. We were received, I remember, in a study so diminutive that there seemed scarcely room for us to sit down, and there, in the midst of books and papers, stood a tall young clergyman, who graciously greeted us in a curiously falsetto voice, which impressed me only less than his extreme pallor, inten- sified by slight side-whiskers of a reddish tinge. He was not content to be merely formal, for on hearing that the master of my preparatory school was R. Cowley Powles, a well-known ex-Fellow and Tutor of Exeter, he remarked with animation "You could not have been in better handfl, Wording at any at to Charles Kingsley, who, in mentioning the other day e friend we had in common, declared that he was the best fellow in the world—always excepting Cowley powles,' " This tribute to my old master, of whom I Was very fond, was not without ite effect, and I inft the gloomy little sanctum considerably less awe-stricken than I heel entered it. Some years afterwards, on the death of ray father, Pr. Butler recalled thisinter- view, speaking of him in terms which to this day remain a source of pride and consolation. Nor waif this his only set of Itinelness to sue, though quite an inconspicuous member of the seh000l. One of particular graciousness will he always memorable. I had been " up " to him in some Greek passage and hopelessly come to grief, thereby incurring the sentence of a certain number of Greek lines to be written out and delivered half-hourly every half-holiday. On one of these half-holidays I happened to be in the Vaughan Library waiting to deliver a fresh batch of lines, and noticed there a new bust of singular beauty, being a replica of that in the statue of Sidney Herbert (an old Harrovian) which new stands in the War Office quadrangle. I was alone in the Library, and as I stood opposite the bust the door opened, and to my consternation in glided the Head-Master, with whom I had so recently fallen into disgrace. He walked straight up to the bust, while I held my ground, furtively watching his expression as he gazed at it in silence. After a moment or two he looked round, then, seeing no one with whom to share his admiration, glanced at me. "Beautiful, isn't it ? " he remarked, with a reassuring touch of gentleness in the falsetto voice. I shamefacedly acquiesced, adding some awkward platitude. Then with a parting gaze of admiration he went his way. On the next half-holiday, when I attended with my first batch of Greek lines, the butler asked "if I was Mr. —." "Yes," I replied. "Why do you want to know ? " "Because," came the welcome response, "the Head-Master says you need bring no more Greek lines." That evening my blessings were impartially divided between Sidney Herbert and one who was assuredly fully
his equal in chivalrous delicacy of feeling. W. T.
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