The Eagle, "a magazine supported by members of St. John's College,"
issued its first number in the Lent term of 1858; it contains an
article by Butler "On English Composition and Other Matters," signed
"Cellarius":

Most readers will have anticipated me in admitting that a man
should be clear of his meaning before he endeavours to give it
any kind of utterance, and that, having made up his mind what to
say, the less thought he takes how to say it, more than briefly,
pointedly and plainly, the better.

From this it appears that, when only just over twenty-two, Butler
had already discovered and adopted those principles of writing from
which he never departed.

In the fifth number of the Eagle is an article, "Our Tour," also
signed "Cellarius"; it is an account of a tour made in June, 1857,
with a friend whose name he Italianized into Giuseppe Verdi, through
France into North Italy, and was written, so he says, to show how
they got so much into three weeks and spent only 25 pounds; they did
not, however, spend quite so much, for the article goes on, after
bringing them back to England, "Next day came safely home to dear
old St. John's, cash in hand 7d." {19}

Butler worked hard with Shilleto, an old pupil of his grandfather,
and was bracketed 12th in the Classical Tripos of 1858. Canon
M'Cormick told me that he would no doubt have been higher but for
the fact that he at first intended to go out in mathematics; it was
only during the last year of his time that he returned to the