cast in his mould, was in fact quite different--or of another
alloy. Do we, I wonder, really understand that there are millions
and billions of these alloys, so many indeed that Nature, or
whatever is behind Nature, never uses the same twice over? That
is why no two human beings are or ever will be quite identical.
Their flesh, the body of their humiliation, is identical in all,
any chemist will prove it to you, but that which animates the
flesh is distinct and different because it comes from the home of
that infinite variety which is necessary to the ultimate
evolution of the good and bad that we symbolise as heaven and
hell.

Further, I had and to a certain extent still have another
advantage over my father, which certainly came to me from my
mother, who was, as I judge from all descriptions and such
likenesses as remain of her, an extremely handsome woman. I was
born much better looking. He was small and dark, a little man
with deep-set eyes and beetling brows. I am also dark, but tall
above the average, and well made. I do not know that I need say
more about my personal appearance, to me not a very attractive
subject, but the fact remains that they called me "handsome
Humphrey" at the University, and I was the captain of my college
boat and won many prizes at athletic sports when I had time to
train for them.

Until I went up to Oxford my father educated me, partly because
he knew that he could do it better than anyone else, and partly
to save school expenses. The experiment was very successful, as my
love of all outdoor sports and of any small hazardous adventure
that came to my hand, also of associating with fisherfolk whom