After we had spoken, a youth rose to give his opinion, and as his speech
was sufficiently laconic, I will repeat it _in extenso_. The effect
would be quite spoiled if I did not add that he was suffering from a
very bad cold, which played sad havoc with his consonants. This was his
speech, without the slightest curtailment:--

"Id by opidiod Queed Elizabeth was to be blabed, because she was a proud
wobad."

My opponent in the debate on Elizabeth was, I believe, all things taken
into consideration, the most gifted youth I ever knew during my boyhood.
He kept at the head of the school without effort, as if the post
belonged to him, and he was remarkable for bodily activity, being the
best swimmer in the school, and, I think, the best cricketer also. He
afterwards died prematurely, and his brother died in early manhood from
exhausting fatigue during an excursion in the Alps.

The school was in those days attended by lads belonging to all classes
of society, except the highest aristocracy of the neighborhood, and it
did a good deal towards keeping up a friendly feeling between different
classes. That is the great use of a good local school. Many of the boys
were the sons of rich men, who could easily have sent them to public
schools at a distance, and perhaps in the present generation they would
do so.




CHAPTER XI.