“I’m sorry you’re obliged to be taken away,” said Hostler; “but it wouldn’t be fair to your friends to keep you any longer on the chance of your passing. You’ve only four months now, and it would take the cleverest boy I know a year to pass. If you’d been very quick, I might have done it at first, but now it’s too late! But what you’ve learnt at this school will be of use to you all your life.”
A steamer was in those days the quickest mode of conveyance from Woolwich to London, and by this means we reached London Bridge, and from thence drove to Trinity Square, Tower Hill, where Mr Rouse lived.
On entering Mr Rouse’s drawing-room we were soon joined by a clergyman, who was Mr Rouse himself.
My father stated the case to Mr Rouse, and informed him of the short time before me, and of Hostler having stated the impossibility of my being able to qualify in a year. “The question now is,” said my father, “do you think you can qualify him for the next examination?”
Mr Rouse smiled, and said, “You set me rather a difficult task, asking me to accomplish in four months what the celebrated Mr Hostler says can’t be done under a year. I can only say it is not probable I can do it, but it is not impossible. It depends entirely on your son’s genius and on how well he knows what he has already learnt. I shall be able to tell in a week what he is made of, and what chance there is for me.”
I had watched Mr Rouse carefully from the time I had entered the room. He was rather tall and stout, with a clear dark eye and a half-bald head. There was a sparkle in his eye that at once indicated quickness and thought, whilst his calm, decided manner spoke of a confidence in himself that was not easily shaken. In ten minutes after entering my father left me, and I was installed as a pupil of Mr Rouse’s.
“Come upstairs,” said Rouse; “I will introduce you to your companions.”
I followed my new tutor upstairs, speculating on who the boys might be that I should meet, and was shown into a room that looked more like a drawing-room or study than a schoolroom. In it were three young men, whose ages might be about twenty. One was reading the Times, another was lounging against the fireplace, and the third helping himself to a sandwich from a plate on a tray at the sideboard.
“Let me introduce a new pupil to you,” said Mr Rouse, “Mr Shepard, who is going up for Woolwich. Mr Robinson, Mr Welton, and Mr Wynn, Addiscombe cadets. Will you have some lunch, Shepard?” continued Mr Rouse. “There’s a sandwich and a glass of ale. We dine at six.”
I helped myself to a sandwich and a glass of ale, for I had now a tremendous appetite, as I was recovering from my late illness, and I then looked round at my companions. I felt I had come to a very different place to that I had left; my fellow-students were men, and I saw gentlemen, whilst Mr Rouse’s manner put me at my ease at once; there was none of the bullying, blustering style there used to be in Hostler, and I felt that I had made a good exchange as far as comfort was concerned, though I feared the manner of the cadets did not seem much like hard work.