The Gentleman Cadet

“You are very rude,” I said, “to speak like that.”

A shout of laughter greeted this speech, whilst the same boy intimated that I was “a confounded young prig!”

“Oh, here you are!” said Fraser, who suddenly appeared on the scene. “I’ve been looking for you. What do you mean by shying a book at me?”

“Why, you kicked me for no reason at all,” I replied. “It is I who have cause to complain of you.”

“Oh, you have, have you? then take that?”

Before I knew what was going to be done, Fraser suddenly struck me full in the face. The blow was so severe that for a second or two I scarcely knew what had happened. Then, however, I realised the fact, and, rushing at Fraser, I struck wildly at him. Without seeming to disturb himself much, Fraser either guarded off my blows or quickly dodged so as to avoid them; and when he saw an opportunity, as he soon did, he punished me severely.

Fraser was smaller than I was, but was certainly stouter, and he possessed what I did not, viz, skill in the use of his fists. This was the first fight I had ever been in, whilst he was an old hand at pugilistic encounters. The result, consequently, was what might be expected, viz, in ten minutes I was entirely beaten, all my strength seemed gone, and I was unable to raise a hand in my defence.

“Don’t you shy a book at me again,” said Fraser as he left me leaning against the wall, trying to recover myself.

“Bravo, Fraser! well done!” said one or two boys who had formed a ring round us as we fought. Not a boy seemed to pity me, or to be disposed to help me, and I felt as utterly miserable as a boy could feel.

As I leant against the wall, with my handkerchief to my nose, a boy named Strong came up and said, —

“You’d better wash the blood off your face, Shepard, or there’ll be a row.”

“I don’t care,” I replied, “whether there’s a row or not.”

“Come along,” said Strong; “don’t be downhearted. Fraser is an awful mill and a great bully, and always bullies a new boy just to show off his fighting. Come and wash your face.”

I went with Strong, and removed as much as possible the evidence of my late combat – Strong all the time trying his best to cheer me up.

“You’ve never been at a boarding-school before?” said Strong inquiringly.

“No; and I don’t think I shall stop here long,” I replied.

“Oh, there will be another new boy soon, and then you’ll lead an easy life.”

“But is every new boy treated as I am?”

“Well, very nearly the same. Then they are down upon you because you boasted you were going to get the Engineers’.”

“Boasted? I didn’t mean to boast. I came here to prepare for the Engineers.”

“But don’t you know that it’s only about one in twenty who go to the Academy who are clever enough for the Engineers? and when you say you are going to be an engineer it looks like boasting. You may be very clever, and a first-rate hand at Euclid and Swat; but it doesn’t do to boast.”

This speech opened my eyes at once. In my ignorance I knew no difference between being an engineer or anything else; but I now saw why it was that all the boys seemed to make such game of me when I said I was intended for the Engineers, as it was like asserting that I was very clever, and claiming to have it in my power to beat nineteen out of twenty boys who might compete with me. I now began to realise it as a fact that I was utterly ignorant on nearly every subject that was likely to be of use to me at Mr Hostler’s. I knew nothing either of schoolboys or school-life. To me it seemed most ungenerous that I should be laughed at because I made a mistake, not knowing that schoolboys as a rule are disposed to make butts of those who are not as well acquainted as themselves with the few facts on which they pride themselves.

In the afternoon of this my first day at Mr Hostler’s, my pride again received a severe blow. The subject studied in the afternoon was arithmetic and algebra; and on coming into the schoolroom Mr Monk asked me where I had left off in arithmetic.

In order not to make any mistake, I replied that rule-of-three was what I had last done.

I remember well that Aunt Emma, who used to teach me arithmetic, had a book out of which she used to copy a sum of a very simple nature, but which she as well as I thought at the time rather difficult. She then used to show me an example to point out how it was done; and, when I had finished it, used to compare my answer with that given in the book. She was rather hazy about the problem as a rule, and never ventured to give me any explanation as to where I was wrong in case my answer did not correspond with that in the book; but still I was supposed to have learnt rule-of-three, though I soon found out my mistake. The style of questions that I used to solve at home were such as the following: —

“If a bushel of coals costs two shillings and sixpence, what would be the price of fifty bushels?”

These I could fairly accomplish without much probability of making a mistake; and so I hoped I might succeed in passing Mr Monk’s examination of my rule-of-three.

“Just write down this question,” said Mr Monk; “we shall soon see if you know anything about rule-of-three.”

The following question was then dictated to me: —

“If 10 men and 6 boys dig a trench 100 feet long, 8 feet wide, and 5 feet deep, in 12 days, how many boys ought to be employed to dig a trench 200 feet long, 3 feet deep, and 6 feet wide, in 8 days, if only 5 men were employed, 2 boys being supposed equal to 1 man?”

As I read over this question I felt my heart sink within me. I knew I could not do it properly, and that I should again expose myself to ridicule in having said I could accomplish rule-of-three, when, if this were rule-of-three, I knew nothing of it. I sat for several minutes looking at the question, and trying to discover some means for its solution. Boys were mixed in my mind with ditches, men with days, and deep holes with width. At least a quarter of an hour passed without my making the slightest advance in the way of solution; at the end of this time Mr Monk looked at my slate and said, —

“So you don’t seem to know much about rule-of-three?”

“I never saw a sum like this before,” I replied.

“Then why did you tell me that you could do rule-of-three? Do you know your multiplication table?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“What’s 12 times 11?” he inquired.

Now, of all the multiplication table, 11 times anything was to me the easiest, because I remembered that two similar figures, such as 66, was 6 times 11, 77 was seven times 11, and so on; but 12 times 11 was a number I was always rather shaky about. I hesitated a moment and then made a wild rush at it, and said, “One hundred and twenty-one?”

Mr Monk looked at me with a mingled expression of pity and contempt, and said, “You’re nearly fifteen, and you don’t know your multiplication table, and yet you think you’re going to be an engineer! Why there’s not a boy at the charity-school who at twelve does not know more than you!”

I listened attentively to this remark, for I felt that Mr Monk was a prophet. It was quite true that I was a dunce. I had learnt it, and realised it in half a day. It had been forcibly impressed on me as I tried to learn Euclid, as I was ignominiously defeated by Fraser in a pugilistic encounter in something like ten minutes, and now when it was proved to me! did not know my multiplication table.

“You’d better commence at simple addition,” said Monk, “and work your way up. You can’t join any class; there’s no one so backward as you are. Your nursemaid ought to have taught you these things. At Mr Hostler’s we don’t expect to have to teach even arithmetic. It will take you three years to get up to quadratics!”

“Well, Mr Monk,” said Hostler, bustling into the room, “I hope Shepard is well up in his algebra?”

“He doesn’t even know his multiplication table?” said Monk.

Hostler stared at me much as he would at a dog with only two legs or a bird with one wing. Having given me a long searching look, under which I blushed and felt inclined to shrink under the form, he said, —

“Poor fellow! your friends have got a lot to answer for! What a pity it is, Mr Monk, that in civilised England people who are gentlefolks are not compelled by law to educate their children! Look at this boy, now. I dare say, at home and in the country, he was thought to be fit to run alone; and yet there he is, a regular dunce! Now, Shepard,” he said, “you must begin to learn; you must work hard; and if there’s no chance of your getting into the Academy, why, what you learn here will always be of use to you; so don’t be idle.”

Having made this remark, Mr Hostler went about the school, looking at the slates of the various boys, talking to several, and explaining their problems to them. As for me, I was soon busily engaged in adding up a long row of pounds, shillings, and pence, which I did not accomplish without three times failing to obtain the right total. At length, however, I was successful, just as it was time to turn out for our afternoon walk.

On going to bed that night I seemed to have passed through more, and to have gained more experience in that one day that I had in years before. I had learnt that I knew nothing – that my supposed knowledge was not real – that I was, in fact, a dunce, far behind all other boys of my own age – that I was weak in physical strength – and though my sisters used to think me awfully strong, yet this, too, was a mistake. Mixed with the depressing effect of this knowledge there was, however, a slight feeling of satisfaction in knowing that now at least I was among realities, whilst before I was among dreams. I had, too, a kind of presentiment that I had within me a capacity for doing work, if I could only get in the way of it. When I used to help my father in his microscope work, and sketched some of the wonderful details of the wings, legs, or bodies of the insects I saw, he always prophesied that I should do great things some day. Now, however, I realised the fact that I was a dunce – that I was so far behind other boys that it was improbable I could ever catch them up, and so to expect to excel was out of the question; if I could only attain to mediocrity I should be satisfied.

Such thoughts passed through my mind as I dozed off to sleep, and dreamed I was untangling a skein of wire, that as fast as I undid one part another portion gathered itself in a knot.

Suddenly I felt a choking sensation, and started up in bed with a strange bewildered feeling over me. The room was quite dark, and I could not see one of the ten beds occupied by the other boys in the room. I, however, heard a slight noise as of some one getting into bed, and then a smothered laugh. As I fully awoke I found I was drenched with water and my bed and pillow were wet – a fact I was much puzzled at.

As I sat up, wondering what had happened, a boy called out, “Shepard! what are you about?”

“I am wet through, somehow,” I said.