only, and calling him in the morning, were about all I had to do for him, for the cleaning of boots was done for us, and all meals were eaten in the hall.

Whilst talking about house fags and fagging, I must also mention Macready. I do not think I was ever actually his fag, but we had one taste in common which drew us together, and that was that I was considered an expert at making electric machines, which was his fad also at this time. He was then in the Sixth Form, a man in appearance, tall, dark, with sharp features and a good deal of almost black hair. He was, I believe, very like his father, the great actor. He had an electric machine made out of a large round green pickle-bottle mounted on a stand. Finding that I understood the working of this machine, he would send for me up to his room-the first door on the right at the top of the stairs-and proceed to experiment upon me, placing me on two tumblers, and making my hair stand on end, taking sparks out of my elbows, and other delights. One night he sent for me and told me to bring all boys out of the hall up to his bedroom-twelve or fourteen of us. We had to make a ring, all holding hands; he gave his Leyden jar, well charged, to the boy on the right of the line, and I on the left had to complete the circuit by touching the ball on the jar. We had previous experience of his philosophical experiments, and it was agreed that when I touched the ball (or pretended to do so) they were all to writhe about and clasp their arms. This they did. All came off as we planned; old Mac gave a saturnine smile and retired to his machine to refill his jar,

when he happened to touch the ball, and got the full shock intended for the lot of us. He seized me, letting the rest bolt, and I had a very unpleasant interview with him and his cane.

On another occasion he gave me another licking, quite undeserved. He had a younger brother in the house, the very opposite to himself in appearance, short, stout, and with well-rounded cheeks. He rejoiced in the name of Cheeks, or sometimes Young Cheeks. Old Mac heard me call young Mac Young Cheeks,' whereupon he seized me and walloped me soundly, saying, 'If you call him Young Cheeks, you evidently call me Old Cheeks.'

Later on I became fag to a Sixth Form fellow named Whitaker. We did not get on well together. I was his fag in the half before he left the school, and at the close of the half I determined to punish him; so, in packing his clothes, I interlarded his evening garments with tooth-powder, putting plenty in the pockets, and made other fancy arrangements to annoy him.

Now, I and my brother Alfred-who had by that time joined the school-living in Yorkshire, had leave to skip morning school on breaking-up day, and to go off early to catch the first train for the North. We therefore rose early, and, as a final adieu to my fagmaster, we collected all the wooden chairs that we could find, stole upstairs with them, tilted one chair on its hind-legs so as to rest against his door, which opened inwards, and piled the other chairs thereon, all sloping inwards against the door; we then ran down to the kitchen to get breakfast before starting, when suddenly

we heard a fearful crash upstairs, and before we had time to turn round, in rushed Whitaker with the leg of a broken chair in his hand, and proceeded to lick me with it wherever he could get 'home.' I had a small leather bag with which I defended myself and guarded what I could, but I took a lot home with me, and he had the best of me, after all; yet the tooth-powder gave me the last word. I have never seen him since.

Another of my masters insisted on my finding him a hot roll every morning for breakfast. He found the penny to pay for it, but I had to run daily, after morning school, to Boyd's, the baker in Abingdon Street, for it. A run of about 800 yards, it warmed me up in winter, and kept me in good wind for football.

CHAPTER II

THE SCHOOL AND PRECINCTS

The school-The library - College - Little Dean's Yard - The cloisters-Great Dean's Yard-'Green '-The Bishop's knocker -The Westminster Memorial.

THE school in my time consisted of one large room, length 96 feet by 34 feet, formerly the dormitory of the monks of the Monastery of Westminster, and assigned to the school on December 3, 1599, by a Chapter order. In this room all the forms except the Sixth were taught. It was built of solid squared stone, without plaster or wainscot; on the walls and on the jambs of the windows were cut, or painted in white on black ground, countless names of the old Westminsters of bygone days, some in letters 5 or 6 inches long, such as G. Legge, G. Parry, Dunlop, Bull, and others, some singly, some in pairs, some in long lists of comrades, six or eight together.

The entrance to the school was from Little Dean's Yard, under a very handsome arch of white stone, surmounted by the arms of Queen Elizabeth, up three steps, then a flat, then up more steps, under another arch, which brought you under cover, round a corner to the left, up more steps, and then along a wide boarded

passage, with the library on your right, to the school doors. The arches and the walls on either side of the main flight of steps were of white, smooth, chiselled stone, and cut deeply into the stone were names and dates again, amongst which, on the left hand, may be seen two names on one stone: H. Saunders and F. Markham. This F. Markham is not the compiler of these Recollections, but General Frederick Markham, C.B., for many years Colonel of the 32nd Regiment, who commanded the Second Division in the Crimea. He was invalided home, and died on November 21, 1855. His name and our family arms are on the Westminster Memorial. I can well remember him—a dark, wiry man, of medium height, with his finger in his waistcoat pocket, feeling for the sovereign which always lay in wait for me on the happy days when I met him.

My own name in February, 1901, was still thereabouts, carved by me, together with my chum's (L. V. Williams's), but in a less conspicuous position, cut on a wooden batten behind the door on the right. There was a new batten placed to strengthen the door; it was painted slate colour, it was smooth, and most tempting. I cut the two names, with the down-strokes cut right through to the old wood behind, so that the paint of the old door showed through. The effect was good, but unseen, for that door was never closed when we were in school. I am sorry to find that some of the pieces between the letters have fallen out.

But to proceed up school. The big doors into school itself were closed by means of a screen, with a side swing-door. I think the doors themselves were opened