UNKNOWN

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXIII, Issue 91, 7 May 1901, Page 4

UNKNOWN

It is rrl-,:i.' ■■ '.. :,\ Macaulay, !h< ewincnt hir,: .•-.:., :,i'<l c ■.»* <> i=t, thai on en; occasion lie wc: v a »--(-;: ; 'n<; i.c rmrc'ir.s< some ballad.-. ■:■. ~.: :h :< was .J-.v'avs .crj loud), and, :-.:-, h.- was ,;'.:u, ; r.= the purchase, somechikiu-n <--!'.:- :t si ',. ol him. Crowding around, the; ; aui ' ihe i;e'iiiian's goin'' to sing," am] 'hereupon followed him into the street, where. i.efcJless to sav, they were disappointed it is v. ill-known that Macaulay had a very retentive memory, and on coe occasion he is said to have modestly asserted that, if by some peculiar freak of fortune, all thecopies ol " paradise Los.." and "Pilgrims Progress" should !>.' s;. jpi out of existence, he would pMvantee to rej roduce them almost word Mr w..ul from memory. He lived and died a bachelor, and, when asked why he did not r.iarry, he i.sed to smile and say he never had time fur courting. Dr. JohiHon was notably an ugly man, and it is said that Boswell, his personal friend and biographer, " added five hundred pounds to the fortune of one of his babies because she was not frightened at Johnson's ugly face." "The preat lexicographer was a glutton at the table, seldom speaking much during meat, and scarcely even emitting anything more than a rude growl when spoken to. So fond was he of his food that, as Macaulay puts it, "he tore his dinner like a famished wolf, with the veins swelling or- his forehead, and the perspiration running flown his cheeks" As a child, indeed, throughout his life, he possessed a remarkably retentive memory, and his mother used to relate a story of his early childhood which sufficiently testifies to this fact. On one occasion, she tells us, being desirous of keeping him quiet for awhile, whilst she did something in the upper rooms, shegavehim a book and told him to learn a certain hymn by heart. She then left him, and proceeded upstairs; but she bad only reached the second flight when " Sammy" cameruhning up after her, declaring that he had learnt it. He thereupon repeated it straight off, although.-as his mother tells us, he could not have read it through more than once. Sir Walter Scott, whilst at school, was noted for his stupidity in learning; he would " only learn when he thought he would." He was generally to be found at the foot of the class, but at times he was stirred up by an ambition to figure at the head of his class. On one occasion, inspired by this noble desire, he was led to adopt by no means noble expedients to attain his end. He had passed up to the second from the head, and there l-.e stayed. The boy who was at the bead saw that Walter was trying to take ■ his place, and he, therefore, worked hard and kept his position, so that for days the two boys were battling with each other, but finally YValtf, despairing of passing his fellow by fair means, determined to pass him by a strategic movement. He soon noticed that this boy, whenever asked to answer a question, always started nervously clutching a butloo rr the bottjm of his waistcoat. This was Walter's ch .nee. As soon as he saw the master comin he took his penknife, and quietly, unobserved, cut off the offending button. The master came, put a question to the head boy, and he immediately dropped his hand in search of the faithinspiring button, but finding it gone, ha blushed, stammered, and forgot 'he answer. Thut 'A'alter won the position be sought.