My highest anticipations of the school were realized. If there ever was a born teacher, William J. Bingham was one. Latin and Greek were taught then by a method very different from the modern one. Before a sentence was read or translated, the invariable direction was—master your grammar. In grammar-drill Mr. Bingham could have no superior. Bullion’s Grammars and Readers were the text-books. The principal definitions were learned practically verbatim. The coarse print was required of all in the class. The older pupils were advised to learn notes, exceptions, and all. I never became so familiar with any other books as with that series of grammars. We were expected to decline every noun and adjective, alone or combined, from nominative singular to ablative plural, backwards or forwards, and to give, at a nod, voice, mood, tense, number, and person of any verb in the lesson. These exercises became at last so easy that they were great fun. Even now, sixty years later, I often put myself to sleep by repeating the old paradigms. It may seem that my estimate of Mr. Bingham is prejudiced by my sense of personal obligation to him for his kindness. Yet I doubt not that the universal verdict of every one who went there to study would be that he should be rated as one of the world’s greatest teachers. The South owes much to him for the dignity he gave to the profession of teaching. No man ever left a deeper impress on me. Thousands of times I have thanked the Lord for the opportunity to attend his school. I was graduated from the school in May, 1849, a few days before I was twenty-one years old. On leaving my kind friends at The Oaks, I was again at sea. It will be remembered that, by my original agreement, I was booked for teaching—but I had no idea where. Once more the unexpected happened. In the midst of negotiations for a school in the southern part of the state, I was greatly surprised at receiving an offer from one of the prominent business men of my own town, Pittsboro, to assist me in organizing a new school of my own there. With much doubt and hesitation on my part—for there were already two preparatory schools in the place—the venture was made, and I began with ten pupils taught in a little business office. The number was considerably increased during the year. But when the second year opened, I was put in charge of the Academy, whose Principal had resigned. Here, in work both pleasant and fairly profitable, I remained until the four years for which I had agreed to stay were up.