An Autobiography of Anthony TrollopeTrollope, Anthony
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An Autobiography of Anthony Trollope
Trollope, Anthony
Novelists, English -- 19th century -- Biography; Trollope, Anthony, 1815-1882
Then I was sent to a private school at Sunbury, kept by Arthur Drury.
This, I think, must have been done in accordance with the advice
of Henry Drury, who was my tutor at Harrow School, and my father's
friend, and who may probably have expressed an opinion that my
juvenile career was not proceeding in a satisfactory manner at
Harrow. To Sunbury I went, and during the two years I was there,
though I never had any pocket-money, and seldom had much in the way
of clothes, I lived more nearly on terms of equality with other boys
than at any other period during my very prolonged school-days. Even
here, I was always in disgrace. I remember well how, on one occasion,
four boys were selected as having been the perpetrators of some
nameless horror. What it was, to this day I cannot even guess; but
I was one of the four, innocent as a babe, but adjudged to have
been the guiltiest of the guilty. We each had to write out a sermon,
and my sermon was the longest of the four. During the whole of one
term-time we were helped last at every meal. We were not allowed to
visit the playground till the sermon was finished. Mine was only
done a day or two before the holidays. Mrs. Drury, when she saw us,
shook her head with pitying horror. There were ever so many other
punishments accumulated on our heads. It broke my heart, knowing
myself to be innocent, and suffering also under the almost equally
painful feeling that the other three--no doubt wicked boys--were the
curled darlings of the school, who would never have selected me to
share their wickedness with them. I contrived to learn, from words
that fell from Mr. Drury, that he condemned me because I, having
come from a public school, might be supposed to be the leader of
wickedness! On the first day of the next term he whispered to me
half a word that perhaps he had been wrong. With all a stupid boy's
slowness, I said nothing; and he had not the courage to carry
reparation further. All that was fifty years ago, and it burns me now
as though it were yesterday. What lily-livered curs those boys must
have been not to have told the truth!--at any rate as far as I was
concerned. I remember their names well, and almost wish to write them
here.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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