But his recent success at the scholarship examination, and his future hopes, seem to have had a strange light thrown upon them by this bereavement, and he began to ask himself the question which some of us have had to face in hours of success or failure—“What _are_ College honours? Are they an end, or only a means?” He writes thus:— “I never felt so strongly as I do now the utter worthlessness of the objects at which I have been aiming with so much zeal. What does it signify whether I am fourth, fifth, sixth, or anything else in this examination, when at one stroke all one’s honour and all one’s learning may be dashed from you? It has impressed me very strongly with the feeling that to read because it is my duty and because it is an admirable preparation for after-life is a glorious object, but to read (as I must confess I have done) for a place and a place only, and slur over higher things for it, is indeed vanity of vanities.” The summer of 1832 was spent with a reading party in Wales. The start was made from Highgate, where the coach “Wonder” took in its passengers and conveyed them to Shrewsbury “with _wonder_ful rapidity,” the journey commencing at 6.40 a.m. and the destination being reached at 10.30 p.m., or one hundred and fifty-six miles in nearly sixteen hours! Thence sometimes on coach, sometimes on foot, they made their way to Llangollen, Llanrwst, Conway, and Bangor. The beautiful suspension bridge was an object of immense interest. The travellers went over to the Anglesea side, and down into the chambers and passages of the rock where the chains are fixed that uphold the structure; the letter recounting this visit contains diagrams descriptive of it all, showing the fascination that it exerted on the mind of the writer. Various accounts of the magnificent scenery fill pages in these interesting letters, and also allusions to the kindly way in which Welsh tracts were taken by the people, and the excited gratitude which the gift sometimes caused. At last Barmouth, the “ultima Thule” of their wanderings, was reached, lodgings were taken, and the party set steadily to work. They were fortunate in the parish clergyman, whose name was Pugh, and young Hoare’s letters often speak with gratitude of the guidance from above which led them into the parish of this excellent man. Michaelmas Term found them back at Cambridge, and now his younger brother Joseph {26} joined the party, and Edward’s feelings with regard to his duties towards him are expressed in a letter to his mother, of which nearly the whole is taken up with a loving interest in his brother’s plans and prospects. He writes:—