In appearance Dr. Hornby was the absolutely perfect type of an Eton Headmaster. Immaculately dressed, and of fine presence, he possessed a natural dignity which even impressed boys totally lacking in reverence for all other institutions of the school. His voice, low and not unpleasant even when delivering a stem admonition, was essentially the voice of an English gentleman of the fine old school. It was a real pleasure to hear him call “Absence,” owing to the dignity which he imparted to this tedious duty. Curiously enough, this Headmaster, who in his latter years, at least, might have been called the incarnation of the best kind of Eton Conservatism, had on his appointment been regarded as a Radical. The first Oppidan, I believe, ever chosen Headmaster, he had succeeded Dr. Balston in 1868, when the latter had relinquished the post from disapproval of the various innovations and changes which resulted from the recommendations of the Public School Commission, the labours of which extended over seven years. The growing worship of athleticism was in some measure responsible for the appointment of the new Headmaster, though Dr. Hornby, besides having been in the eleven, was also a fine scholar. When he first came to Eton the school, used to the patriarchal sway of his predecessor, who had strictly followed the traditions of the past, were rather inclined to regard him as a dangerous reformer, but before long it was realised that such Radical proclivities as the new Headmaster possessed were not very likely seriously to impair the traditional round of Eton life, and the school gradually subsided into a tranquil consciousness that nothing outrageous would be perpetrated under the new “Head,” who long before his retirement grew to be far more Conservative than some of his subordinates; indeed, during his tenure of the Headmastership, which lasted sixteen years, four Assistant Masters are said to have left Eton owing to Dr. Hornby disapproving of some of their ideas. One of these exiles was young Mr. Joynes, whose socialistic tendencies obviously unfitted him for the post of an Eton master; another, Mr. Oscar Browning, whose clever and genial personality is so well known to numbers of old Etonians. [SN: DR. BALSTON]