In spite of the fact that on going to India I had given up £150 of my allowance, and on my getting command of Beatson’s Horse the other £100, I was in funds for once in my life, and should have liked to hunt; but until I had been up for the Examination in July in the following year I took no pleasure except that of rowing, working as many hours a day as my head would allow, and getting exercise by sculling up and down the Thames, summer and winter, in an outrigger which I purchased on going to Sunbury. Delissert was such a pleasant and enthusiastic teacher that I regretted I was forbidden to do any French after the first few weeks, Captain Lendy explaining that I knew enough to secure two-thirds marks, and must turn to German, which I did, being instructed by Herr Zöbel. Both these men were more successful in teaching me than was Captain Lendy, whose mind was so quick that it was difficult for him to exercise sufficient patience with any one who was entirely ignorant of a subject. He himself, besides knowing the answer to any possible question which could be asked in any Examination paper, had also a marvellous memory for dates. One morning when sitting at early study with him, the post was brought in, with it a parcel for me containing Haydn’s _Dictionary of Dates_. My tutor, with the vivacity of his race, looking up, asked me the name of the book, and on my answering observed, “Yes, it is a good book, but you should have it all here,” pointing to his forehead. “Oh, that is impossible; no man could have all in his head.” On which he replied confidently, “I have it all.” I then said, “Well, Captain Lendy, I will open the book with the paper-cutter, and if you answer three questions which I shall take at random, successfully, I will admit you know the book.” My first was the date of Hampden’s death; “1643” came without a moment’s hesitation. The next was the date of the Catholic Emancipation Act, to which he replied immediately, “1829.” I then asked, “Will you tell me the dates of the Numantine Wars?” “Ah,” he said, “that is a little difficult,” and he counted on his fingers for less than a minute, and replied, “143–133 B.C.” I passed through London early on the morning of Monday, the 16th December, when the news of the death of the Prince Consort, on Saturday-Sunday night, was announced. The sorrow was universally deep, and Dean Milman expressed correctly the feeling of the Nation in a sermon delivered a week later in St. Paul’s Cathedral, when he observed, “From the Highest to the Lowest it is felt that a great example has been removed from amongst us.”