Montrose, was one of the first class, and if he had read as much as I did, there is no doubt he would have been before {44} me. I was told at the same time that I learnt the above-named particulars, as I find it in my journal, that 'I was best in mathematics, and Grahame next, although Grahame was first in algebra;' after which I thus expressed my ambition at the time: 'I hope that Grahame will not read for next year's examination, and if my eyes last out (for at that time I was under some apprehension on that point) I may have a chance of being first then, which would be delightful.' Such is all earthly ambition, and, as in my case, so always its effects--disappointment and mortification. Had I offered all my studies to God, and worked for Him, depending on His help, I should have done much more. I should have enjoyed my successes more purely, and should have been guarded from all disappointment. The second year's examination is much more confined to mathematics than to classics, and had I been wise and regular and well-disciplined in my mind, I might have gained that _first_ place which I was aiming at, for Grahame did not read for it. As it was, Ollivant, who was some way behind me in the first year, got up his ground, and beat me in the second year's examination, in which, though I was second again, I had no remarkable superiority over the one who came next to me." Spencer formed the acquaintance of Sir Thomas Fremantle while they were both at Dunton under the charge of Mr. Blomfield. Fremantle went to Oxford and he to Cambridge, but they continued the intimacy, begun here, to which Spencer pays cordial tributes of unfeigned gratitude. Sir Thomas was a welcome guest at Althorp; he and George used to spur each other on to renewed exertions in the pursuit of literary honours. Spencer formed a plan for the long vacation, and went, on March 25, to Oxford, to lay the subject before Fremantle; it was, that they should go somewhere and read together. Spencer got into the coach in London, and arrived in Oxford at twelve at night. He lionised the place next day, was introduced to different celebrities, and dined and "wined" in the most select companies his friends, Fremantle and Lord Wilton, could muster for his reception. He lived during the time in the rooms of a {45} fellow commoner of Oriel. He did not leave a single department unvisited. He played at tennis with a Mr. Denison; compared the agreements and disagreements of their ways there with those of Cambridge; the only thing noteworthy he chose to put down in his diary, as the result of his comparison, is, that (when he plays cards in W ***'s rooms, where there are four tables) "they play high, and I do not like the kind of party so well as those at Cambridge."