“Mr. Beaumont, finding I am fond of a gun, has most kindly offered me a week’s shooting on his moors. I could easily manage it, and meet you in London in time to visit Lady Salusbury. You will not think, I know well, that I like shooting better than home; and if you would like to see me before you go to London, pray say so, and the moors will not occupy another thought in my head. It is not everyone who would have taken the trouble to find out that I liked shooting and I feel Mr. Beaumont’s kindness; in fact, he seems as generous as a prince to everyone with whom he has anything to do.” But it was in his own family, where he would have wished for it most, that the reward came most amply. He became in these years the trusted adviser of your grandfather on all family matters, and especially with respect to his three youngest brothers. The direction of their education was indeed almost handed over to him, and nothing could exceed the admiration and devotion with which they soon learnt to regard him. The eldest of them was sent to Harrow in 1848 to be under his eye, and you may judge of the sort of supervision he exercised by this specimen of his reports:— “I think he has been suffering the usual reaction which takes place when a boy goes to a new school. He worked hard at first, and then, finding he had a good deal of liberty and opportunity of amusement, grew slack. He is too fond of exercise to be naturally fond of work, as some boys are who are blessed with small animal spirits; and he is not yet old enough to see clearly the object of education, and the obligation of work. I have no doubt he will very soon find this out; but, if not, it will very soon be forced on his notice by the unpleasantness of being beaten by his contemporaries.” Speaking of his letters of advice to the boys, your grandfather writes:— “They have given me at least as much pleasure as them. You are doing a very kind thing in the most judicious way, and have assisted the stimulus which they required. Good leaders make a steady-going team, and allow the coachman to turn round on his box. Arthur [the youngest] will in his turn benefit by these fellows, I doubt not. You would, I think, be pleased to see how naturally he takes to cricket. In fact, take him altogether, he is a very good specimen of a six-year-old.” But perhaps nothing will show you in a short space what he was to his younger brothers so well as one of their own letters to him, and one of his to your grandmother. The first is from your uncle Harry, written almost at the end of his first half at Rugby:— “MY DEAR GEORGE,