Dr. George Augustus Selwyn was the most stalwart champion of “muscular Christianity.” His face was somewhat grim and stern, as was to be expected in so redoubtable a preacher of the gospel of hard work; but there was a humorous twinkle in his eyes which betokened a very kind heart; and to any one connected with Eton, present Etonian or Old Etonian, he extended the warmest of welcomes. In fact, New Zealand, the scene of his missionary labours, and Eton, where he had been a successful scholar and athlete, were the standing subjects of conversation at his table: he and Mrs. Selwyn used often to converse together in the Maori tongue; and had there been an Etonian language (other than slang) it would assuredly have been spoken by them. The world was, for the bishop, divided into Etonian and non-Etonian. I once heard him pressing upon an old schoolfellow, who was about to leave the Palace, some table-delicacies of rare excellence, and quoting the Horatian line: Ut libet; hæc porcis hodie comedenda relinques. (“As you like! The pigs will eat them up, if left.”) He explained that some other guests who were coming to Lichfield that day were--non-Etonians. But in spite of the large and lion-like geniality of the bishop, there were anxious moments when the sight of some indolent or slovenly action caused his quick temper to give way, and then one knew not whether to tremble or be inwardly amused at the forms which his anger would take. Once, on a dull Sunday afternoon (the Sundays _were_ dull at the Palace), he overheard his nephew yawning wearily and saying he did not know what to do. “What!” cried the bishop. “A Christian boy not know what to do on a Sunday afternoon!” Then, in terrible tones: “Go and fetch your Greek Testament.” Forthwith, while I made haste to escape from that scene of wrath, the wretched boy had to undergo a long lesson from his uncle. On another occasion it was my pupil’s sister, a very beautiful child of ten or twelve, who caused an eruption of the volcano. She had left, in the course of luncheon, “a wasteful plate”--that is, she had put the gristle of the meat at the side, cleverly hidden, as she thought, under knife and fork--and the bishop, observing this, lectured her sharply on the sinfulness of such a habit. Then, to our consternation, his anger rising higher, he ended by seizing the girl’s plate, and then and there himself devoured the disgusting stuff as a practical lesson in frugality. “The bishop’s in a very bad temper, to-day, sir,” the butler gravely remarked to me afterwards.[9]