Sydney Smith was born on the 3rd of June; and was baptized on the 1st of July in the parish church of Woodford. His infancy was passed at South Stoneham, near Southampton. At the age of six he was sent to a private school at Southampton, and on the 19th of July 1782 was elected a Scholar of Winchester College. He stayed at Winchester for six years, and worked his way to the top place in the school, being "Prefect of Hall" when he left in 1788. Beyond these facts, Winchester seems to retain no impressions of her brilliant son, in this respect contrasting strangely with other Public Schools. Westminster knows all about Cowper--and a sorry tale it is. Canning left an ineffaceable mark on Eton. Harrow abounds in traditions, oral and written, of Sheridan and Byron, Peel and Palmerston. But Winchester is silent about Sydney Smith. Sydney, however, was not silent about Winchester. In one of the liveliest passages of his controversial writings, he said:-- "I was at school and college with the Archbishop of Canterbury:[3] fifty-three years ago he knocked me down with the chess-board for checkmating him--and now he is attempting to take away my patronage. I believe these are the only two acts of violence he ever committed in his life." Now Howley was a prefect when Sydney was a junior, and this game of chess must have been (as a living Wykehamist has pointed out to me) "a command performance." The big boy liked chess, so the little boy had to play it: the big boy disliked being checkmated, so the little boy was knocked down. This and similar experiences probably coloured Sydney's mind when he wrote in 1810:--