The fault in that case, however, was almost entirely Mrs. Byron's. There was some dispute between her and Dr. Glennie, her son's Dulwich headmaster--a dispute which culminated in a fit of hysterics in Dr. Glennie's study. Lord Carlisle was appealed to, and the result of his attempt at mediation was that Mrs. Byron practically ordered him out of the house. Byron, of course, could not help that; but, equally of course, he suffered from it. He was neglected, and he was sensible of the neglect. He had come into a world in which he had every right to move, only to be made to feel that he was not wanted there. Born in exile, and having returned from exile, he was cold-shouldered by kinsmen who seemed to think that he would have done better to remain in exile. Very likely he was, at that age, somewhat of a lout, shy, ill at ease, and unprepossessing. Genius does not necessarily reflect itself in polished behaviour. Aberdeen is not as good a school of manners as Eton, and Mrs. Byron was but an indifferent teacher of deportment. But his pride, it seems clear, was not the less but the greater because of his inability to express it in strict accordance with the rules of the best society. He was a Byron--a peer of the realm--the senior representative of an ancient house. He knew that respect, and even homage, were due to him; and he felt that he must assert himself--if not in one way, then in another. So, when the Earl of Portsmouth--a peer of comparatively recent creation--presumed to give his ear a friendly pinch, he asserted himself by picking up a sea-shell and throwing it at the Earl of Portsmouth's head. That would teach the Earl, he said, not to take liberties with other members of the aristocracy. At this date, too, when writing to his mother, he addressed her as "the Honorable Mrs. Byron," a designation to which, of course, she had no shadow of a right; and he earned the nickname of "the old English Baron" by his habit of boasting to his schoolfellows of the amazing antiquity of his lineage. Lord Carlisle may well have thought that it was high time for his ward to go to Harrow to be licked or kicked into shape. He went there in 1803, at the age of thirteen and a half. Dr. Drury, of Harrow, was the first man who saw in Byron the promise of future distinction. "He has talents, my lord," he soon assured his guardian, "which will add lustre to his rank." Whereat Lord Carlisle merely shrugged his shoulders and said, "Indeed!"--whether because his ward's talents were a matter of indifference to him, or because he considered that rank could dispense with the lustre which talents bestow.