The Portsmouth Road and Its Tributaries: To-Day and in Days of OldHarper, Charles G. (Charles George)
History
The Portsmouth Road and Its Tributaries: To-Day and in Days of Old
Harper, Charles G. (Charles George)
England -- Description and travel; England -- Social life and customs; Portsmouth Road (England)
Here the Carthusians carry on the traditions of their old home in London,
and some of the stones of the old school, deeply carved with the names of
by-gone scholars, have been removed from old Charterhouse to the new
building, where they are to be seen built into an archway. Charterhouse
School numbers five hundred scholars, and its lovely situation, amid the
Surrey Hills, together with its finely-planned buildings and spreading
grounds, render this amongst the foremost public schools of the time.
One of the most interesting features of the school is its museum, housed
in a building of semi-ecclesiastical aspect, built recently in the
grounds. Here are many relics of old times and old scholars, together with
the more usual collections of a country museum: stuffed birds, chipped
flints, and miscellaneous antiquities; or, to quote the sarcastic Peter
Pindar:--
"More broken pans, more gods, more mugs;
Old snivel-bottles, jordans, and old jugs;
More saucepans, lamps, and candlesticks, and kettles;
In short, all sorts of culinary metals!"
[Sidenote: _CHARTERHOUSE_]
Among the _alumni_ of Charterhouse were Addison and Steele; John Wesley,
the founder of Methodism; Chief Justice Blackstone, Sir Henry Havelock,
Grote, Thackeray, and John Leech. Several of these distinguished
Carthusians are represented here, in a fine collection of autographs and
manuscripts. First, in point of view of general interest, is a collection
of drawings and poems in their original MS. by Thackeray. Some thirty of
his weird sketches are here, with the manuscript of "The Newcomes," bound
up in five volumes. Here also is Thackeray's Greek Lexicon, covered
thickly with school-boy scrawls and scribbles.
[Illustration: CHARTERHOUSE RELICS.]
Leech, the caricaturist,--one of the most absurdly over-rated men of this
century,--was at Charterhouse from 1825 to 1831. Here are two letters from
him, written, it would seem, when he was ten years of age, and apparently
before he had been taught the use of capital letters. In one to "my dear
mama," he seems to have been in a far from happy frame of mind. His
"mama" had been to the school, but had not seen him, "me being in the
grounds," "That," he adds, "made me still more unhappy." Writing to "my
dear papa," young Leech is "happy to say I am promoted, because I know it
pleases you very much. allow me to come out to see you on saturday because
I have a great deal to tell you, and I want some one to assist me in the
exercises because they are a great deal harder."
[Illustration: GOWSER JUG.]
[Sidenote: _'MORTIFYING NEGLECT'_]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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