“People who went to look at Mr. Keble as a ‘lion’ were, I think, disappointed to see a very simple old-fashioned clerical gentleman, with very little manner, and so completely unconscious of self that as he talked of common things, they were inclined to think as little of him as he thought of himself. He used to come down early and stand writing at a side-table till it was quite time for prayers and breakfast, and then sit down anywhere and, with a little peculiar jerk of the head and shoulders, read a short ‘Instruction,’ almost as if he were reading it to himself. Certain people even called his reading bad, for his voice was weak, and he had a slight cough which never wholly left him; but he brought out the meaning of Holy Scripture in a manner which I never heard surpassed. Mr. Keble was of middle height, very thin, with a splendid forehead, bright eyes which were rather hidden by his spectacles, and a sweet merry smile. Those who knew him well must remember the way in which he used to pull himself together, as if he were a boy obeying a well-known rule to ‘hold up his head.’ His manner was nervous, so much so that people who were not intimately acquainted with him were rarely quite at their ease when in his presence. The two pictures of Mr. Keble by Richmond are both good likenesses; but the lithograph of the head which was taken from the then-unfinished picture which, in its completed form, now hangs in Keble College, Oxford, has caught the peculiar intelligence of the eyes when lighted up with the eager brightness his friends knew so well. He had the unusual power of being able to write upon one subject and listen to the discussion of another at the same time; and he would often glance up from the paper in which he was apparently immersed, and pushing up his spectacles join eagerly in the conversation.” CHARLES KINGSLEY 1812-1875 [Sidenote: Caroline Fox’s _Journals and Letters_.] “Torquay, _January 30th_.--Charles Kingsley called, but we missed him. “_February 3d._--We paid him and his wife a very happy call; he fraternising at once, and stuttering pleasant and discriminating things concerning F. D. Maurice, Coleridge and others. He looks sunburnt with dredging all the morning, has a piercing eye under an overhanging brow, and his voice is most melodious and his pronunciation exquisite. He is strangely attractive.”--1854. [Sidenote: _The Galaxy_, 1872.]