Mr. John Leighton noting this fondness for animals in
his youthful neighbour, taught him to ride, and gave
him opportunities of proving himself both fearless and
graceful on horseback. Occasional visits to the Upper
Thames delighted him. He took a greater interest
in out-door games than in academic studies. Popular
with his companions, he was always their leader, not
by any exhibition of physical prowess or mental
superiority,* but from a gentle yet firm habit of
getting his own way. “ For a youth to be distinguished
by his companions,” says Disraeli, “ is perhaps
a criterion of talent. At that moment of life, with no
flattery on the one side and no artifice on the other,
all emotion and no reflection, the boy who has obtained
a predominance has acquired this merely by native
powers.”
v.
Towards the end of the year 1874 a gunpowder
barge blew up in the Regent’s Canal, wrecking the
terrace in which Frank lived with his parents. Although
he was hurled from his bed and deposited in the
middle of the room amidst the debris of a shattered
window, he accepted the situation with the greatest
sang-froid. The necessity of changing our home for
a time suggested the desirability of seizing the opportunity
to send Frank abroad. I t had already been
decided that he should be entered as a student at
the college of Marcq, near Lille, in France, and thither
he went. He remained at this establishment, with
occasional visits home, for upwards of two years.
Reports concerning him were always satisfactory. He
mastered the French language with singular rapidity.
In his general studies he only made respectable progress.
His prizes were for good conduct, natural
history, and geography. "When he left Lille he came
home with the reputation of speaking French with
the" purest accent that an English student had ever
obtained there, and with high testimonials to his manliness,
his morality, and his honourable disposition.
Trained previously in Protestant establishments, his
beliefs and opinions had been stirred up by his Roman
-Catholic surroundings. For a short time he devoted
himself to theological studies, comparing the faiths of
the various sects, reading the Koran, and studying
the Fathers. He came out of this personal investigation
opposed to the formalities of creeds, with a determination
to judge of the pretensions of the Churches
for himself, strongly objecting to all kinds of clerical
dictation, but with a' generous toleration for all beliefs
that were honestly held. He was only a boy, and
he had not greatly distinguished himself in his. studies;
but he had a way of looking at things from a common-
sense standpoint, and whatever views he formed, he
held them with tenacity.
I t was at this period of his career that he became
a student of King’s College School. His mother introduced
him to the clerical head of the school, the
Rev. Dr. Maclear. I was in America at the time. Dr.
Maclear expressed a critical opinion unfavourable to
parents who send their sons to be educated in France.
Frank’s mother ventured to say that I believed modern
languages to be essential in the practical education
of a boy who has his living to earn in these
days, and th a t modern languages should be learnt in