Though poor Tom, with his half blind eyes,
and general physical disadvantages, merited
a treatment a little removed from the rigid
equality which governed his parents in their
family organisation, he never met with it; he
was one of the eight, and he had his eighth
of attention—neither more nor less. His
mental training was even below the level of
his brothers and sisters, because the medical
attendance, consequent upon his diseased
eyes, took from the fund that was methodically
set aside for his education. If, as was
the case in the year when he underwent an
operation, the surgical expenses swallowed
up the educational fund, and something
more, his clothes fund was debited with
the difference, and he suffered for his
bodily failings in a short supply of boots
and hats. The father kept a book in
which he had opened debtor and creditor
accounts with all his children, as if they had
been so many mercantile vessels. When
Tom arrived at the same age as his brothers
had arrived at when they went out before
him, he received the same hint that it was
time that he sought for a means of obtaining
a livelihood; and, feeling his own
shortcomings, and want of energy, he accepted the
offer of a chapel connection, and quietly sank
into the position at the school in which I
found him.

Poor Tom's personal appearance gave rise
to all kinds of heartless jokes, such as only
self-willed, thoughtless schoolboys make.
His eyeglasses were always a fruitful source
of amusement. Many a lad in all the full
glow of health, has tried to break those
green coverings, to see what kind of eyes
were concealed behind them. Tom bore all
with wonderful patience and amiability of
temper. He had small authority over the boys,
for want of force of character, but his uniform
kindness did a great deal, and many a little
tormentor has shed bitter tears of remorse,
when he found the way in which his annoyance
was returned. Tom's income was
exceedingly small, far under the average of
ushers' stipends, but he was very careful
and independent with it. Once away from
home he sought for no assistance there; and
by great economy and self-denial he was
always able to indulge in the luxury of
buying little presents for his favourites in the
school. One day, shortly after the mid-
summer holidays, Tom appeared in what
looked like a new coat, but which he told me
privately was a very good secondhand one,
that he had been some time raising the
purchase-money for. It was the day for cleaning
and replenishing all the inkstands and
lamps in the school, and this was a duty that
Tom had to perform. While occupied in his
task, his coat was carefully hung up behind
a door, though not so carefully but what it
caught the eye of a mischievous lad whose
name I forget now, and who, knowing that it
was a new garment belonging to Tom, thought
it would be capital fun to fill the pockets
with oil. When Tom found out the cruel
trick that had been played upon him, I
observed tears oozing from under his green
spectacles, and for the first time since he had
been at the school, he made a complaint to
the master. The master, a stout, pompous
man, replied in these words: " Mr. Craddock,
sir; if you had preserved a proper authority
over my boys, this event would not have
happened. I shall chastise the offender to
preserve the discipline of my school; but, at
the same time, I do not consider you free
from blame."

The chastisement, to do the master justice,
was severe enough, and poor Tom, seeing
this, blamed himself very much for having
made the complaint, and could not persuade
himself that he had not been actuated by a
hasty and unchristian spirit of revenge.

Tom repaired the damage done to his
garment as well as he could with my aid, and
would have walked about in it contented
enough; but he had been induced to buy the
coat sooner than he would otherwise have
done because the master had told him, that
"he wished him to appear a little more gentlemanly
for the credit of the school," and Tom,
now feared that he should be ordered to
purchase another. A favourite relaxation of the
tedium of study used to be an excursion of
the whole school to the Temple Mills at
Tottenham. An excursion of this kind took
place about a week after the above occurrence,
and Tom was put quite at his ease
when we started without any remark being
made upon his greasy costume. It was the
last excursion that we had, for at the close of
the day a boy got away from the ranks—the
boy who had poured the oil over Tom's coat
—and was found drowned in the river Lea.
Of course, the master—who had done nothing
but eat and lounge the whole day—threw all
the blame upon Tom, who, poor fellow, was
nearly worn to death with his day's work,
for in a conscientious spirit, that no one might
suffer from his bodily defects, he always
devoted a double amount of labour to any task
that he undertook. He passed a wretched
night, grieving for the lost boy, grieving that
he had caused him any pain by the punishment
that he had procured him a week
before, and racking himself with doubts as
to whether he might not have prevented
the accident by greater care, activity, and
thoughtfulness, although I knew that he .
had borne nearly the whole fatigue of the
excursion. As I expected, the master
discharged him the next morning, with an
impressive censure upon his carelessness, and
some cruel remarks upon defects which poor
Tom was only too painfully conscious of.

It was some ten years after this, that I got
poor Tom a situation as junior clerk, under
me, in the counting-house of Biddles and Co.
—old Biddles—in the West Indian trade.
Tom's father had died shortly after he left