As he grew older he discovered a strong
liking for books on theology. It was the old Presbyterian streak
cropping out.
The last thing one would expect from such a boy, was to become a
soldier. A divinity student, yes,--perhaps a college professor--but a
soldier, never! Yet it was to soldiering that this quiet boy turned.
The one thing which linked him up with the field was horsemanship. He
was always a devotee of riding, and soon learned to ride well, with a
natural ease and grace.
He received a general education at Clifton, then entered Brasenose
College, Oxford, at the age of twenty. He was never a
"hail-fellow-well-met" sort of person. Reserve was his hallmark. But
the longer he stayed in college, the more of an outdoorsman he became.
Every afternoon would find him mounted on his big gray horse for a
gallop across the moors, or perhaps an exciting canter behind the
hounds on the scent of a fox. It was then that his habitual reserve
would melt away, and he would wave his hat and cheer like a high-school
boy.
The record of his classes is in no sense remarkable. He turned in neat
and precise papers, without making shining marks in any particular
study. Literature and science were his best subjects.
"Well, son, how goes it now?" his father would ask.
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