IV.] EDUCATION. 241
training under Professors . . . . at . . . , and especially in Germany, under . . . ."
(9) "The steadiness with which I was taught by one eccentric schoolmaster reading and accurate spelling, clear, neat, and intelligible writing, and quick and accurate computation by all the primary rules of arithmetic. Faults in these several branches were never overlooked, and all competition was for excellence in each ; Latin and French were evidently thrown in to please parents. Going to sea, at the age of 13, I really think I started with the best education
I could have had. Compared with my youthful messmates, some of whom had passed through public schools, I was far their superior in writing (I soon acquired chart-drawing and sketching from nature), and in calculation of the day's work, and in astronomical observations."
