A friend having lent me a work on artificial
memory, I began to study it; but the work led me into nothing but
confusion, and I soon found that if I did not give it up, I
should be left with no memory at all. I still went an sketching
from Nature, not so much as a study, but as a means of recruiting
my health, which was far from being good. At the beginning of
1881 I obtained my present situation as assistant master at the
Yorebridge Grammar School, of which the Rev. W. Balderston, M.A.,
is principal.
"Soon after I became settled here, I spent some of my leisure
time in reading Emerson's 'Optics,' a work I bought at an old
bookstall. I was not very successful with it, owing to my
deficient mathematical knowledge. On the May Science
Examinations of 1881 taking place at Newcastle-on-Tyne, applied
for permission to sit, and obtained four tickets for the
following subjects:-- Mathematics, Electricity and Magnetism,
Acoustics, Light and Heat, and Physiography. During the
preceding month I had read up the first three subjects, but,
being pressed for time, I gave up the idea of taking
physiography. However, on the last night of the examinations, I
had some conversation with one of the students as to the subjects
required for physiography. He said, 'You want a little knowledge
of everything in a scientific way, and nothing much of anything.'
I determined to try, for 'nothing much of anything' suited me
exactly.
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