the enormous interest of this vacant site, the more suggestive for its very

vacancy.

No one who looks at the marsh can believe in its having ever furnished decent communication with the sea; but at the same time its unhealthiness is probably mythical. We saw no signs of disease in Jenidjeh, and felt no bad effects from our stay there. It is accordingly not for the port or canal that an archeologist should search, but for the city itself in the neighbourhood of Alaklisi. The object of our visit was to estimate the possible success of such research, and we were compelled to admit that it was by no means assured. The site is so vast, the indications are so slight, and the difficulties of procuring labour and obtaining security would be very great in existing circumstances. Add to this that the whole site is under cultivation, and the proprietors must be bought out at a considerable cost from their fertile fields. If excavation be anywhere undertaken, it must be in the neighbourhood of the track which leads from Alaklisi across the main road, and which is marked by the two broken Doric columns aforesaid. The difficulties once overcome, much ought to be found, for neither Alaklisi nor Jenidjeh have stolen very much; the city wall seems mainly to have been quarried for the latter. An uninteresting, stifling, dirty place is this successor of Pella, in whose khan we slept in despite of noisy soldiers (collected there with a view to coming troubles on the frontier) and obtrusive entomological specimens. Far more interesting in many ways is the Bulgarian village of Alaklisi on the other side of the old site, with its barbarian population from whom we bought various relics of

Pella, including some eighty coins, for about five shillings sterling. Jenidjeh is full of refugees from Bulgaria, living in very holes of the earth, though, we were told, of good position in their own country. A wild-looking lot is that one meets between the Vardah and Jenidjeh, each sullen man sitting sideways on his mule or donkey, armed to the teeth, and riding silently on in Indian file. The customary salutations to the passing traveller seem little in vogue here, and altogether one hardly covets a more intimate acquaintance. The strangest group that we passed consisted of five dancing bears of all ages, sleeping peacefully in the sun by the side of their snoring masters! Animal life was further represented by numbers of buffaloes, used for draught, countless coneys or lemurs, cranes and herons in the marshes, and storks on trees and chimneys. Near the fountain of Pel an eagle has also taken possession of a tree, but he sailed away unscathed from an attack with our only available weapon of long range, a Martini rifle.

But whatever the defects of Pella as a site, whatever the dulness and deadness of its marshes, one need only lift one's eyes to the glorious mountain ring encircling it in a half-moon from the superb Olympus to the long white-capped blue line running down in front of Cavalla. It was worth the journey to stand in the centre of that gorgeous arc, even had the site of Pella no other interest; and we left the solitary plateau, if with subdued hopes of resuscitating the city of Philip, at least with an understanding of the motives of its foundation.

D. G. HOGARTH.

mark however failed, to elicit any sympathy, the reply being, "Yes; that is all very well if you want to meet that sort of person, but as a matter of fact one doesn't "! To those whose opportunities are limited the superb indifference of such a rejoinder will sound even more grotesque than to members of the Athenæum Club. When we do find a remarkable man interesting it is difficult to over-rate a privilege that so rarely offers itself.

The subject of this paper, dead many years since, has acquired enviable distinction in a book1 which at least cannot be accused of indiscriminate

panegyric. His claim to be remembered is therefore to some extent a public one, and may furnish these reminiscences with their excuse, if any other be needed than the personal affection of a pupil. Our acquaintance was short indeed : it lasted little more than a month-two periods I think of about a fortnight each, separated by an interval of nearly two years, but they were fortnights of such rare enjoyment as are not immediately suggested by the words private tuition. When some twentytwo years ago I asked a friend to find me some one in London with whom I

1 Mark Pattison's "Memoirs," page 142. He speaks of Hyman "as offering in his talk a type of high scholarship which I had never been in contact with before."

No. 358. vol. LX.

could read, the name of Hyman was unknown to me; and my friend could tell me nothing about him except that he was a Fellow of Wadham College, and that a schoolfellow had pronounced him an excellent "coach." He had been, I believe, a lecturer at King's College, and when he gave up the post lived on in London in lodgings, taking pupils when they were sent to him. The house where he lodged when I knew him was in Porchester Place, off the Edgware Road. The only facts about himself that I remember his telling me were that his father was a German Jew, and (I think) that he had been at school at Reading. Long afterwards at Oxford, the late Rector of Lincoln College spoke to me of him: "Hyman", he said, "was the first man who taught me what scholarship meant". These words made me think of the vast gulf which there then was between my opportunities and my deserts. I had left school, and was then engaged in the somewhat humiliating pursuit of a scholarship which had more than once slipped from my grasp as easily as the ghostly mother of Ulysses from the hero's embraces; and it was in no elevated or disinterested frame of mind that I lighted upon my good fortune. One can scarcely exaggerate the bathos of asking for the services of a man who could "tell you what scholarship meant", to get helped to a scholarship! But little as I deserved "the blind benefit of fate" thus conferred on me, it did not take long to discover that something different in kind as well as in degree from ordinary "coaching" had fallen to my lot. It seemed to me almost at once that this man had read more books than I had ever seen, and that he gave you the marrow

U

of his reading "like wealthy men who care not how they give". The difference in degree spoken of above may be understood very literally. I was supposed to go for an hour's lesson; when I called to make arrangements, he begged that the lesson might be an hour and a half, as he "wasted men's time so by talking"; I seldom got away, as a matter of fact, under three hours, and would not have grudged another two, so rich was the reward of listening. He could illustrate at pleasure anything we were reading from ancient or modern literature, and never missed a chance of an apposite story. Like Praed's Vicar, his talk

Slipped from polities to puns,

And passed from Mahomet to Moses.

Great scholars are not generally credited with superfluous modesty, but I never knew any one so distrustful as Hyman of his own reputation. He thought his college paid him almost an extravagant compliment in asking him to continue examining for Fellowships, adding that it was of course only a pretty act of courtesy, as he had been long left behind in the race of learning. He always denied any knowledge of modern languages, but when I assumed in consequence that he read Dante, whom he was quoting, in a translation, he broke in with fervid eagerness, “Oh, no, sir. I never could abide translations. My accent you see is dreadful, but I can make them out-I can make them out." I ought to mention that he had this Johnsonian peculiarity of invariably addressing you with "Sir". There was one phrase of his indicating a certain amount of self-complacency, but even that was impersonal. When he was conscious that he had told a more than usually good story, he would look up and say, "Very funny fellows those, sir; very funny fellows those." He told me that he thought he had read most of "the pretty books that were going", meaning literature as distinguished from works of science and philosophy. Even in these last he had of course to make exceptions in

classical literature-as "Of course, sir, I know all my Aristotle pretty well.” He certainly did know the classics pretty well, and pretty well by heart. When I began reading Homer with him I noticed he had no book-no books in fact, except three dictionaries on which sat three cats, taking up a sort of official position as friends and counsellors! At the head of the table was a stuffed cat, indicating the strength and continuity of his friendships, and that he was not enslaved to the principle Le Roi est mort! Vive le Roi! But he did not feel the want of books, certainly not of a Homer. Start him with the first line, and he knew at once where you were, and could correct your blunders as promptly as if he had the text before his eyes. I believe that at any given place in Homer he could have quoted for an indefinite number of lines.

There was something specially delightful about the way he would dwell on the best things in famous books. The sixth Æneid and the speech of Pericles were prime favourites. His body would be bent double with fervour as he tasted these choice morsels again and again-dulcem elaborabat saporem.

66

And historical characters he found no less moving than famous passages. Cæsar was his great admiration"No one to put against him, sir, is there?" he would say, no one to put against him." He never however exalted the ancients at the expense of the moderns, was tender of the eighteenth century, and at the same time quite abreast of the criticism of the nineteenth. He was particularly fond. of quoting Gibbon, whom he ranked above all other historians. At the same time he took a little amusement out of the eighteenth century, much as he loved it, for its scant knowledge of Greek, and its apparent preference for Latin literature.

He was distrustful of the mere antiquarian scholar, and hinted wickedly that there were some like the fellow-prisoner of the Vicar of Wakefield who would be not unwilling to

practise incantations with the name of Sanconiathon. Speaking once of a man, then well known in the world of scholarship, he said to me: "Don't they say, sir, that he knows more Greek than any one in England, without knowing anything else?"!

It was said that at King's College he was a very pungent critic of those whose scholarly equipment was less complete than his own. I feel sure

these criticisms must have been humorous rather than bitter. It was often not a little irritating and disappointing to be asked if one had heard some of the terrible things said by the famous people in old Oxford days of one another (Whately, I remember, was of the number), and the next minute to be denied them from considerations of humanity; "Ah well, sir," Hyman would say, "I don't think I'll tell you. It's not good for young

men to hear these bitter things"!

The thing which naturally impressed you most in Hyman's teaching was the way in which he brought all his knowledge to bear on one place; so that over and above full verbal exposition and interpretation you would get illustrations without end, some serious and some playful, of the pas sage before you. There are, no doubt, books which we have felt to be more instructive than many teachers; though as a rule the Platonic indictment against books, and the solemn silence they preserve when you most wish to ask them questions, is a phrase that we can all understand. And when you are talking to, and can question a man who carries ever so lightly a weight of learning which two-and-twenty Homeric waggons would not enable his hearer to put to ready use, the educating power of such talk is something very different even from a very good book-something, perhaps, which the strongest minds can do without, but which to all, except the strongest, renders such a service that they must be very dull or very graceless if they are not the better for it in heart and head. Hyman was a man who never

divorced the manner from the matter of his author. Just because he held Plato to be something greater than the particles he uses, no study of his particles would seem to him too great, if they contributed anything whatsoever to a better understanding of the man and his mind.

There was another side to Hyman's character which lent it a further charm, and made it impossible for his pupils to be anything else than his friends. The Humanities were his studies in every sense of the word; and the ingenuous arts have seldom done their work so finely. Those who had seen some of his queer ways, and had heard of some of his queer habits, and how he lived all alone, might be excused for thinking that such a man would prove somewhat of a crazed and crusty old scholar. There is no doubt that there were things about him that were strange enough; and I fear that as his health gave way, his mind gave way with it. Even when I knew him, it was said that he would cut his books to pieces after he had read them. But whatever these habits amounted to, they never affected the relevancy and vivacity of his talk or the beauty and courtesy of his manners. There is an ancient story of a famous personage who, on a visit to India, at some place where he was entertained was not a little pained at finding "Welcome" written over the lunatic asylum! Had officious people confined this eccentric old scholar for the infelicitous use he made of his scissors and for his other vagaries, I would hazard the assertion that any visitors he might have had would have got such a welcome as not many of the sane know how to give-not even when they put into it all the graciousness they can command. His power of entertaining was much more than mere cleverness. He had that beautiful ancient courtesy which, while it never forgets what may be claimed by the code, adds not a little on the score of equity. Such courtesy treats the stranger as if the presumption

were in favour of his being good company, is easy itself, and tries to make him so; and has at least this degree of success, that he becomes much better company than he would otherwise have been. I have never, I think, met any one who understood better than Hyman what may be called the optimism of good manners. I well remember how one day a school friend called for me before our lesson was over. He came up stairs by invitation, and sat with us during the few minutes we were finishing our book. When we had got to the end, Hyman turned to my friend, and in the easiest, pleasantest manner, drew him out about his work and his office, questioning him about Somerset House with as much interest as if it had been the Roman forum, where there were still to be gathered floating traditions of Cicero and Hortensius. interview was never forgotten, and I was often asked afterwards about "that wonderful old fellow, your coach ".1

The

Hyman himself preferred this designation, and would humorously dwell on the honourable traditions of his calling. "Milton, sir," he used to say, was a coach, and Bob Lowe has been a coach, and I'm a coach."

But there was something in him beyond courtesy; there was real friendliness. He remembered all his friends with affection, and could not bear to think of their having enemies. Speaking of a very distinguished pupil—an extreme republican-he said once to me, "I believe they think he would send all the Tories to the guillotine but, sir, if you could hear his kindly laugh, you would never believe he wanted to guillotine any one."

The last time I saw him I had a curious illustration of his humanity in the commonest sense. I would not stay, for he was going out a thing sufficiently remarkable as he had formerly made it a rule to take no

1 He was not really old, by the way, at that time; not much over fifty, I should think, but he looked much more. He was Ireland" Scholar in 1834.

66

exercise. "My friend and I, sir," he said, are going out. I will introduce you to my friend directly." He opened a door, and there stalked in the leanest and ugliest old greyhound I ever beheld. When the edict came out for the destruction of vagrant dogs, he was seized with a great compassion for this greyhound, whom he had often observed rushing past his windows. Accordingly he gave some money to a neighbouring shopkeeper to secure the dog and save it for him. Exercise, sir," he said, "is good for my friend, and now I go out!" A friend of mine who had seen them go across the park together, told me they made the most wonderful-looking pair he had ever seen in his life.

66

Hyman's appearance was to me singularly attractive, though it had a touch of the grotesque. He always wore an ancient dress-coat, which must have been nearly coeval with the invention of this form of apparel. He was tall and stooped, and his face was lined and seamy like an old apple, every line serving for a channel of humour and benevolence as he said some good or some kindly thing. At these times he would get up from his chair, and sway his body forward, and repeat his sentences with a raised voice and a tone of mingled jest and earnest, which, once heard, no one could ever forget.

It is often said that a hard life makes a hard man. It was not so in his case. An old clergyman, a contemporary of his, once told me that Hyman had nothing but his exhibition at college, and that his poverty was cruelly pinching at times. He told me himself that all he ever had from his father was the half of a five-pound note! (he did not say what had happened to the other half!),—“ And what was I to say, sir, when friends asked me about a young man, and what he would want at Oxford?" What indeed! But this hard life had never induced him to adopt that principle of tribal justice which makes some visit their spleen on their fellows as a compensation for their own hard