An Autobiography of an Ancient Athlete & Antiquarian

14 AUTOBIOGRAPHY young we had acquired a strange lot of miscellaneous information, which has since often been of value to us. As a parent he was kind but stern, and. too much in the habit of depreciating the competence of bis children, though our successes at examinations might have taught him better. He used to walk up from Chelsea to the office, reaching there about 10, and seldom returned (again walking) till 9 p.rn. When a lad of 13 I used to have to put up with these long hours, and as often as not also had to carry home a heavy blue bag filled with his recent book purchases. All this no doubt did me good, but the process was not pleasant, especially as my allowance for food and pocket-money was the magnificent sum of a shilling a day. and my home meal was bread and butter and cocoa only, However, it probably hardened me. He was a good judge of art, and bought many pictures and prints, and when at Chelsea was acquainted with J. M. W. Turner, and once took me to see him painting at a little house near Martin's. I was only a child at the time, and can only remember he was a little old man (he died 1851 when I was only 8), John Martin, who lived at Lindsay House, and others, including the eccentric poet and novelist Atherstone. "Martin gave me the advice never to use white paint, I cannot say why, but he did so. We had a lot to do with McLean, the art dealer, and quite recently we had the original copperplates of some of Martin's etchings at our office as a security,. I expect, for unpaid costs. Friends be had few, and of late years none. 1 He slightly knew Carlyla, who borrowed but never returned a volume of Civil War Tracts from him. He took two of my brothers (E. C. and F.) trips on the Continent when they were young, and in fact did his best (and successfully) to instil into them a love of art. Like his father he was a moderately sized man, but with very large chest and leg measurement, and was very powerful. Once at the office a man came in and was very rude, so he 1 His oldest and practically only friend was Charles Burtt, a lime– buruer, of Camberwell, son of the first Charles Burtt mentioned before. He was the father of Edward Robert Burtt, and he in turn was father of Charles Terwin Burtt and of Edward Burtt, who, ~s I have said before, at the outbreak of the present war, though a middle aged man, pluckily volunteered for active service, and u nluckily was drowned before he fired a shot.