Hoc lecto recumbens Obdormivit in Christo Gulielmus Makepeace Thackeray Per orbem terrarum divulgata. Vixit annos LII. But Col. Newcome, that delightful creation, will ever remain Thackeray's most permanent memorial at Charterhouse. When The Newcomes appeared, Mr. F. D. Carmichael, a nephew of Major Carmichael-Smyth, told the novelist that he recognised the original of the Colonel. "Of course you would know," replied Thackeray, "but you see I had to angelicize them a little." The humourist used the plural "them", because he had drawn the character of Col. Newcome from two Old Carthusians-his step-father and his step-father's brother. Both, like Col. Newcome, had served long in India. Major Carmichael-Smyth, Bengal Engineers, served in Lord Lake's campaigns, and in the war with Nepaul. He was sometime Lt.-Governor at Addiscombe, and died August 1860. The other brother, Charles Montauban Carmichael-Smyth (afterwards Carmichael), Lt.-General, C.B., Colonel 20th Hussars, commanded 3rd Light Cavalry, Bengal Army, in the first Afghan War. He was born 1790, went to Charterhouse 1801-5, and died 1870. Over the grave of Major Carmichael-Smyth his wife inscribed the words of her son: "He whose heart was as that of a little child had answered to his name and stood in the presence of The Master." In the ante-chapel, near Thackeray's, are tablets to two of his dearest friends-Sir Richmond Shakespear and John Leech, whom Mrs. Thackeray Ritchie has described as "a third family Colonel Newcome," and who was only seven when he entered Charterhouse. The caricaturist was present at a Founder's dinner. When called on for a speech, Leech spoke as follows-"I am no speaker, but if any Old Carthusian will call on me, I will put him into Punch." There were a few more Carthusians under Dr. Russell who cannot be passed over in silence in any sketch of old Charterhouse. First and foremost there is the late publisher Mr. John Murray. Mr. John Murray and his brother Hallam were Old Etonians, but their father was an Old Carthusian. This is an instance of the truth that in the interval between the retirement of Dr. Russell (1832) and the removal of the School to Godalming (1872), Old Carthusians would do anything for their school except send their sons there. Then there was the Hon. Robert Curzon, afterwards Private Secretary to Lord Stratford de Redcliffe and author of Monasteries of the Levant. It has often struck me that this delightful book has been rather underrated by critics, just as Eothen has been perhaps rather overrated. John Murray published his schoolfellow's work. A companion of both at Charterhouse was Sir Charles Trevelyan. Like John Murray, he did not send his son, the present Sir George Trevelyan, to Charterhouse, but to Harrow. The brilliant son has overshadowed his father, but Macaulay's brother-in-law was no ordinary man. In announcing his sister's engagement to Charles Trevelyan, then a Bengal Civilian and aged about 28, Macaulay, writing from Calcutta (Dec. 15th, 1834), pays this interesting tribute to Carthusian scholarship and to Dr. Russell's powers of teaching. "He (Trevelyan) came to me the other morning to know whether I would advise him to keep up his Greek, which he feared he had nearly lost. I gave him Homer and asked him to read a page; and I found that, like most boys of any talent who had been at the Charterhouse, he was very well grounded in that language." After some ten years or so of the Indian Civil Service Charles Trevelyan retired and obtained a post in the Treasury at home. He then distinguished himself by the manner in which he dealt with the Irish Famine. After an absence of some twenty years from India and the suppression of the Indian Mutiny, certain letters, signed under a nom de plume, began to appear in the Times in which the Government of India was freely and fearlessly criticized. Lord Stanley (afterwards a member both of Disraeli's and Gladstone's Cabinets) was then (1858-59) Secretary of State for India. The letters attracted his attention and, ascertaining the name of the writer, Lord Stanley offered him the post of Governor of Madras. The offer was accepted, and was honourable both to the Old Rugbeian who made, and the Old Carthusian who accepted it; to Lord Stanley, because he regarded the disposal of public patronage as a public trust; to Trevelyan, because he won an important post through merit alone. His letters to the Times were remarkable for the extraordinary knowledge of India shown by a man who had left her shores twenty years before. It was Lord Stanley who drew up the Proclamation of the Queen on taking over the Government of India from the East India Company. The history of the genesis of that remarkable document will perhaps some day be written. It is to his father's return to Indiajand to his son George accompanying him to Calcutta that we owe Cawnpore and The Letters of a Competition Wallah. As we are on the subject of Anglo-Indians the name of Walter Fane, a gown-boy under Dr. Saunders, should not be omitted. It was he who raised the troop of horse, known as Fane's Horse, and during the Mutiny saved hundreds of Christian lives. If ever there was a beau sabreur, this old Carthusian was he. There was one point of resemblance between him and Thackeray. Both were born with a talent for drawing sufficiently marked to have secured them eminence in that line, had they cared for it. I am not aware that Charterhouse did anything to develop the genius of Thackeray, Leech or Fane as draughtsmen. The Fanes were as much a household word in the mouths of Old Carthusians as Markham, Phillimore or Russell with Old Westminsters. The late Sir James Paget, the eminent Surgeon, was a schoolfellow of the late John Murray. George Palmer, the Samuel Plimsoll of the forties, was also an Old Carthusian. Dr. Saunders, who succeeded to Dr. Russell in 1832, remained in office for 21 years, when, on the death of Dr. George Butler (ex-Head Master of Harrow), on the recommendation of Mr. Gladstone he was appointed by the Queen to the Deanery of Peterborough. As Dean of Peterborough he attended a Founder's Day dinner, and heard himself described, not as tutor of Mr. Gladstone (which he was), but as tutor of Sir Robert Peel. This was too much for the Dean, who exclaimed in a stage whisper-"Dum audio senesco." On looking at Dr. Saunders' portrait I observed to an Old Carthusian who had been in the sixth form under him, that his old master looked wide-awake. "Well," replied my friend, "that was exactly what he was not. When in class he was either writing letters or asleepsometimes he awoke and flogged you." When thoroughly roused his flow of Greek and Latin was worthy of Porson. He would recite to his class pages from Homer and Demosthenes. Under Dr. Saunders Mr. Oliver Walford, a cousin of the compiler of "Who's Who", held the historic post of Usher; while Mr. Dicken was a mathematical master. Mr. Dicken was a rare punster, and with Carthusians has always carried off the palm for that fine pun-Peccavi (I have Scinde), though non-Carthusians have claimed another paternity for it. My space allows me only to name a few more Old boys. There was Julius Hare, the friend of Havelock, of Thirlwall and of Robertson of Brighton-an Archdeacon whose Churchmanship was as wide as the Gospel-Fox Maule, Milner Gibson and Bernal Osborne, typical Parliamentarians of this century, and Sir Richard Webster, for whom all, irrespective of Party, hope that even greater honors are in store than have yet fallen to his lot. All these Old Carthusians have figured in their time at Founder's Day dinners, but never has a toast been more aptly proposed than when the Hon. John Talbot, Q.C., proposed the health of Mr. Fox Maule. Mr. Talbot was the father of that distinguished Carthusian, the present M.P. for Oxford University; Mr. Fox Maule was at the time Secretary for War. Mr. Talbot said, "Arma virumque cano I propose the health of the Secretary for War," and sat down. The name of Fox Maule reminds me of that once famous cablegram-"Take care of Dowb." There is probably not a man in the Services who has reached the age of 50 that has not heard of "Dowb." The phrase has become a 1 Afterwards Earl of Dalhousie and a Governor of Charterhouse. synonym for unblushing nepotism, and yet was due to an accident. As both the sender and the subject of the cablegram were Old Carthusians, the story can be told here, more especially as the whole truth clears the character of an honorable public man from an unfair aspersion. Montagu Hamilton Dowbiggin was a nephew of Mr. Fox Maule and a Carthusian. He joined the army and went out to the Crimea. His uncle, as Secretary for War, despatched a cablegram to the effect of "Take care of Dowbiggin etc. etc." The cable, which was a new one, broke off at the first syllable, and "Take care of Dowb" got into the papers and excited great laughter. Dr. Saunders found only 104 boys (including the gownboys) in the school, and the numbers under him and his two successors, Dr. Elder and Mr. Elwyn, never reached 200. When the late Head Master, Dr. Haig Brown, was appointed in 1863, the numbers stood at 121 boys with six masters, and when the school was removed at 147 with eight masters. The removal to Godalming has had a magical effect on the fortunes of the school. Its numbers have gone up with leaps and bounds in the new home. In Oration quarter 1873 the number of boys stood at 268, and of masters at 15; in 1874 at 386 and 19, in 1875 at 462 and 22, and in 1876 at 500 and 28. At first the Governors limited the number of the boys to 500, but subsequently raised the limit to 550. No one can visit modern Charterhouse without feeling convinced that Sutton's school has immensely benefited by two wise reforms-its removal to "pastures new", and throwing open the Foundation scholarships to competition. Dr. Haig Brown and other wise friends of the school urged that its intellectual growth was dwarfed by the low standard of qualification, which was adopted to suit those who alone were recognised as the School by the Governing Body. The present Head Master, the Rev. Gerald Henry Rendall, is qualified both by training and character to keep up a public school at the high-level of proficiency at which it 1 The year at Charterhouse is divided into three quarters called Long, Summer and Oration. |