My Life as an Author

Preliminary—Sonnet—Public Life, not Private—Benjamin Franklin—Samples from Books—Self-judgment 1-6 Infancy and Schooldays—Parentage—Germany and Guernsey, America and Canada—Winsor's Patent Gaslights—King George III.'s Blessing—My Father's Dream—Second Sight—Heredity—First School at Brentford—Next at Brook Green—Third Charterhouse—Dr. Russell—Parson Schoolmasters—Coins and Hoops—Andrew Irvine—Cockshies—Harpies at the Feast—Dr. Stocker—Holt's—M'Neile—Harold Browne 7-25 Young Authorship in Verse and Prose—Melite—Rough Rhymes—Carthage—Umbrella Sapphics—Height of Honesty—Holkar Hall—Melrose Abbey—Heidelberg—Pterodactyles—The Buckstone—Scotch Journal—Vitrified Forts—Ireland—Kingston Caverns—Cornish Letter and Sketches—Penzance—The Logan—Land's End—St. Michael's Mount—Rapid Travel 26-51 College Days—Voice from the Cloister—Gladstone—Aristotle Class—Giants in those Days—Studentship—A Reading-Man—College Larks—D.C.L.—Dr. Bliss 52-61 Failure as to Orders—Stammering—Blewbury Vicarage—Lincoln's Inn—Lewin's Critique—Brodie's Cacography—Inkpen's Entomology—Duke of Wellington—Walters'—Letter as to India—Barrister and Benedict—A Hoax—Theodore Hook—Old Lady Cork 62-71 Stammering—Man's Privilege of Speech—Chess Playing—Anecdotes—Angling—Fishing Sonnets 72-78 Oxford Prize Poems—Verses in the Schools—Parodies—Rhyme and Rhythm—Scriptural Science—Classic Parallels 79-85 Sundry Providences—The Small Semisuicide—A Concussion—Horse Accidents—Perils by Land and Sea—Lydstep Cavern 86-89 Yet more Escapes—White Cross Guild—Evils and Temptations—Potipheras—Heresies—Creeds 90-94 Fads and Fancies—Vegetarian—Teetotalism—The Anglo-Saxon—Opera Colonnade—Moderation—America Revisited—Poem on Temperance and Total Abstinence—Gough—Dr. Hodgkin—A Martyr—Clerical Letter on Pharisaism 95-104 Sacra Poesis—Geraldine—Critiques—John and Tom Hughes—Donnington Priory—Little Providences 105-110 Origin of "Proverbial Philosophy"—M'Neile and Stebbing—N. P. Willis—Harrison Ainsworth—Hatchard's—Moxon's—Cassell's—A Prophecy—My Father's Letter and Gift—Sixty Times—Politeuphuia—Parallels—Mr. Orton's Volume—American Laudations, and English—As to per contra —Copyright Question—Wedding Gifts—An Elizabethan Author—Seldom Seen, and Few Adventures 111-133 A Modern Pyramid—The Vision—A Fearful Flight—Imagination—The Crystal Cubes and Mud Bricks—Sonnets and Sonneteering—Mackay and Shakespeare's 134-144 An Author's Mind—Prefatory Ramble—Addled Eggs—The Mental Cathedral—Probabilities—Job's Trials 145-152 The Crock of Gold—Dramatised in Boston and London—Origin of the Story—The Twins—Heart: drawn from Living Models—Critiques from Ollier and St. John 153-158 Æsop Smith—Mudie's—Rabelaisian Hints—The Early Gallop—Alfred, or Albert Order—Fables 159-162 Stephan Langton—King Alfred's Poems—The Silent Pool—Hard