necessities. In the
calculation made by Mrs. Peak and her sister, outlay on books had practically
been lost sight of; it was presumed that ten shillings a term would cover this
item. But Godwin could not consent to be at a disadvantage in his armoury for
academic contest. The first month saw him compelled to contract his diet, that
he might purchase books; thenceforth he rarely had enough to eat. His landlady
supplied him with breakfast, tea, and supper - each repast of the very simplest
kind; for dinner it was understood that he repaired to some public table, where
meat and vegetables, with perchance a supplementary sweet when nature demanded
it, might be had for about a shilling. That shilling was not often at his
disposal. Dinner as it is understood by the comfortably clad, the regular meal
which is a part of English respectability, came to be represented by a small
pork-pie, or even a couple of buns, eaten at the little shop over against the
College. After a long morning of mental application this was poor refreshment;
the long afternoon which followed, again spent in rigorous study, could not but
reduce a growing frame to ravenous hunger. Tea and buttered bread were the means
of appeasing it, until another four hours' work called for reward in the shape
of bread and cheese. Even yet the day's toil was not ended. Godwin sometimes
read long after midnight, with the result that, when at length he tried to
sleep, exhaustion of mind and body kept him for a long time feverishly wakeful.
    These hardships he concealed from the people at Twybridge. Complaint, it
seemed to him, would be ungrateful, for sacrifices were already made on his
behalf. His father, as he well remembered, was wont to relate, with a kind of
angry satisfaction, the miseries through which he had fought his way to
education and the income-tax. Old enough now to reflect with compassionate
understanding upon that life of conflict, Godwin resolved that he too would bear
the burdens inseparable from poverty, and in some moods was even glad to suffer
as his father had done. Fortunately he had a sound basis of health, and hunger
and vigils would not easily affect his constitution. If, thus hampered, he could
outstrip competitors who had every advantage of circumstance, the more glorious
his triumph.
    Sunday was an interval of leisure. Rejoicing in deliverance from
Sabbatarianism, he generally spent the morning in a long walk, and the rest of
the day was devoted to non-collegiate reading. He had subscribed to a
circulating library, and thus obtained