He
was a very great genius. Everyone knew this; they said, indeed, that he was one
of the few people to whom the word genius could be applied without exaggeration.
Had he not taken I don't know how many university scholarships in his freshman's
year? Had he not been afterwards Senior Wrangler, and First Chancellor's
Medallist and I do not know how many more things besides? And then he was such a
wonderful speaker; at the Union Debating Club he had been without a rival, and
had, of course, been president; his moral character - a point on which so many
geniuses were weak - was absolutely irreproachable; foremost of all, however,
among his many great qualities, and perhaps more remarkable even than his
genius, was what biographers have called the simple-minded and childlike
earnestness of his character - an earnestness which might be perceived by the
solemnity with which he spoke even about trifles. It is hardly necessary to say
he was on the Liberal side in politics.
    His personal appearance was not particularly prepossessing. He was about the
middle height, portly, and had a couple of fierce gray eyes, that flashed fire
from beneath a pair of great bushy beetling eyebrows and overawed all who came
near him. It was in respect of his personal appearance, however, that if he was
vulnerable at all his weak place was to be found. His hair when he was a young
man was red, but soon after he had taken his degree he had a brain fever which
caused him to have his head shaved; when he reappeared he did so wearing a wig -
and one which was a good deal more off red than his hair had been. He not only
never discarded his wig, but year by year it edged itself a little more and a
little more off red, till by the time he was forty there was not a trace of red
remaining, and his wig was brown.
    When Dr. Skinner was a very young man - hardly more than five and twenty -
the headmastership of Roughborough Grammar School had fallen vacant, and he had
been unhesitatingly appointed. The result justified the selection. Dr. Skinner's
pupils distinguished themselves whichever university they went to. He moulded
their minds after the model of his own, and stamped an impress upon them which
was indelible in after-life; whatever else a Roughborough man might be, he was
sure to make everyone feel that he was a God-fearing earnest Christian, and a
Liberal, if not a Radical, in politics. Some boys, of course, were incapable of