as a Byron, and would
never belie his motto, "_Trust Byron_."

He was, indeed, much more anxious to distinguish himself among his
school-fellows by prowess in all sports[15] and exercises, than by
advancement in learning. Though quick, when he could be persuaded to
attend, or had any study that pleased him, he was in general very low
in the class, nor seemed ambitious of being promoted any higher. It is
the custom, it seems, in this seminary, to invert, now and then, the
order of the class, so as to make the highest and lowest boys change
places,--with a view, no doubt, of piquing the ambition of both. On
these occasions, and only these, Byron was sometimes at the head, and
the master, to banter him, would say, "Now, George, man, let me see
how soon you'll be at the foot again."[16]

During this period, his mother and he made, occasionally, visits among
their friends, passing some time at Fetteresso, the seat of his
godfather, Colonel Duff, (where the child's delight with a humorous
old butler, named Ernest Fidler, is still remembered,) and also at
Banff, where some near connections of Mrs. Byron resided.

In the summer of the year 1796, after an attack of scarlet-fever, he
was removed by his mother for change of air into the Highlands; and it
was either at this time, or in the following year, that they took up
their residence at a farm-house in the neighbourhood of Ballater, a
favourite summer resort for health and gaiety, about forty miles up
the Dee from Aberdeen. Though this house, where they still show with
much pride the bed in which young Byron slept, has become naturally a
place of pilgrimage for the worshippers of genius, neither its own
appearance, nor that of the small bleak valley, in which it stands, is
at all worthy of being associated with the memory of a poet. Within a
short distance of it, however, all those features of wildness and
beauty, which mark the course of the Dee through the Highlands, may be
commanded. Here the dark summit of Lachin-y-gair stood towering before
the eyes of the future bard; and the verses in which, not many years
afterwards, he commemorated this sublime object, show that, young as
he was, at the time, its "frowning glories" were not unnoticed by
him.[17]

Ah, there my young footsteps in infancy wandered,
My cap was the bonnet, my cloak was the plaid;
On chieftains long perish'd my memory ponder'd
As daily I strode through the pine-cover'd glade.
I