ons would naturally be of these two
landmarks--the ivy-grown church, with its twenty and more generations
buried round it, and the great chalk hill whose rudely carved White
Horse can be seen gleaming in the sunshine full ten miles away, just
as it did when Alfred the Great cut it to commemorate his victory over
the Northmen a thousand years ago.

Thomas had a brother George, who was a little older than he, and who
was his opposite in many respects. From him he learned many lessons
which helped to shape his after life. George was quick to turn his
hand to anything, and a lover of all out-door sports; if they had a
spice of danger in them, so much the better. Thomas, on the other
hand, was naturally both awkward and timid; the sound of a gun
frightened him; and a pet pony soon found that, while George was his
master, he was Thomas's, and meant to keep so. Thomas was ashamed of
what he called his two left hands, with which he never seemed to get
the right hold of anything the first time. He was still more ashamed
of his timidity. That feeling of fear he could not prevent.
Eventually, however, he did better; he so mastered it that he could
bravely face what he feared, so making duty stand him in the stead of
that mere physical courage, which is often but another name for
insensibility to danger.

When he reached the age of seven he went to Twyford to school. Here he
found how easy it is to get a nickname, and how hard it is to get rid
of it. One of his first lessons related to Greek literature and to the
history of Cadmus, who was said to have "first carried letters from
Asia to Greece." Instead of asking the question in the book, the
master demanded, "What was Cadmus?" This new way of questioning
disconcerted the class, who were prepared to tell who Cadmus was, but
not what he was. But young Hughes, remembering the letter-carrier at
Uffington, suddenly jumped up and shouted out, "I can tell! Cadmus was
a postman, sir!" From that day the boy was christened "Cadmus" by his
companions, a name which, for convenience' sake, was soon shortened to
"Cad,"--a particularly aggravating abbreviation, since in England a
"cad" is the exact opposite of a gentleman. Then all sorts of
ingenious and mischievous changes were rung on it until poor "Cadmus"
was in a fair way of being driven wild with torment. Wherever he went
the walls echoed with the jeering cry. But luckily for him his brother
George happened to hear a big fellow teasing