ught of the groundwork
of the word--the finished word I'm going to send to M----, as he has
the strongest constitution of any one I know. Then I shall get Duke
Bismarck to patent it; after which I shall take out a professorship on
the strength of it at Berne. It will, of course, be the "Hauptsache"
of my existence.'

{19}

Forbes was far from being an athlete, but in 1891, shortly before his
ordination, he accomplished the feat of walking with two athletic
friends from London to Cambridge in a day, a distance of more than
fifty miles. The following description is by Mr. A. N. C.
Kittermaster, who was one of his companions.

_Walk from London to Cambridge._

Some of us had read that Charles Kingsley had walked from London to
Cambridge; so we determined to follow in his footsteps. We were a
party of three--Forbes Robinson, D. D. Robertson, and myself. We spent
the previous day at the Naval Exhibition, the night at the Liverpool
Street Hotel, and at 4.30 A.M. of Tuesday, August 25, 1891, we started
on our fifty-mile trudge. We walked steadily, at first over immense
stretches of pavement, till we reached Ware, twenty-one miles out.
There we had breakfast or lunch of huge chops at 10.15. After that we
took the road again, and did not call a halt of any length till we had
put another twenty miles behind us. The day was fine but dull, and we
were not troubled by the heat. At the fortieth milestone it began to
appear doubtful whether we should all reach the journey's end. I have
an entry in my diary: 'At 40 Robertson bad, I worse, Deanlet (_i.e._
Forbes) quite fit.' So at Foulmire, nine miles from Cambridge, we
stopped for tea. By this time I was in a state of temporary collapse,
but I remember the other two during tea carried on an animated
discussion upon the creation as described in Genesis. We all felt
better after the {20} rest and covered the last stage fairly easily,
arriving at Christ's at 9.30 P.M. We had a meal in Forbes's rooms,
fought our battles over again, and retired to rest about midnight.

The thing which remains with me best is the amazing ease with which
Forbes accomplished the journey. It is a matter of common experience
that prolonged physical effort reacts on the mind; conversation becomes
difficult, and cheerfulness forced. I must say that in my case the
thought which for a considerable period occupied my mind was how I was
to get to the end. But it was not so with Forbes. He tra