prayed, it is certain, as few men pray. Prayer was to him the very
breath of life. And his prayers, like his life, must have been utterly
selfless. Many do not understand the amount they owe to his prayers.
Some of us may some day realise the magnitude of the debt; at present
it is not seen. But he prayed with all the effort of his being for his
friends: eagerly, passionately, unceasingly he prayed. "Pray for him,
believe in him; believe in him, pray for him," he was never tired of
saying to those who spoke to him of some disappointing friend. And his
own life was a proof of the power which lay behind such prayer.

'To those reading this who did not know Forbes Robinson it may seem
that a man of such intensity of feeling and holiness of life would be
more likely {47} to frighten away than to attract to close quarters the
"average undergraduate" (whose existence he denied). This most
certainly was not the case. For, if there was in him something utterly
divine, he was also human as ever man could be. He admired, like the
veriest freshman, the physical strength and powers of the athlete. In
his presence the man of bodily attainments and strength of limb
experienced the strange sensation of being looked up to by one whom he
knew to be utterly superior to him. But perhaps nearly all who knew
him experienced this at one time or another; for he must have been one
of the most humble men that have ever lived. His humility was almost a
fault. It led him to depreciate himself so far. And yet how beautiful
a thing it was! He did indeed count all men better than himself.

'He easily condoned offences which in some eyes, and especially the
eyes of dons, loom as a general rule heinous and large. And the
riotous undergraduate, who cuts chapels and lectures, found that a
don--yes, and a junior dean--could be a friend of his.

'He possessed too a keen and real sense of humour. He could, and often
did, laugh with all his heart. He chaffed continuously his large
circle of undergraduate friends. When he was questioning a man in the
lecture-room, you felt that all the time he was half chaffing him. He
addressed us all in lectures as "Mr.," in a half serious, half amused
style. "It is the only chance for some men to retain any
self-respect--to address them as 'Mr.'"--he would say, after the
discovery of some more than usual piece of {48} ignorance in his class
of "special" men; "for how can a man have any self-respect u