horoughly
well, vague outlines of geography, Greek to the extent of the alphabet
mainly." His first two years at Annan Academy were among the most
miserable in his life, from his being bullied by some of his
fellow-pupils, whom he describes as "coarse, unguided, tyrannous
cubs." But he "revolted against them, and gave them shake for shake."
In his third year, Carlyle had his first glimpse of Edward Irving, who
was five years his senior, and had been a pupil at Annan Academy, but
was then attending classes at Edinburgh University. In November, 1809,
Carlyle himself entered that university, travelling on foot all the
way, a hundred miles, between Ecclesfechan and the Scottish capital.
Except in one department, Carlyle's college curriculum was not
remarkable. In "the classical field" he describes himself "truly as
nothing," and learned to read Homer in the original with difficulty.
He preferred Homer and Aeschylus to all other classical authors, found
Tacitus and Virgil "really interesting," Horace "egotistical,
leichtfertig," and Cicero "a windy person, and a weariness." Nor did
he take much to metaphysics or moral philosophy. In geometry, however,
he excelled, perhaps because Professor (subsequently Sir John) Leslie,
"alone of my professors had some genius in his business, and awoke a
certain enthusiasm in me." But even in the mathematical class he took
no prize.

In 1813 Carlyle's attendance at the Arts course in Edinburgh
University came to an end, and he began formal, though fitful,
preparation for the ministry of the Church of Scotland by enrolling
himself, on November 16th of the same year, as a student at its
Divinity Hall. In the summer of 1814 he competed successfully at
Dumfries for the mathematical mastership of Annan Academy. The post
was worth only between L60 and L70 a year; but it enabled Carlyle, who
was as frugal as his parents, to relieve his father of the expense of
his support, and to save a few pounds. Meanwhile he read widely, and
wrote of his reading at great length, and with considerable power of
satiric characterization, to some of his college friends. But he found
himself "abundantly lonesome, uncomfortable, and out of place" in
Annan, and from the first disliked teaching; while his "sentiments on
the clerical profession" were "mostly of the unfavorable kind."

In 1816 Carlyle accepted the post of assistant to the teacher of the
parish (or grammar) school of Kirkcaldy, with "an emolument rated