Read more
I, Frank Fairlegh, age 15, am off to London, to complete my schooling as one of the select set of pupils studying under the Rev. Dr. Mildman.
"Yes, sir, master's in, sir," says the manservant who answers my timorous knock at the door. "So you're Mr. Fairlegh, sir, our new young gent, sir?" (here the ludicrous expression predominates); "hope you'll be comfortable, sir" (here he nearly bursts into a laugh); "show you into master's study, sir, directly" (here he becomes preternaturally grave again); and, opening the study door, he ushers me into the presence of the dreaded tutor.
"A pleasant journey, had you?" inquires Mrs. Mildman, later at the evening table, while offering a platter of fish.
"Not any, I am much obliged to you," I reply, thinking of the fish.
This produces a total silence. I am plainly proving myself, on my first day!
About the author
Francis Edward Smedley (1818 - 1864) was an English novelist. His name appears in print usually as Frank E. Smedley. He was born with deformed feet, a disability that impaired his mobility and prevented him from attending regular school. Instead he was privately educated by his uncle. His cousin, the poet Menella Bute Smedley, later kept house for him and acted as his secretary. Smedley died in London in 1864. Smedley contributed his first book, Scenes from the Life of a Private Pupil, anonymously to Sharpe's London Magazine in 1846-1848. His first essay proved so successful that it was expanded into Frank Fairlegh, and published in book-form in 1850. His next book Lewis Arundel or The Railroad of Life was originally contributed to the same magazine, which he for some time edited and was published in book-form in 1852. Of his other writings the best-known is Harry Coverdale's Courtship (1855). These stories are racily told.
