ABSTRACT
THE education of Johnnie Northwood was a sad mixture. At the Hertford branch of the Blue Coat School, bullying, fagging and flogging went on uninterruptedly, and the two years spent by the boy in that institution were mostly spent in learning to take lickings without flinching, and in fighting bigger boys than himself. Incidentally he learned some Latin. When his mother arrived in England, she was much displeased with his surroundings and promptly transferred him to a horribly expensive and fearfully suburban “Collegiate School for Young Gentlemen.” At this establishment he acquired a thorough knowledge of French, thanks to his aptitude for languages, and a liking for Molière and other French classics. Of anything else likely to be of the slightest use to him he had not the faintest knowledge. The dream of the lad’s life was to enter the Navy. But his father decided to make him a Merchant Prince. It was the mistake of Captain Northwood’s life.
