He also excelled
at 'Bases,' a game which requires considerable swiftness of foot."]
[Footnote 16: On examining the quarterly lists kept at the
grammar-school of Aberdeen, in which the names of the boys are set
down according to the station each holds in his class, it appears that
in April of the year 1794, the name of Byron, then in the second
class, stands twenty-third in a list of thirty-eight boys. In the
April of 1798, however, he had risen to be fifth in the fourth class,
consisting of twenty-seven boys, and had got ahead of several of his
contemporaries, who had previously always stood before him.]
[Footnote 17: Notwithstanding the lively recollections expressed in
this poem, it is pretty certain, from the testimony of his nurse, that
he never was at the mountain itself, which stood some miles distant
from his residence, more than twice.]
[Footnote 18: The Island.]
[Footnote 19: Dante, we know, was but nine years old when, at a
May-day festival, he saw and fell in love with Beatrice; and Alfieri,
who was himself a precocious lover, considers such early sensibility
to be an unerring sign of a soul formed for the fine arts:--"Effetti,"
he says, in describing the feelings of his own first love, "che poche
persone intendono, e pochissime provano: ma a quei soli pochissimi e
concesso l' uscir dalla folla volgare in tutte le umane arti." Canova
used to say, that he perfectly well remembered having been in love
when but five years old.
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