I do not attach any credit to passing in physiography, but merely relate the circumstance as curiously showing what can be done by a good 'cram.' "The failure in mathematics caused me to take the subject 'by the horns,' to see what I could do with it.

I began by going over quadratic equations, and I gradually solved the whole of those given in Todhunter's larger 'Algebra.' Then I re-read the progressions, permutations, combinations; the binomial theorem, with indices and surds; the logarithmic theorem and series, converging and diverging.

I got Todhunter's larger 'Plane Trigonometry,' and read it, with the theorems contained in it; then his 'Spherical Trigonometry;' his 'Analytical Geometry, of Two Dimensions,' and 'Conics.' I next obtained De Morgan's 'Differential and Integral Calculus,' then Woolhouse's, and lastly, Todhunter's.

I found this department of mathematics difficult and perplexing to the last degree; but I mastered it sufficiently to turn it to some account.

This last mathematical course represents eighteen months of hard work, and I often sat up the whole night through.