FOUNDER of that scholastic institution, Whinham College. He has been all his life an educationist, and is probably the oldest schoolmaster in the colony, if not in the Australian colonies. Born in 1803, at Sharperton, Northumberland, he at an early age evinced a decided bent for the acquisition of knowledge. He would walk miles to hear a scientific lecture, and thought no exertion too great and no toil too hard, so long as he could thereby add to his stores of learning. He displayed an almost equal taste for mathematics and the classics, and under a scholarly Roman Catholic priest qualified himself, by the time he was nineteen years of age, for taking a degree in the University of Dublin; but the sudden illness of a sister and friend, both of whom subsequently died, led him to abandon his intention as he was on the eve of starting for Ireland. He then devoted his attention to teaching, and had a good school in the quiet rustic village of Ovingham, by Newcastle-on-Tyne. His abilities as a teacher were in due course recognised, and he had some ​tempting offers to open a school in Newcastle, but always resisted them, preferring the simplicity of a rural town to the noisy turmoil of a large city. After pursuing the even tenor of his way for nearly a quarter of a century, during which he married and became the father of five daughters and two sons, he was a victim of the financial disasters which in 1848-9 ruined so many persons in England. His savings, invested in collieries, steamboats, and banks, were swept away, and after waiting a long time for liquidation of the various companies, he gathered sufficient out of the general wreck to pay for the passage of himself and family to Australia, and reached Adelaide in the year 1852, beginning the world again at a period when most men have passed the meridian of their strength and life. He brought with him agricultural implements, thinking that possibly farming would be the only pursuit to which he could successfully devote his attention in the colony, but fortunately for the cause of education, he was led to resume his old work. He was teacher of Mathematics at St. Peter's College, and after a while left the college to start a school himself at North Adelaide. He brought letters of introduction to Colonel Freeling, Mr. Anthony Forster, and other leading colonists, but was so independent and determined to succeed only upon his own merits, that he would not make use of a single adventitious aid to advance the prospects of his school. Thus he began with one scholar and added others as his fame as a teacher spread. Solidly was his establishment founded and built up, for without the help of patronage, without the tempting bait of endowment, he competed successfully with institutions which had these inducements. Thousands of youths, now living in all parts of the colony—some successful squatters and farmers, some holding high position in the mercantile community, and others winning fame as lawyers and journalists, have passed through his hands, and upon all of them he ever sought to impress the force and beauty of those principles of conduct ​which were illustrated by his own simple and blameless life. He retired a few years ago from the active duties of his profession, after a scholastic career of over half a century; and in his cheery old age had the satisfaction of seeing the same principles which he inculcated, the same system, and the same discipline which he observed, carried out in their integrity by his son Robert, who, until the sad and fatal accident which deprived him of life occurred, was the Principal of the establishment.