Sidmouth and its neighbourhood were so healthy, that his patients were few and far between; and when he died, of injuries received from being thrown over his horse's head, when the animal one night trod on a stone coming down the hill into Sidmouth, his widow and son were left almost penniless.
Mrs.Walsham was, fortunately, an energetic woman, and a fortnight after her husband's death, she went round among the tradesmen of the place and the farmers of the neighbourhood, and announced her intention of opening a school for girls.

She had received a good education, being the daughter of a clergyman, and she soon obtained enough pupils to enable her to pay her way, and to keep up the pretty home in which her husband lived in the outskirts of Sidmouth.
If she would have taken boarders, she could have obtained far higher terms, for good schools were scarce; but this she would not do, and her pupils all lived within distances where they could walk backwards and forwards to their homes.

Her evenings she devoted to her son, and, though the education which she was enabled to give him would be considered meagre, indeed, in these days of universal cramming, he learned as much as the average boy of the period.
He would have learned more had he followed her desires, and devoted the time when she was engaged in teaching to his books; but this he did not do.

For a few hours in the day he would work vigorously at his lessons.
The rest of his time he spent either on the seashore, or in the boats of the fishermen; and he could swim, row, or handle a boat under sail in all weather, as well or better than any lad in the village of his own age.
His disposition was a happy one, and he was a general favourite among the boatmen.

He had not, as yet, made up his mind as to his future.