WILLIAM PENGELLY was born at East Looe, a fishing village in Cornwall, England, January 12, 1812, and died in Torquay, March 16, 1894. The name of Pengelly is not uncommon in Cornwall, and has figured in English history--among others, in the person of Sir Thomas Pengelly, who was chief baron of the exchequer, and left certain sums for the discharge of debtors from the jails of Bodmin and Launceston. His father was captain of a small coasting vessel, and he acquired a strong attachment to the sea. He was sent to the Dame's School in his native village when very young, and before he was five years old had made so rapid progress that his mother applied to the master of a school for larger boys to receive him as a pupil. The master declined to take him, but, hearing him reading as he passed the door of the house not long afterward, concluded to grant the mother's request. At school he soon gained such a reputation for scholarship that the boys made him spend all his play hours helping them in their lessons. His school days ended when he was twelve years old, and he accompanied his father to sea, making, however, voyages that were seldom more than three days long, most of the work of which consisted in taking in and taking out cargo. The sailors soon discovered his clerkly gifts and employed him to write their letters, but did not so well appreciate his excellent conversational powers. On "tailoring days" it was understood that his clothes should be repaired for him, while he read aloud for the general benefit, and the sailors would amuse themselves by finding solutions to questions in Walkingham's Arithmetic. His seafaring life closed in his sixteenth year, when the death of a brother made it desirable that he should remain at home.
Though working hard all the day for a mere support, young Pengelly managed to spend several hours every night in study, seeking to master mathematics. He had no tutor and no really good text-books, but made such progress in his studies that in a comparatively short time he became "a mathematical tutor of no mean order." He bought his first Euclid of a peddler who occasionally visited the place; then, having saved up a little money for the purpose, it was a happy day for him when he walked thirty miles to Devonport and back, bearing, on his return, twenty volumes in a bundle over his shoulder; among them were the works of some of the standard authors, for he cultivated a literary as well as a mathematical taste.