accompany him on his regular European trips during the summer holidays, as did Gerald Balfour, the future prime minister's brother, in 1869. Although this type of close, even affectionate master-boy relationship was considered generally acceptable in Victorian public school life, Browning's flamboyance and mannerisms were contrary to Hornby's vision for the school; Anstruther writes: "The mere sight of Oscar Browning with his pale face and effeminate manner was enough in itself to make Hornby suspicious". Furthermore, Browning's friendship with the artist Simeon Solomon was widely known. Solomon, like Browning, was an advocate of "Greek love", a concept derived from Plato's Dialogues which held that the highest form of love was that of men for each other, exclusive of physical expression. The two holidayed together, and Solomon was a frequent visitor to Eton – he exchanged with Browning a series of intimate letters in which they mutually extolled the beauties of various boys. In February 1873 Solomon was convicted of an act of gross indecency in a London public lavatory – a consensual act of sodomy with a mature working-class male was far from the ideals of Greek love, and Browning ended the relationship with Solomon immediately. Dismissal Hornby's patience with Browning's conduct was tested further in 1874, when Browning began a friendship with a boy from another house – acting with the full approval of the boy's father. The boy was George Curzon, the future Conservative statesman and Viceroy of India. The nature of this association became the occasion for gossip amongst the staff; Curzon's housemaster, Charles Wolley-Dod, complained to Hornby, who after some equivocation ordered Browning to end all contact with the boy during term-time. Browning was outraged by what he took as a slur on his morals, and a heated correspondence with Hornby ensued. Since he had the support of Curzon's father, Lord Scarsdale, Browning challenged the headmaster's injunction and appealed to the provost, who upheld Hornby. Under threat of dismissal unless he submitted, Browning did so reluctantly, while continuing to meet Curzon during the holidays. According to Browning's biographer Ian Anstruther, Browning seriously contemplated resignation in the summer of 1874, but was persuaded otherwise by his friend, the novelist George Eliot. He returned to Eton that autumn, but made little effort to lie low or adhere to regulations which he was accustomed to ignore if inconvenient. One of these related to the maximum number of pupils for