at a
day-school, kept by an old dame near our lodgings, and I had never a
more regular teacher, although I think I did not attend her a quarter
of a year. An occasional lesson from my aunt supplied the rest.
Afterwards, when grown a big boy, I had a few lessons from Mr. Stalker
of Edinburgh, and finally from the Rev. Mr. Cleeve. But I never
acquired a just pronunciation, nor could I read with much propriety.

In other respects my residence at Bath is marked by very pleasing
recollections. The venerable John Home, author of Douglas, was then at
the watering-place, and paid much attention to my aunt and to me. His
wife, who has survived him, was then an invalid, and used to take the
air in her carriage on the Downs, when I was often invited to
accompany her. But the most delightful recollections of Bath are dated
after the arrival of my uncle, Captain Robert Scott, who introduced me
to all the little amusements which suited my age, and above all, to
the theatre. The play was As You Like It; and the witchery of the
whole scene is alive in my mind at this moment. I made, I believe,
noise more than enough, and remember being so much scandalized at the
quarrel between Orlando and his brother in the first scene, that I
screamed out, "A'n't they brothers?" A few weeks' residence at home
convinced me, who had till then been an only child in the house of my
grandfather, that a quarrel between brothers was a very natural event.

The other circumstances I recollect of my residence in Bath are but
trifling, yet I never recall them without a feeling of pleasure. The
beauties of the parade (which of them I know not), with the river Avon
winding around it, {p.019} and the lowing of the cattle from the
opposite hills, are warm in my recollection, and are only rivalled by
the splendors of a toy-shop somewhere near the Orange Grove. I had
acquired, I know not by what means, a kind of superstitious terror for
statuary of all kinds. No ancient Iconoclast or modern Calvinist could
have looked on the outside of the Abbey church (if I mistake not, the
principal church at Bath is so called) with more horror than the image
of Jacob's Ladder, with all its angels, presented to my infant eye. My
uncle effectually combated my terrors, and formally introduced me to a
statue of Neptune, which perhaps still keeps guard at the side of the
Avon, where a pleasure boat crosses to Spring Gardens.

After being a year at Bath, I returned first to Edinburgh,