whom he felt that he would like to know better
was Uncle Samuel, and that argued, on his part, a certain tendency
towards rebellion and individuality. He was no longer rude to Aunt 'Amy,
although he hated her just as he had always done. She did not seem any
longer a question that mattered. His attitude to his whole family now
was independent.

Indeed, he was, in reality, now beginning to live his independent life.
He was perhaps very young to be sent off to school by himself, although
in those days for a boy of eight to be plunged without any help but a
friendly word of warning into the stormy seas of private school life was
common enough--nevertheless, his father, conscious that the child's
life had been hitherto spent almost entirely among women, sent him
every morning during these last weeks at home down to the Curate of St.
Martin's-in-the-Market to learn a few words of Latin, an easy sum or
two, and the rudiments of spelling. This young curate, the Rev. Wilfred
Somerset, recently of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, had but two ideas
in his head--the noble game of cricket and the jolly qualities of Mr.
Surtees's novels. He was stout and strong, red-faced, and thick in the
leg, always smoking a largo black-looking pipe, and wearing trousers
very short and tight. He did not strike Jeremy with fear, but he was,
nevertheless, an influence. Jeremy, apparently, amused him intensely. He
would roar with laughter at nothing at all, smack his thigh and shout,
"Good for you, young 'un," whatever that might mean, and Jeremy,
gazing at him, at his pipe and his trousers, liking him rather, but not
sufficiently in awe to be really impressed, would ask him questions
that seemed to him perfectly simple and natural, but that, nevertheless,
amused the Rev. Wilfred so fundamentally that he was unable to give them
an intelligible answer.

Undoubtedly this encouraged Jeremy's independence.

He walked to and fro the curate's lodging by himself, and was able
to observe many interesting things on the way. Sometimes, late in the
afternoon, he would have some lesson that he must take to his master
who, as he lodged at the bottom of Orange Street, was a very safe and
steady distance from the Coles.

Of course Aunt Amy objected.

"You allow Jeremy, all by himself, into the street at night, and he's
only eight. Really, you're too strange!"

"Well, in the first place," said Mrs. Cole, mildly, "it isn't
night--it's afternoon; in the second plac