s sternness melted into a
universal complaisance. He laughed and smiled, he paid to my
opinions the tribute of the gravest considerations, he indulged--
utterly unlike his wont--in shy and furtive caresses. I could
express no wish that he did not attempt to fulfill, and the only
warning which he cared to give me was one, very gently expressed,
against spiritual pride.

This was certainly required, for I was puffed out with a sense of
my own holiness. I was religiously confidential with my Father,
condescending with Miss Marks (who I think had given up trying to
make it all out), haughty with the servants, and insufferably
patronizing with those young companions of my own age with whom I
was now beginning to associate.

I would fain close this remarkable episode on a key of solemnity,
but alas! If I am to be loyal to the truth, I must record that
some of the other little boys presently complained to Mary Grace
that I put out my tongue at them in mockery, during the service
in the Room, to remind them that I now broke bread as one of the
Saints and that they did not.

CHAPTER IX

THE result of my being admitted into the communion of the
'Saints' was that, as soon as the nine days' wonder of the thing
passed by, my position became, if anything, more harassing and
pressed than ever. It is true that freedom was permitted to me in
certain directions; I was allowed to act a little more on my own
responsibility, and was not so incessantly informed what 'the
Lord's will' might be in this matter and in that, because it was
now conceived that, in such dilemmas, I could command private
intelligence of my own. But there was no relaxation of our rigid
manner of life, and I think I now began, by comparing it with the
habits of others, to perceive how very strict it was.

The main difference in my lot as a communicant from that of a
mere dweller in the tents of righteousness was that I was
expected to respond with instant fervour to every appeal of
conscience. When I did not do this, my position was almost worse
than it had been before, because of the livelier nature of the
responsibility which weighed upon me. My little faults of
conduct, too, assumed shapes of terrible importance, since they
proceeded from one so signally enlightened. My Father was never
tired of reminding me that, now that I was a professing
Christian, I must remember, in everything I did, that I was an
example to others. He used to draw dreadful pictures o