chool, which he never again visited after originally leaving me
there, was conducted upon the same principles as his own
household. I was frequently tempted to enlighten him, but I never
found the courage to do so. As a matter of fact the piety of the
establishment, which collected to it the sons of a large number
of evangelically minded parents throughout that part of the
country, resided mainly in the prospectus. It proceeded no
further than the practice of reading the Bible aloud, each boy in
successive order one verse, in the early morning before
breakfast. There was no selection and no exposition; where the
last boy sat, there the day's reading ended, even if it were in
the middle of a sentence, and there it began next morning.

Such reading of 'the chapter' was followed by a long dry prayer.
I do not know that this morning service would appear more
perfunctory than usual to other boys, but it astounded and
disgusted me, accustomed as I was to the ministrations at home,
where my Father read 'the word of God' in a loud passionate
voice, with dramatic emphasis, pausing for commentary and
paraphrase, and treating every phrase as if it were part of a
personal message or of thrilling family history. At school,
'morning prayer' was a dreary, unintelligible exercise, and with
this piece of mumbo-jumbo, religion for the day began and ended.
The discretion of little boys is extraordinary. I am quite
certain no one of us ever revealed this fact to our godly parents
at home.

If any one was to do this, it was of course I who should first of
all have 'testified'. But I had grown cautious about making
confidences. One never knew how awkwardly they might develop or
to what disturbing excesses of zeal they might precipitously
lead. I was on my guard against my Father, who was, all the time,
only too openly yearning that I should approach him for help, for
comfort, for ghostly counsel. Still 'delicate', though steadily
gaining in solidity of constitution, I was liable to severe
chills and to fugitive neuralgic pangs. My Father was, almost
maddeningly, desirous that these afflictions should be sanctified
to me, and it was in my bed, often when I was much bowed in
spirit by indisposition, that he used to triumph over me most
pitilessly. He retained the singular superstition, amazing in a
man of scientific knowledge and long human experience, that all
pains and ailments were directly sent by the Lord in chastisement
for some def