xed and impossible civilization in the
place of that he knew from his Goldsmith, he was quite helpless to break
from their influence. He was always expecting some wonderful thing to
happen to him as things happened there in fulfilment of some saying or
prophecy; and at every trivial moment he made sayings and prophecies for
himself, which he wished events to fulfil. One Sunday when he was
walking in an alley behind one of the stores, he found a fur cap that
had probably fallen out of the store-loft window. He ran home with it,
and in his simple-hearted rapture he told his mother that as soon as he
picked it up there came into his mind the words, "He who picketh up this
cap picketh up a fortune," and he could hardly wait for Monday to come
and let him restore the cap to its owner and receive an enduring
prosperity in reward of his virtue. Heaven knows what form he expected
this to take; but when he found himself in the store, he lost all
courage; his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth, and he could not
utter a syllable of the fine phrases he had made to himself. He laid the
cap on the counter without a word; the storekeeper came up and took it
in his hand. "What's this?" he said. "Why, this is ours," and he tossed
the cap into a loose pile of hats by the showcase, and the boy slunk
out, cut to the heart and crushed to the dust. It was such a cruel
disappointment and mortification that it was rather a relief to have his
brother mock him, and come up and say from time to time, "He who picketh
up this cap picketh up a fortune," and then split into a jeering laugh.
At least he could fight his brother, and, when he ran, could stone him;
and he could throw quads and quoins, and pieces of riglet at the jour
printers when the story spread to them, and one of them would begin, "He
who picketh--"

He was not different from other boys in his desire to localize, to
realize, what he read; and he was always contriving in fancy scenes and
encounters of the greatest splendor, in which he bore a chief part.
Inwardly he was all thrones, principalities, and powers, the foe of
tyrants, the friend of good emperors, and the intimate of magicians, and
magnificently apparelled; outwardly he was an incorrigible little
sloven, who suffered in all social exigencies from the direst
bashfulness, and wished nothing so much as to shrink out of the sight of
men if they spoke to him. He could not help revealing sometimes to the
kindness of his father