was Anne, the second John, the third
Christopher.

Anne was strong, robust and hearty; John was slender, pale, with dreamy,
dark gray eyes and a head too big for his body; Christopher was so-so.
And, in passing, it is well to explain, once for all, that Christopher
made his way straight to the front in life, taking up his father's
business and being appointed a Court Officer. Thence he was promoted to
the Woolsack, became rich, cultivated a double chin, was knighted, and
passed out full of honors. The chief worriment and source of shame in the
life of Sir Christopher Milton came from the unseemly conduct of his
brother John, who was much given to producing political and theological
pamphlets. And once in desperation Sir Christopher Milton requested John
Milton to change his family name, that the tribe of Milton might be saved
the disgrace of having in it "a traducer of the State, an enemy of the
King, and a falsifier of Truth." Sir Christopher Milton was an excellent
and worthy man, and I must apologize for not giving him more attention at
this time; but lack of space forbids.

Sickly boys who are wise beyond their years are ever the pets of big
sisters, and the object of loving, jealous, zealous care on the part of
their mothers. John Milton talked like an oracle while yet a child, and
one biographer records that even as a babe he sometimes mildly reproved
his parents for levity.

He was a precocious child, and have we not been told that precocity does
not fulfill its promises? But this boy was an exception. He was incarnated
into a family that prized music, poetry, philosophy, and yet held fast to
the Christian faith. His father set psalms to music, his sister wrote
madrigals, and his mother played sweet strains on a harp to waken him at
morningtide. The entire household united in a devotion to poetry and art.
Possibly this atmosphere of high thinking was too rarefied for real
comfort--the gravity of the situation being sustained only by a stern
effort.

But no matter--father, mother and sister joined hands to make the pale,
handsome boy a prodigy of learning: one that would surprise the world and
leave his impress on the time.

And they succeeded.

Of the three Milton children that passed away in childhood, I can not but
think that they succumbed to overtraining, being crammed quite after the
German custom of stuffing geese so as to produce that delicious diseased
tidbit known to gourmets as pate de foies gras