expect to get
knowledge, to cultivate our minds, to get rid of the weeds growing up
constantly in them, without labour, and hard labour, too? Now, I dare
say, my dear fellow, you think that I am talking very learnedly, or you
may say, very pedantically; but I do not even claim originality for my
views. My father pointed them out to me and my brothers long ago. He
threw difficulties in our way, and stood by till we overcame them,
telling us it was the best practice we could have in the world. I
cannot tell you how much we owe to our father. He is the wisest man I
ever met. I dare say there are many cleverer people; men who can talk
better, and have done more, and have written more, and who are thought
much more of in the world; but my brother and I agree, for all that,
that he is the wisest, and if not the most talented, which we don't say
he is, that he makes the best use of the talents he has got. You must
come and see him one of these days; I would say at once; but I think
that you will like him, and that he will like you better by and by. I
wrote to him about you, I must confess that, and he put me up to some of
the advice I gave you. My brothers and I always write to him just as we
write to one another; indeed, we generally pass our letters on to him,
because we know that he likes to hear everything that we are doing. We
have no secrets from him, as I find some fellows here have. We always
go to him for advice about everything. He often tells us to act as we
think best, and to let him know what we have done. Sometimes he tells
us that he thinks we have acted very judiciously; at other times he
tells us that, from the judgment he has been able to form, we ought to
have done differently. He has never kept us in what might be called
leading-strings; but has placed the same confidence in us that we do in
him--that is to say, he knows we want to do what is right. Depend on
it, Ellis, there is nothing like having the most perfect confidence
between your father and yourself. I assure you that I should be
miserable if I had not, and if I did not believe that he is the best
friend I have on earth, or ever shall have."

Bracebridge said a great deal more to the same effect. Indeed, whenever
he got on the subject of his father's excellences, he was always
enthusiastic. Not without ample reason, I believe, for Mr Bracebridge
was a man possessed of very rare qualities; and Oaklands, his place, was
one of the m