ol about his top-boots, and his
feats across country. He began to think seriously of a scarlet coat:
and his mother must own that she thought it would become him remarkably
well; though, of course, she passed hours of anguish during his absence,
and daily expected to see him brought home on a shutter.

With these amusements, in rather too great plenty, it must not be
assumed that Pen neglected his studies altogether. He had a natural
taste for reading every possible kind of book which did not fall into
his school-course. It was only when they forced his head into the waters
of knowledge, that he refused to drink. He devoured all the books at
home from Inchbald's Theatre to White's Farriery; he ransacked the
neighbouring book-cases. He found at Clavering an old cargo of French
novels, which he read with all his might; and he would sit for hours
perched upon the topmost bar of Doctor Portman's library steps with
a folio on his knees, whether it were Hakluyt's Travels, Hobbes's
Leviathan, Augustini Opera, or Chaucer's Poems. He and the Vicar were
very good friends, and from his Reverence, Pen learned that honest taste
for port wine which distinguished him through life. And as for that dear
good woman, Mrs. Portman, who was not in the least jealous, though her
Doctor avowed himself in love with Mrs. Pendennis, whom he pronounced
to be by far the finest lady in the county--all her grief was, as she
looked up fondly at Pen perched on the book-ladder, that her daughter,
Minny, was too old for him--as indeed she was--Miss Myra Portman being
at that period only two years younger than Pen's mother, and weighing as
much as Pen and Mrs. Pendennis together.

Are these details insipid? Look back, good friend, at your own youth,
and ask how was that? I like to think of a well-nurtured boy, brave and
gentle, warm-hearted and loving, and looking the world in the face with
kind honest eyes. What bright colours it wore then, and how you enjoyed
it! A man has not many years of such time. He does not know them whilst
they are with him. It is only when they are passed long away that he
remembers how dear and happy they were.

In order to keep Mr. Pen from indulging in that idleness of which
his friend the Doctor of the Cistercians had prophesied such awful
consequences, Mr. Smirke, Dr. Portman's curate, was engaged at a liberal
salary, to walk or ride over from Clavering and pass several hours daily
with the young gentleman. Smirke was a m