of maid and mother, I waded by the hour; the garden where I sowed
flower-seeds, and then turned up the ground again and planted potatoes,
and then rooted out the potatoes to insert acorns and apple-pips, and
at last, as may be supposed, reaped neither roses, nor potatoes, nor
oak-trees, nor apples; the grass-plots on which I played among those
with whom I never can play nor work again: all these are places and
employments,--and, alas, playmates,--such as, if it were worth while to
weep at all, it would be worth weeping that I enjoy no longer.

"I remember the house where I first grew familiar with peacocks; and the
mill-stream into which I once fell; and the religious awe wherewith I
heard, in the warm twilight, the psalm-singing around the house of the
Methodist miller; and the door-post against which I discharged my brazen
artillery; I remember the window by which I sat while my mother taught
me French; and the patch of garden which I dug for-- But her name is
best left blank; it was indeed writ in water. These recollections are
to me like the wealth of a departed friend, a mournful treasure. But the
public has heard enough of them; to it they are worthless: they are
a coin which only circulates at its true value between the different
periods of an individual's existence, and good for nothing but to keep
up a commerce between boyhood and manhood. I have for years looked
forward to the possibility of visiting L----; but I am told that it is
a changed village; and not only has man been at work, but the old yew on
the hill has fallen, and scarcely a low stump remains of the tree which
I delighted in childhood to think might have furnished bows for the
Norman archers." [3]

In Cowbridge is some kind of free school, or grammar-school, of a
certain distinction; and this to Captain Sterling was probably a motive
for settling in the neighborhood of it with his children. Of this
however, as it turned out, there was no use made: the Sterling family,
during its continuance in those parts, did not need more than a primary
school. The worthy master who presided over these Christmas galas, and
had the honor to teach John Sterling his reading and writing, was an
elderly Mr. Reece of Cowbridge, who still (in 1851) survives, or lately
did; and is still remembered by his old pupils as a worthy, ingenious
and kindly man, "who wore drab breeches and white stockings." Beyond the
Reece sphere of tuition John Sterling did not go in this l