father's house in Stambourne and we are told that his letters were taught him by his Aunt Ann. She loved to relate in after years many little anecdotes illustrative of his "great mind" as a boy. But an examination of them does not show any special precociousness. They are like all those incidents which are so carefully preserved by mothers, grandmothers, and indulgent aunts about their first-born son, first grandson, or favorite nephew.

His grandfather also occasionally assisted in teaching him to read. But the impress of his grandfather's noble character seems to have been the most important branch of his early learning.

"Example draws where precept fails,

And sometimes are more read than tales."

Mr. Spurgeon wrote that "Example is the school of mankind, and many will learn at no other. Examples preach to the eye and leave a deeper impress than counsel addressed to the ear. Children like pictures better than letter press, so do men prefer example to precept."

And when speaking directly of his grandfather's influential example he also said:

"When a little child, I lived some years in my grandfather's house. In his garden there was a fine old hedge of yew of considerable length, which was clipped and trimmed till it made quite a wall of verdure. Behind it was a wide grass walk which looked out upon the fields, and afforded a quiet out

look. The grass was kept mown, so as to make pleasant walking. Here ever since the old puritanic chapel was built, godly divines had walked, and prayed and meditated. My grandfather was wont to use it as his study. Up and down he would walk when preparing his sermons, and always on Sabbath days, when it was fair, he had half an hour there before preaching. To me it seemed a perfect paradise, and being forbidden to stay there when grandfather was meditating, I viewed it with no small degree of awe. I love to think of the green and quiet walk at this moment, and could wish for just such a study. But I was once shocked, and even horrified, by hearing a farming man remark concerning this sanctum sanctorum, 'It 'ud grow a many 'taturs if it wor ploughed up.' What cared he for holy memories? What were meditation and contemplation to him? Is it not the chief end of man to grow potatoes, and to eat them? Such on a larger scale would be an unconverted man's estimate of joys so elevated and refined as those of heaven, could he by any possibility be permitted to gaze upon them."

To the day-school, taught by Mrs. Burleigh, at Stambourne, reference has already been made. It appears that he learned so little, or was altogether so inattentive or mischievous that the school never made any very deep impression upon his memory. It is clear that at that early day in his history, before he was eight years old, he was not to be specially

!

distinguished from many other boys living in his
social position and circumstances. But in his grand-
father's family he necessarily saw more of books
than other boys in the neighborhood would see, and
heard a great deal more of literary matters and in-
tellectual discussion than would fall to the lot of a
farmer's son.
He learned slowly but remembered
long. A lesson once thoroughly comprehended was
indelible.

He left his grandfather's manse and returned to his father's house at Coldchester, where his father kept a shop, when he was seven or eight years of age, and there found an opportunity for excellent school training. But in that school there were some scholars who excelled him, and it is said that he himself did not consider it any special disgrace to be at the foot of the class, provided that it brought him in the winter season nearer the stove.

But the clearness with which these events at that time in his life impressed themselves upon his memory is wonderfully shown in the account which when an elderly man he gave of a little incident while at school. In his "John Ploughman's Talks," he assailed debt with peculiar bitterness and said:

"When I was a very small boy, in pinafores, and went to a woman's school, it so happened that I wanted a stick of slate pencil, and had no money to buy it with. I was afraid of being scolded for losing my pencils so often, for I was a real careless little fellow, and so did not dare to ask at home; what

then was John to do? There was a little shop in the place, where nuts, and tops, and cakes, and balls were sold, by old Mrs. Dearson, and sometimes I had seen boys and girls get trusted by the old lady. I argued with myself that Christmas was coming, and that somebody or other would be sure to give me a penny then, and perhaps even a whole silver sixpence. I would therefore go into debt for a stick of slate pencil, and be sure to pay for it at Christmas. I did not feel easy about it, but still I screwed my courage up and went into the shop. One farthing was the amount, and as I had never owed anything before, and my credit was good, the pencil was handed over by the kind dame, and I was in debt. It did not please me much, and I felt as if I had done wrong, but I little knew how soon I should smart for it. How my father came to hear of this little piece of business, I never knew, but some little bird or other whistled it to him, and he was very soon down upon me in right earnest. God bless him for it; he was a sensible man, and none of your children-spoilers; he did not intend to bring up his children to speculate and play at what big rogues call financiering, and therefore he knocked my getting into debt into the head at once, and no mistake. He gave me a very powerful lecture upon getting into debt, and how like it was to stealing, and upon the way in which people were ruined by it; and how a boy who would owe a farthing, might one day owe a hundred pounds, and get into prison, and bring

his family to disgrace. It was a lecture indeed; I think I can hear it now, and can feel my ears tingling at the recollection of it. Then I was marched off to the shop like a deserter marched into barrack, crying bitterly all down the street, and feeling dreadfully ashamed because I thought everybody knew I was in debt. The farthing was paid amid many solemn warnings, and the poor debtor was free, like a bird let out of a cage. How sweet it felt to be out of debt. How did my little heart declare and vow that nothing should ever tempt me into debt again. It was a fine lesson, and I have never forgotten it. If all boys were inoculated with the same doctrine when they were young, it would be as good as a fortune to them, and save them wagon-loads of trouble in after life. God bless my father, say I, and send a breed of such fathers into old England, to save her from being eaten up with villainy, for what with companies, and schemes, and paper money, the nation is getting to be as rotten as touchwood.

"Ever since that early sickening, I have hated debt as Luther hated the Pope, and if I say some fierce things about it, you must not wonder. To keep debt, dirt, and the devil out of my cottage has been my greatest wish ever since I set up housekeeping; and although the last of the three has sometimes gotten in by the door or window, for the old serpent will wriggle through the smallest crack, yet, thanks to a good wife, hard work, honesty, and scrubbing brushes, the other two have not crossed the threshold. Debt is so