FullReads

[Footnote 1: Blackstone]

“To bear and forbear ” has been said to be the sum of manly virtue: the virtue of forbearance in childhood must always be measured by the pupil’s disposition to activity: a vivacious boy must often have occasion to forbear more, in a quarter of an hour, than a dull, indolent child in a quarter of a year.

“May I touch this?”–“May I meddle with that?” were questions which our prudent hero now failed not to ask, before he meddled with the property of others, and he found his advantage in this mode of proceeding. He observed that his governess was, in this respect, as scrupulous as she required that he should be, and he consequently believed in the truth and general utility of her precepts.

The coachmaker’s, the cooper’s, the turner’s, the cabinet-maker’s, even the black ironmonger’s and noisy tinman’s shop, afforded entertainment for many a morning; a trifling gratuity often purchased much instruction, and Mad. de Rosier always examined the countenance of the workman before she suffered her little pupils to attack him with questions. The eager curiosity of children is generally rather agreeable than tormenting to tradesmen, who are not too busy to be benevolent; and the care which Herbert took not to be troublesome pleased those to whom he addressed himself. He was delighted, at the upholsterer’s, to observe that his little models of furniture had taught him how several things were put together, and he soon learned the workmen’s names for his ideas. He readily understood the use of all that he saw, when he went to a bookbinder’s, and to a printing-office, because, in his own printing and bookbinder’s press, he had seen similar contrivances in miniature.

Prints, as well as models, were used to enlarge his ideas of visible objects. Mad. de Rosier borrowed the Dictionnaire des Arts et des Metiers, Buffon, and several books, which contained good prints of animals, machines, and architecture; these provided amusement on rainy days. At first she found it difficult to fix the attention of the boisterous Herbert and the capricious Favoretta. Before they had half examined one print, they wanted to turn over the leaf to see another; but this desultory, impatient curiosity she endeavoured to cure by steadily showing only one or two prints for each day’s amusement. Herbert, who could but just spell words of one syllable, could not read what was written at the bottom of the prints, and he was sometimes ashamed of applying to Favoretta for assistance;–the names that were printed upon his little models of furniture he at length learned to make out. The press was obliged to stand still when Favoretta, or his friend, Mad. de Rosier, were not at hand, to tell him, letter by letter, how to spell the words that he wanted to print. He, one evening, went up to Mad. de Rosier, and, with a resolute face, said, “I must learn to read.”

“If any body will be so good as to teach you, I suppose you mean,” said she, smiling[2].

[Footnote 2: Vide Rousseau.]

“Will you be so good?” said he: “perhaps you could teach me, though Grace says ’tis very difficult; I’ll do my best.”

“Then I’ll do my best too,” said Mad. de Rosier.

The consequences of these good resolutions were surprising to Mrs. Grace. Master Herbert was quite changed, she observed; and she wondered why he would never read when she took so much pains with him for an hour every day to hear him his task. “Madame de What d’ye call her,” added Mrs. Grace, “need not boast much of the hand she has had in the business: for I’ve been by at odd times, and watched her ways, whilst I have been dressing Miss Favoretta, and she has been hearing you your task, Master Herbert.”