"I now entered on a new state of being, and one of which I had formed no previous idea. I believed that the wish to please one who was dear to me would render every task easy; that I did wrong merely from caprice and revenge, and that if I chose, I could with my finger stem and direct the tide of my passions. I was astonished to find that I could not even bend my mind to attention--and I was angry with myself, when I felt my breast boiling with tumultuous rage, when I promised myself to be meek, enduring, and gentle. My endeavours to conquer these evil habits were indeed arduous. I forced myself by fits and starts to study sedulously--I yielded obedience to our school laws; I taxed myself to bear with patience the injustice and impertinence of the ushers, and the undisguised tyranny of the master. But I could not for ever string myself to this pitch. Meanness, and falsehood, and injustice again and again awoke the tiger in me. I am not going to narrate my boyhood's wrongs; I was doomed. Sent to school with a bad character, which at first I had taken pains to deserve, and afterward doing right in my own way, and still holding myself aloof from all, scorning their praise, and untouched by their censure, I gained no approbation, and was deemed a dangerous savage, whose nails must be kept close pared, and whose limbs were still to be fettered, lest he should rend his keepers. "From such a scene I turned, each Sunday morning, my willing steps to the cottage of Mrs. Rivers. There was something fascinating to me in the very peculiarities of her appearance. Ill health had brought premature age upon her person--but her mind was as active and young--her feelings as warm as ever. She could only stand for a few minutes, and could not unassisted walk across the room--she took hardly any nourishment, and looked, as I have said, more like a spirit than a woman. Thus deprived of every outward resource, her mind acquired, from habits of reflection and resignation, aided by judicious reading, a penetration and delicacy quite unequalled. There was a philosophical truth in all her remarks, adorned by a feminine tact and extreme warmth of heart, that rendered her as admirable as she was endearing. Sometimes she suffered great pain, but, for the most part, her malady, which was connected with the spine, had only the effect of extreme weakness, and at the same time of rendering her sensations acute and delicate. The odour of flowers, the balmy air of morning, the evening breeze almost intoxicated her with delight; any dissonant sound appeared to shatter her--peace was within, and she coveted peace around; and it was her dearest pleasure when we--I and her lovely daughter--were at her feet, she playing with the sunny ringlets of Alithea's hair, and I listening, with a thirst for knowledge--and ardour to be taught; while she with eloquence mild and cheering, full of love and wisdom, charmed our attentive ears, and