I remember I was fishing or appearing to fish one bright morning, in a link of our water, which was a kind of hermitage to me,--I might be twelve years old then--when my father suddenly approached me, leading in his hand a boy of my own years--a boy so differently endowed, so superior to myself as I felt at once in my shy consciousness. My father visited Mossgray seldom: at this time we had received no intimation of his coming, and the timid constraint and awkward diffidence, which were always upon me in his presence, were heightened into exceeding pain by this sudden appearance. “Adam,” said my father, “this is your cousin Charles. He is to stay with you in future at Mossgray.” My father’s own name was Charles; he looked with favour on his namesake, as he watched our greeting. I so shy and rustic, and Charlie Graeme so bold and manly--I felt how disadvantageous was the comparison. But when my father left us, and we became acquainted, as we did soon, for my cousin was as frank as I was shy, then the glorious new life of genuine boyhood which burst upon Mossgray and upon me! How I lavished upon Charlie the unsunned treasures of my solitary child’s heart; how I awoke out of my dreamy loneliness, to find myself enriched beyond all wealth in his companionship. How I discovered a new charm and attraction in my own beloved water and noble woods, from the wild shout of mirth with which Charlie plunged into riotous enjoyment of them. How the old walls and doorways that had been disturbed by few sounds louder than my pensive stealings out and in, resounded now with the ringing speed of boyish footsteps, and the blythe din of boyish laughter. It is pleasant to look back upon that time, when from a childish hermit I became a boy! There was for me after that era no more solitary watching of the sports of others. The “haill water” ere long knew Charlie Graeme as the adventurous leader of every troop of juvenile mischief-makers, and I was by no means a slow or backward pupil. The complete revolution in my life which this produced gave these vigorous enjoyments a still greater zest to me, albeit I sometimes felt the pleasure of compassionate benevolence towards these strong fellows, my seniors in years, whose unthinking mirth of mood was so much younger than mine. I liked the sports for their sake, and they gave me some casual place in their regard for sake of the games in which I shared--we were different so far--but the lingerings of my recluse spirit did by no means operate disadvantageously upon my physical activities. I had emerged into a new existence. I had entered the second stage of life.