Her boys went to a public school. It was not till they had been there for some time, that Maria remarked there was a great change in Edward. His spirits, which had been constantly and exuberantly gay, were now only occasionally elevated. His temper, formerly mild and even, was now sometimes stern and morose; if his brother thwarted him, he yielded immediately, but it was with a sort of proud humility. Instead of asking the servants to mend any of the implements of his boyish amusements, and applying to them for all the various little services so often asked, and so willingly performed, he would pass whole days mending his own tools; he would walk off to the village to get his knife sharpened, and scrupulously pay for it; in short, there seemed to pervade every action, a desire not to be beholden to any one. He was tender to his mother, fond of his sister, kind to his brother; still there was something unsatisfactory in his manner. His pursuits were solitary; he did not want the companionship of his brother; and Charles, in his turn, would say, “Oh! Edward goes his own way, so I shall go mine.” It sometimes occurred that both could not ride, or that both could not shoot, or that there was only one place in the carriage on some excursion of pleasure. On such occasions, Edward invariably said he preferred staying at home. At length the feeling that was rankling in the bosom of the elder boy was inadvertently betrayed. Edward had seated himself next to his mother at dinner, when Charles said, laughingly, “This is too bad, Edward; you sat by mamma yesterday; it is not fair play. Come, turn out!” With a flushed cheek, and an angry eye, the colour mounting to his very temples, he exclaimed in a tone but little justified by the occasion:— “I won’t! I have as good a right as you to sit by my mother at least. From _this_ place you shall not turn me out.” Charles answered, “Why, Edward, you are grown so crabbed, I don’t know what is come to you; however, I shall have merrier playfellows than you, when I get back to school.” Maria more than suspected that Edward had learned the history of his own birth; and she also perceived that the indignant sense of honour, and the independent spirit, which if properly directed, might lead to all that is most brilliant and admirable, were likely, in Edward’s unfortunate circumstances, to spoil a disposition naturally amiable and noble.