250 EARLY REMINISCENCES into the parlour was to acquire consciousness that one was regarded as a check upon female confidences ; the nursery was out of the question, for the children were being put to bed. So there remained but a single place of refuge, the library—but where could be found a better ? I revert to a slightly earlier stage. At this period of life one is conscious of special sensitiveness to ridicule, or, what is as galling, to pity. There exists a craving after sympathy, but ignorance as to in what and where it is desired that sympathy should be sought. The mind, the whole system, is passing out of one stage of existence, one world of experience into another, and gropes to find its way. Owing to my not having had a public-school education, and to my youth having been migratory from one part of the Continent to another, I had not acquired any relish for and experience in field games, cricket and football, valuable acquisitions in many ways, not physical only but moral as well, giving energy, self-control and sociability. This was a great loss to me. Nothing could have been kinder to me than were my parents, but we were out of touch with one another. It was solely when I was excavating the Roman villa at Pau, that my father took any interest in my pursuits. My mother was always tender and loving, and a well-educated person, as education of ladies then went. In Natural History her interest was confined to botany, but with her that was of absorbing interest. " I know not how't be that often I feel A languor and wistfulness over me steal. Unbidden, the tears start into my eye, I look on the ground, and strain up at the sky. No longer a boy, not attained to be man, Bewilder'd, uneasy, sans purpose, sans plan; And Nature says—filled with malevolent joy: Hobble-dy-hoy ! poor hobble-dy-hoy ! I stray all alone, companions I shun, My dreams of the future are idle or none. I am clumsy in body, and awkward in limb, My knowledge of life is but doubtful and dim. No longer a boy, not attained to be man, Bewilder'd, uneasy, scans purpose, sans plan ; Now boist'rous, now bashful, now forward, then coy : Hobble-dy-hoy ! poor hobble-dy-hoy !
