when he
reaches seven, and would prefer to grow up be a bargee, and earn a lot
of money. Maybe this is the consequence of falling in love, which he
does about this time with the young lady at the milk shop aet. six. (God
bless her little ever-dancing feet, whatever size they may be now!)
He must be very fond of her, for he gives her one day his chiefest
treasure, to wit, a huge pocket-knife with four rusty blades and a
corkscrew, which latter has a knack of working itself out in some
mysterious manner and sticking into its owner's leg. She is an
affectionate little thing, and she throws her arms round his neck and
kisses him for it, then and there, outside the shop. But the stupid
world (in the person of the boy at the cigar emporium next door) jeers
at such tokens of love. Whereupon my young friend very properly prepares
to punch the head of the boy at the cigar emporium next door; but fails
in the attempt, the boy at the cigar emporium next door punching his
instead.

And then comes school life, with its bitter little sorrows and its
joyous shoutings, its jolly larks, and its hot tears falling on beastly
Latin grammars and silly old copy-books. It is at school that he injures
himself for life--as I firmly believe--trying to pronounce German;
and it is there, too, that he learns of the importance attached by the
French nation to pens, ink, and paper. "Have you pens, ink, and paper?"
is the first question asked by one Frenchman of another on their
meeting. The other fellow has not any of them, as a rule, but says
that the uncle of his brother has got them all three. The first fellow
doesn't appear to care a hang about the uncle of the other fellow's
brother; what he wants to know now is, has the neighbor of the other
fellow's mother got 'em? "The neighbor of my mother has no pens, no ink,
and no paper," replies the other man, beginning to get wild. "Has the
child of thy female gardener some pens, some ink, or some paper?" He has
him there. After worrying enough about these wretched inks, pens, and
paper to make everybody miserable, it turns out that the child of his
own female gardener hasn't any. Such a discovery would shut up any one
but a French exercise man. It has no effect at all, though, on this
shameless creature. He never thinks of apologizing, but says his aunt
has some mustard.

So in the acquisition of more or less useless knowledge, soon happily to
be forgotten, boyhood passes away. The red-brick school-h