paused and strove to whistle; but that effort of harmony
failed him, and he added, smiling, "So much for my apple-trees, brother
John. Leave them to their natural destination of filling tarts and
dumplings."

Uncle Jack looked a little discomposed for a moment; but he then
laughed with his usual heartiness, and saw that he had not yet got to
my father's blind side. I confess that my revered parent rose in my
estimation after that conference; and I began to see that a man may not
be quite without common sense, though he is a scholar. Indeed, whether
it was that Uncle Jack's visit acted as a gentle stimulant to his
relaxed faculties, or that I, now grown older and wiser, began to
see his character more clearly, I date from those summer holidays the
commencement of that familiar and endearing intimacy which ever
after existed between my father and myself. Often I deserted the
more extensive rambles of Uncle Jack, or the greater allurements of a
cricket-match in the village, or a day's fishing in Squire Rollick's
preserves, for a quiet stroll with my father by the old peach
wall,--sometimes silent, indeed, and already musing over the future,
while he was busy with the past, but amply rewarded when, suspending his
lecture, he would pour forth hoards of varied learning, rendered amusing
by his quaint comments, and that Socratic satire which only fell short
of wit because it never passed into malice. At some moments, indeed, the
vein ran into eloquence; and with some fine heroic sentiment in his old
books, his stooping form rose erect, his eye flashed, and you saw that
he had not been originally formed and wholly meant for the obscure
seclusion in which his harmless days now wore contentedly away.

CHAPTER IV.

"Egad, sir, the county is going to the dogs! Our sentiments are not
represented in parliament or out of it. The 'County Mercury' has ratted,
and be hanged to it! and now we have not one newspaper in the whole
shire to express the sentiments of the respectable part of the
community!"

This speech was made on the occasion of one of the rare dinners given by
Mr. and Mrs. Caxton to the grandees of the neighborhood, and uttered by
no less a person than Squire Rollick, of Rollick Hall, chairman of the
quarter-sessions.

I confess that I (for I was permitted on that first occasion not only to
dine with the guests, but to outstay the ladies, in virtue of my growing
years and my promise to abstain from the decanters)