ad vast deference. Indeed, I believe he
would have pardoned anything in me more readily than poetry; which he
called a cursed, sneaking, puling, housekeeping employment, the bane of
all true manhood. He swore it was unworthy of a youngster of my
expectations, who was one day to have so great an estate, and would he
able to keep horses and hounds and hire poets to write songs for him
into the bargain.

I had now satisfied, for a time, my roving propensity. I had exhausted
the poetical feeling. I had been heartily buffeted out of my love for
theatrical display. I felt humiliated by my exposure, and was willing
to hide my head anywhere for a season; so that I might be out of the
way of the ridicule of the world; for I found folks not altogether so
indulgent abroad as they were at my father's table. I could not stay at
home; the house was intolerably doleful now that my mother was no
longer there to cherish me. Every thing around spoke mournfully of her.
The little flower-garden in which she delighted was all in disorder and
overrun with weeds. I attempted, for a day or two, to arrange it, but
my heart grew heavier and heavier as I labored. Every little
broken-down flower that I had seen her rear so tenderly, seemed to
plead in mute eloquence to my feelings. There was a favorite
honeysuckle which I had seen her often training with assiduity, and had
heard her say it should be the pride of her garden. I found it
grovelling along the ground, tangled and wild, and twining round every
worthless weed, and it struck me as an emblem of myself: a mere
scatterling, running to waste and uselessness. I could work no longer
in the garden.

My father sent me to pay a visit to my uncle, by way of keeping the old
gentleman in mind of me. I was received, as usual, without any
expression of discontent; which we always considered equivalent to a
hearty welcome. Whether he had ever heard of my strolling freak or not
I could not discover; he and his man were both so taciturn. I spent a
day or two roaming about the dreary mansion and neglected park; and
felt at one time, I believe, a touch of poetry, for I was tempted to
drown myself in a fish-pond; I rebuked the evil spirit, however, and it
left me. I found the same red-headed boy running wild about the park,
but I felt in no humor to hunt him at present. On the contrary, I tried
to coax him to me, and to make friends with him, but the young savage
was untameable.

When I returned from my