I read all sorts of books. But _do_ let us stop at the top of the
hill, and look at the house there, if you please!'

"'You admire that house?' said I.

"'Bless you, sir,' said the very queer small boy, 'when I was not more
than half as old as nine, it used to be a treat for me to be brought to
look at it. And now I am nine, I come by myself to look at it. And ever
since I can recollect, my father, seeing me so fond of it, has often
said to me, _If you were to be very persevering and were to work hard,
you might some day come to live in it_. Though that's impossible!' said
the very queer small boy, drawing a low breath, and now staring at the
house out of window with all his might.

"I was rather amazed to be told this by the very queer small boy; for
that house happens to be _my_ house, and I have reason to believe that
what he said was true."

The queer small boy was indeed his very self. He was a very little and a
very sickly boy. He was subject to attacks of violent spasm which
disabled him for any active exertion. He was never a good little
cricket-player. He was never a first-rate hand at marbles, or peg-top,
or prisoner's base. But he had great pleasure in watching the other
boys, officers' sons for the most part, at these games, reading while
they played; and he had always the belief that this early sickness had
brought to himself one inestimable advantage, in the circumstance of his
weak health having strongly inclined him to reading. It will not appear,
as my narrative moves on, that he owed much to his parents, or was other
than in his first letter to Washington Irving he described himself to
have been, a "very small and not-over-particularly-taken-care-of boy;"
but he has frequently been heard to say that his first desire for
knowledge, and his earliest passion for reading, were awakened by his
mother, who taught him the first rudiments not only of English, but
also, a little later, of Latin. She taught him regularly every day for a
long time, and taught him, he was convinced, thoroughly well. I once put
to him a question in connection with this to which he replied in almost
exactly the words he placed five years later in the mouth of David
Copperfield: "I faintly remember her teaching me the alphabet; and when
I look upon the fat black letters in the primer, the puzzling novelty of
their shapes, and the easy good nature of O and S, always seem to
present themselves before me as they used to do."

Then