friends whose affection I prized so highly.

For some months after my father's death I continued to live at the
rectory; Mr. Dalton, the new incumbent, who had been his curate, and was
unmarried, kindly allowing my mother to remain there till her plans for
the future should be so far arranged as to enable her to determine in
what part of the country it would be advisable for her to reside. It had
been my father's wish and intention, when I should have attained a fit
age, to send me to one of the universities: a wish my mother was most
anxious to carry into effect. In order to accomplish this wish with her
reduced means, it would have been necessary for her, not only to have
practised the strictest economy, but also, in great measure, to have
sacrificed my sister's education, as she would have been utterly unable
to afford the advantage of masters. To this, of course, I would not
consent; after much discussion, therefore, the idea of college was
reluctantly given up, and, as a last resource, my mother applied to an
uncle of hers, engaged in the West India trade, begging him to endeavour
to procure for me a clerkship in some mercantile establishment. She
received a very kind reply, saying that, although he considered me too
young at present to be chained to a desk, he should advise me to apply
myself diligently to the study of French and book-keeping; and ending
by offering me a situation in his own counting-house when I should
be eighteen. As my only alternative lay between accepting this offer
(however little suited to my taste), or remaining a burden upon my
mother, it may easily be imagined that I lost no time in signifying my
desire to avail myself of his kindness; and, ere a couple of months had
elapsed, I had plunged deeply into the mysteries of book-keeping, and
could jabber French with tolerable fluency. I was still working away at
"Double Entry," and other horrors of a like nature, when one morning I
received a large business-like letter, in an unknown hand, the contents
of which astonished me not a little, as well they might; for they proved
to be of a nature once more entirely to change my prospects in life. The
epistle came from Messrs. Coutts, the bankers, and stated that they
were commissioned to pay me the sum of four hundred pounds per annum,
in quarterly payments, for the purpose ~112~~of defraying my expenses at
college; the only stipulations being, that the money should be used for
the purpose specifie