.
Now my brother was as yet very crude and inconsistent in his theories
concerning sleep, and had no conception what a real sleeper would do
under these circumstances. Fear deprived him of his powers of
reflection, and he thus unfortunately concluded that because sleepers, so
far as he had observed them, were always motionless, therefore they must
be rigid and incapable of motion; and indeed that any movement, under any
circumstances (for from his earliest childhood he liked to carry his
theories to their legitimate conclusion), would be physically impossible
for one who was really sleeping; forgetful, oh! unhappy one, of the
flexibility of his own body on being carried up stairs, and, more unhappy
still, ignorant of the art of waking. He therefore clenched his fingers
harder and harder as he felt my mother trying to unfold them, while his
head hung listless, and his eyes were closed as though he were sleeping
sweetly. It is needless to detail the agony of shame that followed. My
mother begged my father to box his ears, which my father flatly refused
to do. Then she boxed them herself, and there followed a scene, and a
day or two of disgrace for both of us.

Shortly after this there happened another misadventure. A lady came to
stay with my mother, and was to sleep in a bed that had been brought into
our nursery, for my father's fortunes had already failed, and we were
living in a humble way. We were still but four and five years old, so
the arrangement was not unnatural, and it was assumed that we should be
asleep before the lady went to bed, and be down stairs before she would
get up in the morning. But the arrival of this lady and her being put to
sleep in the nursery were great events to us in those days, and being
particularly wanted to go to sleep, we of course sat up in bed talking
and keeping ourselves awake till she should come up stairs. Perhaps we
had fancied that she would give us something, but if so we were
disappointed. However, whether this was the case or not, we were wide
awake when our visitor came to bed, and having no particular object to
gain, we made no pretence of sleeping. The lady kissed us both, told us
to lie still and go to sleep like good children, and then began doing her
hair.

I remember this was the occasion on which my brother discovered a good
many things in connection with the fair sex which had hitherto been
beyond his ken; more especially that the mass of petticoats and