a very bookish turn, and
probably destined to be a bishop. If he could have discovered and
analysed his son's waking dreams, he would have formed a very different
conclusion.

CHAPTER IV

CASTLE-BUILDING

I have already hinted, that the dainty, squeamish, and fastidious taste
acquired by a surfeit of idle reading, had not only rendered our hero
unfit for serious and sober study, it had even disgusted him in some
degree with that in which he had hitherto indulged.

He was in his sixteenth year, when his habits of abstraction and love of
solitude became so much marked, as to excite Sir Everard's affectionate
apprehension. He tried to counterbalance these propensities, by engaging
his nephew in field sports, which had been the chief pleasure of his
own youthful days. But although Edward eagerly carried the gun for one
season, yet when practice had given him some dexterity, the pastime
ceased to afford him amusement.

In the succeeding spring, the perusal of old Isaac Walton's fascinating
volume determined Edward to become 'a brother of the angle.' But of
all diversions which ingenuity ever devised for the relief of idleness,
fishing is the worst qualified to amuse a man who is at once indolent
and impatient; and our hero's rod was speedily flung aside. Society and
example, which, more than any other motives, master and sway the
natural bent of our passions, might have had their usual effect upon the
youthful visionary: but the neighbourhood was thinly inhabited, and the
homebred young squires whom it afforded, were not of a class fit to form
Edward's usual companions, far less to excite him to emulation in the
practice of those pastimes which composed the serious business of their
lives.

There were a few other youths of better education, and a more liberal
character; but from their society also our hero was in some degree
excluded. Sir Everard had, upon the death of Queen Anne, resigned his
seat in Parliament, and, as his age increased and the number of his
contemporaries diminished, had gradually withdrawn himself from
society; so that when, upon any particular occasion, Edward mingled
with accomplished and well-educated young men of his own rank and
expectations, he felt an inferiority in their company, not so much from
deficiency of information, as from the want of the skill to command and
to arrange that which he possessed. A deep and increasing sensibility
added to this dislike of society. The idea of ha