presence of old age and, with the restraints it brought upon
him, and having less imagination than falls to the lot of most children,
he was the more affected by his position. When he strayed into a field
of wheat, and there was waving and whispering above his head, it was not
all one to him, as if he had been lost in some old-world forest, where
uncouth creatures dwelt, and castles and caverns might be encountered
before the stile. He could not see the great world out of the parlour
window, and understand and almost inherit another world beyond the
hills; as to the moon, the child's silver heaven, he never saw something
marvellous and mild sitting up there and smiling to him to come.

But he was happy, and instead of the wide-open eyes of a child fed to
the full with the wonders about him and within him, his eyes were shaded
constantly by their light lashes; he enjoyed his play, but he blinked
when day was at the full; and all his observations concerned realities.
Some story had reached him about a ghost which had been seen in that
immediate neighbourhood.

"Who cooks his dinner for him?" inquired the child.

"He has no dinner," answered the old housemaid.

"I don't want to see him, then," said the little winking, blinking
philosopher; "he might ask me for some of mine."

But that was a height of prudence that he could not reach often, and he
several times annoyed his mother and alarmed his aunt by asking
questions about this ghost.

Laura Melcombe, Peter's aunt, acted as his governess, and took a certain
pride and pleasure in his young intelligence. It was well that she had
something real to interest her, for her character was in strong contrast
to her nephew's. She lived mainly in an ideal world, and her life was
fed by what she fetched up from the clod or down from the clouds.
Chiefly by the former. She was "of imagination all compact;" but that is
a very unlucky case where there is weak judgment, little or no keenness
of observation, a treacherous memory, and a boundless longing for the
good things of life. Of all gifts, imagination, being the greatest, is
least worth having, unless it is well backed either by moral culture or
by other intellectual qualities. It is the crown of all thoughts and
powers; but you cannot wear a crown becomingly if you have no head
(worth mentioning) to put it on.

Miss Laura Melcombe thought most of the young farmers in the
neighbourhood were in love with her. Accordingly, at c