rld had the effect, unconsciously to myself, of brightening my
little inner world; but over and above all this must be ranked my keen
enjoyment of a scramble, and of the sense of difficulty and danger
attendant upon certain steep parts of the descent. It was one of my
great amusements to be trusted occasionally to guide my parents'
visitors down by this path, for the sake of the view, whilst their
carriages would be sent the long way by the drive to meet them at the
lodge. There were precipitous places, where even grave and stately
grown-up people would give up walking and take to running; and then
again little perilous points, where ladies especially would utter faint
cries of fright, and would require gentle persuasion to induce them to
step down from stone to stone; whilst I, fearless from long practice,
would triumphantly perform the feat two or three times, to show that I
was not in the least afraid, devising, moreover, short cuts for myself
even steeper than those of the recognized path.

I question whether the birth-day which conferred on me the privilege of
going alone up and down the Zig-zag was the greatest boon to myself or
to my nurse; the exertion involved in scaling the hill-side being to the
full as wearisome to her as it was enchanting to myself. The
emancipation, however, came early in my career, since my friend, old
George, by my father's consent, assumed a sort of out-of-door charge of
me at a period when most little boys are exclusively under nursery
discipline. For my father reposed the utmost confidence in the old man's
principles, and did not hesitate to let me be for hours under his care,
saying, often in my hearing, that he would rather have me out on the
water learning from him how to manage the boats, or climbing the rocks
and exploring the caves under his safe guardianship, than learning from
a woman only how to keep _off_ the rocks and avoid tumbling into the
water. He was an old seaman, united by strong ties of friendship and
gratitude to our family. In earlier years he had served on board the
same ship in which my father had been a young midshipman; and on one
occasion, when my father fell overboard, at a time when the vessel was
at full speed, had thrown himself into the water, and held my father's
head up when he was too exhausted to swim, until the boat put out for
the rescue had time to come up and save both lives, which the delay had
placed in great peril. When, some years later, on my