grandfather had been dictator time out of mind; but as he neither paid
for my board, nor supplied me with clothes, books, or other necessaries,
my condition was very ragged and contemptible; and the schoolmaster gave
himself no concern about the progress I made.

In spite of all this, I became a good proficient in the Latin tongue;
but the contempt which my appearance produced, the continual wants to
which I was exposed, and my own haughty disposition, involved me in a
thousand troubles and adventures. I was often inhumanly scourged for
crimes I did not commit; because having the character of a vagabond in
the village every piece of mischief whose author lay unknown, was
charged upon me. Far from being subdued by this infernal usage, my
indignation triumphed, and the more my years and knowledge increased,
the more I perceived the injustice and barbarity of the treatment I
received. By the help of our usher, I made a surprising progress in the
classics and arithmetic, so that before I was twelve years old I was
allowed by everybody to be the best scholar in the school.

Meanwhile, I took the advantage of every playday to present myself
before my grandfather, to whom I seldom found access, by reason of his
being closely besieged by a numerous family of his grandchildren, who,
though they perpetually quarrelled among themselves, never failed to
join against me, as the common enemy of all. His heir, who was about the
age of eighteen, minded nothing but fox-hunting, and never set eyes on
me, without uncoupling his beagles, and hunting me into some cottage or
other, whither I generally fled for shelter.

About this time, my mother's only brother, who had been long abroad,
lieutenant of a man of war, arrived in his own country; where, being
informed of my condition, he came to see me, and, out of his slender