is being nagged at, and may therefore cease to attend, and may enjoy a
grievance into the bargain!

Now, I have slow friends who really suffer from a sense of their failing,
and who realize acutely what they make others suffer; they were not
trained at first to pull themselves together and to collect beforehand any
materials they were likely to want (as you can train yourselves by
settling in properly to do your preparation)--and they did not teach
themselves to start five minutes sooner instead of leaving things to the
last moment. (They think that the consequent family thundercloud is their
sad fate from their being of a slow constitution.) But if you have only
one horse and your neighbour two, and you are to dine at the same house,
it only means that you must order yours earlier. Do not start together and
then bewail your sad fate; nothing condemns you to be late except your own
bad management.

Especially be careful to be up early when you are going to early service
with your mother; it fidgets her to wait--she recalls all your many
previous sins of the same kind--and just when you both want to feel _at
one_, you start off together (rather, I should say, you overtake her),
both feeling very much _at two_. And yet you made an effort to go! and you
feel she ought to be pleased with you--do not spoil it by that fly in the
ointment of being late.

* * * * *

It seems to me that the Benevolent Despot, the Peter Grievous, and the
Martyred Snail, are people to avoid in choosing your family!

Now, the people to choose for your family party are, first, _the Reliable