window by his father's side, looking at a cloud of black smoke
pouring out of a tall chimney. He asked if that was hell; an
inquiry that was received with a grave displeasure which at the
time he could not understand. The kindly father must have been
pained, almost against his own will, at finding what feature of
his creed it was that had embodied itself in so very material a
shape before his little son's imagination. When in after days
Mrs. Macaulay was questioned as to how soon she began to detect
in the child a promise of the future, she used to say that his
sensibilities and affections were remarkably developed at an age
which to her hearers appeared next to incredible. He would cry
for joy on seeing her after a few hours' absence, and, (till her
husband put a stop to it,) her power of exciting his feelings was
often made an exhibition to her friends. She did not regard this
precocity as a proof of cleverness; but, like a foolish young
mother, only thought that so tender a nature was marked for early
death.

The next move which the family made was into as healthy an
atmosphere, in every sense, as the most careful parent could wish
to select. Mr. Macaulay took a house in the High Street of
Clapham, in the part now called the Pavement, on the same side as
the Plough inn, but some doors nearer to the Common. It was a
roomy comfortable dwelling, with a very small garden behind, and
in front a very small one indeed, which has entirely disappeared
beneath a large shop thrown out towards the road-way by the
present occupier, who bears the name of Heywood. Here the boy
passed a quiet and most happy childhood. From the time that he
was three years old he read incessantly, for the most part lying
on the rug before the fire, with his book on the ground, and a