I should have been lured off in pursuit of him. The dreams passed
colourlessly; I put colouring touches to the figures seen in them
afterward, when I was cooler, and could say, 'What is the use of fancying
things?' yet knew that fancying things was a consolation. By such means
I came to paint the mystery surrounding my father in tender colours.
I built up a fretted cathedral from what I imagined of him, and could
pass entirely away out of the world by entering the doors.

Want of boys' society as well as hard head-work produced this mischief.
My lessons were intermittent Resident tutors arrived to instruct me,
one after another. They were clergymen, and they soon proposed to marry
my aunt Dorothy, or they rebuked the squire for swearing. The devil was
in the parsons, he said: in his time they were modest creatures and stuck
to the bottle and heaven. My aunt was of the opinion of our neighbours,
who sent their boys to school and thought I should be sent likewise.

'No, no,' said the squire; 'my life's short when the gout's marching up
to my middle, and I'll see as much of my heir as I can. Why, the lad's
my daughter's son: He shall grow up among his tenantry. We'll beat the
country and start a man at last to drive his yard of learning into him
without rolling sheep's eyes right and left.'

Unfortunately the squire's description of man was not started. My aunt
was handsome, an heiress (that is, she had money of her own coming from
her mother's side of the family), and the tenderest woman alive, with a
voice sweeter than flutes. There was a saying in the county that to
marry a Beltham you must po'chay her.

A great-aunt of mine, the squire's sister, had been carried off. She
died childless. A favourite young cousin of his likewise had run away