perfectly scoundrel offspring of a newspaper editor. I formed no
friendships with any of my colleagues, but one of them I greatly
envied. He was deaf and dumb, the son of a poor clergyman, and had
an extraordinary passion for botany. Every holiday was devoted to
rambling about the country near London. He cared little for
anything but his favourite science, but that he understood, and he
never grew tired of it. I took no account of his deafness and
dumbness; the one thing I saw was his mastership over a single
subject. Gradually my incompleteness came to weigh on me like a
nightmare. I imagined that if I had learned any craft which
required skill, I should have been content. I was depressed when I
looked at the watchmaker examining my watch. I should have walked
the streets erect if there had been one thing which I could do
better than anybody I met. There was nothing: I stood for nothing:
no purpose was intended by God through me. I was also
constitutionally inaccurate--this was another of my troubles--and
nothing short of the daily use of a fact made me sure of it. No
matter how zealously I went over and over again a particular
historical period, I always broke down the moment my supposed
acquisitions were tested by questions or conversation. I have read
a book with the greatest attention I could muster, and have found,
when I have seen a simple examination paper on it, that I could not
have got a dozen marks. Of what value, then, were my notions on
matters demanding far greater concentration of thought? Accuracy I
fancied might be acquired, but I was mistaken. It is a gift as much
as the art of writing sublime poetry. I struggled and struggled
with pencil and precis, but I did not improve. My cousin's before-
mentioned friend took delight in checking, like an accountant, what
was said to him, especially by me, and although I saw that this for
the most part was a mere trick, I could not deny that it proved