he was able to ride at all in that condition. I clearly remember one
particular occasion when he seemed to be keeping his seat with more than
usual uncertainty, and at last fairly rolled out of it. We were riding
along a paved street, so that the fall would have been very serious; but
two or three men who were watching him foresaw the accident just in
time, and rushed forward to catch him as he fell. On another occasion
when I was not present (indeed this happened before my settled residence
with my father) he fell in a most dangerous way, with his foot caught in
the stirrup, and was dragged violently down a steep hill till the horse
was brought to a stand. Fortunately my father wore a top-coat at the
time, which was soon torn off his back by the friction, and so were his
other clothes, and the back itself was almost flayed; but the doctor
said that if he had been lightly dressed the accident would have been far
more serious.

My father would sometimes send me on errands to a considerable distance
with the pony, and as he hated all dawdling and loitering in others,
though he had become a perfectly undisciplined man himself, he would
limit me strictly to the time necessary for my journey, a time that I
never ventured to exceed. In some respects the education that he was
giving me, though of Spartan severity, was not ill calculated for the
formation of a manly character. He quite understood the importance of
applying the mind completely to the thing which occupied it for the
moment. If he saw me taking several books together that had no
connection with each other, he would say, "Take one of those books and
read it steadily, don't potter and play with half-a-dozen."

Desultory effort irritated him, and he was quick to detect busy idleness
under its various disguises. He swore very freely himself, and as I
heard so many oaths I was beginning to acquire the same accomplishment,