him as though the answer in some way helped out the purport of his
question.

'Because I could remember, when I was a child,' said Smike, 'but that is
very, very long ago, or at least it seems so. I was always confused
and giddy at that place you took me from; and could never remember,
and sometimes couldn't even understand, what they said to me. I--let me
see--let me see!'

'You are wandering now,' said Nicholas, touching him on the arm.

'No,' replied his companion, with a vacant look 'I was only thinking
how--' He shivered involuntarily as he spoke.

'Think no more of that place, for it is all over,' retorted Nicholas,
fixing his eyes full upon that of his companion, which was fast settling
into an unmeaning stupefied gaze, once habitual to him, and common even
then. 'What of the first day you went to Yorkshire?'

'Eh!' cried the lad.

'That was before you began to lose your recollection, you know,' said
Nicholas quietly. 'Was the weather hot or cold?'

'Wet,' replied the boy. 'Very wet. I have always said, when it has
rained hard, that it was like the night I came: and they used to crowd
round and laugh to see me cry when the rain fell heavily. It was like a
child, they said, and that made me think of it more. I turned cold all
over sometimes, for I could see myself as I was then, coming in at the
very same door.'