It was not many days after the enacting of this scene, that I entered upon my duties as the instructor of the infant children of my friend.  It was useless to renew my application to the deacon, and I abandoned the idea.  The youngest of my pupils was the lisping Billy.  It was my honour to introduce him at the very porch of knowledge—­to place him on the first step of learning’s ladder—­to make familiar to him the simple letters of his native tongue, in whose mysterious combinations the mighty souls of men appear and speak.  The lesson of the alphabet was the first that I gave, and a heavy sadness depressed and humbled me when, as the child repeated wonderingly after me, letter by letter, I could not but feel deeply and acutely the miserable blighting of my youthful promises.  How long was it ago—­it seemed but yesterday, when the sun used to shine brightly into my own dear bed-room, and awake me with its first gush of light, telling my ready fancy that he came to rouse me from inaction, and to encourage me to my labours.  Oh, happy labours!  Beloved books!  What joy I had amongst you!  The house was silent—­the city’s streets tranquil as the breath of morning.  I heard nothing but the glorious deeds ye spoke of, and saw only the worthies that were but dust, when centuries now passed were yet unborn, but whose immortal spirits are vouchsafed still to elevate man, and cheer him onward.  How intense and sweet was our communion; and as I read and read on, how gratefully repose crept over me; how difficult it seemed to think unkindly of the world, or to believe in all the tales of human selfishness and cruelty with which the old will ever mock the ear and dull the heart of the confiding and the young.  How willing I felt to love, and how gay a place was earth, with her constant sun, and overflowing lap, and her thousand joys, for man!  And how intense was the fire of hope that burned within me—­fed with new fuel every passing hour, and how abiding and how beautiful the future!  THE FUTURE! and it was here—­a nothing—­a dream—­a melancholy phantasm!

There are seasons of adversity, in which the mind, plunged in despondency and gloom, is startled and distressed by pictures of a happier time, that travel far to fool and tantalize the suffering heart.  I sat with the child, and gazing full upon him, beheld him not, but—­a vision of my father’s house.  There sits the good old man, and at his side—­ah, how seldom were they apart!—­my mother.  And there, too, is the clergyman, my first instructor.  Every well-remembered piece of furniture is there.  The chair, sacred to my sire, and venerated by me for its age, and for our long intimacy.  I have known it since first I knew myself.  The antique bookcase—­the solid chest of drawers—­the solemn sofa, all substantial as ever, and looking, as at first, the immoveable and natural properties of the domestic parlour.  My mother has her eyes upon me, and they are full of tears.  My father and the minister are building