Eric, or, Little by Little | Page 3

life. All was
simple, sweet, and unaffected about their charity and their devotions.
They loved God, and they did all the good they could to those around
them. The floating gossip and ill-nature of the little village never
affected them; it melted away insensibly in the presence of their
cultivated minds; and so friendship with them was a bond of union
among all, and from the vicar to the dairyman every one loved and
respected them, asked their counsel, and sought their sympathy.
They called themselves by no sectarian name, nor could they have told
to what "party" they belonged. They troubled themselves with no
theories of education, but mingled gentle nurture with "wholesome
neglect." There was nothing exotic or constrained in the growth of
Eric's character. He was not one of your angelically good children at all,
and knew none of the phrases of which infant prodigies are supposed to
be so fond. He had not been taught any distinction between "Sunday
books" and "week-day" books, but no book had been put in his way
that was not healthy and genuine in tone. He had not been told that he

might use his Noah's ark on Sunday, because it was "a Sunday
plaything," while all other toys were on that day forbidden. Of these
things the Trevors thought little; they only saw that no child could be
happy in enforced idleness or constrained employment; and so Eric
grew up to love Sunday quite as well as any other day in the week,
though, unlike your angelic children, he never professed to like it better.
But to be truthful, to be honest, to be kind, to be brave, these had been
taught him, and he never quite forgot the lesson; nor amid the sorrows
of after life did he ever quite lose the sense--learnt at dear quiet
Fairholm--of a present loving God, of a tender and long-suffering
Father.
As yet he could be hardly said to know what school was. He had been
sent indeed to Mr. Lawley's grammar-school for the last half-year, and
had learned a few declensions in his Latin grammar. But as Mr. Lawley
allowed his upper class to hear the little boys their lessons, Eric had
managed to get on pretty much as he liked. Only once in the entire
half-year had he said a lesson to the dreadful master himself, and of
course it was a ruinous failure, involving some tremendous pulls of
Eric's hair, and making him tremble like a leaf. Several things
combined to make Mr. Lawley dreadful to his imagination. Ever since
he was quite little, he remembered hearing the howls which proceeded
from the "Latin school" as he passed by, whilst some luckless
youngster was getting caned; and the reverend pedagogue was
notoriously passionate. Then, again, he spoke so indistinctly with his
deep, gruff voice, that Eric never could and never did syllable a word
he said, and this kept him in a perpetual terror. Once Mr. Lawley had
told him to go out, and see what time it was by the church clock. Only
hearing that he was to do something, too frightened to ask what it was,
and feeling sure that even if he did, he should not understand what the
master said, Eric ran out, went straight to Mr. Lawley's house, and after
having managed by strenuous jumps to touch the knocker, informed the
servant "that Mr. Lawley wanted his man."
"What man?" said the maid-servant, "the young man? or the butler? or
is it the clerk?"

Here was a puzzler! all Eric knew was that he was in the habit of
sending sometimes for one or the other of these functionaries; but he
was in for it, so with a faltering voice he said "the young man" at
hazard, and went back to the Latin school.
"Why have you been so long?" roared Mr. Lawley, as he timidly
entered. Fear entirely prevented Eric from hearing what was said, so he
answered at random, "He's coming, sir." The master, seeing by his
scared look that something was wrong, waited to see what would turn
up.
Soon after, in walked "the young man," and coming to the astonished
Mr. Lawley, bowed, scraped, and said, "Master Williams said you sent
for me, sir."
"A mistake," growled the schoolmaster, turning on Eric a look which
nearly petrified him; he quite expected a book at his head, or at best a
great whack of the cane; but Mr. Lawley had naturally a kind heart,
soured as it was, and pitying perhaps the child's white face, he
contented himself with the effects of his look.
The simple truth was, that poor Mr. Lawley was a little wrong in the
head. A scholar and a gentleman, early misfortunes and an imprudent
marriage had driven him to