He was bored, for in his heart he hated Liberalism, though he
was ashamed to say so, and, as I have said, professed to be on the
Whig side. He did not want to be reconciled to the Church of Rome;
he wanted to make all Roman Catholics turn Protestants, and could
never understand why they would not do so; but the Doctor talked in
such a truly liberal spirit, and shut him up so sharply when he
tried to edge in a word or two, that he had to let him have it all his
own way, and this was not what he was accustomed to. He was
wondering how he could bring it to an end, when a diversion was
created by the discovery that Ernest had begun to cry- doubtless
through an intense but inarticulate sense of a boredom greater than he
could bear. He was evidently in a highly nervous state, and a good
deal upset by the excitement of the morning; Mrs. Skinner therefore,
who came in with Christina at this juncture, proposed that he should
spend the afternoon with Mrs. Jay, the matron, and not be introduced
to his young companions until the following morning. His father and
mother now bade him an affectionate farewell, and the lad was handed
over to Mrs. Jay.
O schoolmasters- if any of you read this book- bear in mind when any
particularly timid, drivelling urchin is brought by his papa into your
study, and you treat him with the contempt which he deserves, and
afterwards make his life a burden to him for years- bear in mind
that it is exactly in the disguise of such a boy as this that your
future chronicler will appear.
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