nion, I went home, told the whole to my mother with a full heart, expressing the hope that I should never more, say any bad words, or refuse to do what she or my father might command. She was both surprised and affected, and gave me much encouragement, and prayed heartily for me. With a glad heart she communicated the information to my father, on whom I could see it did not make the same impression; for he had little opinion of pious resolutions in childish minds, though he feared God, and was a serious conscientious churchman. I must own that the way in which he treated it was very discouraging to my mind, and served to mingle impressions with my serious feelings, that were not friendly to their permanence: yet the impression, though it grew faint, did not wear away. It was laid deep in the consideration of eternity; and my accountableness to God for my conduct; and the absolute necessity of enjoying his favour, that I might never taste the bitter pains of eternal death. Had I had any person to point out the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world, I believe I should then have been found as capable of repentance and faith, (my youth and circumstances considered,) as I ever was afterwards. But I had no helper, no messenger, one among a thousand, who could shew man his righteousness.'

Though the place was divided between the Church and the Presbyterians, yet there was little even of the form of godliness, and still less of the power. Nor indeed, were the people excited to examine the principles of their own creed, till many years after, when the Methodists came into that country, "preaching repentance towards God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ."

As to his little companion, James Brooks, there was something singular in his history. It has already been noted that he was the tenth child of his parents, and

that the Rector of the parish was the famous Dr. Barnard, deservedly celebrated among the literary friends of Dr. Samuel Johnson.

Mrs. Brooks having gone to the dean's one morning, to pay her tithe, took little James in her hand: when she had laid down her money, she observed:-"Sir, you have annually the tenth of all I possess, except my children; it is but justice you should have the tenth of them also. I have eleven, and this is my tenth son, whom I have brought to you as the tithe of my children, as I have brought the tithe of my grain. I hope, Sir, you will take and provide for him." To this singular address, the dean found it difficult to reply. He could not, at first, suppose the woman to be in earnest: but on her urging her application, and almost insisting on his receiving this tenth of her intellectual live stock, both his benevolence and humanity were affected;-he immediately accepted the child, had him clothed, &c., let him lodge with the parents for a time, and sent him to school to Mr. John Clarke. In a short time Mr. C. removed from that part of the country; and what became of the interesting young man is not known. He was always called Tithe by the school-boys.

In some children, as well as grown-up persons, certain unaccountable sympathies and antipathies have been observed. Adam had a singular antipathy to large fat men, or men with big bellies, as he phrased it.

A gentleman of the name of Pearce Quinlin, was his father's nearest neighbour: this man was remarkably corpulent; his eyes stood out with fatness, and his belly was enormously protuberant. With this gentleman Adam was a favorite, yet he ever beheld him with abhorrence; and could hardly be persuaded to receive the little gifts which Mr. Q. brought to obtain his friendship. The following

circumstance rendered the dislike more intense.-A dumb. man, who pretended to tell fortunes, called there a spaeman, came one day to his father's house. Mrs. Clarke, looked upon such persons with a favorable eye, as it was her opinion, that if God in the course of his providence, deprived a man of one of his senses, he compensated this by either rendering the others more intense and accurate, or by some particular gift: and she thought, to most that were born dumb, a certain degree of foreknowledge was imparted. She was therefore, ready to entertain persons of this caste: and the man in question was much noted in that country, as having been remarkably fortunate in some of his guesses. Adam, who was conning the wizard's face with an eye of remarkable curiosity, was presented to him, to learn what was to be his lot in life. The artist, after beholding him for some time, gave signs that he would be very fond of the bottle, grow fat and have an enormous belly! These were precisely two of the things that he held in most abhorrence. He had often seen persons drunk, and he considered them as dangerous madmen, or the most brutish of beasts: and his dislike to the big belly has already been stated. He had even then a high opinion of the power and influence of prayer. He thought, that the spae-man might possibly be correct: but he believed there was no evil awaiting him in futurity which God could not avert. He therefore went immediately out into a field, got into a thicket of furze-bushes, and kneeling down he most fervently uttered the following petition:—“ O, Lord God, have mercy upon me, and never suffer me to be like Pearce Quinlin!" This he urged, with little variety of language, till he seemed to have a persuasion that the evil would be averted! Strange as it may appear, this predic tion left a deep impression upon his mind: and he has

hitherto passed through life's pilgrimage, equally dreading the character of the brutal drunkard, and the appearance of the human porpoise. Had it not been for this foolish prediction, he had possibly been less careful; and what the effects might have been we cannot calculate, for no man is impeccable.

There was little remarkable in other parts of his childhood, but that he was a very inapt scholar, and found it very difficult to acquire the knowledge of the Alphabet. For this dulness he was unmercifully censured and unseasonably chastised : and this, so far from eliciting genius, rather produced an increase of hebitude, so that himself began to despair of ever being able to acquire any knowledge by means of letters. When he was about eight years of age, he was led to entertain hopes of future improvement from the following circumstance. A neighbouring schoolmaster calling at the school where he was then endeavoring to put vowels and consonants together; was desired by the teacher to assist in hearing a few of the lads their lessons: Adam was the last that went up, not a little ashamed of his own deficiency: he however hobbled through his lesson, though in a very indifferent manner and the teacher apologised to the stranger, and remarked that, that lad was a grievous dunce. The assistant, clapping young Clarke on the head, said, Never fear, Sir, this lad will make a good scholar yet. This was the first thing that checked his own despair of learning; and gave him hope. How injudicious is the general mode of dealing with those who are called dull boys. To every child learning must be a task; and as no young person is able to comprehend the maxim that the acquisition of learning will compensate the toil, encouragement and kind words from the teacher, are indispensably necessary to induce the learner to undergo the toil of these gymnastic

exercises. Wilful idleness and neglect should be reprehended and punished; but where genius has not yet been developed, nor reason acquired its proper seat, the mildest methods are the most likely to be efficient: and the smallest progress should be watched, and commended, that it may excite to farther attention and diligence. With those who are called dull boys, this method rarely fails.

But there are very few teachers who possess the happy art of developing genius. They have not a sufficiency of penetration to find out the bent or characteristic propensity of the minds of their pupils, in order to give them the requisite excitement and direction. In consequence, there have been innumerable native diamonds which have never shone, because they have fallen into such hands as could not distinguish them from common pebbles; and to them neither the hand nor the art of the lapidary, has ever been applied. Many children, not naturally dull, have become so under the influence of the schoolmaster.

As soon as Adam got through the Reading made easy, had learnt to spell pretty correctly, and could read with tolerable ease in the New Testament; his father, who wished if possible to make him a scholar, put him into Lilly's Latin Grammar. This was new and painful work to little Clarke, and he was stumbled by almost the first sentence which he was ordered to get by heart; not because he could not commit it to memory, but because he could not comprehend

"In speech be these eight parts following; Noun, Pronoun, Verb, Participle, declined; Adverb, Conjunction, Preposition, Interjection, undeclined."

He, however, committed this to memory, and repeated it and many of its fellows, without understanding one tittle of the matter; for no pains were taken to enable him to see the reason of those things which he was com