I now look back and see with what foresight and kindness Mr. Percy arranged to keep me in his home until I had become accustomed to my new mode of life before sending me out to fight my own battles. Scarcely a day passed but he examined me in my studies and seemed to take great pleasure in watching my progress. He had a special delight in his large garden, trimming and training his trees and plants, particularly those of a new kind, and it appeared to me that I was one of his plants that he was watching and developing. I needed no urging, as his pleased, intense interest made me respond with eagerness to his desires.
Clothes were made for me until I hardly knew where to put them, and it is not improper to say that I enjoyed practicing in them. He enjoyed making me pleasant surprises. I recall the great delight I experienced when one morning, dressing, I found in my waistcoat pocket a beautiful watch with chain and charm attached. I fairly danced for joy and I am not even now ashamed to say, I cried. I had to wait awhile for I hardly knew how to meet him. At length I went out with a joyful fear. I saw him watching me with his paper up before him pretending to read, with a merry twinkle in his eyes and a quizzical expression on his face waiting to see what I would do.
“O, Mr. Percy!” I exclaimed, “you are too good, too kind to me!” and I threw myself sobbing upon the sofa, shedding tears of joy. How could I do otherwise? “All right, Charles,” he said, “all right, my boy! Time is everything, improve it. Watch your watch! never be late for anything good, and always keep your appointments as you would your honor.”
Was I not proud? Where is the boy that is not proud of his first watch? If he is not, then there is something wrong in the make-up of that boy. How often during many days that followed, I took that watch from my pocket, let any boy who has had a watch answer. That watch has been the companion of my life, and now lies on the table before me. Many a time as I have looked at it during all these years it has recalled the expression of the eyes and face of the dearest friend I ever had, as he looked out at me from behind his paper on that memorable morning.
Such a man, such a friend, such a benefactor, was he not worthy of all my love, of my worship even? Is it not well for me now an old man, full of years and alas! bowed down with too many sorrows, to cherish with adoration the remembrance of such a friend? The very best of us have so few real, true friends, that we should make all we can of them.
The days passed and quickly too. I was absorbed in my studies and in trying to please my benefactor. He was very busy with his duties. In the mornings he usually went out to some village or to look at some road, bridge or building. During this time my teacher was with me. Our breakfast was at eleven when we had a pleasant time. Mr. Percy always had something new to tell me, made remarks on all kinds of subjects to give me ideas, and stimulate my intelligence. Then till evening he was in his court. After a time, when I had become somewhat acclimatized, so to speak, he took me with him on his evening drives to the club, the library and other public places. I kept retired as much as possible, conscious that I would appear awkward, and Mr. Percy showed his appreciation of my feelings. He was a man of the world enough to know that manners cannot be taught as from a recipe book. They must come by nature, from observation, be rubbed in by the friction of association, so he never gave me any instructions how to act, or placed any restraint upon me. Thus I was never uncomfortable in his presence since I had no fear of criticism. I was free to act, and he in all his ways, without suggesting his purpose, set me an example, in his manner, the tones of his voice, his words and method of expressing his thoughts. In after years I have often thought of this method of instruction and have wondered that so little attention is paid to the deportment, manners and personal habits of the instructors of youth. One, by observation, can invariably tell where persons were educated, from noticing in them the idiosyncrasies of their teachers. Man like a monkey is an imitative animal, and in early life he follows and becomes like that which most strikes his fancy.
Mr. Percy was of course my model, and though I have seen many men of all degrees of culture and schools, I have never met a more worthy example.
Though busy with my studies and taken up with the novelty of my life, I could not and would not forget the past. So great was the change that it seemed sometimes that I must be dreaming; but the events were too vivid in my memory to be anything but real.
I would frequently find myself sitting staring into the beyond. I always commenced with the clinking of those rupees. The sound is as real to me even now as when I first heard it. If a report starting miles away reaches me after some seconds, is it less a reality? It takes years for light to reach us from some distant planet. Is it less real because it has been years on the way? So I often saw that sahib as I see him now, as real to me as when I sat crouched in a corner of that room only a few feet from him. And the dear mama! How real she has always seemed! I have never thought of her but tears would come welling up from my heart. How I wished she could see me in my happiness! She surely would have smiled again. The little sister, always so cheerful even when she was hungry and tired! Our new mama, the good old faqir, all the scenes of the past, the hot dusty road, the separation from that sister, the losing her—what a queer strange kind of pain came into my whole body, a pain that never can be described, caused by the loss of those we dearly love; not a fleshy pain and not wholly in the mind, but of the soul, the heart, all the whole being, mental and physical; a choking, stifling, benumbing grief, that seems to stop the current of life and make us only wish for death.
The time approached for my entering some school. Mr. Percy wrote a number of letters. Catalogues were received, and it was at length decided that I should go to the St. George’s School at Dhurm Thal, a hill station. Preparations then began. The darzies were set to work, more clothes were made, and what they could not make were ordered from an English shop. The boxwalas came with brushes for the hair, the teeth, for the fingers, for the clothes, the boots and the bath. I never knew there were so many kinds before. Then thread, needles, tape, buttons, for Mr. Percy said in selecting them, “You must have a ‘Bachelor’ just like what my mother made for me when I started for school,” and away he went to his room to bring the Bachelor that his mother had made years ago, and which he had kept as a treasure. Blessed is the boy who has a mother to make nice things for him, but alas for me, my mother I had scarcely known!