Henry’s attention was so firmly fixed that he forgot there was a spectator of his fervour; nor did he hear young William enter the chamber and even speak to his father.
At length closing his book and rising from his knees, he approached his uncle and cousin, with a sedateness in his air, which gave the latter a very false opinion of the state of his youthful companion’s mind.
“So, Mr. Henry,” cried William, “you have been obliged, at last, to say your prayers.”
The dean informed his son “that to Henry it was no punishment to pray.”
“He is the strangest boy I ever knew!” said William, inadvertently.
“To be sure,” said Henry, “I was frightened when I first knelt; but when I came to the words, Father, which art in Heaven, they gave me courage; for I know how merciful and kind a father is, beyond any one else.”
The dean again embraced his nephew, let fall a tear to his poor brother Henry’s misfortunes; and admonished the youth to show himself equally submissive to other instructions, as he had done to those which inculcate piety.
CHAPTER XVIII.
The interim between youth and manhood was passed by young William and young Henry in studious application to literature; some casual mistakes in our customs and manners on the part of Henry; some too close adherences to them on the side of William.
Their different characters, when boys, were preserved when they became men: Henry still retained that natural simplicity which his early destiny had given him; he wondered still at many things he saw and heard, and at times would venture to give his opinion, contradict, and even act in opposition to persons whom long experience and the approbation of the world had placed in situations which claimed his implicit reverence and submission.