"'Nor do I mean that you should,' coldly retorted Rachel. 'My secret is worth keeping. You will know it one day too soon.'
"We had now reached home, and the presence of the strange woman put an end to this mysterious conversation. Though only a boy of eight years old, it struck me as so remarkable, that I could never forget it; and now, when years have gone over me, I can distinctly recall every word and look which passed between those sinful women. Alas, that one should be so near to me.
"But you are sleepy, Geoffrey. The rest of my mournful history will help to wile away the tedium of the long to-morrow."
GEORGE HARRISON CONTINUES HIS HISTORY.
"The sorrows of my childhood were great," continued George, "but still they were counterbalanced by many joys. In spite of the disadvantages under which I laboured, my gay, elastic spirit surmounted them all.
"Naturally fearless and fond of adventure, I never shrunk from difficulties, but felt a chivalrous pride in endeavouring to overcome them. If I could not readily do this at the moment, I lived on in the hope that the day would arrive when by perseverance and energy, I should ultimately conquer.
"I have lived to prove that of which I early felt a proud conviction; that it is no easy matter for a wicked person, let him be ever so clever and cunning, to subdue a strong mind, which dares to be true to itself.
"Dinah North felt my superiority even as a child, and the mortifying consciousness increased her hatred. She feared the lofty spirit of the boy whom her tyrannical temper could not tame; who laughed at her threats, and defied her malice, and who, when freed from her control, enjoyed the sweets of liberty in a tenfold degree.
"Sir Alexander put me to a school in the neighbourhood, where I learned the first rudiments of my mother tongue, writing, reading, and simple arithmetic. The school closed at half-past four o'clock in the afternoon; when I returned to the Lodge, for so the cottage was called in which we resided, and which stood just within the park at the head of the noble avenue of old oaks and elms that led to the Hall. Two of the loveliest, sweetest children nature ever formed were always at the Park gates watching for my coming, when they ran to meet me with exclamations of delight, and we wandered forth hand in hand to look for wild fruit and flowers among the bosky dells and romantic uplands of that enchanting spot.