encounters, through the force of his wit and the sweetness of his
voice. But this eloquence is heard only by his own inner ears, and
these triumphs are the triumphs of his imagination.

The true hobbledehoy is much alone, not being greatly given to social
intercourse even with other hobbledehoys--a trait in his character
which I think has hardly been sufficiently observed by the world at
large. He has probably become a hobbledehoy instead of an Apollo,
because circumstances have not afforded him much social intercourse;
and, therefore, he wanders about in solitude, taking long walks, in
which he dreams of those successes which are so far removed from his
powers of achievement. Out in the fields, with his stick in his hand,
he is very eloquent, cutting off the heads of the springing summer
weeds, as he practises his oratory with energy. And thus he feeds an
imagination for which those who know him give him but scanty credit,
and unconsciously prepares himself for that latter ripening, if only
the ungenial shade will some day cease to interpose itself.

Such hobbledehoys receive but little petting, unless it be from a
mother; and such a hobbledehoy was John Eames when he was sent away
from Guestwick to begin his life in the big room of a public office
in London. We may say that there was nothing of the young Apollo
about him. But yet he was not without friends--friends who wished him
well, and thought much of his welfare. And he had a younger sister
who loved him dearly, who had no idea that he was a hobbledehoy,
being somewhat of a hobbledehoy herself. Mrs Eames, their mother, was
a widow, living in a small house in Guestwick, whose husband had been
throughout his whole life an intimate friend of our squire. He had
been a man of many misfortunes, having begun the world almost with
affluence, and having ended it in poverty. He had lived all his days