the impetus of the master-spring. No wonder that, to others, the nut of
such a character was hard to crack! But in the eyes of my poor mother,
Augustine (familiarly Austin) Caxton was the best and the greatest of
human beings; and she ought to have known him well, for she studied him
with her whole heart, knew every trick of his face, and, nine times out
of ten, divined what he was going to say before he opened his lips. Yet
certainly there were deeps in his nature which the plummet of her tender
woman's wit had never sounded; and certainly it sometimes happened that,
even in his most domestic colloquialisms, my mother was in doubt whether
he was the simple, straightforward person he was mostly taken for.
There was, indeed, a kind of suppressed, subtle irony about him, too
unsubstantial to be popularly called humor, but dimly implying some sort
of jest, which he kept all to himself; and this was only noticeable when
he said something that sounded very grave, or appeared to the grave very
silly and irrational.

That I did not go to school--at least to what Mr. Squills understood by
the word "school"--quite so soon as intended, I need scarcely observe.
In fact, my mother managed so well--my nursery, by means of double
doors, was so placed out of hearing--that my father, for the most part,
was privileged, if he pleased, to forget my existence. He was once
vaguely recalled to it on the occasion of my christening. Now, my
father was a shy man, and he particularly hated all ceremonies and
public spectacles. He became uneasily aware that a great ceremony, in
which he might be called upon to play a prominent part, was at hand.
Abstracted as he was, and conveniently deaf at times, he had heard such
significant whispers about "taking advantage of the bishop's being in
the neighborhood," and "twelve new jelly-glasses being absolutely
wanted," as to assure him that some deadly festivity was in the wind.
And when the question of godmother and godfather was fairly put to hire,