BOYHOOD IN CENTRAL NEW YORK- 1832 -1850 15 



sure even more intense, the earlier works of Dickens, 

 which were then appearing. 



My only regret, as regards that time, is that, between the 

 rather trashy " boys' books " on one side and the rather 

 severe books in the family library on the other, I read 

 far less of really good literature than I ought to have 

 done. My reading was absolutely without a guide, hence 

 fitful and scrappy; parts of Rollings " Ancient History" 

 and Lander's "Travels in Africa" being mixed up with 

 "Robinson Crusoe" and "The Scottish Chiefs." Re- 

 flection on my experience has convinced me that some 

 kindly guidance in the reading of a fairly scholarly boy 

 is of the utmost importance, and never more so than now, 

 when books are so many and attractive. I should lay 

 much stress, also, on the hearing of good literature well 

 read, and the interspersing of such reading with some 

 remarks by the reader, pointing out the main beauties 

 of the pieces thus presented. 



About my tenth year occurred an event, apparently 

 trivial, but really very important in my mental devel- 

 opment during many years afterward. My father 

 brought home one day, as a gift to my mother, a hand- 

 some quarto called "The Gallery of British Artists." 

 It contained engravings from pictures by Turner, Stan- 

 field, Cattermole, and others, mainly representing scenes 

 from Shakspere, Scott, Burns, picturesque architecture, 

 and beautiful views in various parts of Europe. Of this 

 book I never tired. It aroused in me an intense desire 

 to know more of the subjects represented, and this desire 

 has led me since to visit and to study every cathedral, 

 church, and town hall of any historical or architectural 

 significance in Europe, outside the Spanish peninsula. 

 But, far more important, it gave an especial zest to nearly 

 all Scott's novels, and especially to the one which I have 

 always thought the most fascinating, "Quentin Dur- 

 ward. ' ' This novel led me later, not merely to visit Liege, 

 and Orleans, and Clery, and Tours, but to devour the 

 chronicles and histories of that period, to become deeply 



