A Flat Iron for a Farthing; or, Some Passages in the Life of an only Son

When one has reached a certain age time seems to go very fast. Then, also, one begins to understand the meaning of such terms as "the uncertainty of life," "changes," "loss of f...

The next time I saw Sir Lionel was about two days afterwards, in the afternoon, when the elder girls had gone for a drive in the carriage with Aunt Maria, and the others, with m...

Aunt Maria was my father's sister. She was married to a wealthy gentleman, and had a large family of children. It was from her that we originally got Nurse Bundle; and anecdotes...

I was soon to discover the whole of my father's plans with Mr. Andrewes for my benefit. Not only had they decided that I was to have a pony, and learn to ride, but it was also s...

The tutor himself, who had been "on the foundation" at Eton, had helped to fill me with anticipations of public-school life. It was decided that I also should go to Eton, but as...

A phase of my life, into which I do not propose to enter, left me firmly resolved that (as I said in confidence to Clerke) "I shall marry to please the governor. One doesn't go...

I must not forget to speak of an incident which had a considerable influence on my character at this time. The church which my uncle and his family "attended," as it was called,...

One fine morning, when my father was busy with the farm-bailiff, and Mrs. Bundle was "sorting" some clothes, I took my best hat from the wardrobe, deliberately, and with some di...

My first letter to my father was the work of several days, and as my penmanship was not of a rapid order, it cost me a good deal of trouble. When it was finished it ran thus:

Naturally enough, I did my best to give Nurse Bundle a faithful account of my attempt to realize her idea of "dropping in," with all that came of it. My garden projects, the arr...

My feelings may therefore be "better imagined than described" when, at about ten o'clock the following morning, my father called me downstairs, and said, with an odd expression...

The expedition was very successful, and we all returned in safety to Dacrefield; rather, I think, to the astonishment of some of the good-wives of the village, who looked upon a...

By the time that my father came to fetch us away, I was wonderfully improved in health and strength. I even wanted to go back outside the coach; but this was not allowed.

So two years passed away. Nurse Bundle was still with me. With her I "did lessons" after a fashion. I learned to read, I had many of the Psalms and a good deal of poetry--sacred...

I sat up for a short time with my father on my return. When I went to bed, to my amazement Sweep was absent, and I could not find him anywhere. I did not like to return to the R...

On the day when I first left my sick room, and was moved to a sofa in what had been my poor mother's boudoir, my father put fifty pounds into Nurse Bundle's hand, and sent anoth...

Polly came into the house, as she always did, like a sunbeam. Mrs. Bundle, who was getting old, and apt to be depressed in spirits from time to time, always revived when "Miss M...

Mr. Clerke was a small, slight, fair man. He was short-sighted, which caused him to carry a round piece of glass about the size of a penny in his waistcoat pocket, and from time...

I went joyfully to school the first time, but each succeeding half with less and less willingness. And yet my school-days were very happy ones, especially to look back upon.

I had closely copied this form of speech from the apprentice, whose ways, as I have said, I endeavoured in every way to imitate. Thus, twopence being at that time the extent of...

Oakford was not a large town. It only boasted of one street, "to be called a street," as Mr. Buckle phrased it, though two or three lanes, with more or less pretentious rows of...

The stone that marks the burying-place of the Andrewes family taught me the secret of the special love the Rector bore me. It recorded the deaths of his wife Margaret, and of hi...

My widowed father and I were both terribly lonely. The depths of his loss in the lovely and lovable wife who had been his constant companion for nearly six years I could not fat...

I had been quite prepared to find Polly a willing convert to my charitable schemes, but I had not expected to find in Cousin Helen so strong an ally as she proved. But our ideas...

When the children clamour for a story, my wife says to me, "Tell them how you bought a flat iron for a farthing." Which I very gladly do; for three reasons. In the first place,...

I can appreciate now what my father and Nurse Bundle must have suffered during my dangerous illness. It was not a common tie that bound my father's affections to my life. Not on...

It was perhaps partly because, like most only children, I was accustomed to be with grown-up people, that I liked the way in which Mr. Andrewes treated me, and resented the very...

If Nurse Bundle hoped that when I went to school an end would be put to the "collections" which troubled her tidy mind, she was much deceived. Neither Leo nor I were bookworms,...

It was true. My theories and my disappointment went to the winds. We had few common acquaintances or social interests to talk about, and yet the time we spent together never see...

I could not make out how matters stood between Leo and Polly. When Damer came, Polly was three times as _brusque_ with him as with any of us; he himself seemed dreamy, and just...

I think it was Mr. Clerke who first suggested that we should take the Sunday scholars and teachers for a holiday trip. Such things are matters of course now in every parish, but...

The day my wife and I returned from our wedding trip to Dacrefield was a very happy one. We had a triumphal welcome from the tenants, my dear father was beaming, the Rector no l...

"Well, Regie," he answered, "I think you have made out a good case. But the question which now remains is, whether Mrs. Bundle will have your young friends in the nursery."