t know i promised of course and we kissed one another over and over again and i soon fell fast asleep it seems to me at this distance of time as if it were the next day when the striking and adventurous proposition i am about to mention but it was probably about two months afterwards we were sitting as before one evening when my mother was out as before in company with the and the yard measure and the bit of wax and the box with saint paul s on the lid and the book when after looking at me several times and opening her mouth as if she were going to speak without doing it � which i thought was merely gaping or i should have been rather alarmed � said master how should you like to go along with me and spend a fortnight at my brother s at wouldn t that be a treat is your brother an agreeable man i oh what an agreeable man he is cried holding up her hands then there s the sea and the boats and ships and the and the beach and am to play with � meant her nephew ham mentioned in my first chapter she spoke of him as a morsel of english grammar i was flushed by her summary of delights and replied that it would indeed be a treat but what would my mother say why then i ll as good as bet a guinea said intent upon my face that she let us go i ask her if you like as soon as ever she comes home there now but what s she to do while we re away said i putting my small elbows on the table to argue the point she can t live by herself if were looking for a hole all of a sudden in the heel of that it must have been a very little one indeed and not worth c the personal history and experience i say she can t live by herself you know oh bless you said looking at me again at last don t you know she s going to stay for a fortnight with mrs mrs s going to have a lot of company oh if that was it i was quite ready to go i waited in the utmost impatience until my mother came home from mrs s for it was that identical neighbour to ascertain if we could get leave to carry out this great idea without being nearly so much surprised as i had expected my mother entered into it readily and it was all arranged that night and my board and lodging during the visit were to be paid for the day soon came for our going it was such an early day that it came soon even to me who was in a fever of expectation and half afraid that an earthquake or a fiery mountain or some other great of nature might to stop the expedition we were to go in a s cart which departed in the morning after breakfast i would have given any money to have been allowed to wrap myself up over night and sleep in my hat and boots it touches me nearly now although i tell it lightly to recollect how eager i was to leave my happy home to think how little i suspected what i did leave for ever i am glad to recollect that when the s cart was at the gate and my mother stood there kissing me a grateful fondness for her and for the old place i had never turned my back upon before made me cry i am glad to know that my mother cried too and that i felt her heart beat against mine i am glad to recollect that when the began to move my mother ran out at the gate and called to him to stop that she might kiss me once more i am glad to dwell upon the earnestness and love with which she lifted up her face to mine and did so as we left her standing in the road mr came up to where she was and seemed to with her for being so moved i was looking back round the of the cart and wondered what business it was of his who was also looking back on the other side seemed anything but satisfied as the face she brought back into the cart i sat looking at for some time in a reverie on this case whether if she were employed to lose me like the boy in the fairy tale i should be able to track my way home again by the buttons she would shed of david iii i have a change the s horse was the horse in the world i should hope and along with his head down as if he liked to keep the people waiting to whom the were directed i fancied indeed that he sometimes chuckled audibly over this reflection but the said he was only troubled with a cough the had a way of keeping his head down like his horse and of drooping forward as he drove with one of his arms on each of his knees i say drove but it struck me that the cart would have gone to quite as well without him for the horse did all that and as to conversation he had no idea of it but whistling had a basket of on her knee which would have lasted us out handsomely if we had been going to london by the same conveyance we ate a good deal and slept a good deal always went to sleep with her chin upon the handle of the basket her hold of which never relaxed and i could not have believed unless i had heard her do it that one woman could have so much 