Gulliver18780527_002

2.

classical environment is said always to do.
As I have said, Mr Johnson was a man of real
dignity. If any one wishes to realise this, til him attempt
to enter the school room door of the Brick Academy, in
opposition to a squeaking pulley & a ponderous weight,
& turn ^{ing the} sharp corner & climb into the contracted wooden
box at the right, and add _ing to his embarassments a
heavy cane & a lame foot and a mountain of wrap-
pings. But Mr Johnson did all this, and not one
of the fun loving boys who crowded the room saw
anything to laugh at. On the contrary no sooner
was that wooden foot heard in the entry than we
were all hushed. Every eye was fixed upon him
in respect as he entered. Levi Wilder at the upper
end of the room stopped tuning his violin. We
rose in silence, while 'Mr Johnson' pronounced
a brief invocation, uniformly asking that our
morning devotions might be performed "as seeing
Him who is invisible". Then followed a few verses
of scripture, so read that a hidden radiance
was made to flash out from its depths, as when
a skillful lapidary holds before you a gem, so
adjusted that all its inner light beams up upon your
suprised vision. Then came the hymn; and was there
ever such a reading of a hymn? With finer voice,
but with distant articulation, and melodious