242 THE STORY OF MY LIFE [1851 which I could draw. . . . When we came home \ ached with cold and my fire was out. Mrs. Bradley is certainly most good-natured; for happening to pass and see my plight, she insisted on going down herself to get sticks, lay* ing it, and lighting it again. When I was going to bed, too, the servant come up with a little bason of arrowroot, steaming hot, and some biscuits, which 'Missis thought would do my cold good.' " Bradley improves greatly on acquaintance, and is very kind to me, though I am sorry to say he finds me far more backward and stupid than he expected, especially in grammar. He has a wonderfully pleasant way of teaching, and instead of only telling us we are dunces and blockheads, like Mr. K., he helps us not to remain so. " He was exceedingly indignant yesterday at receiving a letter from Lord Portman to say that his son had complained of the dreadful damp of the house, that his shirts put out at night were always wet before morning. After expatiating for a long time upon the unkindness and impropriety of Portman's conduct in writing to complain instead of asking for a fire, he ended good-humouredly by insisting on his going out into a laurel bush in the garden with Forbes, to receive advice as to improved conduct for the future! All this every pupil in the house was called down to witness: indeed, if any one does wrong, it is Bradley's great delight to make him a looking-glass to the others. Sometimes he holds up their actual persons to be looked at. If they are awkward, he makes them help the others at meals, &c., and all his little penances are made as public as possible." " Feb. 14. The days go quickly by in a succession of lessons, one after the other. I am much happier already at Southgate than I ever was anywhere else, for Bradley's whole aim, the whole thought of his soul, is to teach us, and he makes his lessons as interesting as Arthur (Stanley)lv hidden by L«»n