Splendid, moral institution! Sacred family! Divinely appointed, unassailable, where citizens are to be educated in truth and virtue! Thou art supposed to be the home of the virtues, where innocent children are tortured into their first falsehood, where wills are broken by tyranny, and self-respect killed by narrow egoism. Family! thou art the home of all social evil, a charitable institution for comfortable women, an anchorage for house-fathers, and a hell for children.

After this John lived in perpetual disquiet. He dared not confide in his mother, or Louise, still less his brothers, and least of all his father. Enemies everywhere! God he knew only through hymns. He was an atheist, as children are, but in the dark, like savages and animals, he feared evil spirits.

"Who drank the wine?" he asked himself; who was the guilty one for whom he suffered? New impressions and anxieties caused him to forget the question, but the unjust treatment remained in his memory. He had lost the confidence of his parents, the regard of his brothers and sisters, the favour of his aunt; his grandmother said nothing. Perhaps she inferred his innocence on other grounds, for she did not scold him, and was silent. She had nothing to say. He felt himself disgraced—punished for lying, which was so abominated in the household, and for theft, a word which could not be mentioned, deprived of household rights, suspected and despised by his brothers because he had been caught. All these consequences, which were painful and real for him, sprang out of something which never existed—his guilt.

*

It was not actual poverty which reigned in the house, but there was overcrowding. Baptisms, and burials followed each other in rapid succession. Sometimes there were two baptisms without a burial between them. The food was carefully distributed, and was not exactly nourishing. They had meat only on Sundays, but John grew sturdy and was tall for his age. He used now to be sent to play in the "court," a well-like, stone-paved area in which the sun never shone. The dust-bin which resembled an old bureau with a flap-cover and a coating of tar, but burst, stood on four legs by the wall. Here slop-pails were emptied and rubbish thrown, and through the cracks a black stream flowed over the court. Great rats lurked under the dust-bin and looked out now and then, scurrying off to hide themselves in the cellar. Woodsheds and closets lined one side of the court. Here there was dampness, darkness, and an evil smell. John's first attempt to scrape out the sand between the great paving-stones was frustrated by the irascible landlord's deputy. The latter had a son with whom John played, but never felt safe. The boy was inferior to him in physical strength and intelligence, but when disputes arose he used to appeal to his father. His superiority consisted in having an authority behind him.

The baron on the ground-floor had a staircase with iron banisters. John liked playing on it, but all attempts to climb on the balustrade were hindered by the servant who rushed out.