But the worst and most unforgivable thing about Addison was this: he had no wish to be a soldier--and said so. The sound of a pop-gun caused his heart to thump against his breast in an unpleasantly violent manner, and a review was to him a prolonged agony that made him ill for days.
His mother--whom he worshipped--and who loved him tenderly, was quite unconscious of his many sufferings. She was absolutely devoid of nerves herself, and thought that Addison would grow out of his “delicacy,” as she called it. She was proud of his remarkable resemblance to her father, whom she admired above all mortal men--but she was disappointed; and poor Addison, with the quick intuition of childhood, was perfectly aware of it--at his being what her husband called “such a Molly.”
So it came about that Kit was always brought forward, and Addison kept in the background--to his own satisfaction certainly, but very much to the detriment of Kit.
Edinburgh, where the regiment was stationed, was too cold for mother, and dad obtained leave to take her to the Riviera for the worst months; so Kit and Addison were sent to Gaffer, and for Addison it was the turning-point of his life.
To most people, their initiation into the accidence of the Latin language is not a very happy recollection. To Addison it is a recollection little short of rapturous.
To him the first pages of a Latin grammar call up the picture of a large, old-fashioned room, flooded with a mellow light like that of the sun through a veil of yellowing beeches. There is a goodly smell in the room, the smell of dressed and well-kept leather. The walls are lined with books, books bound in calf and russet-colored Russia, and in the middle of the room stands a knee-hole table both deep and wide. It, too, is covered with books; but here they lie open, one upon the other, a crowd of witnesses to the tastes of the owner of the room. That gracious owner! Addison’s eyes grow dim as he thinks of the spare upright figure seated in the revolving chair; the keen scholarly face and noble white head. He hears again the kind, cultivated voice ever ready to answer questions, to answer them so fully and so beautifully, with such a tender sympathy for the eager childish questioner. And then Addison goes down on his mental knees and thanks his God that as yet he had brought no look of sorrow into those kind eyes, but many a look of pride and joy.