when Hugh got his foot so crushed it had to be amputated, though his mother came to him and gave him every proper attention, yet "Hugh saw no tears from her"; nothing more than that "her face was very pale and grave." His anticipations of her coming had not been warm; his one anxiety had been that he might bear his pain resolutely before her. "As Hugh cried, he said he bore it so very badly he did not know what his mother would say if she saw him." And it was well that he had not anticipated any outburst of pity or expression of sympathy from her, for, when she did come, "she kissed him with a long, long kiss; but she did not speak." Her first words in the hearing of her agonized child were spoken to give him an intimation that the surgeons were waiting to take off his foot. The boy's reply was—not to cling to her for support, and to nestle in her bosom for comfort in the most terrible moment of his young life, but—"Do not stay now; this pain is so bad! I can't bear it well at all. Do go, now, and bid them make haste, will you?"

Later, when the leg was better, the poor boy's mental misery once overpowered him, even in his mother's presence. Sitting with her and his sister—"… He said, 'He did not know how he should bear his misfortune. When he thought of the long, long days, and months, and years, to the end of his life, and that he should never run and play, and never be like other people, and never able to do the commonest things without labor and trouble, he wished he was dead. He would rather have died!' Agnes thought he must be miserable indeed if he would venture to say this to his mother." Such was the idea that these children had of maternal sympathy and love! So little did they look upon their mother as the one person above all others to whom their secret troubles should be opened!

It is proper to observe that the mother came out of this test well. There is no record that Mrs. Martineau was ever found wanting in due care for her children when the pent-up agony of their bodies or spirits became so violent as to burst the bonds of reserve that her general demeanor and method of management imposed upon them. Her children's misery (for Harriet was not the only one of the family whose childhood was wretched) came not from any intentional neglect, or even from any indifference on her part to their comfort and happiness, but solely, let it be repeated, from her arbitrary manner and her quickness of temper. It is worth repeating (if biography be of value for the lessons which may be drawn from it for the conduct of other lives) that the mother whose children were so spirit-tossed and desolate was, nevertheless, one who gave herself up to their interests, and labored incessantly and unselfishly for their welfare. It was not love that really was wanting; far less was it faithfulness in the performance of a mother's material duties to her children; all that was lacking was the free play of the emotions on the surface, the kisses, the loving phrases, the fond tones, which are assuredly neither weaknesses nor works of supererogation in family life. By means of candid expression alone can the emotions of one mind touch those of another; and from the lack of such contact between a child and its mother there must come, in so close a life relationship, misery to the younger and disappointment to the elder of the two.

"I really think," says Harriet, "if I had once conceived that anybody cared for me, nearly all the sins and sorrows of my anxious childhood would have been spared me." Yet, not only was she well fed, well clothed, well educated, and sent to amusements to give her pleasure (magic lanterns, parties and seaside trips are all mentioned); but besides all this, when she did burst forth, like Hugh Proctor in the book, with the expression of her suffering, she was soothed and cared for. But this last happened so rarely—of course entirely because it was made so difficult for her to express herself—that the occasions lived in her memory all her life.

The moral consequences of all this were naturally bad. Even with all motherly sympathy and encouragement, so sickly a child would have been likely to suffer from timidity, and to fall into occasional fits of despondency and irritability; but, with fear continually excited in her mind, and with an eternal storm of passionate opposition to arbitrary authority raging in her soul, it is no wonder that the poor child made for herself a character for willfulness and obstinacy, while internally she suffered dreadfully from her conscience. "In my childhood," she says, "I would assert or deny anything to my mother that would bring me through most easily.... This was so exclusively to one person that, though there was remonstrance and punishment, I was never regarded as a liar in the family." Her strength of will was very great; and when she had been placed in a false position by her dread of rebuke, the powerful will came into play to maintain a dogged, stubborn, indifferent appearance. Yet all the while her conscientiousness—the strong convictions as to what was right, and the ardent desire to do it, which marked her whole career—was at work within her, causing a mental shame and distress which might have been easily aided by gentle treatment to overcome the fear and the firmness which were acting together to make her miserable and a sinner.

It is altogether a sad story, but I have not told it at length without reason. The fact that other children are suffering similarly every day makes the record worth repeating. But, besides this, her vivid remembrance of her childish pangs tends to show how warm and strong were her natural affections. If Harriet Martineau's mind had not been sensitive and emotional, and if her love for those united to her by family ties had not been ardent, she would not have felt as she did in her childhood, and she would not have remembered, all through her life, how she had suffered in her early years from unsatisfied affection. Now, this soft, loving, emotional side of her character must be recognized before her life and her work can be properly appreciated.

The intellectual influences of her home life were not more happy than the moral ones. She was thought by her family anything but a clever child. Indeed, Dr. James Martineau (whose recollections are peculiarly valuable, both from his nearness to Harriet in age and from their great attachment in early life) still thinks that she really was a dull child. Her intelligence, he believes, awoke only in her later youth, coincidentally with some improvement in health. It is hard to guess what the impression of her childish intellectual powers might have been under different conditions. She suggestively remarks[1]: "It should never be forgotten that the happier a child is the cleverer he will be. This is not only because in a state of happiness the mind is free, and at liberty for the exercise of its faculties instead of spending its thoughts and energy in brooding over troubles, but also because the action of the brain is stronger when the frame is in a state of hilarity; the ideas are more clear, impressions of outward objects are more vivid, and the memory will not let them slip." Moreover, it is a fact worthy of note that the recognition by her family of her mental development followed upon her return home after she had been away for a time, and had been learning at a boarding-school under "the first person of whom she never felt afraid." Still, the fact remains that Harriet was the ugly duckling of her family, and supposed to be the most stupid of the group of Martineau children.

She was active-minded enough, however, to begin early that spontaneous self-education which only intellects of real power undertake, either in childhood or in later years.

Milton was her master. When she was seven years old she came by accident upon a copy of Paradise Lost lying open upon a table. Taking