DESPITE the sinister semi-predictions of the /ci-devant/ heir-at-law,
the youthful Chillingly passed with safety, and indeed with dignity,
through the infant stages of existence. He took his measles and
whooping-cough with philosophical equanimity. He gradually acquired
the use of speech, but he did not too lavishly exercise that special
attribute of humanity. During the earlier years of childhood he spoke
as little as if he had been prematurely trained in the school of
Pythagoras. But he evidently spoke the less in order to reflect the
more. He observed closely and pondered deeply over what he observed.
At the age of eight he began to converse more freely, and it was in
that year that he startled his mother with the question, "Mamma, are
you not sometimes overpowered by the sense of your own identity?"
Lady Chillingly,--I was about to say rushed, but Lady Chillingly never
rushed,--Lady Chillingly glided less sedately than her wont to Sir
Peter, and repeating her son's question, said, "The boy is growing
troublesome, too wise for any woman: he must go to school."
Sir Peter was of the same opinion. But where on earth did the child
get hold of so long a word as "identity," and how did so extraordinary
and puzzling a metaphysical question come into his head? Sir Peter
summoned Kenelm, and ascertained that the boy, having free access to
the library, had fastened upon Locke on the Human Understanding, and
was prepared to dispute with that philosopher upon the doctrine of
innate ideas. Quoth Kenelm, gravely, "A want is an idea; and if, as
soon as I was born, I felt the want of food and knew at once where to
turn for it, without being taught, surely I came into the world with
an 'innate idea.'"
Sir Peter, though he dabbled in metaphysics, was posed, and scratched
his head without getting out a proper answer as to the distinction
between ideas and instincts. "My child," he said at last, "you don't
know what you are talking about: go and take a good gallop on your
black pony; and I forbid you to read any books that are not given to
you by myself or your mamma. Stick to 'Puss in Boots.'"