Alas! the good man did not suspect that this same child, whose birth so much rejoiced him, would soon be a cause of sorrow. At the very first, the boy Peregrine showed a singular disposition. After he had cried night and day uninterruptedly for some weeks, without their being able to find out any bodily ailment, he became on the sudden quite quiet and as it were stupified into a motionless insensibility: he seemed incapable of the least impression. The little brow, which appeared to belong to a lifeless puppet, was wrinkled neither by tears nor laughter. His mother maintained that it was owing, on her part, to the sight of the old bookkeeper, who had for twenty years sat in the countinghouse before the great cashbook, with the same lifeless countenance, and she wept bitter tears over the little automaton.
At last an old gossip hit upon the lucky thought of bringing Peregrine a very motley, and, in fact, a very ugly harlequin. The child’s eyes quickened in a strange fashion, the mouth contracted to a gentle smile, he caught at the puppet, and the moment it was given to him, hugged it tenderly. Then again he gazed upon the mannequin with such intelligent and speaking eyes, that it seemed as if reason and sensation had suddenly awakened in him, and with much greater vigour than is usual with children of his age.
“He is too wise,” said the godmother; “you’ll not keep him. Only look at his eyes; he already thinks more than he ought to do.”
This declaration greatly comforted the old merchant, who had in some measure reconciled himself to the idea of having begot an idiot, after so many years of fruitless expectation. Soon, however, he fell into a fresh trouble, and this was that the time had long since gone by in which children usually begin to speak, and yet Peregrine had not uttered a syllable. The boy would have been thought dumb, but that he often gazed on the person who spoke to him with such attention—nay, even showed such sympathy by sad as well as by joyful looks that there could be no doubt not only of his hearing but of his understanding everything.
In the meantime his mother was mightily astonished at finding what the nurse had told her confirmed. At night, when the boy lay in bed and fancied himself unnoticed, he talked to himself single words, and even whole sentences, and so little broken that a long practice might be inferred from this perfection. Heaven has lent to women a certain tact of reading human nature as its growth variously develops itself, on which account—for the first years, at least of childhood—they are the best educators. According to this tact, Mrs. Tyss was far from letting the boy see he was observed, or from wishing to force him to speak; she rather contrived to bring it about by other dexterous means, that he should of himself no longer keep concealed the beautiful talent of speech, but should slowly, yet plainly, manifest it to the world, and to the wonder of all. Still, however, he evinced a constant aversion to talking, and was most pleased when they left him in quiet by himself.
Thus was Mr. Tyss freed from all anxiety on account of his want of tongue, but it was only to fall into a much greater care afterwards. When Peregrine had grown a boy and ought to have learned stoutly, it seemed as if nothing was to be driven into him without the greatest trouble. It was with his writing and reading as it had been with his talking: at first the matter could not be compassed at all, and then on a sudden he did it admirably, and beyond all expectation. In the meantime one master after another left the house, not from dislike to the boy, but because they could not enter into his disposition. Peregrine was still, mannerly, and industrious, and yet it was no use thinking of any systematic learning with him. He had understanding for that only which happened to chime in exactly with his genius; all the rest passed over him without leaving any impression. And that which suited his genius was the wonderful—all that excited his imagination; in that he lived and moved. So, for example, he once received a present of a sketch of Beijing, with all its streets, houses, etc. which occupied the entire wall of his chamber. At the sight of this city of fables, of the singular people that seemed to crowd through its streets, Peregrine felt as if transported by some magic sleight into another world, in which he was to become at home. With eagerness he now fell upon everything that he could get hold of respecting China, the Chinese, and Beijing, and having somewhere found the Chinese sounds described, he laboured to pronounce them according to the description, with a fine chanting voice; nay, he even endeavoured, by means of the paper-scissors, to give his handsome calimanco bed-gowns the Chinese cut as much as possible, that he might have the pleasure of walking the streets of Beijing in the fashion. Nothing else could excite his attention—to the great annoyance of his tutor, who just then wished to instill into him the history of the Hanseatic League, according to the express wish of Mr. Tyss, but the old gentleman found to his sorrow that Peregrine was not to be brought out of Beijing, wherefore he brought Beijing out of the
