Confessions of a Young Lady

Even yet, when I am in the mood, I read everything in the way of print that I can lay my hand on. In that respect, also, I fear that the girl was mother to the woman. I had recently come across an article in a magazine treating of infant phenomena; I am not quite sure if the plural ought to be written with an a or an s when using the word in that particular sense; but, any way, I will leave it. How I had lighted on the magazine I cannot remember. But I rather fancy that it must have been the property of one of the governesses, who had left it lying about, and that I borrowed it without going through the form of asking leave. I know that I took it to a corner of the orchard of which we had the freedom when there was no fruit upon the trees, and that I devoured that article. It was all about precocious children. Recording how Mozart had composed masses--whatever they were!--at the age of two, or less, and how some little girl had won fame as a dancer at the age of three, or perhaps a trifle more. But in particular it told of the Infant Roscius. The story of that Wonderful Boy--he was throughout alluded to as The Wonderful Boy--set my brain in a whirl. I do not think that I have read much--if anything--about William Henry West Betty since; but I do believe that I recollect nearly all that I read then. He took London by storm when he was twelve years old; my age! the tale of my own years nearly to a tick! As Selim in Barbarossa--when one thinks of it, it must have been a wonderful part in a truly wonderful play for that Wonderful Boy!--the whole world of wit, and wealth, and fashion was at his feet. In the course of a single season he gained over seventeen thousand pounds.