The hieroglyphics of childhood were an unknown language to them, for they had never been much with those younger than themselves.

I am inclined to think, too, that they had not the happy knack of imparting information, which seems to be a separate gift from the faculty of acquiring it; a kind of sympathetic tact, which instinctively perceives the difficulties that impede comprehension in a child's mind, and that yet are too vague and unformed for it, with its half-developed powers of expression, to explain by words.

Consequently, teaching very young children was anything but a "delightful task" to the three Bronte sisters.

With older girls, verging on womanhood, they might have done better, especially if these had any desire for improvement.

But the education which the village clergyman's daughters had received, did not as yet qualify them to undertake the charge of advanced pupils.