On Wednesdays and Saturdays we were dismissed at noon, and these half-holidays were the brightest epochs of my existence.
Daily contact with boys who had not been brought up as gently as I worked an immediate, and, in some respects, a beneficial change in my character.

I had the nonsense taken out of me, as the saying is--some of the nonsense, at least.

I became more manly and self-reliant.

I discovered that the world was not created exclusively on my account.
In New Orleans I labored under the delusion that it was.

Having neither brother nor sister to give up to at home, and being, moreover, the largest pupil at school there, my will had seldom been opposed.