With me it was the growing time, that idle summer by the sea, and I grew all the faster because I had been so cramped before.

My mind, too, had so recently been worked upon by the impressive experience of a change of country that I was more than commonly alive to impressions, which are the seeds of ideas.
Let no one suppose that I spent my time entirely, or even chiefly, in inspired solitude.

By far the best part of my day was spent in play--frank, hearty, boisterous play, such as comes natural to American children.

In Polotzk I had already begun to be considered too old for play, excepting set games or organized frolics.

Here I found myself included with children who still played, and I willingly returned to childhood.