I met him on his return in the late afternoon, and hung over him when he laid out his books for his lessons.

Sometimes he had long Russian pieces to commit to memory.

He would walk up and down repeating the lines out loud, and I learned as fast as he.

He would let me hold the book while he recited, and a proud girl was I if I could correct him.
My interest in his lessons amused him; he did not take me seriously.
He looked much like his father, and twinkled his eyes at me in the same way and made fun of me, too.

But sometimes he condescended to set me a lesson in spelling or arithmetic,--in reading I was as good as he,--and if I did well, he praised me and went and told the family about it; but lest I grow too proud of my achievements, he would sit down and do mysterious sums--I now believe it was algebra--to which I had no clue whatever, and which duly impressed me with a sense of my ignorance.
There were other books in the house than school-books.