CHAPTER I.
RETROSPECT OF MY CAREER.
_Days and scenes of childhood--Parental care--Power of early impressions--School experience--Commencements in business--Sunday school teaching and its results--Experiment on a large scale--Development of means and invention of implements--Heavy bereavement--Propagation of the system of education in the neighbourhood of London, and ultimately in most of the principal places in England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland--Misapprehension and perversion of the principles of infant education--Signs of advancement--Hope for the future_.