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PARTISAN REVIEW
by deadening drudg.ery and forced striving, since he was like his
father, intense, passionate, ambitious, and without imagination.
Samuel admired his brother and took pride in the fact that
he was going to be a doctor as he took pride in his family as a whole,
whenever pride was possible. And Samuel also admired Leonard
because his mother loved Leonard so much. It was accepted in the
family as a natural fact that the mother should love Leonard most
of all. Perhaps the girls felt some resentment of this preference, but
their resentment never became strong while on the other hand there
had been a sharp obvious rivalry among the girls for the affection
of the father.
Leonard was loved very much not only by his mother but also
by his oldest sister Rebecca, for Rebecca in many ways, and espe–
cially in the depths where the emotions begin, followed her mother.
Consequently Samuel was the pet of his sister as well as of his mother.
The indulgence granted him was endless. One reason he did not like
to go to school was that it was very difficult for him to get up in the
morning, the result of his dislike of going to sleep or of coming
home from his evenings with the boys. His mother became angry
when he stayed out late, but hated to wake him up in the morning,
and she did not become angry when he would not get up because
as a mother she felt that sleep was very important to a boy's health.
Leonard's health was delicate and she wished that he too would
sleep late instead of getting up in the early morning to study just
as his father had arisen at five and waited impatiently for the time
when his store would be open for business.
Sarah was somewhat critical of her mother's attitude to Samuel
and she felt that a boy ought to have an education. But it was
thought by the family that Sarah was too critical of everyone. When
Sarah argued with her mother that she was spoiling Samuel by
"waiting on him hand and foot," the mother merely became angry.
She pointed out Leonard's habits as a justification of her belief that
it was a question of a boy's innate nature, the character he had at
the moment of birth.
"You are not a good mother," said Sarah, "it is not good to
pamper a boy like that. What will become of him?"
"I want my children to be happy, that's enough," said Ruth
Hart, angered by her daughter's criticism.
Sarah married Michael, a successful young man, when she was
nineteen and departed from the bosom of the family, much to her
brother Samuel's relief, for she was the only one who ·nagged him
