Friday, February the 5th, 2010
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As we know, tiny John Ruskin was allowed to jump off his favourite box on Sunday afternoons. Things were not nearly so idyllic for Augustus Hare:
“I remember that one day when we went to visit the curate, a lady very innocently gave me a lollypop, which I ate. This crime was discovered when I came home by the smell of peppermint, and a large dose of rhubarb and soda was at once administered with a forcing-spoon, though I was in robust health at that time, to teach me to avoid such carnal indulgences as lollypops for the future. For two years, also, I was obliged to swallow a dose of rhubarb every morning and every evening because—according to old-fashioned ideas—it was supposed to ‘strengthen the stomach’! I am sure it did me a great deal of harm, and had much to do with accounting for my after sickliness.”
From The Years With Mother : Being an abridgement of the first three volumes of The Story Of My Life by Augustus J C Hare (1952)