No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be an
heroine. Her situation in life, the character of her father and mother, her own person and disposition,
were all equally against her. Her father was a clergyman, without being neglected, or poor, and a very
respectable man, though his name was Richard - and he had never been handsome. He had a considerable
independence besides two good livings - and he was not in the least addicted to locking up his daughters.
Her mother was a woman of useful plain sense, with a good temper, and, what is more remarkable, with
a good constitution. She had three sons before Catherine was born; and instead of dying in bringing
the latter into the world, as anybody might expect, she still lived on - lived to have six children more -
to see them growing up around her, and to enjoy excellent health herself. A family of ten children will
be always called a fine family, where there are heads and arms and legs enough for the number; but the
Morlands had little other right to the word, for they were in general very plain, and Catherine, for many
years of her life, as plain as any. She had a thin awkward figure, a sallow skin without colour, dark lank
hair, and strong features - so much for her person; and not less unpropiteous for heroism seemed her
mind. She was fond of all boy's plays, and greatly preferred cricket not merely to dolls, but to the more
heroic enjoyments of infancy, nursing a dormouse, feeding a canary-bird, or watering a rose-bush. Indeed
she had no taste for a garden; and if she gathered flowers at all, it was chiefly for the pleasure of mischief -
at least so it was conjectured from her always preferring those which she was forbidden to take. Such
were her propensities - her abilities were quite as extraordinary. She never could learn or understand
anything before she was taught; and sometimes not even then, for she was often inattentive, and occasionally
stupid. Her mother was three months in teaching her only to repeat the "Beggar's Petition"; and after
all, her next sister, Sally, could say it better than she did. Not that Catherine was always stupid - by
no means; she learnt the fable of "The Hare and Many Friends" as quickly as any girl in England. Her
mother wished her to learn music; and Catherine was sure she should like it, for she was very fond of
tinkling the keys of the old forlorn spinner; so, at eight years old she began. She learnt a year, and could
not bear it; and Mrs. Morland, who did not insist on her daughters being accomplished in spite of incapacity
or distaste, allowed her to leave off. The day which dismissed the music-master was one of the happiest
of Catherine's life. Her taste for drawing was not superior; though whenever she could obtain the outside
of a letter from her mother or seize upon any other odd piece of paper, she did what she could in that
way, by drawing houses and trees, hens and chickens, all very much like one another. Writing and accounts
she was taught by her father; French by her mother: her proficiency in either was not remarkable, and
she shirked her lessons in both whenever she could. What a strange, unaccountable character! - for
with all these symptoms of profligacy at ten years old, she had neither a bad heart nor a bad temper,
was seldom stubborn, scarcely ever quarrelsome, and very kind to the little ones, with few interruptions
of tyranny; she was moreover noisy and wild, hated confinement and cleanliness, and loved nothing so
well in the world as rolling down the green slope at the back of the house.
Such was Catherine Morland at ten. At fifteen, appearances were mending; she began to curl her hair
and long for balls; her complexion improved, her features were softened by plumpness and colour, her
eyes gained more animation, and her figure more consequence. Her love of dirt gave way to an inclination
for finery, and she grew clean as she grew smart; she had now the pleasure of sometimes hearing her
father and mother remark on her personal improvement. "Catherine grows quite a good-looking girl -
she is almost pretty today," were words which caught her ears now and then; and how welcome were the
sounds! To look almost pretty is an acquisition of higher delight to a girl who has been looking plain the
first fifteen years of her life than a beauty from her cradle can ever receive.
Mrs. Morland was a very good woman, and wished to see her children everything they ought to be; but
her time was so much occupied in lying-in and teaching the little ones, that her elder daughters were
inevitably left to shift for themselves; and it was not very wonderful that Catherine, who had by nature
nothing heroic about her, should prefer cricket, baseball, riding on horseback, and running about the
country at the age of fourteen, to books - or at least books of information - for, provided that nothing like
useful knowledge could be gained from them, provided they were all story and no reflection, she had
never any objection to books at all. But from fifteen to seventeen she was in training for a heroine; she
read all such works as heroines must read to supply their memories with those quotations which are so
serviceable and so soothing in the vicissitudes of their eventful lives.