"You don't mean us to conclude," said Badham at last, "that you have never so much as heard of all these well-known matters before?"
"Sir," replied Franks, as calmly as he could, though his tone betrayed some emotion, "my work is to train village lads for usefulness here and happiness hereafter; and I do not suppose that farm-lads will be the less suited for either the one or the other because they can't give the names of Italian factions or of the favorites of French kings."
Badham shrugged his shoulders, the baronet and the medical student shrugged theirs, to express their utter contempt for such a very ridiculous observation. The baronet was the first to break the silence which followed, which he did by addressing himself to Badham.
"What say you to our master here,—you who have all kinds of learning at the ends of your fingers,—is he fit to be a teacher of boys?"
"About as fit as to be a performer on a lady's grand piano," said the lawyer.
"While he remains here, the motto of the school had better be, 'Where ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be wise,'" observed the medical student.
"It was a shame for Mr. Curtis to recommend such a fellow to my father," said Sir Lacy. "You see how unfit he is for the place."
"Utterly unfit!" cried the lawyer.
"Disgracefully incompetent!" chimed in the student.