"I can manage French, and do pretty well in history and geography, but I can't learn Latin," groaned Winnie. "I didn't mind so much when we only did sentences, but now we've begun Cæsar it's simply detestable. I'm an absolute goose at translation."
"So am I," echoed Avis, mournfully. "I don't think Latin was ever meant for girls. My brother did Cæsar two years ago, and he's in Virgil now, though he's a year younger than I am. It seems quite easy to him, but I never know which verb goes with which substantive, or whether a thing is a nominative or a genitive. I look out all the words in the dictionary, and learn their meanings, but I can't make the least sense of them until Miss Harper shows me how they fit into the sentences. Why isn't Latin arranged like English? Everything seems turned the wrong way."
"I don't know," said Winnie. "I should think it must have been difficult for a Roman baby to learn to talk. Miss Harper says it's good mental exercise for us, and we must try to use our brains."
"Mine will wear out," said Avis. "They never were very strong, to begin with. I always forget everything I have learnt the term before; I do indeed. I knew the whole of 'Lycidas' by heart last year, and I can't remember a line of it now. Miss Rowe says my head is like a sieve. You ought to like Cæsar, at any rate, Cissie, because it's all about soldiers."
"I don't care for Roman soldiers," said Cissie; "at least, not in Cæsar, though I rather like them in stories. I love the one in Puck of Pook's Hill, who had to set out for the great wall; he was a perfect dear. If Rudyard Kipling could have written that wretched De Bello Gallico it would have been so different, and so much nicer."
"I should think it would!" said Enid laughing. "Much too nice for us. They choose the driest books possible for schools. Patty, why don't you grumble too? It's quite aggravating to see you looking so complacent."
"I grumble over mathematics, at any rate," said Patty.
"But not over Latin?"
"No, I rather like it."
"How can you like it?"