"My first French lesson-book. No, it is not stupid. Read on. It has hints of the prettiest fairy tale I know, and of the fairy in especial who bewitched my fancies as a boy."
By this time they had gained the gate of the burial-ground.
"What fairy tale? what fairy?" asked Lily, speaking quickly.
"She was a fairy, though in heathen language she is called a nymph,—Egeria. She was the link between men and gods to him she loved; she belongs to the race of gods. True, she, too, may vanish, but she can never die."
"Well, Miss Lily," said the vicar, "and how far in the book I lent you,—'Numa Pompilius.'"
"Ask me this day next week."
"I will; but mind you are to translate as you go on. I must see the translation."
"Very well. I will do my best," answered Lily meekly. Lily now walked by the vicar's side, and Kenelm by Mrs. Cameron's, till they reached Grasmere.
"I will go on with you to the bridge, Mr. Chillingly," said the vicar, when the ladies had disappeared within their garden. "We had little time to look over my books, and, by the by, I hope you at least took the Juvenal."
"No, Mr. Emlyn; who can quit your house with an inclination for satire? I must come some morning and select a volume from those works which give pleasant views of life and bequeath favourable impressions of mankind. Your wife, with whom I have had an interesting conversation, upon the principles of aesthetical philosophy—"