"Indeed I did. I overcame the difficulties of the Greek and Latin tongues with amazing rapidity—at least so my dear master said; and he counted me his most successful pupil."
"And then?" said Paul.
"Then it happened that a young lady came to pay a lengthy visit to friends in our neighbourhood. She was well born, and possessed considerable personal charm; but her ignorance was something appalling. I recall that she once asked, before a room full of people, whether Homer wrote Greek or Latin, and if Cæsar were a poet." And Miss Dallicot fairly shuddered.
Paul could not forbear smiling, Miss Drusilla was so intensely shocked at the mere memory of these atrocities.
"Yet in spite of all this," continued Miss Dallicot, "my friend married her. Why he did so was always incomprehensible to me, as they two could not have had a single idea or interest in common. Yet he did it. I shall never forget a visit I once paid to them not long after their marriage. She endeavoured to make use of a Latin quotation, and actually—yes, actually, my dear Paul—she made a false quantity; and she the wife of a headmaster!"
"Good gracious!" said Paul; "what ever did the bridegroom do?"
"It was then that he showed the marvellous nobility and patience which always struck me so much in my contemplation of his character. I realized what he must have suffered, as a false quantity was always torture to his cultivated and sensitive ear; if one of his boys were guilty of such a thing, he straightway chastised the offender; when I made a false quantity, he blamed me severely, and said that his nerves could not stand it."
"Then what did he do to his bride?"
"My dear, his amiability was something marvellous. I was so grieved for him—so ashamed—that I could scarcely look up; but he rose to the occasion. He said not one single word of reproof—though I knew that many were burning upon his tongue—but he just laughed, and went up to his wife and kissed her. Did you ever hear of an instance of more heroic self-restraint?"
Paul thought that he had, but he did not say so. He sympathized with Miss Drusilla; but he also sympathized with the headmaster.