“Instructive, my lad!” he cried with energy. “I don’t know any business that is more full of teaching. I’ve been at it all my life, and the older I grow the more I find there is to learn.”
“I like that,” I said, for it opened out a vista of adventure to me that seemed full of bright flowers and sunshine.
“A man who has brains may go on learning and making discoveries, not discoveries of countries and wonders, but of little things that may make matters better for the people who are to come after him. Then he may turn a bit of the England where he works into a tropical country, by covering it over with glass, and having a stove; then some day, if he goes on trying, he may find himself able to write FRHS at the end of his name.”
“And did you, sir?”
“No,” he said, “I never did. I was content with plodding. I’m a regular plodder, you see; so’s Samuel.”
“Is he, sir?” I said, for he evidently wanted me to speak.
“Yes, a regular plodder. Well, there, my boy, we’ll see. Don’t you be in a hurry; wait and see if your relatives are going to do anything better for you. If they are not, don’t you be in a hurry.”
But I was in a hurry, for the idea of coming to that garden, living there, and learning all about the flowers and fruit, excited me, longing as I was for some change.
“Yes, yes,” he said, “wait, wait;” and he looked at me, and then about him in the slow meditative manner peculiar to gardeners; “we’ll see, we’ll see, wait till you know whether your people are going to do anything for you.”
“But, indeed, sir,” I began.