“So would I, sir,” I said, swallowing down something which seemed to rise in my throat as I gazed in his bright, intelligent face.
“Bah! It was a pitiful bit of triumph for the young idiot; but never mind, my lad: work at it and finish it like a man, and it will be a piece of self-denial that you may be proud of to the end of your days.”
We walked on for some distance in silence, he evidently thoroughly enjoying the beauty of the forest as we rambled on, knee-deep in ferns and heather, and I feeling that the old days were coming back, such as I used to love when wandering with my father through one of our woods, botanising or collecting bird and insect. Almost involuntarily as Mr Hallett took off his soft felt hat to let the breeze blow on his broad white forehead, I began, as of old, to pick a specimen here and there, till, after being in a musing fit for some time, he suddenly noticed what I was doing, and became interested.
“What have you got there?” he said, pointing to a plant I had just picked.
“Oh, that’s a twayblade,” I replied, “one of the orchis family.”
“Indeed,” he said, looking at me curiously, “and what is this?”
“Oh, a very common plant—dog’s mercury.”
“And this, Grace?” he continued, pointing to another, with its bulbous roots in the water.
“Water hemlock, sir.”
“Why, Antony Grace, you are quite a young botanist,” he said, smiling and showing his white teeth, while I gazed up at him wonderingly, he seemed so changed.