“Louder!” cried the master; “louder!”
The “new fellow” then took a supreme resolution, opened an inordinately large mouth, and shouted at the top of his voice as if calling someone in the word “Charbovari.”
A hubbub broke out, rose in crescendo with bursts of shrill voices (they yelled, barked, stamped, repeated “Charbovari! Charbovari”), then died away into single notes, growing quieter only with great difficulty, and now and again suddenly recommencing along the line of a form whence rose here and there, like a damp cracker going off, a stifled laugh.
However, amid a rain of impositions, order was gradually re-established in the class; and the master having succeeded in catching the name of “Charles Bovary,” having had it dictated to him, spelt out, and re-read, at once ordered the poor devil to go and sit down on the punishment form at the foot of the master’s desk. He got up, but before going hesitated.
“What are you looking for?” asked the master.
“My c-a-p,” timidly said the “new fellow,” casting troubled looks round him.
“Five hundred lines for all the class!” shouted in a furious voice stopped, like the Quos ego[[1]], a fresh outburst. “Silence!” continued the master indignantly, wiping his brow with his handkerchief, which he had just taken from his cap. “As to you, ‘new boy,’ you will conjugate ‘ridiculus sum’[[2]] twenty times.”
[1] A quotation from the Aeneid signifying a threat.
[2] I am ridiculous.
Then, in a gentler tone, “Come, you’ll find your cap again; it hasn’t been stolen.”