“Truly,” said his father, with a glance of grave tenderness; “destiny declared it so in the hour that you were born. And I doubt not you will be called to great endeavours.”
“Oh yes, my father,” said the boy, with strange simplicity. “I am to walk the path of heroes.”
The white-haired man averted his glance.
“It is for that reason I must be well found in knowledge, my father,” said the boy.
“True, beloved one,” said the man through pale lips.
“And the meaning of every thing, my father,” said the boy; “bird, beast and reptile, and the moon and stars, and why the street-persons walk the streets of the great city; and why the earth is so many-coloured; and why the sky is so near and yet so far off; and why when you clutch the air there is nothing in your hand. Must not such as I know all this, my father?”
“True.”
“And why a man has two legs, and a horse four, and a crocodile I know not how many, and why a serpent crawls upon its belly.”
“True, true,” said his father. “But I fear, beloved one, that all this knowledge is not to be acquired in this little room of ours. If you wish to learn the meaning of all things, will you not have to go to school?”
A shiver passed through the boy’s frame. His face had the pallor of great fear.