“Well, I would not say that, precisely,” Kerin would reply, good-temperedly looking up for the while from his book, “because geology has made great progress of late. And so, Messire Gander, I would not say quite that. Rather, I would say that Earth is a planet infested with the fauna best suited to survive in this particular stage of the planet’s existence. In any case, I finished long ago with earth, and with all ordinary terrestrial phenomena, such as earthquakes, and the formation of continents, and elevation of islands, and with stars and meteorics and with cosmography in general.”
“—And of all creatures man is the most miraculous—”
“The study of anthropology is of course important. So I have learned too about man, his birth and organization, his invention and practice of the arts, his polities at large, and about the sidereal influences which control the horoscope and actions of each person as an individual.”
“—A child of god, a brother to the beasts—!”
“Well, now, I question too the scientific value of zoömorphism: yet the facts about beasts, I admit, are interesting. For example, there are two kinds of camels; the age of the stag can be told by inspection of his horns; the period of gestation among sheep is one hundred and fifty days; and in the tail of the wolf is a small lock of hair which is a supreme love charm.”
“You catalogue, poor Kerin,” said the gander; “you collect your bits of knowledge as a magpie gathers shining pebbles; you toil through one book to another book as methodically as a worm gnaws out the same advance: but you learn nothing, in the wasted while that your youth goes.”
“To the contrary, I am at this very moment learning,” replied Kerin. “I am learning about the different kinds of stone and marble, including lime and sand and gypsum. I am learning that the artists who excelled in sculpture were Phidias, Scopas and Praxiteles. The last-named, I have just learned also, left a son called Cephisodotos, who inherited much of his father’s talent, and made a notably fine Group of Wrestlers.”
“You and your wrestlers,” said the gander, “are profoundly absurd! But time is the king of wrestlers; and he already prepares to try a fall with you.”
“Now, indeed, those Wrestlers were not absurd,” replied Kerin. “And the proof of it is that they were for a long while the particular glory of Pergamos.”
At that the gander seemed to give him up, saying, after a little hissing: “Very well, then, do you catalogue your facts about Pergamos and stag-horns and planets! But I shall sing.”