"Nothing in particular."
"Then come round and take a look at my den, or sanctum I ought to call it; as I am talking to a member of the editorial profession."
"Not quite yet," said Harry, smiling.
"Oh, well that'll come in due time. Will you come?"
"Sha'n't I be disturbing you?"
"Not a bit. My Greek lesson is about finished, and that's all I've got to do this evening. Come round, and we will sit over the fire, and chat like old friends."
"Thank you, Oscar," said Harry, irresistibly attracted by his bright and lively acquaintance, "I shall enjoy calling. I have made no acquaintances yet, and I feel lonely."
"I have got over that," said Oscar. "I am used to being away from home and don't mind it."
The two boys walked together to Oscar's boarding-place. It was a large house, of considerable pretension for a village, and Oscar's room was large and handsomely furnished. But what attracted Harry's attention was not the furniture, but a collection of over a hundred books, ranged on shelves at one end of the room. In his father's house it had always been so difficult to obtain the necessaries of life that books had necessarily been regarded as superfluities, and beyond a dozen volumes which Harry had read and re-read, he was compelled to depend on such as he could borrow. Here again his privileges were scanty, for most of the neighbors were as poorly supplied as his father.
"What a fine library you have, Oscar!" he exclaimed.