"I'm sure it doesn't, ma'am," said Gratian simply. "So often the things you tell me about or read to us, or that I hear about somehow when I am here, seem to come in just at the right minute, and to make my lessons easier. I have never found lessons so nice as this winter."
"I don't like lessons," said Fergus. "I never shall like them."
"You will have to look upon them as necessary evils then," said his mother.
"I usedn't to like them," said Gratian. "Now I often think I'd like to go on till I'm quite big."
"Well, so you can, can't you?" said Fergus.
"No," Gratian replied; "boys like me have to stop when they're big enough to help their fathers at home, and I've no big brother like Tony. I'll have to stop going to school before very long. I used to think I'd be very glad. Now I'd be sorry even if I was to be a shepherd."
"How do you mean?" asked the lady.
Gratian looked up at her with his soft brown eyes.
"I used to think being a shepherd and lying out on the heather all day—alone with the sheep and Watch, like old Jonas—would be the best life of any. But now I want to know things. I think one can fancy better when one knows more. And I'd like to do more than fancy."