“Yes, but we are losing the shining hours. The busiest bee could not improve them here.”
“No, indeed!”
“Oh, one word more, and then let us pitch the horrid thing overboard. I was so puzzled once—I still am—about this passage in my Aurelius.”
“Real or fictitious, Pardy? You are not always above following Aunt Anne’s wicked ways!”
“Oh, real. He says, ‘There is no dishonor in pain.’ I have remarked in my commentary that this passage is not clear.”
“But is it not, papa? He must mean that dishonor is the worst anguish, and that pain is only an evil to the body, and that an ache of the soul is worst of all, and therefore—”
“Only an ill to our grossest part, if we so determine to limit its effects. Is that it, my dear?”
“I suppose so,” said Rose, with some hesitation. “Yes, that is it.”
“But now you shall argue with a fish. You will be awkward at first. Here is a lighter rod; we call it a grilse-rod. Tom shall coach you, and I will grin at your failures!”
“I hate failure!”