“Am I? I don’t feel ill.”
“Humph! you’re overdoing it. But aren’t you going to offer me some breakfast?”
George coloured, and his spirits sank as his eyes fell on the scanty fare of which he himself had been partaking.
“It’s only bread-and-butter,” he said.
“And what better?” said Dr Wilkins, sitting down; “and I warrant the butter’s good if it’s your mother’s making.”
“So it is,” said George, beginning to recover his spirits. “And how did you leave them at home, sir?”
“First-rate, my boy;—looking much better than you are. And so this is your den? Well, it’s—”
“Nothing very grand,” put in George.
“Exactly, nothing very grand; but I dare say you find it as good a place to read in as a drawing-room, eh? Now tell me all about yourself, my boy, while I drink this good tea of yours.”
And George, with light heart and beaming face, told his good friend of all his doings, his hardships, his difficulties, his triumphs, and his ambitions.