“He didn’t take it, but he advised me to give it up.”
“And you were fool enough to give in to him?”
“Well, he made out it wasn’t honourable to use cribs,” said Telson.
“Grandmother!” snarled Parson. “Why, Telson, I didn’t think you’d have been such a soft!”
“No more did I, but somehow—oh! I’m awfully sorry, old man; I’ll try and get it back.”
“Doesn’t much matter,” said Parson, resignedly. “I’m in for it hot to-day.”
“I’ll prompt you all I can,” said the repentant Telson.
“Thanks; I’d do the same to you if I could,” replied Parson.
“It is a long lane that has no turning,” as the proverb says, and Parson, after all, was destined to enjoy one brief glimpse of the smiles of fortune that day. The first boy put up to translate stumbled over a somewhat intricate point of syntax. Now Mr Warton, the master—as the manner of many masters is—was writing a little book on Latin Syntax, and this particular passage happened to be a superb example of a certain style of construction which till this moment had escaped his notice. Delighted with the discovery, he launched out into a short lecture on the subject generally, citing all the examples he had already got in his book, and comparing them with other forms of construction to be found scattered through the entire range of Latin classical literature.
How Parson and Telson enjoyed that lecture! They listened to it with rapt attention with hearts full of gratitude and faces full of sympathy. They did not understand a word of it, but a chapter out of “Midshipman Easy” could not have delighted them more; and when they saw that the clock had slowly worked round from nine to ten they would not have interrupted it for the world.