"As for granting a pension to a scholar—or a title, or anything of that sort—it is really never done. So that you would have to make your own living if you remained here."
"I thought that when the book was published people would buy it."
Angela shook her head.
"Oh, no! That is not the kind of book which is bought—very few people know anything about inscriptions. Those who do will go to the British Museum and read it there—one copy will do for all."
Daniel looked perplexed.
"You do not go back empty-handed," she said. "You will have a fine story to tell of how the great scholars laughed at your discovery, and how you got about and told people, and they subscribed, and your book was published, and how you sent it to all of them—to show the mistake they had made—and how the English people have got the book now, to confound the scholars; and how your mission is accomplished, and you are at home again—to live and die among your own people. It will be a glorious return, Mr. Fagg. I envy you the landing at Melbourne—your book under your arm. You will go back to your old township—you will give a lecture in the schoolroom on your stay in England, and your reception. And then you will take your old place again and follow your old calling, exactly the same as if you had never left it, but for the honor and reverence which people will pay you!"
Daniel cooed like a dove.
"It may be," the siren went on, "that people will pay pilgrimages to see you in your old age. They will come to see the man who discovered the Primitive Alphabet and the Universal Language. They will say: 'This in Daniel Fagg—the great Daniel Fagg, whose unaided intellect overset and brought to confusion all the scholars, and showed their learning was but vain pretence; who proved the truth of the Scriptures by his reading of tablets and inscriptions; and who returned when he had finished his task, with the modesty of a great mind, to his simple calling.'"
"I will go," said Daniel, banging the table with his fist; "I will go as soon as the book is ready."