Page:A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Huebsch 1916).djvu/230

 at first. Take Mr Moonan. He was a long time before he got to the top. But he got there.—

—I may not have his talent—said Stephen quietly.

—You never know—said the dean brightly.—We never can say what is in us. I most certainly should not be despondent. Per aspera ad astra.—

He left the hearth quickly and went towards the landing to oversee the arrival of the first arts' class.

Leaning against the fireplace Stephen heard him greet briskly and impartially every student of the class and could almost see the frank smiles of the coarser students. A desolating pity began to fall like dew upon his easily embittered heart for this faithful serving-man of the knightly Loyola, for this half-brother of the clergy, more venal than they in speech, more steadfast of soul than they, one whom he would never call his ghostly father: and he thought how this man and his companions had earned the name of worldlings at the hands not of the unworldly only but of the worldly also for having pleaded, during all their history, at the bar of God's justice for the souls of the lax and the lukewarm and the prudent.

The entry of the professor was signalled by a few rounds of Kentish fire from the heavy boots of those students who sat on the highest tier of the gloomy theatre under the grey cobwebbed windows. The calling of the roll began and the responses to the names were given out in all tones until the name of Peter Byrne was reached.

—Here!—

A deep bass note in response came from the upper tier, followed by coughs of protest along the other benches.