Page:Adams - A Child of the Age.djvu/58

46 'Very,' I said. Mr. Cholmeley had started slowly on in the original direction. We came up to him in a few steps, one on each side.

'I can't make out,' I went on, 'what could have made me so forgetful.'

'In the over-wrought condition of our nerves nowadays,' said Mr. Cholmeley, 'the wonder is that we remember anything.'

And with that we went out of the station to a small pony-carriage and a small brown fat pony, waiting by the kerb. Rayne drew back. Mr. Cholmeley got in, and made a motion to sit down in the front seat. I ran round to the other side to stop him, and succeeded. In a moment Rayne had jumped in: taken the reins: touched up the pony, and we were off at a smart trot.

Mr. Cholmeley was leaning back with his eyes closed.

Then Rayne asked something about my journey. And I answered in sort: till Mr. Cholmeley came into the conversation, and it drifted to Glastonbury. He asked me a good many questions about the school: the system of teaching the classics in use, the subjects taught in each form, the amount taught, and other things, I answering as I best could.

All at once:

'I do not care for Latin,' said Rayne. 'It is dry.'

Mr. Cholmeley lay back again with his eyes closed, smiling serenely.

'Nor do I, Miss Cholmeley,' I said, 'I can't understand Latin properly. It seems all so lifeless to me, as if they had all sat down and written it to pass away the wet afternoons. But Greek!—Homer, or even Xenophon. You remember that bit in the seventh book, I think, where they see the sea'

Mr. Cholmeley murmured:

'.—A beautiful little touch, that .'

'What does it mean?' she asked.

I, looking at Mr. Cholmeley and perceiving his eyes still closed, answered rather diffidently:

'It means, passing the cry on to one another like the watchword, I think.'