Page:Carroll - Notes by an Oxford Chiel.djvu/117

Rh one. Aye, and even an English book, worth naught in this its native dress, shall become, when rendered into German, a valuable contribution to Science.

Sir, you much amaze me.

Nay, Sir, I'll amaze you yet more. No learned man doth now talk, or even so much as cough, save only in German. The time has been, I doubt not, when an honest English 'Hem!' was held enough, both to clear the voice and rouse the attention of the company, but now-a-days no man of Science, that setteth any store by his good name, will cough otherwise than thus, ! ! !

'Tis wondrous. But, not to stay you further, wherefore do we see that ghastly gash above us, hacked, as though by some wanton school-boy, in the parapet adjoining the Hall?

Sir, do you know German?

Believe me. No.

Then, Sir, I need but ask you this,

I doubt not. Sir, but you are in the right on't.

But, Sir, I will by your favour ask you one other thing, as to that unseemly box that