Page:Tom Brown's School Days (6th ed).djvu/353

 "Yes, I remember it very well."

"Well, the Doctor, after he'd flogged me, told me himself that he didn't flog me for using a translation, but for taking it into lesson, and using it there when I hadn't learned a word before I came in. He said there was no harm in using a translation to get a clew to hard passages if you tried all you could first to make them out without."

"Did he, though?" said Tom; "then Arthur must be wrong."

"Of course he is," said Gower, "the little prig. We'll only use the crib when we can't construe without it. Go ahead. East."

And on this agreement they started; Tom satisfied with having made his confession, and not sorry to have a locus pœnitentæ, and not to be deprived altogether of the use of his old and faithful friend.

The boys went on as usual, each taking a sentence in turn, and the crib being handed to the one whose turn it was to construe. Of course, Tom couldn't object to this, as, was it not simply lying there to be appealed to in case the sentence should prove too hard altogether for the construer? But it must be owned that Gower and East did not make very tremendous exertions to conquer their sentences before having recourse to its help. Tom, however, with the most heroic virtue and gallantry, rushed into his sentence, searching in a high-minded manner for nominative and verb, and turning over his dictionary frantically for the first hard word that stopped him. But in the mean time Gower, who was bent on getting to fives, would peep quietly into the crib, and then suggest, "Don't you think this is the meaning?" "I think you must take it this way, Brown"; and as Tom didn't see his way to not profiting by these suggestions, the lesson went on about as quickly as usual, and Gower was able to start for the fives'-court within five minutes of the half-hour.

When Tom and East were left face to face, they looked at each other for a minute, Tom puzzled, and East chock-full of fun, and then burst into a roar of laughter.