Dr. Bluett"s jaw dropped, and his eyes a.s.sumed a hollow aspect. "You will corrupt their minds, sir," he said,--"you will corrupt their minds." Then he added, in a sepulchral tone, which came from the very depths of his inside: "You will introduce them, sir, to some subtle Jesuit--to some subtle Jesuit, Mr. Reding."
CHAPTER XI.
Mrs. Reding was by this time settled in the neighbourhood of old friends in Devonshire; and there Charles spent the winter and early spring with her and his three sisters, the eldest of whom was two years older than himself.
"Come, shut your dull books, Charles," said Caroline, the youngest, a girl of fourteen; "make way for the tea; I am sure you have read enough.
You sometimes don"t speak a word for an hour together; at least, you might tell us what you are reading about."
"My dear Carry, you would not be much the wiser if I did," answered Charles; "it is Greek history."
"Oh," said Caroline, "I know more than you think; I have read Goldsmith, and good part of Rollin, besides Pope"s Homer."
"Capital!" said Charles; "well, I am reading about Pelopidas--who was he?"
"Pelopidas!" answered Caroline, "I ought to know. Oh, I recollect, he had an ivory shoulder."
"Well said, Carry; but I have not yet a distinct idea of him either. Was he a statue, or flesh and blood, with this shoulder of his?"
"Oh, he was alive; somebody ate him, I think."
"Well, was he a G.o.d or a man?" said Charles.
"Oh, it"s a mistake of mine," said Caroline; "he was a G.o.ddess, the ivory-footed--no, that was Thetis."
"My dear Caroline," said her mother, "do not talk so at random; think before you speak; you know better than this."
"She has, ma"am," said Charles, "what Mr. Jennings would call "a very inaccurate mind.""
"I recollect perfectly now," said Caroline, "he was a friend of Epaminondas."
"When did he live?" asked Charles. Caroline was silent.
"Oh, Carry," said Eliza, "don"t you recollect the _memoria technica_?"
"I never could learn it," said Caroline; "I hate it."
"Nor can I," said Mary; "give me good native numbers; they are sweet and kindly, like flowers in a bed; but I don"t like your artificial flower-pots."
"But surely," said Charles, "a _memoria technica_ makes you recollect a great many dates which you otherwise could not?"
"The crabbed names are more difficult even to p.r.o.nounce than the numbers to learn," said Caroline.
"That"s because you have very few dates to get up," said Charles; "but common writing is a _memoria technica_."
"That"s beyond Caroline," said Mary.
"What are words but artificial signs for ideas?" said Charles; "they are more musical, but as arbitrary. There is no more reason why the sound "hat" should mean the particular thing so called, which we put on our heads, than why "abul-distof" should stand for 1520."
"Oh, my dear child," said Mrs. Reding, "how you run on! Don"t be paradoxical."
"My dear mother," said Charles, coming round to the fire, "I don"t want to be paradoxical; it"s only a generalization."
"Keep it, then, for the schools, my dear; I dare say it will do you good there," continued Mrs. Reding, while she continued her hemming; "poor Caroline will be as much put to it in logic as in history."
"I am in a dilemma," said Charles, as he seated himself on a little stool at his mother"s feet; "for Carry calls me stupid if I am silent, and you call me paradoxical if I speak."
"Good sense," said his mother, "is the golden mean."
"And what is common sense?" said Charles.
"The silver mean," said Eliza.
"Well done," said Charles; "it is small change for every hour."
"Rather," said Caroline, "it is the copper mean, for we want it, like alms for the poor, to give away. People are always asking _me_ for it.
If I can"t tell who Isaac"s father was, Mary says, "O Carry, where"s your common sense?" If I am going out of doors, Eliza runs up, "Carry,"
she cries, "you haven"t common sense; your shawl"s all pinned awry." And when I ask mamma the shortest way across the fields to Dalton, she says, "Use your common sense, my dear.""
"No wonder you have so little of it, poor dear child," said Charles; "no bank could stand such a run."
"No such thing," said Mary; "it flows into her bank ten times as fast as it comes out. She has plenty of it from us; and what she does with it no one can make out; she either h.o.a.rds or she speculates."
""Like the great ocean,"" said Charles, ""which receives the rivers, yet is not full.""
"That"s somewhere in Scripture," said Eliza.
"In the "Preacher,"" said Charles, and he continued the quotation; ""All things are full of labour, man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.""
His mother sighed; "Take my cup, my love," she said; "no more."
"I know why Charles is so fond of the "Preacher,"" said Mary; "it"s because he"s tired of reading; "much study is a weariness to the flesh."
I wish we could help you, dear Charles."
"My dear boy, I really think you read too much," said his mother; "only think how many hours you have been at it to-day. You are always up one or two hours before the sun; and I don"t think you have had your walk to-day."
"It"s so dismal walking alone, my dear mother; and as to walking with you and my sisters, it"s pleasant enough, but no exercise."
"But, Charlie," said Mary, "that"s absurd of you; these nice sunny days, which you could not expect at this season, are just the time for long walks. Why don"t you resolve to make straight for the plantations, or to mount Hart Hill, or go right through Dun Wood and back?"
"Because all woods are dun and dingy just now, Mary, and not green. It"s quite melancholy to see them."
"Just the finest time of the year," said his mother; "it"s universally allowed; all painters say that the autumn is the season to see a landscape in."
"All gold and russet," said Mary.