A story is told of Edward VI., that at the time of arriving at the kingly dignity he gave way to a torrent of the most sonorous oaths. The pastors and masters charged with the well-being of the royal youth could not but stare in blank astonishment at the conduct of one so well nurtured as the child of Anne Boleyn. It transpired, however, that the young king had been given to believe by one of his associates that language of the kind was dignified and becoming in the person of a sovereign. Edward was asked to name the preceptor who had so ably supplemented the course of the royal education. This he instantly and innocently did, and was not a little surprised at the severe whipping that was administered to the delinquent.[29] The predicament in which the royal child was placed is similar to that which once befel a clerical gentleman while travelling on mule-back across Syria. The Syrian muleteers are, it seems, accustomed to urge onward their beasts with the shout of "Yullah!" or "Bismillah!" and it was under the escort of these shouting and belabouring drivers that the traveller made his way into the town of Beyrout. His friends naturally inquired of him what progress he had made in Arabic, and in reply he told them he had only acquired two words, _bakhshish_ for a present, and _Yullah!_ for go-ahead. He was asked if he had used the latter word much on his way. Certainly, he said, he had used it all the way. "Then, your reverence," replied his friend, "you have been swearing all the way through the Holy Land." CHAPTER VI. "When a gentleman is disposed to swear, it is not for any standers-by to curtail his oaths."--'_Cymbeline_,' ii. 1. In the study of antiquity there are steep and irregular by-paths that defy the traveller every step that he pursues them. It is in threading these tortuous windings that many a fearless venturer has lost foot-hold and been utterly cast away. Many a man with the passion for antiquity deep at his heart, and with limbs well girded to attain to the summit of his aim, has been fain to settle down, jaded and dispirited, at mid-task. He has accomplished nothing perhaps beyond the mere reading of an inscription or deciphering of a medallion, but the spirit of his insight is dimmed, and stricken in the work. Thus has it been with many generations of seekers and inquirers. The _virtuosi_ and _cognoscenti_, the curious in gems and medals, in brasses and torsos, the commentators and concordancers,--all these may be said to be nothing more than so many units in the lost tribe of eager scholarship. Starting confident of probing to the very source and mystery of things, they have rather preferred the shelter of some attainable evening refuge than be overtaken in their task by the chills and storms of night.