But now Timm’s reading was interrupted. Whether Dr. Mantelsack could not hear him, or whether he stood in need of exercise, is not to be known. But he left his platform and walked slowly down through the room. He paused near Timm, with his book in his hand; Timm meanwhile had succeeded in getting his own book out of sight, but was now entirely helpless. His funnel-shaped mouth emitted a gasp, he looked at the _Ordinarius_ with honest, troubled blue eyes, and could not fetch out another syllable. “Well, Timm,” said Dr. Mantelsack. “Can’t you get on?” Timm clutched his brow, rolled up his eyes, sighed windily, and said with a dazed smile: “I get all mixed up, Herr Doctor, when you stand so close to me.” Dr. Mantelsack smiled too. He smiled in a very flattered way and said “Well, pull yourself together and get on.” And he strolled back to his place. And Timm pulled himself together. He drew out and opened his book again, all the time apparently wrestling to recover his self-control and staring about the room. Then he dropped his head and was himself again. “Very good,” said the master, when he had finished. “It is clear that you have studied to some purpose. But you sacrifice the rhythm too much, Timm. You seem to understand the elisions; yet you have not been really reading hexameters at all. I have an impression as if you had learned the whole thing by heart, like prose. But, as I say, you have been diligent, you have done your best--and whoever does his best--; you may sit down.” Timm sat down, proud and beaming, and Dr. Mantelsack gave him a good mark in his book. And the extraordinary thing was that at this moment not only the master, but also Timm himself and all his classmates, sincerely felt that Timm was a good industrious pupil who had fully deserved the mark he got. Hanno Buddenbrook, even, thought the same, though something within him revolted against the thought. He listened with strained attention to the next name. “Mumme,” said Dr. Mantelsack. “Again: _aurea prima_--” Mumme! Well! Thank Heaven! Hanno was now in probable safety. The lines would hardly be asked for a third time, and in the sight-reading the letter B had just been called up. Mumme got up. He was tall and pale, with trembling hands and extraordinarily large round glasses. He had trouble with his eyes, and was so short-sighted that he could not possibly read standing up from a book on the desk before him. He had to learn, and he had learned. But to-day he had not expected to be called up; he was, besides, painfully ungifted; and he stuck after the first few words. Dr. Mantelsack helped him, he helped him again in a sharper tone, and for the third time with intense irritation. But when Mumme came to a final stop, the _Ordinarius_ was mastered by indignation. “This is entirely insufficient, Mumme. Sit down. You cut a disgraceful figure, let me tell you, sir. A _cretin_! Stupid and lazy both--it is really too much.”