Thenceforth, during the voyage home, Constantine pestered Karl with a ludicrous, dog-like fidelity. The Armenian was lean, tall, and dark, with the big, black eyes, large mouth, small ears, and prominent nose of his race. Ordinarily, he was a bumptious and exceedingly “clever” young man, the heir to crores of rupees, and a business of world-wide renown; yet the mere sight of Karl skipping towards him along the deck would stop his blatant chatter and convert him into a sort of human grey-hound, a timid animal, which had just caught sight of its master. This submissiveness amused the other passengers, annoyed Mrs. Grier, and caused Macpherson certain ponderings. Constantine told the doctor that when he found himself in the water grasping the life-buoy his first impression was that the ship could not possibly find him. He began to cry in a frenzy, but suddenly he became reassured. After that he had no fear of being drowned, but he had a horrible premonition that a huge shark was rushing from the depths with incredible speed to devour him. The memory of this shark always returned whenever he saw Karl! The monster’s jaws opened! He could feel it crush his bones! The boy throve splendidly aboard ship. Constantine went to England overland from Marseilles, but he met the _Ganges_ at Tilbury, and Mrs. Grier could hardly refuse the aldermanic gold watch and absurdly heavy chain he presented to Karl. The watch had a fine inscription, too: “From Paul Constantine to Karl Grier, in memory of the s.s. _Ganges_, Bay of Bengal, Lat. 12.10 N.; Long. 84.40 E.” There was a date, but Karl was saved from mind-searchings by the fact that his mother placed the gift in her bank, to await later years. And then Karl went to school. Just picture this sturdy little human dynamo, with his superhuman eyes and ears, sitting down in class with a number of youthful Edinburgh contemporaries! Yet it was impossible for his parents to encourage the growth of his spiritual faculties (as we may describe them) at the expense of the equipment needed to fit him for the citizenship of the world. So he learnt the exact locality of the North Cape in Lapland, the value of the common denominator, and the great utility of the algebraic x. And, as he pored over books, so the hidden spark dimmed. At first he was wont to startle his companions no less than his tutors. When a master was explaining that the moon was a satellite of the earth, and was popularly known as a destroyed world, owing to the arid mountains and volcanic chasms with which her bright face is decorated, it was slightly ridiculous to be told by a boy of eleven, all aglow with interest--“Oh, yes, sir. I saw the lunar mountains quite plainly last night. And there are several great pits as black as ink.” “Nonsense, Grier!” would the master say sharply, and Karl would be stilled for the hour. Hence, he kept to himself the daily knowledge he had of the hours of high water in the Forth, many miles away.