“I don’t think I am getting any good out of it.” “But how can you tell what good you are getting?” “I don’t seem to feel that I am,” said Thyrsis, deprecatingly. “It is not to be supposed that you would feel it,” said the other--“not at this early stage. You must wait.” “But I don’t like the method, sir.” “What’s wrong with the method?” Thyrsis was embarrassed. He was not sure, he said; but he did not think that writing could be taught. Anyway, one had first to have something worth saying-- “Are you laboring under the delusion that you know anything about writing?” demanded the professor. (He had written across Thyrsis’ last composition the words, “Feeble and trivial”.) “Why, no,” began the boy. “Because if you are, let me disabuse your mind at once. There is no one in the class who knows less about writing than yourself.” “I think,” said Thyrsis, “it’s because I can’t bring myself to write in cold blood. I have to be interested. I’m sure that is the trouble.” “I’m sure,” said the other, “that the trouble is that you think you know too much.” “I’m sorry, sir,” said Thyrsis, humbly. “I’ve tried my best---” “It is my business to teach students to write. I’ve given my life to that, and I think I know something about it. But you think you know more than I do. That’s all.” And so they parted. Thyrsis kept a vivid recollection of this interview, for the reason that at a later stage of his career he came into contact with Prof. Osborne again, and got another glimpse of the authoritarian attitude towards the art of letters. Section 15. Thyrsis had not many friends at college, and none at all at the university. He had no time to make any; and besides, there was a certain facetious senior who had caught him hurrying through the corridors one day, declaring in excitement that-- “Banners yellow, glorious, golden, On its roof did float and flow!” But he had long ago ceased to hope for a friend, or to care what anybody thought about him; it was clear to him by this time that he had made himself into a poet, and was doomed to be unhappy. His mother had given up all hope of seeing him a bishop, and they had compromised upon a judgeship; but here at the university there was a law-school, and he met the students, and saw that this, too, could not be. These “lawyers” were not seeking knowledge for the love of it--they were studying a trade, by which they could rise in the world. They were not going out to do battle for truth and justice--they were perfecting themselves in cunning, so that they might be of help in money-disputes; they were sharpening their wits, to make them useful tools for the opening of treasure-chests. And this attitude to life was written all over their personalities; they seemed to Thyrsis a coarse and roistering crew, and he shrunk from them in repugnance.