As he walked down the road leading to the village he met the minister, who immediately remarked that something or other was amiss. Whether Edmund had ruffled Mr. Wycherly’s hair and neck-cloth as well as his equanimity we are not told, but it is certain that the Reverend Peter Gloag thought him looking less "Oxfordish" than usual, and stopped him to ask kindly, "Nothing wrong up at the house I hope?" "No, I thank you," said Mr. Wycherly, stopping in his turn. "At least—I wonder now if you happen to know of any one who can make rabbits out of handkerchiefs?" The minister stared at Mr. Wycherly as though for a moment he feared for his reason, then he looked as though he were about to laugh, when quite suddenly his face changed, and the eyes under his bushy eyebrows were wonderfully kind and gentle as he said, "You’ll hardly believe it, but I can do something in that sort myself. I used often to make them when the bairns were wee." "My dear friend," Mr. Wycherly exclaimed delightedly, "can you really? But of course you can, you have children of your own. Why didn’t I think of you at the very first? Are you pressed for time at present? Could you return with me now, at once?" For answer the minister turned and walked with Mr. Wycherly toward Remote, and not only did he teach him how to make the most lively and enchanting of rabbits, but he also instructed him how to originate one "Sandy," who sat on the manipulator’s hand, whose arms were worked by his fingers, a creature of infinite jest and dexterity. Mr. Wycherly was not half so elated when he got the Newdigate as when he achieved this latter feat. But Oh, dear me, Mr. Wycherly had a tremendous deal to learn! Every day was he confronted with new deficiencies in his education. The constant demand for songs was most embarrassing: even Miss Esperance seemed to fail the children here, for although she knew innumerable psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, and endless and delightful Scottish ballads, yet her repertoire of purely nursery ditties was but small. It was heartrending to Mr. Wycherly, when, during their first days at Remote, Edmund would remark reproachfully anent his inability to sing some hitherto unheard-of nursery song, "Mamma singed it." And the eyes of Miss Esperance would fill with tears at the thought of these two little ones bereft of their young parents, who seemed to have been so light-hearted, so ready to sing upon every possible occasion. No books of nursery rhymes had come with the children from Portsmouth. Perhaps they were forgotten in the hurry of their departure. Perhaps they did not exist: where was the need, with a girl-mother whose store of such ditties seemed inexhaustible? It did not occur either to Miss Esperance or Mr. Wycherly that such books could be purchased. It is true that the latter received many catalogues, but they mostly concerned learned works dealing with the more obscure of the Latin authors.