"My dear, Mr. Wycherly is always considered a man of great personal attractions," she replied, rather shocked at his choice of an adjective. "Yes, aunt, dear, I know, but it’s a tidy sort of handsomeness; not a bit like Noah and Jacob and those hairy prophets in the parlour." The walls of his aunt’s sitting-room were adorned by many engravings illustrative of the Scriptures, and Montagu, fresh from the study of his beloved Flaxman, would compare these bearded Hebrew prophets, so hampered by heavy draperies, with his airily attired and clean-limbed Greeks, always to the advantage of the latter. Yet he was forced to acknowledge to himself that his adored Mr. Wycherly resembled them equally little both in appearance and manner of life: for nothing could savour less of the adventurous than his existence. So Montagu "put the question by" as one to be answered in that wonderful, grown-up time that children think will solve so many riddles. Mr. Wycherly was immensely happy in this new work and approached his task with a certain tender reverence, rare among teachers, for he agreed with wise old Roger Ascham in thinking that "the pure, clean wit of a sweet, young babe is like the newest wax, most able to receive the best and fairest printing, and like a new bright silver dish never occupied to receive and keep clean any good thing that is put in it." One morning in early October, Montagu was sitting, as usual, at his little table copying the Greek alphabet, while Mr. Wycherly sat watching him with pleased, dreamy eyes. As the little boy completed his task he raised his head with a sigh of satisfaction and happened to look down into the garden. "Do you think?" he suddenly asked Mr. Wycherly, "I might go out and help Aunt Esperance dig the potatoes? The ground seems so heavy this morning." Mr. Wycherly rose hastily, crossed over to Montagu’s window and looked out. "Good God!" he exclaimed, and fled from the room. Much astonished at this outburst from his usually serene tutor, Montagu tore downstairs after him. What Mr. Wycherly had seen to cause him such consternation was what he might have seen any time during the last fifteen years—namely, the tiny, stooping figure of Miss Esperance digging the potatoes for the day’s dinner. But if it ever happened that he did look out he had never chanced to look down into the homely garden below, or if he had his eyes were holden, and he was wrapped in his dreams. So that he beheld only the things of the spirit, nor did he know how often the palms of those little hands, so ready to help others, were hard and blistered by their labours.