But if there was some subtle profanity in playing lawn-tennis in sight of the Jungfrau, I thought it much more blasphemous to study “Medea” and the “Æneid” in the same sacred presence. I had a considerable spell of these, because it had been discovered that, although I was going to Marlborough without a scholarship, there was yet another of those odious competitions which I could enter for after I had got there. I had fondly thought that after this trinity of failures I had thoroughly be-dunced myself and need make no more efforts, but it appeared that I was wholly mistaken, for next December there would be a chance of going in for Foundation Scholarships at my new school, and in that there would be less competition, for they were open only to sons of clergymen. So, after a few days’ holiday, out came the Greek dictionary and the Latin dictionary and the “Medea” and the “Æneid,” and I had a couple of hours every morning under my father’s tuition. I think he was very strict with me, for he still believed in the existence of my brains, and was determined that I should use them. But it is impossible to get good results from a small boy unless somehow interest is kindled, and there was often despair on the part of the teacher and resentful gloom on the part of the taught. Things came to a climax on one particular wet morning, when we were all seated in the sitting-room, Nellie with her logic, and Maggie with her political economy, and Hugh going swimmingly with his “nuces” under my mother’s instructions. One by one they all finished their tasks, and there was I left with a chorus in the “Medea” which I could not translate at all, getting more muddled and hopeless every minute, and making fresh mistakes as we went over it again, and my father getting exasperated with my stupidity. Stupid I was, but my chief ailment that morning was that I was frightened and addled and dazed with his displeasure. Right up till lunch time was I kept at my task that day, and in the afternoon there was a walk in the rain, and I got into some further disgrace for hitting Hugh with my umbrella in mere retaliation. I was “done to a turn” by this time, and I think my mother must have pointed that out, for next morning, anyhow, instead of that just and terrible thunder-cloud, when I brought up the weary chorus again for retranslation, my father was enchantingly encouraging, and slipped in little corrections when I made mistakes, as if I had corrected myself. There was no allusion to yesterday’s trouble, and under his approval my wits rallied themselves, and at the end he shut up the book with a delicious smile and told me that it was the best lesson I had ever brought him.... CHAPTER VII THE WIDENING HORIZONS