Boyce presented Edwin with a high social recommendation. “A friend of Denis Martin’s,” he said. Mrs. Boyce smiled on him. “Look here,” said her son, “I’m afraid we can’t very well go into the guvnor’s study. He hates any one invading it when he’s not there. Let’s go upstairs to my own room and talk.” Edwin had a passing vision of the forbidden chamber, the flanks of a grand piano in which a reflection of firelight glowed red, and endless shelves of gilt-lettered books. The rest of the house seemed to him rather untidy, as if it were no more than a dry chrysalis protecting the central beauty of the poet’s room; but he had not time to see much following in the rear of Boyce’s long-legged progress up the stairs. He found himself, at last, in a small attic with a gable window that framed the starry sky: the kind of room that satisfied all his own ideals of comfort and seclusion. Boyce was proud and willing to exhibit his treasures. They showed a curious mixture of the schoolboy, represented by photographic groups of cricket teams, glass cases of butterflies, and a tasseled Rugby cap, and the more mature intelligence that now possessed them. Edwin and he sat down opposite one another in a couple of easy-chairs, and talked and smoked incessantly all that evening. They spoke of Wordsworth, the idol of Boyce’s literary devotions, of Browning, whose claims to poetry he would not allow, and of Shenstone, whose name he had never met before. By this time Edwin was getting rather ashamed of his early admiration for Shenstone, and the fact that Boyce had never heard of the Pastoral Ballad confirmed him in his decision that the author was an acquaintance whom he had better drop. They went on to Francis Thompson—Dr. Moon’s quotation from the _Anthem of Earth_ had sent Edwin searching for his works in the municipal library—and he now learned that this bewildering genius, who had once, like him, been a medical student, had actually slept in the room beneath his feet. “He never qualified,” said Boyce dreamily, “and yet medicine is a wonderful thing. I should think the fact that the medical man is always face to face with mortality”—he pointed to a suspended skeleton in the corner—“and all the other big fundamental things like birth and pain, ought to give him a sort of sense of proportion and make him sensitive to the beauties of life. Your friend, Sir Thomas Browne, is an example. Then there’s Rabelais.” “There are heaps of others,” said Edwin. “Well, yes. . . . Keats.” “Byron and Akenside,” Edwin supplied from the eighteenth century. “I don’t know the gentleman,” said Boyce. “Well, then, Goldsmith and Crabbe. Crabbe’s rather good, you know. And Shelley—” “Shelley?” “Yes, Shelley walked a hospital when he was in London with Harriet.” “I’d no idea of that,” said Boyce, “but there’s a modern fellow that the guvnor’s rather keen on, named Bridges. Robert Bridges, who’s a physician.” “I’ve never heard of him.”