At these words Dodson, who, throughout his interview with the father, had remained so calm and self-secure, now turned away hastily from him who was sightless, with a half-strangled sob. “You do not tell me in what manner Crumpett and Hawker received our little treatise,” said the poet. Dodson found it a great matter to recover his wise self-possession, but by the time the poet had repeated the question he had regained it. “Why--why, in what manner could they receive it, old boy?” said Jimmy Dodson. “What _could_ they say to it? What does a religious chap say to the Bible? What does a scholar say to Homer? What does everybody say to Shakespeare?” “It is almost more than I can realize,” said the poet, with a look of rapture that seemed to sear the veins of his unhappy friend. LI Dodson promised bravely, recklessly, despairingly that the next time he entered the little room he would bring the first printed sheets of the book. For the poet’s insistence that each line must undergo a rigorous scrutiny before it was given to the world was reiterated again and again that evening with an imperiousness that, in one formerly so gentle and timid, astonished its witness beyond measure. “Luney, old boy,” said Jimmy Dodson in a rather bewildered manner after several of these austere reminders, “I am not accustomed to move in royal circles, I have never been spoken to by a king, but if ever I was, old boy, I should expect him to speak to me just like that. You make me feel, old boy, that I have no right to call you Luney any longer--it seems almost like an act of presumption--you make me feel, old boy, that I ought to address you as ‘my lord,’ or as ‘sire’.” The poet laughed a strange, rarefied note of laughter. “Ah, dear Jimmy,” he said, “in the presence of the faithful we will not insist on our royalty too much.” Dodson could frame no reply. Such words appeared to transcend those bounds indicated by human intelligence which the speaker had seemed to overstep so many times already. But, to the amazement of the beholder, the white-haired old man, who all this time had sat at the table with his eyes pressed devoutly to the Book of the Ages, rose at these words of the dying poet, and with a grave deliberation sank upon his knees before him who was blind. “My liege,” said the old man humbly, “I would not have you consider your servants to be insensible of your quality if they do not address you in the fashion which it would seem to demand. Sire, your servants do not esteem your royalty to be the less because they do not wear its livery upon their lips.” Smiling his secret and beautiful smile, the dying poet extended his right hand, so white, so fragile, and so transparent towards the aged man, his father, with the sweet air of a great prince, and the old man, still kneeling, bore it to his lips.