"
He was cut short by his son Joe rushing in headlong, exclaiming—-
"Papa, papa, please come! Rob has knocked Johnny down and he doesn't
come round."
Colonel Brownlow hurried off, Caroline trying to make him hear her
offer to follow if she could be useful, and sending Jock to see
whether there was any opening for her. Unless the emergency were
very great indeed she knew her absence would be preferred, and so she
and Mr. Ogilvie remained, talking the matter over, with more pity for
the delinquent than his own family would have thought natural.
"It really is a terrible thing to be stupid," she said. "I don't
imagine that unlucky boy ever entered into his father's idea of truth
and honour, which really is fine in its way."
"Very fine, and proved to have made many fine fellows in its time.
I dare say the lad will grow up to it, but just now he simply feels
cruelly injured by interference with a senior's claim to absolute
submission."
"Which he sees as singly as his father sees the simple duty of
justice."
"It would be comfortable if we poor moderns could deal out our
measures with that straightforward military simplicity. I cannot
help seeing in that unfortunate boy the victim of examinations for
commissions. Boys must be subjected to high pressure before they can
thoroughly enter into the importance of the issues that depend upon
it; and when a sluggish, dull intellect is forced beyond endurance,
there is an absolute instinct of escape, impelling to shifts and
underhand ways of eluding work.
Pages:
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284