The triumph of Tim

Front matter

CORNELL

UNIVERSITY

LIBRARY

Book One: White

"To attain knowledge, strength, wisdom, to know life and folly and disaster and triumph — these are the things, this is youth, this is the food for the heart, for the spirit. To attain these all sacrifice is good, is splendid; is not sacrifice at all, but a gift rather, a great gift. To do, to be, to grow, to put out roots into the world and suck nutriment irom the living rock and living soil! There is naught else, children of the sea, of the Island, of the ,land encompassed by the Father of Waters!"

MoELEV Roberts, in "Flying Cloud."

Book One: White Chapter I

THE Vicar's name was White. In Little Pennington, however, everybody spoke of him reverentially as the Vicar. He had succeeded a famous man, a poet and a prophet to whose grave in Little Pennington churchyard Ipilgrims from overseas still bring themselves and votive wreaths. Tertius White was neither poet nor prophet. He would have made an admirable man of business, a great solicitor or administrator, because essentially he was interested in the affairs of others. He never sought preferment, reigning quietly over a Hampshire parish bordered on the east by breezy, high-lying downs ; on the west and north by vast woods.

He was thirty-five, when he made a romantic marriage, running away with the only daughter of an Irish peer, an elopement which created something of a scandal at the time, for the father was furious and swore that he would never acknowledge the runaways. Nor did he. But he sent after them a portrait of his daughter painted by Pynsent before he achieved fame, a portrait which hung in the parson's study above the fireplace, challenging attention because it seemed preposterously out of tune with the ordered harmony of that historical workshop. Here his predecessor had laboured for more than a quarter of a century. The pilgrims regarded it as a shrine, because it contained the desk, the chair and the bookcases of the poet. Its

II austere simplicity impressed all visitors. There were many books in plain bindings, a few engravings of sacred subjects, cocoanut matting upon the floor, three Windsor chairs, and a large window through which could be seen a high, carefully-trimmed yew hedge and above it, soaring into the soft skies, the spire of the village church. The big desk faced this window, and the pilgrims always understood the significance of the outlook, the symbolism of the high fence and the inexorable spire.

Behind the desk hung Mrs. White's portrait.

Some of the more sophisticated pilgrims may have wondered whether the parson deliberately worked with his back to the picture, now admitted to be a masterpiece. For Pynsent had painted more than a portrait. Tim's lovely mother, like Lionardo's Gioconda, stood smilingly representative of Woman, the dulce monstrum of the Early Fathers, the magnet which might lure men's souls to destruction. The face indicated great possibilities for good or evil. Half a dozen strokes of the brush could have made of it a saint or a sinner. Herein, of course, lay its attractiveness and interest. This radiant creature had bloomed delightfully. It was difficult to believe that she had died prematurely. One realised that she must still live in the person of her child, for life flamed in her eyes, the joy of life so fierce a passion to some, which must, one is constrained to believe, survive the disintegration of the body, an imperishable essence seeking other habitations.

Mrs. White died shortly after Tim was born; the Vicar never spoke of her, not even to Tim.

The boy respected this silence, although it informed his childhood with curiosity and mystery. The room in which the portrait hung became an inquisitorial chamber. In it Tim was called to account for his outgoings and ingoings and shortcomings. To his credit he told no lies, although much of the truth was sometimes suppressed. Generally ■ his father would send for him after breakfast. His nurse would say:

"Yon are wanted, Master Tim, in your pa's study."

Invariably, the father would be seated at his desk, pilal high with papers and pamphlets. Tim would seat himself on the hard edge of a Windsor chair, and wait till his sire, with exasperating deliberateness, laid down his pen. The Vicar, upon such occasions, spoke gently to the urchin in a voice singularly sweet but impersonal As a child Tim vaguely realised that this calm, slow utterance was irresistible. Nobody presumed to argue with the Vicar when he adopted this tone, the tone of a wise and merciful judgei As a rule certain formalities were observed.

"Well, Tim, you are in mischief again?"

Very soon Tim learned that a. simple "Yes," or a nod of a curly head, embarked him safely along the lines oi least resistance.

"What are we going to do ?" .

This "we" was terribly disconcerting. It implied fellowship, the warming of a small heart's cockles, implying also a sense of responsibility. To get into mischief might be to a healthy boy a ha'penny matter; to drag a saintly father into the mud of petty peccadilloes became an odious affair, for the boy knew that the father would insist upon doing what the son might elect to leave undone. For example, Tim could remember the morning when he refused to apologise to an old woman in the village who had confiscated a cricket ball wandering^ too often into her cabbages. Tim avenged himself by catapulting a cucumber frame. Three marbles were foimd amongst the cucumbers, overwhelming proof that the n^isdemeanant was not a village boy, who would have used pebbles. The Vicar pointed a finger at the marbles.

"Ours," he said; for he had bought the marbles and given them to Tim.

"Yes," Tim replied.

"We must apologise."

"Sha'n't, daddy."

"I shall. Come with me."

Important work was abandoned immediately. Father and son marched down the village street, hand in hand, till the old woman's cottage was reached. The Vicar tapped at the door

"May we come in?"

This was the regular formula, acknowledged by curtseys and smiles. The Vicar entered no cottage without permission.

"I am here to apologise on behalf of this young man. I make myself responsible for the damage he has done. I am sincerely sorry that he has caused you this annoyance."

"I'm not sorry," said Tim, boldly, "She bagged my ball."

"Did you?" asked the parson quietly.

"Yes, sir. I warned 'un again a;n' again. Seemin'ly, Master Tim thinks that cricket balls is manure for an old woman's cabbages an* cauliflowers."

"Keep the ball till he grows wiser. Good-day."

II

Tim was sent to the village school when he was eight years old. The squire of Little Pennington happened to be one of the last of England's ^country gentlemen. He had been the friend far more than the patron of Tertius; White's predecessor, working shoulder to shoulder with him in the development of a great estate much impoverished by the mortgages which plastered it. Tim loved the old Squire, a genial autocrat in a high-collared blue coat, who welcomed a schoolboy as courteously as an ambassador."! Great men came to Pennington Park, because their host was a distinguished scholar and Parliamentarian. Many wondered why he had abandoned the great world for Little Pennington. The position of Speaker of the House of Commons had been within his grasp. He refused that and other honours because his estate needed him. After his death a tenant said of him : "I had often occasion to ask Sir Gilbert

The Vicar of Little Fennington

some particular favour. I can never remeniber his refusing me without giving me a perfectly adequate reason." This furnishes a glimpse of the man. He was an ardent Churchman and Tory. No Nonconformists, for instance, were to be found amongst his tenants; no Radicals disturbed the village peace. Wisely, or unwisely, this kindly autocrat imposed his convictions upon his own people. He had made sacrifices for them, and they knew it. He had swept away poverty and vice and ignorance from Little Pennington. He was a Tory in the sense of conserving religiously what he held to be worth conserving, but he was the first to champion the better education of the masses, and to provide out of his own pocket first-class teachers in his own schools. He encouraged cricket on Sundays; he gave his tenants free access to his park.

Tim was sent to the village school because Sir Gilbert Pennington had chosen the schoolmaster. Here again we have a significant instance of what example may achieve. The village dominie, Arthur Hazel, refused in his turn preferment, devoting life and aiergies to his scholars. The village doctor, fired by this altruism, remained staunch at his post. It seemed to be understood on all hands that there was work to do in Little Pennington worth the doing. The fame of the model village helped to sustain the standard set by squire and parson, and those under them. Even the gentlepeople in and about the village, the retired colonels and admirals and Indian commissioners were, so to speak, weeded out not so much by the squire or parson as by the force of public opinion. Undesirable tenants wandered in and out of this charmed circle. The right sort (in the j Squire's eye) remained whether conscious or unconscious of their privilege. Little Pennington became known as "the happy village." Outsiders might — and did — scoff at the adjective. Insiders smiled complacently.

in

It is a curious fact that the unkindness, or indifference, or even cruelty, which is the lot of a, new boy at genteel preparatory schools is almost unknown in our National Schools. The children in our villages and towns are, with rare exceptions, happy at school, and soon learn to like it. Tim enjoyed himself very well, and came to an understanding of his fellows, boys and girls, which endured when much else was forgotten. He had the knack of making friends, particularly with those older than himself, and ran in and out of half the cottages in the village. Moreover, he would call ceremoniously upon Sir Gilbert, and inform him gravely that a cottage roof was leaking. The old man listened to his prattle with twinkling eyes, and profited by it. For example, the great house was f^ll of beautiful pictures. Tim adored beauty. He would stand entranced before a Gainsborough or a Reynolds and repeat his intention of becomin|| a painter of lovely women. One morning he found a blank space upon the wall of the north drawing-room.

"Where is the yellow lady ?" he asked of Sir Gilbert.

The Squire answered him after Kis own fashion.

"She is building new cottages."

"When is she coming back. Sir Gilbert?"

"She will not come back."

Tim nodded.

"You have sold her?"

"Yes."

"How could you ?"

"Come, come, who told me not so long ago that certain persons were thinking of emigrating to Canada, because? there was not house-room for them?"

"Did you sell the yellow lady to keep the Panels here?"

"To keep them and others."

Tim weighed this conscientiously. i6

The Vicar of Little f*ennington

"It was fuggy for 'em," he admitted, "but villagers don't mind fug much. Do they know?"

"Certainly not; I rely upon your discretion not to tell them."

"Tj^ have kept the yellow lady," said Tim decidedly. "Canada is a jolly decent place. The Panels wanted to go, but, of course, in Little Pennington nobody does what they want, do they?"

Sir Gilbert smiled grimly.

"That is your honest opinion, eh?"

"They do what Father and you tell 'em to do. It's rather dull. When I grow up I shall try to please myself."

"I'm sorry."

"Why?"

"I'm sorry that I shall not be alive to hear from your own lips the results. Do you feel very dull in Little Pennington ?"

"Only when I'm very extra good," said Tim, after a pause. "And you see. Sir Gilbert, I'm very seldom good."

"Original Sin !" murmured Sir Gilbert.

Alone with the Parson, the old man repeated this conversation, adding with a chuckle : "He is a rebel."

The father winced, sensible tfiat Tim's revelation had been vouchsafed to another. The Squire continued genially: "I suppose it's the Irish in him. Forninst the Government. The Sheridan tincture — ^what?"

"Yes; he puzzles me." After a pause, the Vicar continued less calmly: "What a tragedy — this inability of one generation to understand another !"

Sir Gilbert laughed; and yet he had taken, seriously enough the fences between himself and his sons, taken them, perhaps, in too big a stride. He pressed his companion's arm with his finely shaped fingers.

"A generation lies between us. White, and I am sure that you understand me and that I understand you."

'We are of the same generation. I believe that I was born old. I hardly remember being young. I mean by that

I cannot recall feeling exuberantly boyish. We were very poor; I had to make my way, to plot and plan for myself and others. I liked the Struggle; I am not complaining; but — there it is. And my experience discolours my viewpoint of Tim. I never see Tim quite clearly."

"I do," said the Squire trenchantly. "What an attractive little sinner it is!"

"Too attractive," murmured the Vicar. "He gets what he wants too easily — ^particularly love and attention, quicksands both of them, unless a strong hand is on the helm."

"Our hands are not weak. White."

"They are growing daily weaker."

"Will he win this scholarship?"

"I think so."

Already, it had been settled that Tim's chance of being educated at a great public school depended on his wits. But Tertius White, who had won scholarships, knew that Tim might be crammed cunningly to pass a given examination; he could never develop into a scholar or be satisfied with a scholar's ambitions.

"And afterwards ?"

The parson shrugged his shoulders.

"That lies on the lap of the gods, quite beyond my vision."

"Have you not a glimpse of him as a painter?"

"A painter? Any form of Art exacts, a long apprenticeship. Tim loathes drudgery. He will rush at his future, leap into it withbut looking."

"We must do the looking."

"If he will let us."

IV

Tim was twelve when his future was thus discussed, a .strong handsome boy, amazingly like his mother, who looked down upon him with a faintly derisive smile whenever he sat, before the parson upon the hard stool of Penitence.

Tertius White consoled himself with the reflection that i8

The Vicar of Little Fennington

the boy was really penitent — intermittently. He could take a caning from Arthur Hazel with tearless composure, but a deserved reproof from his father might provoke a passion of weeping. Then he would plunge into mischief again with an uplifted heart.

His resource confounded his elders. The Vicar read prayers before breakfast, and Tim was expected to present himself in parade order. If his appearance indicated imperfect ablutions, or undue haste in the putting on of garments, he was despatched to his bedroom again. ' One morning, the Vicar's suspicions were aroused, because Tim's forgetfulness of a hairbrush or a necktie seemed about to become chronic. Tim, moreover, exhibited disappointment when his father's critical eye failed to observe the deficiencies of his toilet. Tim knelt down with a frown upon his face. During Lent, the parson said lightly at breakfast :

"You wanted to cut prayers this morning."

Tim's face betrayed uneasiness.

"Last Wednesday you forgot your necktie; to-day you didn't brush your hair. Own up ! Did you forget, or did you want to cut prayers?"

"I wanted to cut prayers."

"Why?"

"I do such a lot of praying.''

"You have a lot to be thankful for. Do you grudge thanking me or Sir Gilbert when we give you a good time ?"

"It doesn't take so long to thank you or Sir Gilbert."

"We don't do so much for you."

Tim rallied his wits; then he said triumphantly:

"You and Sir Gilbert just hate to be thanked too much. Sir Gilbert says, 'Tut, tut,' and you say, 'Run along.' I should think that God got tired of being thanked again and again. I know I should."

The Vicar said hastily:

"Well, well, you are hardly old enough to realise what sincere prayer means, not to God himself, but to the one who prays."

"If you tell me, I'll try to understand."

Tim fixed his sparkling eyes upon the parson's face, leaning his head upon his hands in an attitude of profound attention. The Vicar accepted the challenge after a moment'! hesitatiofi. ;

"Why do we eat thre^ or four times a day? Because? we are hungry, because the body needs constant nourishment. It is the same with the soul, Tim. It cannot expand without prayer, which means far more than thanksgiving. It is very important that you should be grateful to God, for He has given much to you, and will require much from you. How will you pay Him back?"

"I don't know."

"By doing His will, by opening your heart, so that His Will may flow through it, and direct your life aright.| Prayer, apart from thanksgiving, means communion with God, it means being with Him, it means walking and talking with Him. He comes when you want Him. And prayer brings God to earth, and exalts Man to Heaven. It is indeed the golden thread between earth and Heaven."

Tertius White spoke quietly, never taking his eyes from the boy's face. He could see that his words had produced J an effect. Tim understood. He had forgotten his breakfast.

"Gaon! Please go on!"

"I have said enough, Tim."

"Of course this just settles it."

"Settles — what, my boy?"

"I shall become a parson like you, because a parson does more praying than anybody else. I always wondered why ' you were so good, and often J've wondered why you looked

so — so r"

"Yes?"

"So far away. You were with God. I shall not cut prayers any more, daddy, and I'll make Ernest Judd pray with me."

"Amen!" said the Vicar.

Tim hastily finished his breakfast and disappeared. It happened to be Saturday, and a whole holiday. At the end of the village, hard by the Pound, Ernest Judd was waiting for Tim. A great expedition had been planned involving excitements, a breaking of the sacred law of trespass, and possible injury to life and limb, for the boys believed, or pretended to believe, that Lanterton Wood concealed man-traps! There was a real man-trap in the stable yard of Pennington House, a monstrous affair, enough to strike terror into the heart of the most daring poacher. Sir Gilbert was too humane a man to use man-traps, and his woods were open to Tim and Ernest. Really and truly, bird's-nesting was better in the Pennington woods, because the Squire cared little for game-preserving, and would not allow jays and kites and hawks to be shot by his keepers. But it would be senselessly dull to enter any domain from which trespassers were not rigidly excluded.

Tim walked the length of the village, slightly understudying his father's leisurely stride and genera!! deportment. He greeted all and sundry with studied courtesy. At the grocer's he entered to buy a penn'orth of pear drops. The grocer sang in the choir, and grew a silky, apostolic beard. Tim admired him enormously.

"Marnin', Master Tim."

"Good-morning, Mr. Benner. How is' Mrs. Benner?"

"No better, pore soul! nor likely to be this side o' the grave. Where be going. Master Tim?"

"That's a secret, Mr. Benner."

"Up to larks, I'll be bound."

"You are mistaken."

"What a queer little gentleman to be sure! Now, tell us what you be up to, and I'll give 'ee better weight."

Tim hesitated. t "You sing in the choir, Mr. Benner ?"

"Ah! That I do, and have done this many a year."

"You pray??'

"Most upliftingly." ,

Tim said solemnly : quoting Sir Gilbert :

"I rely upon your discretion, Mr. Benner, not to repeat what I tell you. Ernest Judd and I are going to pass the day in prayer. Somebody else may join us. Good^day."

He walked sedately out of the ^hop, leaving a gaping and gasping grocer behind him.

Passing the Pennington Arms, which happens to be the last house in the village, Tim broke into a dog-trot. He passed swiftly the meadows where plovers' eggs might be found in early April and pulled up pantingly at the Pound.^J On the topmost rail Erny Judd was sitting, smoking a brown-paper cigarette.

"You be late," said Erny.

"I know, Journey, I've a lot to tell you."

Journey, a pleasing amalgam of Erny and Judd, nodded, " He could boast, with rare veracity, that he had taught the Vicar's son to read. It happened in this wise. Tim was very backward in reading when he joined the village school, < and Mr. Hazel had been duly prepared for this. He took Tim in hand, and became humorously sensible of the urchin's indifference and inattention. Whereupon, being a man of parts, he said curtly :

"I can't waste my valuable time with you, Tim. Ernest Judd will give you a lesson. Come here, Erny."

Tim's pride was outraged, but Hazel had understood what wa| needful. Tim made up his mind to reveal to Erny and his master powers of application hitherto latent. Erny's superiority as a reader of two syllable treatises was soon rolled in the dust. Nevertheless the boys remained friends, partly, perhaps, because Erny's father was recognised and respected by scapegraces as a troublesome and incorrigible character. He had been a sailor before the mast, returning to the village blind of both eyes. He could sing a mellow song, tell many tales of sea and land, and carry more ale without showing it than any man in Little Pennington. He earned a few shillings a week by playing the fiddle; and his wife, a hard-working woman, was head laundry-maid at Pennington House.

"We ain't a going to no Lanterton Wood," began Tim. Alone with Journey, he used the village vernacular, abandoning it in serious moments. , ,

"Why isn't us ?" said Journey.

"Because we be two mis'able sinners. We be going to the Cathedral."

"The Cathedral? There ain't no nestesses in they beeches."

The Cathedral had been so named by the poet and prophet, a noble group of lofty beech trees in the heart of Pennington High Wood. From some such group Bradford and Ratisam and William of Wykeham may have derived inspiration. The rounded trunks soared upwards till they met overhead in Nature's exquisite fan-vaulting. Beneath, the moss lay thick and verdant. Aisles, transepts and chancel were there awaiting the worshippers.

Tim carried a brown paper parcel tied with string. Journey stared at it interrogatively with a hungry expression. It might contain cake, apples and roly-poly pudding. His face fell when Tim extracted a not too clean nightgown and a yard of black riband.

Tim dropped the vernacular.

"I shall go into the vestry and put on my surplice. You kneel down and pray."

"I'll be danged if I do."

"Look here. Journey, something wonderful is going to happen, if you behave yourself. I'm expecting Somebody."

"Who be you expectin'?"

"God."

"Gosh!"

"You kneel down and pray. Open your sinful heart."

" 'Tain't more sinful than yours."

"You kneel down, or I'll have to punch your head."

Journey dropped upon his knees. Tim retired behind a majestic tree. When he reappeared he was wearing his nightgown, and the black riband made a passable stole. Journey was much impressed, because Tim's face appeared to have changed. He looked angelic.

"Pray out loud," commanded Tim.

Journey shut his eyes and opened his mouth. Prayer! did not come fluently to his lips, but he repeated a formula kept for special use at school-treats, when either Vicar or Squire might call suddenly upon any boy or girl to ask a blessing.

"For what we be goin' to receive may the Lard make us truly thankful !"

Tim stood in front of Journey, gazing into the intersecting boughs above. A squirrel caught his eye. Instinctively he glanced about him for some stick or stone to throw at it. Then he closed his eyes, and prayed in his turn :

"Come down, O God, and join us ! You say that, Ernest Judd."

"Come down, O God, and join us."

Tim was trembling with excitement. Suddenly, he remembered a familiar passage in the Old Testament.

"Take off your boots," he commanded. "And socks."

Soon, they stood bare-footed upon the soft moss. Tim raised up his voice:

"Come down, O God, and talk. Our hearts are open."

They waited, blinking through the branchesunto the ethereal blue. Tim said impatientiy:

"Ernest, son of Judd, your sinful heart is not open. If Evarannie Bunce were here- 1"

Evarannie was the model girl of Little Pennington. 24

Journey, much troubled, conscious of innumerable misdeeds, said miserably:

"It don't feel open, Master Tim."

"You open it — quick!"

"I'm danged if I can."

"It's locked," said Tim, with conviction, "and you've lost the key. I'm sorry for you, Journey, but you must go and hide yourself. Leave me here alone."

"Ain't you afeard. Master Tim?"

"No," said Tim valiantly. "Take these pear drops. You can eat 'em all. I must fast as well as pray."

Journey took the pear drops and vanished. Looking back, he could see Tim upon his knees, gazing upwards. He heard a rustling of wings, and shivered. A glance into the tree-tops was reassuring ; some wood pigeons were flying through the beeches. He hid himself in a clump of hollies, and waited with the patience of the Hampshire peasant.

VI

Tim prayed hard, repeating all the prayers he knew, and some that were extemporary. Finally, the conviction forced itself upon him that his heart, like Journey's, must be hermetically sealed. His thoughts strayed to Lanterton Wood, lingering beside a pond where dabchicks nested, with a vigorous mental effort he recalled these vagabond thoughts, dwelling with concentration upon the sinfulness of the Judds, father and son. If only Evarannie were beside him !

At this moment temptation beset him. Was it possible to tell the truth to Journey? Journey, unhappily, lacked discretion. He would tell the other boys, and they would laugh riotously. In time the girls might giggle as Tim walked through the village street. Desperately he clutched at Compromise.

"Ernest Judd, come forth."

Journey emerged from the hollies with his mouth full of pear drops. Tim was standing up in an attitude which recalled the Vicar in the act of pronouncing the benedictiotjj

"Kneel, thou son of Judd !"

Journey, quaking with fear, obeyed.

"I have talked to God," said Tim. This was true, and might save a lamentable situation.

"You seen Him, Master Tim?"

"Thou fool! Is He not invisible? I have talked to Him. I have asked Him to open your sinful heart."

"Thank ye, Master Tim."

"Tut, tut! Prayer is more than thanksgiving."

"What happened, Master Tim?"

"I looked up and saw light. I heard a rustling of many wings. . . ." ' "Them was wocid pigeons."

"Shush-h-h ! We are standing on holy ground. All the sin has gone out of me. I stand white before the Lord."

"That be your name. Master Tim."

Tim was immensely struck by this.

"It's true ; I. had never, never thought of that. Journey, it's a sign. I shall be a Saint and perhaps a Martyr."

"Gosh, it sounds fine."

"You shall follow me into strange lands. We will baptise the heathen and "

"Catch turtles."

"Shush-h-h ! I shall be a bishop, and you "

"Your man Friday."

"If you talk silly I shall take Evarannie instead of you. I want to get into your thick head that I'm going to save your soul, and open it up. I am going to be a good example] to you, thou son of Judd. Thou shalt be clean even as I am."

"Yes, Master Tim."

"Say—Amen."

"Amen."

"You can rise from your knees. Do you feel holy?" 26

"I come all over queer when I seen you kneeling."

"That's holiness. I never felt holy before. Now I'm going to take off my surplice."

He slipped away, to return a minute later swinging a brown paper parcel. In silence the boys left the Cathedral, walking soberly side by side. Passing from the shade of the beeches into a sunny glade, Tim said suddenly:

"Any pear drops left?"

"Only two."

"Let's have 'em."

DAISY

TIM did not remain sinless for any appreciable length of time, although that time lasted longer than was quite agreeable. For the remainder of the Lenten season, Journey and he vowed solemnly to give up biting their nails, but as Tim remarked: "Didn't we just make up for it on Sundays." From Journey's lips dropped highly coloured details of what had passed in the Cathedral. A few boys scoffed, notably George Chalk, who demanded proof of saintship, Tim rose to the occasion.

"Saints can perform miracles sometimes. Would it be a miracle if I licked you?"

George was of opinion that it might be almost a miracle. Tim licked him there and then in the presence of a dozen boys and girls, including Evarannie. Afterwards, the conqueror held a prayer meeting, and prayed magnanimously* for the souj of George, who looked uncommonly sheepish. He was a head taller than Tim, but measured less round the chest.

Tim's correspondence with the S. P. G, and kindred societies must be briefly recorded. He obtained a list of such societies from his father, and then wrote boldly demanding pamphlets. The Vicar smiled when the pamphlets came. Tim read two of them aloud to Journey and Evarannie.^ Incidentally, he slacked at his work. The Vicar was pushing him on in Algebra and Latin Prose. When reproved for an exercise full of blunders, Tim said loftily: "The disciples were not scholars, but ignorant men. What good 28 '