"Doesn't your father approve of your doing this?"

"He wouldn't mind my entering the navy as an officer, but he is not
willing to have me enter the merchant service."

"Then why doesn't he send you to the Naval Academy?"

"Because I can't enter without receiving the appointment from a
member of Congress. Our member can only appoint one, and there is no
vacancy. So, as I can't go where I want to, I am preparing for
Harvard."

"Are you studying Latin and Greek?"

"Yes."

"Have you studied them long?"

"About two years. I was looking over my Greek lesson when you
playfully tumbled over me."

"Will you let me look at your book? I never saw a Greek book."

"I sometimes wish I never had," said Oscar; "but that's when I am
lazy."

Harry opened the book--a Greek reader--in the middle of an extract
from Xenophon, and looked with some awe at the unintelligible letters.

"Can you read it? Can you understand what it means?" he asked,