"I mean to have a shot at the History," I admitted. "Wish I was
better at dates."

"It's always two-thirds dates," Dan assured me, to my discouragement.
"Old Florret thinks you can't eat a potato until you know the date
that chap Raleigh was born."

"I've prayed so hard that I may win the History prize," I explained to
him. I never felt shy with Dan. He never laughed at me.

"You oughtn't to have done that," he said. I stared. "It isn't fair
to the other fellows. That won't be your winning the prize; that will
be your getting it through favouritism."

"But they can pray, too," I reminded him.

"If you all pray for it," answered Dan, "then it will go, not to the
fellow that knows most history, but to the fellow that's prayed the
hardest. That isn't old Florret's idea, I'm sure."

"But we are told to pray for things we want," I insisted.

"Beastly mean way of getting 'em," retorted Dan. And no argument that
came to me, neither then nor at any future time, brought him to right
thinking on this point.

He would judge all matters for himself. In his opinion Achilles was a
coward, not a hero.