Lucian went slowly, but not discreditably, up the school, gaining prizes
now and again, and falling in love more and more with useless reading and
unlikely knowledge. He did his elegiacs and iambics well enough, but he
preferred exercising himself in the rhymed Latin of the middle ages. He
like history, but he loved to meditate on a land laid waste, Britain
deserted by the legions, the rare pavements riven by frost, Celtic magic
still brooding on the wild hills and in the black depths of the forest,
the rosy marbles stained with rain, and the walls growing grey. The
masters did not encourage these researches; a pure enthusiasm, they felt,
should be for cricket and football, the _dilettanti_ might even play
fives and read Shakespeare without blame, but healthy English boys should
have nothing to do with decadent periods. He was once found guilty of
recommending Villon to a school-fellow named Barnes. Barnes tried to
extract unpleasantness from the text during preparation, and rioted in
his place, owing to his incapacity for the language. The matter was a
serious one; the headmaster had never heard of Villon, and the culprit
gave up the name of his literary admirer without remorse. Hence, sorrow
for Lucian, and complete immunity for the miserable illiterate Barnes,
who resolved to confine his researches to the Old Testament, a book which
the headmaster knew well. As for Lucian, he plodded on, learning his work
decently, and sometimes doing very creditable Latin and Greek prose. His
school-fellows thought him quite mad, and tolerated him, and indeed were
very kind to him in their barbarous manner. He often remembered in after
life acts of generosity and good nature done by wretches like Barnes, who
had no care for old French nor for curious meters, and such recollections
always moved him to emotion. Travelers tell such tales; cast upon cruel
shores amongst savage races, they have found no little kindness and
warmth of hospitality.