Leighton, gravely.

"I--I don't know," began Lewis. "I've never been educated. By the time I
was nine I knew how to read and write and figure a little. After
that--you know--I just sat on the hills for years with the goats. I read
the Reverend Orme's books, of course."

"What were the books?"

"There weren't many," said Lewis. "There was the Bible, of course. There
was a little set of Shakspere in awfully fine print and a set of Walter
Scott."

Leighton nodded. "The Bible is essential but not educative until you
learn to depolarize it. Shakspere--you'll begin to read Shakspere in
about ten years. Walter Scott. Scott--well--Scott is just a bright ax
for the neck of time. What else did you read?"

"I read 'The City of God' but not very often."

For a second Leighton stared; then he burst into laughter. He checked
himself suddenly.

"Boy," he said, "don't misunderstand. I'm not laughing at the book; I'm
laughing at your reading St. Augustine even 'not very often!'"

"Why shouldn't you laugh?" asked Lewis, simply. "I laughed sometimes. I
remember I always laughed at the heading to the twenty-first book."

"Did you?" said Leighton, a look of wonder in his face. "What is it? I