For my part I say nothing--nothing--but
_This_ I will say--my reasons are my own--
That if I had an only son to put
To school (as God be praised that I have none),
'T is not with Donna Inez I would shut
Him up to learn his catechism alone,
No--no--I'd send him out betimes to college,
For there it was I picked up my own knowledge.

LIII.

For there one learns--'t is not for me to boast,
Though I acquired--but I pass over _that_,
As well as all the Greek I since have lost:
I say that there's the place--but "_Verbum sat_,"
I think I picked up too, as well as most,
Knowledge of matters--but no matter _what_--
I never married--but, I think, I know
That sons should not be educated so.

LIV.

Young Juan now was sixteen years of age,
Tall, handsome, slender, but well knit: he seemed
Active, though not so sprightly, as a page;
And everybody but his mother deemed
Him almost man; but she flew in a rage[45]
And bit her lips (for else she might have screamed)
If any said so--for to be precocious
Was in her eyes a thing the most atrocious.