When the catechumens were assembled for the first time, Theodore found
himself quite unexpectedly surrounded by a totally different class of
boys to whom he had been used at school. When he entered the
assembly-room he was met by the stare of something like a hundred
inimical eyes. There were tobacco binders, chimney sweeps, apprentices
of all trades. They were on bad terms and freely abused one another,
but this enmity between the different trades was only superficial;
however much they quarrelled, they yet held together. He seemed to
breathe a strangely stifling atmosphere; the hatred with which they
greeted him was not unmixed with contempt, the reverse of a certain
respect or envy. He looked in vain for a friend, for a companion,
like-minded, dressed as he was. There was not a single one. The parish
was poor, the rich people sent their children to the German church which
was then the fashion. It was in the company of the children of the
people, the lower classes, that he was to approach the altar, as their
equal. He asked himself what it was that separated him from these boys?
Were they not, bodily, endowed with the same gifts as he? No doubt, for
every one of them earned his living, and some of them helped to keep
their parents. Were they less gifted, mentally? He did not think so, for
their remarks gave evidence of keen powers of observation; he would have
laughed at many of their witty remarks if he had not been conscious of
his superior caste. There was no definite line of demarcation between
him and the fools who were his school-fellows. But there was a line here
Was it the shabby clothes, the plain faces, the coarse hands, which
formed the barrier? Partly, he thought. Their plainness, especially,
repulsed him. But were they worse than others because they were plain?

He was carrying a foil, as he had a fencing lesson later on. He put it
in a corner of the room, hoping that it would escape attention. But it