does not happen to be; and read _Les Trois Mousquetaires_ in the
cloisters of Bluefriars, or _Ivanhoe_ in the dull, dusty prison-yard
that serves for a playground in so many a French _lycee_!

Without listening, he hears all round him the stodgy language of every
day, and the blatant shouts of his school-fellows, in the voices he
knows so painfully well--those shrill trebles, those cracked barytones
and frog-like early basses! There they go, bleating and croaking and
yelling; Dick, Tom, and Harry, or Jules, Hector, and Alphonse! How
vaguely tiresome and trivial and commonplace they are--those too
familiar sounds; yet what an additional charm they lend to that so
utterly different but equally familiar word-stream that comes silently
flowing into his consciousness through his rapt eyes! The luxurious
sense of mental exclusiveness and self-sequestration is made doubly
complete by the contrast!

And for this strange enchantment to be well and thoroughly felt, both
his languages must be native; not acquired, however perfectly. Every
single word must have its roots deep down in a personal past so remote
for him as to be almost unremembered; the very sound and printed aspect
of each must be rich in childish memories of home; in all the countless,
nameless, priceless associations that make it sweet and fresh and
strong, and racy of the soil.

Oh! Porthos, Athos, and D'Artagnan--how I loved you, and your immortal
squires, Planchet, Grimaud, Mousqueton! How well and wittily you spoke
the language I adored--better even than good Monsieur Lallemand, the
French master at Bluefriars, who could wield the most irregular
subjunctives as if they had been mere feathers--trifles light as air.