"Hanky," said Panky, "you must get this fellow to give you lessons."




CHAPTER IV: MY FATHER OVERHEARS MORE OF HANKY AND PANKY'S CONVERSATION


My father, schooled under adversity, knew that it was never well to press
advantage too far. He took the equivalent of five shillings for three
brace, which was somewhat less than the birds would have been worth when
things were as he had known them. Moreover, he consented to take a
shilling's worth of Musical Bank money, which (as he has explained in his
book) has no appreciable value outside these banks. He did this because
he knew that it would be respectable to be seen carrying a little Musical
Bank money, and also because he wished to give some of it to the British
Museum, where he knew that this curious coinage was unrepresented. But
the coins struck him as being much thinner and smaller than he had
remembered them.

It was Panky, not Hanky, who had given him the Musical Bank money. Panky
was the greater humbug of the two, for he would humbug even himself--a
thing, by the way, not very hard to do; and yet he was the less
successful humbug, for he could humbug no one who was worth
humbugging--not for long. Hanky's occasional frankness put people off
their guard. He was the mere common, superficial, perfunctory Professor,
who, being a Professor, would of course profess, but would not lie more
than was in the bond; he was log-rolled and log-rolling, but still, in a
robust wolfish fashion, human.