My good uncle was exceedingly affected. "Look ye, child," said he, "I
do not believe them. 'Sdeath, not a word; I would repeat to you a good
jest now of Sedley's, 'Gad, I would, but I am really too much moved just
at present. I tell you what, my boy, I tell you what you shall do:
there is a trial coming on at school--eh?--well, the Abbe tells me
Gerald is certain of being first, and you of being last. Now, Morton,
you shall beat your brother, and shame the Jesuit. There; my mind's
spoken; dry your tears, my boy, and I'll tell you the jest Sedley made:
it was in the Mulberry Garden one day--" And the knight told his story.

I dried my tears, pressed my uncle's hand, escaped from him as soon as I
was able, hastened to my room, and surrendered myself to reflection.

When my uncle so good-naturedly proposed that I should conquer Gerald at
the examination, nothing appeared to him more easy; he was pleased to
think I had more talent than my brother, and talent, according to his
creed, was the only master-key to unlock every science. A problem in
Euclid or a phrase in Pindar, a secret in astronomy or a knotty passage
in the Fathers, were all riddles, with the solution of which application
had nothing to do. One's mother-wit was a precious sort of necromancy,
which could pierce every mystery at first sight; and all the gifts of
knowledge, in his opinion, like reading and writing in that of the sage
Dogberry, "came by nature." Alas! I was not under the same pleasurable
delusion; I rather exaggerated than diminished the difficulty of my
task, and thought, at the first glance, that nothing short of a miracle
would enable me to excel my brother. Gerald, a boy of natural talent,
and, as I said before, of great assiduity in the orthodox
studies,--especially favoured too by the instruction of Montreuil,--had
long been esteemed the first scholar of our little world; and though I