"
One day I said to him, "I don't know why, Damer, but you always make
me think of a vision of one of the Greek heroes when I see you walking
in the playing-fields."
I believe my simply-spoken compliment deeply gratified him; but he
only said, like Mr. Clerke, "You _do_ say the oddest things, little
'un!"
CHAPTER XXIV
COLLECTIONS--LEO'S LETTER--NURSE BUNDLE AND SIR LIONEL
If Nurse Bundle hoped that when I went to school an end would be put
to the "collections" which troubled her tidy mind, she was much
deceived. Neither Leo nor I were bookworms, and we were not by any
means so devoted as some boys to games and athletics. But for
collections of all kinds we had a fancy that almost amounted to mania.
Our natural history manias in their respective directions came upon us
like fevers. We "sickened" at the sight of somebody else's collection,
or because we had been reading about butterflies, or birds' eggs, or
water-plants, as the case might be. When "the complaint" was "at its
height," we lived only for specimens; we gave up leisure, sleep, and
pocket-money to our collection; we made notes and memoranda in our
grammars and lexicons that had no classical reference.
Pages:
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229