r? That may be the mere accident of constitution; and if so, there is
no more merit in being courageous than in being this table."

"I am very glad to hear you speak thus," observed Mr. Caxton, "for I
should not like to consider myself a coward; yet I am very sensible to
fear in all dangers, bodily and moral."

"La, Austin, how can you say so?" cried my mother, firing up; "was it
not only last week that you faced the great bull that was rushing after
Blanche and the children?"

Blanche at that recollection stole to my father's chair, and, hanging
over his shoulder, kissed his forehead.

MR. CAXTON (sublimely unmoved by these flatteries).--"I don't deny that
I faced the bull, but I assert that I was horribly frightened."

ROLAND.--"The sense of honour which conquers fear is the true courage
of chivalry: you could not run away when others were looking on,--no
gentleman could."

MR. CAXTON.--"Fiddledee! It was not on my gentility that I stood,
Captain. I should have run fast enough, if it had done any good. I stood
upon my understanding. As the bull could run faster than I could, the
only chance of escape was to make the brute as frightened as myself."

BLANCHE.--"Ah, you did not think of that; your only thought was to save
me and the children."

MR. CAXTON.--"Possibly, my dear, very possibly, I might have been afraid
for you too; but I was very much afraid for myself. However, luckily I
had the umbrella, and I sprang it up and spread it forth in the animal's
stupid eyes, hurling at him simultaneously the biggest lines I could
think of in the First Chorus of the 'Seven against Thebes.' I began with
ELEDEMNAS PEDIOPLOKTUPOS; and when I came to the grand howl of [A line
in Greek], the beast stood appalled as at the roar of a lion. I shall
never forget his amazed snort at the Greek. Then he kicked up his hind
legs, and went bolt through the gap in the hedge. Thus, armed with
AEschylus and the umbrella, I remained master of the field; but"
(continued Mr. Caxton ingenuously) "I should not like to go through that
half-minute again."

"No man would," said the captain, kindly. "I should be very sorry to
face a bull myself, even with a bigger umbrella than yours, and even
though I had AEschylus, and Homer to boot, at my fingers' ends."

MR. CAXTON.--"You would not have minded if it had been a Frenchman with
a sword in his hand?"

CAPTAIN.--"Of course not. Rather liked it than otherwise," he added
grimly.

MR. CAXTON.