A word so common
as os! and after all these years you make it perispomenon!"

Mr. Simeon stammered contrition. In the matter of Greek accents he
knew himself to be untrustworthy beyond hope. "I can't tell how it
is, sir, but that os always seems to me to want a circumflex, being
an adverb of sorts." On top of this, and to make things worse, he
pleaded that he had left out the accent in os ptochoi, just above.

"H'm--as poor, and yet thankful for small mercies," commented the
Master with gentle sarcasm. He had learnt in his long life to
economise anger. But he frowned as he dipped a pen in the ink-pot
and made the correction; for he was dainty about his manuscripts as
about all the furniture of life, and a blot or an erasure annoyed
him. "Brother Copas," he murmured, "never misplaces an accent."

Mr. Simeon heard, and started. It was incredible that the Master,
who five-and-twenty years ago had rescued Mr. Simeon from a school
for poor choristers and had him specially educated for the sake of
his exquisite handwriting, could be threatening dismissal over a
circumflex. Oh, there was no danger! If long and (until the other
day) faithful service were not sufficient, at least there was
guarantee in the good patron's sense of benefits conferred.
Moreover, Brother Copas was not desirable as an amanuensis. . . .
None the less, poor men with long families will start at the shadow
of a fear; and Mr. Simeon started.

"Master," he said humbly, choosing the title by which his patron
liked to be addressed, "I think Greek accents must come by gift of
the Lord."

"Indeed?"

The Master glanced up.

"I mean, sir"--Mr. Simeon extended a trembling hand and rested his
fingers on the edge of the writing-table for support--"that one man
is born with a feeling for them, so to speak; while another, though
you may teach and teach him--"

"In other words," said the Master, "they come by breeding. It is
very likely."

He resumed his reading:

'--and yet possessing all things. We may fancy St. Paul's
actual words present in the mind of our Second Founder, the
Cardinal Beauchamp, as their spirit assuredly moved him,
when he named our beloved house the College of Noble Poverty.
His predecessor, Alberic de Blanchminster, had called it after
Christ's Poor; and the one title, to be sure, rests implicit in
the other; for the condescension wherewith Christ made choice of
His associates on