-what wouldst ha' wi' un, mon?"

"To shoe my horse, good dame," answered Tressiliany; "you may see that
he has thrown a fore-foot shoe."

"Master Holiday!" exclaimed the dame, without returning any direct
answer--"Master Herasmus Holiday, come and speak to mon, and please
you."

"FAVETE LINGUIS," answered a voice from within; "I cannot now come
forth, Gammer Sludge, being in the very sweetest bit of my morning
studies."

"Nay, but, good now, Master Holiday, come ye out, do ye. Here's a mon
would to Wayland Smith, and I care not to show him way to devil; his
horse hath cast shoe."

"QUID MIHI CUM CABALLO?" replied the man of learning from within; "I
think there is but one wise man in the hundred, and they cannot shoe a
horse without him!"

And forth came the honest pedagogue, for such his dress bespoke him. A
long, lean, shambling, stooping figure was surmounted by a head thatched
with lank, black hair somewhat inclining to grey. His features had the
cast of habitual authority, which I suppose Dionysius carried with him
from the throne to the schoolmaster's pulpit, and bequeathed as a legacy
to all of the same profession, A black buckram cassock was gathered at
his middle with a belt, at which hung, instead of knife or weapon, a
goodly leathern pen-and-ink case. His ferula was stuck on the other
side, like Harlequin's wooden sword; and he carried in his hand the
tattered volume which he had been busily perusing.

On seeing a person of Tressilian's appearance, which he was better
able to estimate than the country folks had been, the schoolmaster
unbonneted, and accosted him with, "SALVE, DOMINE. INTELLIGISNE LINGUAM
LATINAM?"

Tressilian mustered his learning to reply, "LINGUAE LATINAE HAUD PENITUS
IGNARUS, VENIA TUA, DOMINE ERUDITISSIME, VERNACULAM LIBENTIUS LOQUOR."

The Latin reply had upon the schoolmaster the effect which the mason's
sign is said to produce on the brethren of the trowel. He was at once
interested in the learned traveller, listened with gravity to his story
of a tired horse and a lost shoe, and then replied with solemnity, "It
may appear a simple thing, most worshipful, to reply to you that there
dwells, within a brief mile of these TUGURIA, the best FABER FERARIUS,
the most accomplished blacksmith, that ever nailed iron upon horse. Now,
were I to say so, I warrant me you would think yourself COMPOS VOTI, or,
as the vulgar have it, a made man."

"I should at least," said Tressilian, "have