s that?« said Mr. Tulliver.
    »O, I don't know: it's definitions, and axioms, and triangles, and things.
It's a book I've got to learn in - there's no sense in it.«
    »Go, go!« said Mr. Tulliver, reprovingly, »you mustn't say so. You must
learn what your master tells you. He knows what it's right for you to learn.«
    »I'll help you now, Tom,« said Maggie, with a little air of patronising
consolation. »I'm come to stay ever so long, if Mrs. Stelling asks me. I've
brought my box and my pinafores, haven't I, father?«
    »You help me, you silly little thing!« said Tom, in such high spirits at
this announcement that he quite enjoyed the idea of confounding Maggie by
showing her a page of Euclid. »I should like to see you doing one of my lessons!
Why, I learn Latin too! Girls never learn such things. They're too silly.«
    »I know what Latin is very well,« said Maggie, confidently. »Latin's a
language. There are Latin words in the Dictionary. There's bonus, a gift.«
    »Now, you're just wrong there, Miss Maggie!« said Tom, secretly astonished.
»You think you're very wise! But bonus means good, as it happens - bonus, bona,
bonum.«
    »Well, that's no reason why it shouldn't mean gift,« said Maggie, stoutly.
»It may mean several things - almost every word does. There's lawn, - it means
the grass-plot, as well as the stuff pocket-handkerchiefs are made of.«
    »Well done, little 'un,« said Mr. Tulliver, laughing, while Tom felt rather
disgusted with Maggie's knowingness, though beyond measure cheerful at the
thought that she was going to stay with him. Her conceit would soon be overawed
by the actual inspection of his books.
    Mrs. Stelling, in her pressing invitation, did not mention a longer time
than a week for Maggie's stay; but Mr. Stelling, who took her between his knees,
and asked her where she stole her dark eyes from, insisted that she must stay a
fortnight. Maggie thought Mr. Stelling was a charming man, and Mr. Tulliver was
quite proud to
