“Get up and brush himself.”
One of the young nobles was called up now. I thought I would question him a little myself. I said:
“Can your lordship read?”
His face flushed indignantly, and he fired this at me:
“Takest me for a clerk? I trow I am not of a blood that—”
“Answer the question!”
He crowded his wrath down and made out to answer “No.”
“Can you write?”
He wanted to resent this, too, but I said:
“You will confine yourself to the questions, and make no comments. You are not here to air your blood or your graces, and nothing of the sort will be permitted. Can you write?”
“No.”
“Do you know the multiplication table?”
“I wit not what ye refer to.”
“How much is nine times six?”
“It is a mystery that is hidden from me by reason that the emergency requiring the fathoming of it hath not in my life-days occurred, and so, not having no need to know this thing, I abide barren of the knowledge.”
“If A trade a barrel of onions to B , worth two pence the bushel, in exchange for a sheep worth four pence and a dog worth a penny, and C