was the cricket-field,
from which the thud of balls struck by the bat, voices, and laughter
resounded in a way to tempt any fellow out of his hole. But there he
stuck with his elbows on the table and his head in his hands, forcing
himself to concentrate his attention upon a book which lay open before
him.

"Because _a divided by b_ equals _c divided by d_," he murmured, "the
first quotients _m m_ are equal. Yes, I see that; again, since _a
divided by b_ equals _m_ plus _x divided by b_, and _c divided by d_
equals _m_ plus _r divided by d_, hum, hum, why, in the name of all
that's blue--oh, yes! I see. But then--oh, a thousand blisters on the
idiot who invented this rot! But I won't be licked."

And he began again and again, sticking to it for another half-hour, when
he suddenly cried out, "I have it! What a double-distilled ass I am!
Of course it is simple enough. If _a divided by b_ equals _c divided by
d_, and _a_ and _b_ be prime to each other, _c_ and _d_ are
equimultiples of _a_ and _b_. Of course they are; how could they be
anything else? The other fellows saw it at once, no doubt. What a lot
of trouble it gives one to be a fool! Now, I'll go and practise
bowling."

Buller was no fool; indeed he would not have thought himself one if he
had been; but he was slow at everything--learning, games,
accomplishments--though he had this compensation, no slight one either,
that when he had once mastered a thing he had got it for ever. His
school-fellows called him a duffer, but it did not vex him in the least,
for he considered it a mere statement of a patent fact, and was no more
offended than if they had said that he had two legs. But he had a
strong belief that perseverance, _sticking_, he called it, could make up
in a great measure for want of natural ability. The fable of the hare
and tortoise had given him great encouragement, and, finding in practice
that he passed boys who had far more brilliant parts than himself, he
never gave way to despair, however hopeless the task before him might
seem.

His ambition--never expressed, however, to anyone--was to get into the
eleven. Had it been known it would have been thought the very height of
absurdity, and have become such a standing joke that its realisation
would have been rendered well nigh impossible. It proved that Buller
had sound sense that he was able to see this. He did not much expect to
succeed, but he meant to try all he knew, ever since