"What?"

The doctor repeated his answer.

"Then do you mean to say he understands Greek?"

"Yes," said the doctor, sadly; "he is, or must have been, a classical
scholar."

The manager took time to digest this, and then asked:

"What was the song?"

"Oh, that was an old song we used to sing at the Dublin University,"
said the doctor.

During his sober days Bogg used to fossick about among the old mullock
heaps, or split palings in the bush, and just managed to keep out of
debt. Strange to say, in spite of his drunken habits, his credit was
as good as that of any man in the town. He was very unsociable, seldom
speaking, whether drunk or sober; but a weary, hard-up sundowner was
always pretty certain to get a meal and a shake-down at Bogg's lonely
but among the mullock heaps. It happened one dark night that a little
push of local larrikins, having nothing better to amuse them, wended
their way through the old mullock heaps in the direction of the lonely
little bark hut, with the object of playing off an elaborately planned
ghost joke on Bogg. Prior to commencing operations, the leader of the
jokers put his eye to a crack in the bark to reconnoitre. He didn't see
much, but what he did see seemed to interest him, for he kept his eye
there till his mates grew impatient. Bogg sat in front of his rough
little table with his elbows on the same, and his hands supporting
his forehead. Before him on the table lay a few articles such as lady
novelists and poets use in their work, and such as bitter cynics often
wear secretly next their bitter, cynical hearts.

There was the usual faded letter, a portrait of a girl, something that
looked like a pressed flower, and, of course, a lock of hair. Presently
Bogg folded his arms over these things, and his face sank lower and
lower, till nothing was visible to the unsuspected watcher except
the drunkard's rough, shaggy hair; rougher and wilder looking in the
uncertain light of the slush-lamp.

The larrikin turned away, and beckoned his comrades to follow him.

"Wot is it?" asked one, when they had gone some distance. The leader
said, "We're a-goin' ter let 'im alone; that's wot it is."

There was some demur at this, and an explanation was demanded; but the
boss bully unbuttoned his coat, and spat on his hands, and said:

"We're a-goin' ter let Bogg alone; that's wot it is."

So they went away and let Bogg alone.

A few days later the following paragraph appeared in the