Chapter XXVI

"It's Mother!"

Their belief in the Magic was an abiding
thing. After the morning's incantations Colin
sometimes gave them Magic lectures.

"I like to do it," he explained, "because when
I grow up and make great scientific discoveries I
shall be obliged to lecture about them and so this
is practise. I can only give short lectures now because
I am very young, and besides Ben Weatherstaff
would feel as if he was in church and he
would go to sleep."

"Th' best thing about lecturin'," said Ben, "is
that a chap can get up an' say aught he pleases an'
no other chap can answer him back. I wouldn't
be agen' lecturin' a bit mysel' sometimes."

But when Colin held forth under his tree old
Ben fixed devouring eyes on him and kept them
there. He looked him over with critical affection.
It was not so much the lecture which interested
him as the legs which looked straighter and
stronger each day, the boyish head which held itself
up so well, the once sharp chin and hollow

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v?