Page:While the Billy Boils, 1913.djvu/329

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BOGG OF GEEBUNG
297

the common in the shaggy, unkempt head upon which poor Bogg used to 'do his little time,' until a young English doctor came to practise at Geebung. One night the doctor and the manager of the local bank and one or two others wandered into the bar of the Diggers' Arms, where Bogg sat in a dark corner mumbling to himself as usual and spilling half his beer on the table and floor. Presently some drunken utterances reached the doctor's ear, and he turned round in a surprised manner and looked at Bogg. The drunkard continued to mutter for some time, and then broke out into something like the fag-end of a song. The doctor walked over to the table at which Bogg was sitting, and, seating himself on the far corner, regarded the drunkard attentively for some minutes; but the latter's voice ceased, his head fell slowly on his folded arms, and all became silent except the drip, drip of the overturned beer falling from the table to the form and from the form to the floor.

The doctor rose and walked back to his friends with a graver face.

'You seem interested in Bogg,' said the bank manager.

'Yes,' said the doctor.

'What was he mumbling about?'

'Oh, that was a passage from Homer.'

'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.'