"
"Exactly. That's empirical knowledge; but when you explain _causes_, you
give a man a new pleasure. It _clinches_ his knowledge. Then, again,
supposing I were to tell those men something accurate about the movement
of the stars? Don't you think that would be interesting? If I could not
make it like a romance, then all the years I spent in learning were
thrown away."
"Could you get them to care for anything of the kind? Do you know that a
seaman is the most absolutely conservative of the human race?"
"We must begin. You give the men light, and I'll be bound that some of
us will make them like sweetness. If Miss Dearsley were to read
'Rizpah,' or 'Big Tom,' or any other story of pathos or self-sacrifice,
she would do the men good. Why, if I had the chance, I'd bring off my
friend Tom Gale, and let him make them laugh till they cried by reading
about Mr. Peggotty of Great Yarmouth and the lobster; or Mrs. Gummidge
and the drown-ded old-'un."
Mrs. Walton had been very quiet. She turned to the staid and taciturn
Mrs. Hellier and asked, "How do you find your readings suit at your
mission-room?"
"They please the women, and I suppose they would please men. Our people
are quite happy when we have a good reader. I'm a failure, because I
always begin to cry at the critical points; but Lena has no feelings at
all, and she can keep the room hushed for a whole hour."
Mrs. Walton smiled placidly.
"You see, Mr.
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