CHAPTER XV.
Monsieur Dante--Condemned Musket--Sporting--Sweet Rivulet--The Earl's Home--The Pool--The Sonorous Voice--What dost Thou Read ?--Man of Peace--Zohar and Mishna--Money Changers.
So I studied French and Italian under the tuition of the banished priest, to whose house I went regularly every evening to receive instruction.

I made considerable progress in the acquisition of the two languages.

I found the French by far the most difficult, chiefly on account of the accent, which my master himself possessed in no great purity, being a Norman by birth.

The Italian was my favourite.
"_Vous serez un jour un grand philologue_, _mon cher_," said the old man, on our arriving at the conclusion of Dante's Hell.
"I hope I shall be something better," said I, "before I die, or I shall have lived to little purpose." "That's true, my dear! philologist--one small poor dog.

What would you wish to be ?" "Many things sooner than that; for example, I would rather be like him who wrote this book." "_Quoi_, _Monsieur Dante_?
He was a vagabond, my dear, forced to fly from his country.