BUDDENBROOKS
recover his self-control and staring about the room. Then he dropped his head and was himself again.
“Very good,” said the master, when he had finished. “It is clear that you have studied to some purpose. But you sacrifice the rhythm too much, Timm. You seem to understand the elisions; yet you have not been really reading hexameters at all. I have an impression as if you had learned the whole thing by heart, like prose. But, as I say, you have been diligent, you have done your best—and whoever does his best—; you may sit down.”
Timm sat down, proud and beaming, and Dr. Mantelsack gave him a good mark in his book. And the extraordinary thing was that at this moment not only the master, but also Timm himself and all his classmates, sincerely felt that Timm was a good industrious pupil who had fully deserved the mark he got. Hanno Buddenbrook, even, thought the same, though something within him revolted against the thought. He listened with strained attention to the next name.
“Mumme,” said Dr. Mantelsack. “Again: aurea prima—”
Mumme! Well! Thank Heaven! Hanno was now in probable safety. The lines would hardly be asked for a third time, and in the sight-reading the letter B had just been called up.
Mumme got up. He was tall and pale, with trembling hands and extraordinarily large round glasses. He had trouble with his eyes, and was so short-sighted that he could not possibly read standing up from a book on the desk before him. He had to learn, and he had learned. But to-day he had not expected to he called up; he was, besides, painfully ungifted; and he stuck after the first few words. Dr. Mumme helped him, he helped him again in a sharper tone, and for the third time with intense irritation. But when Mumme came to a final stop, the Ordinarius was mastered by indignation.
“This is entirely insufficient, Mumme. Sit down. You
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