Now, we will work it out." Oswald was intelligent, and anxious to learn.

He had been accustomed, when riding, to notice every irregularity of ground, every rock and bush that might serve as a guide, if lost in a fog, and he very quickly took in the instruction given him; and, by the time the convent bell rung to dinner, he had made a considerable progress with the variations that could be formed with the six letters that he had learned; and the friar expressed himself as highly satisfied with him.
"You have learned as much, in one morning, as many of the boys who attend schools would learn in a month," he said.

"If you go on like this, I will warrant that, if Percy delays his return for two months, you will know as much as many who have been two years at the work.

I have always said that it is a mistake to teach children young; their minds do not take in what you say to them.

You may beat it into them, but they only get it by rote; and painfully, because they don't understand how one thing leads to another, and it is their memory only, and not their minds, that are at work." The next day came news that the Scotch had crossed the border, and there was great excitement in the castle; but it was soon learned that the invasion was not on a great scale, neither the Douglases nor the Earl of March having taken part in it.
"There is no fear of our being attacked, here," Alwyn Forster said to Oswald.