The Life of the Fly 



problems solved by chemistry, yet another ray 

 of sunshine was reserved for me, adding its 

 gladness to that of my success. Let us go 

 back a couple of years. The chief-inspectors 

 visited our grammar-school. These person- 

 ages travel in pairs: one attends to literature, 

 the other to science. When the inspection was 

 over and the books checked, the staff was sum- 

 moned to the principal's drawing-room, to re- 

 ceive the parting admonitions of the two lumi- 

 naries. The man of science began. I should 

 be sadly put to it to remember what he said. 

 It was cold professional prose, made up of 

 soulless words which the hearer forgot once 

 the speaker's back was turned, words merely 

 boring to both. I had heard enough of these 

 chilly sermons in my time; one more of them 

 could not hope to make an impression on me. 

 The inspector in literature spoke next. At 

 the first words which he uttered, I said to my- 

 self: 



'Oho ! This is a very different business !' 

 The speech was alive and vigorous and 

 imageful; indifferent to scholastic common- 

 places, the ideas soared, hovering gently in the 

 serene heights of a kindly philosophy. This 

 time, I listened with pleasure; I even felt 

 stirred. Here was no official homily: it was 

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