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THE next morning Kenelm arrived at Oxford, "Verum secretumque Mouseion."

Then there must be besides a Mouseion, a Temple of the Muses, with all due appliances, in a vast building adjoining the palace itself, under the very wing of royalty; and it must have porticos, wherein sages may converse; lecture-rooms, where they may display themselves at their will to their rapt scholars, each like a turkey-cock before his brood; and a large dining-hall, where they may enjoy themselves in moderation, as befits sages, not without puns and repartees, epigrams, anagrams, and Attic salt, to be fatal, alas, to poor Diodorus the dialectician.

I see you wandering where the Cam steals its way through those noble gardens; and, confusing you with myself, I recall the old dreams that haunted me when the chiming bells swung over the placid waters. Verum secretumque Mouseion, quam multa dictatis, quam multa invenitis! There at that illustrious college, unless the race has indeed degenerated, you will measure yourself with young giants.

In ancient Greece the word "mouseion" meant "the place of the Muses" a grove or a temple and there was such a place on a part of the Acropolis of Athens, the rocky temple-crowned hill around which the city was built. There were other "museums," or seats of the Muses, in ancient Greece; those on the slopes of Mount Helicon and of Mount Olympus were the most famous.

I see you wandering where the Cam steals its way through those noble gardens; and, confusing you with myself, I recall the old dreams that haunted me when the chiming bells swung over the placid waters. Verum secretumque Mouseion, quam multa dictatis, quam multa invenitis! There at that illustrious college, unless the race has indeed degenerated, you will measure yourself with young giants.

THE next morning Kenelm arrived at Oxford, "Verum secretumque Mouseion."